Who’s more out-of-touch?

It was earlier this week that we learned of a federal judge in Texas who issued an order that prevented a Texas state effort to prevent municipalities from declaring themselves to be sanctuary cities with regards to immigration policy.

Also earlier this week was the initiative signed into law by Gov. Bruce Rauner that declared all of Illinois to be something similar to a sanctuary place – one in which local police are prevented from harassing people because of suspicions about immigration law violations.

SO WHAT’S THE latest action? It seems we have six members of the Illinois General Assembly – all Republican and from communities of a less-urban composition – who are coming up with bills determined to repeal the Trust Act.

That was the measure that Rauner used to take his immigration-related action, and was one that received overwhelming support from the General Assembly.

So it may be very likely that these half-dozen legislators aren’t acting with serious hopes of actually getting anything undone. They just want to be sure they’re on the record as being on the side of the crackpots who want to view immigration law as an excuse to harass those who aren’t exactly like themselves.

Now for those who are saying to themselves, “That’s overly harsh!” or are thinking other obscene thoughts about me right now, I’m not apologetic.

“CRACKPOTS” IS ABOUT the nicest term I can use to describe these people, who clearly are putting themselves on the wrong side of the issue – just like all the people of a half-century or so ago who were determined to believe that the concept of segregation somehow had a place within our society.

Maybe some people just feel the need to create someone else to look down upon themselves, because otherwise they’d have to look at themselves and realize how little they contribute to our society?

My own viewpoint on the whole immigration issue and sanctuary cities, welcoming cities or whatever label you put on it is that it makes sense that local police enforce local law and federal immigration officials enforce the U.S. immigration policies.

GARCIA: Struck down Texas efforts

Seriously, I wouldn’t expect local cops to comprehend the nuances of immigration policy. I don’t think they should be expected to do something that is beyond their jurisdiction.

THE KIND OF people who would want local cops to get themselves involved in something that is beyond their scope are the kind who view police as the official thugs of municipal government – harassing those whom they object to.

Which most definitely is NOT what any responsible person should expect from their police. Or what any responsible law enforcement officer should have any desire to do.

Much of the cheap political rhetoric coming from the White House in this Age of Trump about sanctuary cities and wanting to revoke federal funding from those municipalities is truly pathetic. Only the most pathetic of pols are trying to side themselves up with it.

Because it’s pretty much a safe thing that those people some 50 years from now are going to come off looking absurd, if not downright ignorant.

WHICH IS WHY U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia issued the order on Wednesday that prevented Texas from enforcing its initiative to make sanctuary cities such as the now-completely-flooded-over Houston a prohibited concept.

CURIEL: Judge who infuriated Trump

I’m sure the crackpots are going to be spewing nonsense about Garcia similar to how Trump himself tried attacking federal Judge Gonzalo Curiel (an East Chicago, Ind., native) of California because of his rulings in that court case that ultimately found the concept of Trump University to be less-than-legitimate.

But that’s what too much of the immigration opposition rhetoric comes down to – trash talk that no one of intelligence can possibly take seriously.

And the day will come when state Reps. John Cabello of Rockford, David McSweeney of Barrington, C.J. Davidsmeyer of Jacksonville and David Reis of Olney, along with state Sens. Kyle McCarter of Lebanon and Tim Bivins of Dixon (as a former county sheriff, he in particular should know better) will regret how ridiculous they looked this week.

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Pols seeing Houston as a blessing – Harvey detracts from their problems

President Donald J. Trump is scheduled to be in Houston on Tuesday, getting a first-hand glance at the devastation caused by Hurricane Harvey and the severe floods it brought to parts of Texas.
 

Sun-Times more interested in '19 mayor's race

I suspect that if he could any reason to justify his presence, Gov. Bruce Rauner would eagerly catch a flight for the Lone Star State so that he could express his concerns, while also detracting attention from the many messes that exist in Illinois.

AT LEAST THAT’S how I interpreted the verbose statement that Rauner issued on Monday expressing his concern for the people whose lives have been disrupted by the severe flooding that will take years to recover from – and which some may never do so.

Rauner made a point of saying he’s praying for those who suffered from Hurricane Harvey and how the Illinois Emergency Management Agency is prepared to assist other entities in providing relief to Texans.

Of course, I’ve read news reports indicating that relief could come from some 37 different states, and may well wind up including the entirety of the nation.

So for what Rauner needed 158 words to say was a message I could have summarized in three – “We care too.” Or perhaps “Don’t forget me.”

Heart of the disaster

IT’S ALMOST AS though if there was a political god, he would have caused this disaster so as to give political people a chance to have a distraction from the issues that otherwise would make them look foolish.

For Rauner, I’m sure he’d rather talk about what Illinois could do to help Texans in their time of need, rather than the two issues that wound up dominating his share of the news cycle on Monday – signing into law the Trust Act and also the creation of an automatic voter registration program.

Trump-ite perspective?

Both of which are issues that will gain Rauner some praise from urban interests, but will be perceived by the rural Illinois voters whom Rauner thus far has been banking his re-election chances on as him selling them out.

Too many of them are interested in having a governor who will deliberately harm urban and Chicago interests. Particularly since many of them are going to want to believe that making it easier to be registered to vote is bad because you don’t want too many urban voters to be able to vote.

IN SHORT, RAUNER is going to have to cope with many political headaches and there will be speculation over to what degree Rauner’s followers will want to dump on him for what he did on Monday.

Easier for the governor to talk about how he gave Illinois Emergency Management Agency Director James Joseph the order to personally contact Texas officials and let them know we in Illinois care.

Much more pleasant than having to take abuse over immigration policy and wonder if the governor is “selling out” to foreigners – which is the way that conservative ideologues will want to perceive the issue.

How quickly will feds react to Harvey?

It may also be a similar situation for Trump – who has some people believing the reason he issued his pardon for former Maricopa Ariz. Sheriff Joe Arpaio late Friday was because that was when Hurricane Harvey was headed ashore, doing its devastation to Corpus Cristi, Texas, before moving on to Houston.

WHO, IN TRUMP’S mindset, would possibly care about Arpaio when there was a vicious hurricane striking?

Of course, the fact that Trump could focus attention on Arpaio at a time of the first significant natural disaster of his presidency has many people wondering how depraved he could be to do something so repulsive to many at a time when people were about to suffer.

Which is why Trump feels the need to be in Texas on Tuesday. He’s going to want to appear to be presidential. Or as presidential as he is capable of being – which might not be very much.

“The impacts of this disaster will be long-lasting. (We’re) committed to assisting Texas and other states in the Gulf region through the response and recovery process.” A canned quote from Rauner, but one where Trump is very likely to say the same thing later Tuesday.

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A race ‘war’ by the cops? Or nonsense to attract attention to broadcaster?

WALSH: From back in his Congress days

Remember Joe Walsh? You ‘member.

He’s not the guitar player from the Eagles; he’s the guy whom the people of the northwest suburbs of Chicago got stuck with as their representation in Congress.

THE GUY WHO managed to get himself elected by Tea Party-type goofs in 2010 – only to be dumped two years later when Barack Obama’s re-election bid created momentum for his opponent?

Since then, Walsh has sort of been able to keep up his persona as a public person by hosting a radio talk show that would allow him to spout out whatever nonsense he could get people to listen to.

But it seems that Walsh is always in need of more attention – perhaps he doesn’t gain enough listeners to attract advertisers who’d make his programs actually worth paying attention to.

In that context, Walsh’s behavior this week makes sense. He’s talking trash because he needs the attention. He certainly isn’t making any sense.

WALSH, WHO LIKES to think he speaks on behalf of those conservative ideologues who can’t stand that anybody pays attention to anyone who isn’t exactly like them, took up the issue of the shootings Thursday night in Dallas – the one that seems to have resulted in the deaths of five city police officers.

Now is it bad that he’s decided to take up the cause of the cops? Not particularly.

 

OBAMA: Didn't praise police enough to appease Walsh

Although it is his choice of rhetoric he used while posting his thoughts on Twitter (whose outrageous-ness have since caused them to be removed) that make us wonder how desperate Walsh must be these days to gain attention for himself.

“This is now war. Watch out Obama,” wrote Walsh, in implying that the president’s comments of support for the Dallas police weren’t supportive enough.

“WATCH OUT BLACK lives matters punks. Real America is coming after you,” he wrote.

For it seems that Walsh is one of those people who thinks all the incidents of recent years where police committed racially-inspired violence against black people was somehow justified.

 

Would Walsh have found this image subversive

But one act where a law enforcement type wound up getting hurt – that was the moment of outrage. The one that will justify turning the police loose to defend themselves against the barbarians who threaten to overrun our society unless we deal with them first.

Just writing that rant gave me a headache. It is so nonsensical. And from the perspective of those people inclined to want to think of war, it is one that was declared many generations ago by law enforcement itself. When it behaves in ways that make us think they view themselves as our government’s thugs; the muscle it uses to keep people in line.

WALSH’S RANT MAKES me think he’s just the descendant of those kind of people whom some 50 years ago would have been complaining about the racist Black Panther Party types who talked of the need for black people to defend themselves against law enforcement types who occasionally turned out to be Klan members or other white supremacists hiding behind the shields of the badges they wore.

If one thinks about what it is that Walsh is saying, they’d have to realize he’s speaking on behalf of the people who ARE the problem – particularly if they think the solution somehow entails themselves “coming after” the people they disagree with.

Which is why it makes more sense to think of this rant as nothing more than a cheap stunt meant to gain some attention to the aspiring radio host who perhaps hopes his thoughts will attract more listeners.

Although to tell you the truth, I think I have more respect for broadcasters like Mancow Muller or Howard Stern and the nonsensical stunts they have engaged in throughout the years to gain listener attention.

PARTICULARLY THE TIME when Muller tried to claim that “waterboarding” as a form of torture wasn’t really so bad. It kind of makes me wish we could do something similar to Walsh.

Although I suspect the biggest harm we could do to him would be to simply ignore his broadcasts altogether.

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Some people determined to move us all backward; it's the only way they gain

We used to regard certain individuals in our society as being worth only three-fifths of a person. We used to think it natural that certain-gendered people didn’t have full citizenship – including the right to register to cast ballots in elections.

But we have moved forward in ways meant to include as many people as possible in our society. Which is a concept that offends some ideologically-minded people who want everybody who isn’t exactly like them to be excluded.

Will the high court take us back in time?

NOW THEY’RE TURNING to the Supreme Court of the United States, which this week said it would hear a case later this year that seeks to alter the way that determines the number of people included in political districts.

Currently, we undergo the redistricting process every decade, when local government officials take into consideration changes in population – then redraw political boundaries to try to make districts as equal in population as is possible.

Of course, the fact that political people are involved means a sense of self-interest gets worked into the process. Illinois has Democratic Party-leaning government because da Dems ruled in 2011 – and still have huge influence now, as Gov. Bruce Rauner is learning first-hand.

Just as a place like Texas had its boundaries drawn to maintain as much political influence as possible in the old white establishment of the state because Republicans dominate the state.

THERE PROBABLY IS no perfect way to draw boundaries – not even for those people who have fantasies about computers drawing arbitrary and neutral boundaries that ignore partisan political considerations. I’d wonder about the political leanings of the people programming the computers.

The nation’s high court is going to be asked to consider another means – the Austin, Texas-based Project on Fair Representation (which is most certainly unfair) wants only people registered to vote to be counted.

Which in a nation whose population is growing due to immigration means many people with a fully-legitimate reason to be here means there would be significant numbers of people who wouldn’t be counted.

That would wind up altering the composition of our government officials, reducing the numbers of non-Anglo officials in places like Texas and California – which is the very point that these people are pushing for, and which they’re hoping the Supreme Court will uphold sometime early next year.

I’LL BE HONEST – I could almost understand giving non-registered (to vote) people less say, but only if it were those native-born people who voluntarily choose not to cast votes. Except those aren’t the people being targeted by such an initiative!

Besides, the fact is that all people living here are covered by this nation’s laws. We’re all expected to follow them. We can’t be exempted from them by the fact that we don’t bother to vote, or that we’re not yet a U.S. citizen.

Nor should we be.

Which means we all ought to have some sense that our views are being represented in this government. Unless we really are determined to head backwards to the days when women couldn’t vote. Or when those of African origins were considered less than a full human being for census purposes.

NOBODY WOULD SERIOUSLY try to undo those changes in our society. At least not so bluntly. Although I wonder how much of an impact this particular measure would have on such people.

Also, I can’t help but think that this measure would merely slow down political progress. Because many of those non-citizen residents will eventually become U.S. citizens and take part in the electoral process – unless the ideologues plan to follow this up with measures restricting voting only to those who will cast ballots for their preferred candidates!

I believe that we as a society are better off taking measures that try to include more individuals. This particular measure is one headed in the absolute wrong direction – and one that the Supreme Court ought to reject out-of-hand.

But the court didn’t do that. They decided to hear the case, some time during the autumn months. Which means there’s always the chance that the ideologues of our high court will manage to get a majority ruling in their favor.

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Maybe we can fight over pies?

I can envision already the fight that’s going to occur next spring. There’s bound to be someone who gets all worked up over the state’s financial problems being ignored because our state legislators are quarrelling over the merits of pumpkin pie.

 

The dessert that’s supposed to be a part of every Thanksgiving Day meal (to the point where I wonder if anyone really eats it any other time of the year?) is going to be the focus of a bill now pending in the Illinois House of Representatives.

 

STATE REP. KEITH Sommer, R-Morton, says the bulk of canned pumpkin used to make many pies in this nation is produced in central Illinois. Hence, he wants the designation of the pumpkin pie as the Official State Pie of Illinois.

 

He told the Associated Press that it will promote the business interest of the Nestle plant in his legislative district, and is universal enough that the whole state ought to take pride in this fact!

 

Personally, I always thought some people took such designations too seriously. I don’t see that it makes much difference on any level that popcorn is the Official State Snack of Illinois.

 

Although discussing the merits of popcorn or pumpkins is bound to be easier than trying to figure out the intricacies of how the state needs to fund the pension programs in a way that won’t drive Illinois both bankrupt and financially destitute.

 

FOR WHAT IT’S worth, only one other state has an Official State Pie – Florida, which takes claim to giving us key lime pie.

 

But Maine has as its Official State Dessert blueberry pie, provided it is made with wild Maine blueberries – which happen to be the Official State Fruit. While Massachusetts has the Boston Cream pie as its Official State Dessert, while Vermont has apple pie and both Texas and Oklahoma claim pecan pie.

 

Is that the focus of the next interstate brawl?

 

For the record, Utah’s Official State Snack is Jell-O, but that’s a topic for another day’s commentary.

 

ALL THE TIME and effort that went into making such designations – couldn’t it have been used more productively? Then again, political people will always go for the trivial if it gives them potential to pontificate on a subject without putting anyone at risk.

 

I remember a couple of decades ago an actual political brawl at the Illinois Statehouse when a Springfield-based legislator tried to give recognition to chili (which is the Official State Dish of Texas). Only she used a local quirk in spelling it “chilli” (remember Dan Quayle’s “potatoe”?), which provoked a debate intense enough that you’d have thought life on Planet Earth as we know it was about to end.

 

But back to the pumpkin pie, which I have noticed seems to have an overrated rep when it comes to its edibility.

 

Personally, I don’t mind it. I’ll have an occasional piece (if I ate other fattening foods as infrequently as I do the pumpkin pie, I probably wouldn’t have the gut I have developed throughout the years).

 

ALTHOUGH I HAVE seen Thanksgiving celebrations where people acknowledge the presence of the pumpkin pie, then refuse to eat any of it. Too much of it gets thrown away uneaten.

 

Is that really what we want to honor?

 

I also stumbled across a story published last month by the Slate.com website that picked a dessert for each state, and said that Illinois’ state dessert, so to speak, is brownies – which originally were created for the World’s Fair in Chicago in 1893.

 

Although I can think of another potential brawl over an Official State Pie for Illinois. Let’s not forget that pizza is technically a “pie.” It might not be dessert, but we’d probably be better off if we laid back on the sweet stuff.

 

THERE CAN BE no more filling of a meal than a slice of stuffed pizza, particularly if you have a decent salad to go along with it.

 

Perhaps that’s the direction our officials ought to focus on in terms of making designations about what we eat.

 

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Illinois vs. Texas – Maybe we should send fake leg to Mexico, instead! But would they refuse its return?

I don’t get the concept of military “trophies,” as in soldiers in combat taking on morbid items so as show how interesting their experiences were.

The 'leg' that has officials ...

I still remember the site a few years ago of photographs taken of U.S. soldiers who captured the palace where Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein had lived. Some went so far as to pose for pictures on Saddam’s bed, while holding their weapons and clothed in full combat garb.

MOMENTS LIKE THIS crop up in every military conflict. There are many so-called trophies in existence.

And one of those trophies is now the focus of a spat between interests in Texas and in downstate Springfield – one that has been written up in the Dallas Morning News and Chicago Tribune, along with dispatches by the Associated Press.

It’s Santa Anna’s leg. As in General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna.

The Mexican army general who crushed a dinky band of Texas rebels at the Alamo in 1836, but then allowed himself to personally get captured by their allies just two weeks later, later in life lost a leg in combat.

IT WAS IN line with Santa Anna’s ego that he had the crushed (and dead) remains of his leg buried with full military honors. And got it replaced with a wooden prosthetic.

Which, during the Mexican/American War of 1845-47, he managed to lose. The prosthetic device was found by U.S. soldiers from Illinois, who brought it back home with them.

... in Springfield quarreling ...

For many years, one of those soldiers had the leg on display in his home in downstate Pekin. Then it moved along to the Illinois State Military Museum in Springfield.

Operated by the Illinois National Guard as a way of promoting the military accomplishments of soldiers from Illinois in various military conflicts throughout the years, the leg is considered one of the museum’s key artifacts.

MY OWN MEMORY of the museum from when I lived in Springfield for a seven-year stretch was that it was a small building that was easy to miss unless you knew exactly what you were looking for. And that leg is really about the only artifact they have that was even the least bit intriguing.

... w/ counterparts in San Jacinto.

In short, I don’t think it’s that big a deal.

But I seem to be alone on this point. For the San Jacinto Museum of History (the Texas town near which Santa Anna was captured and Texians were able to pressure him to grant independence from Mexico to the Lone Star State) is making a big deal out of wanting to borrow the leg.

They want to put it on display to further enhance the idea that they still have a piece of Santa Anna. But Illinois museum officials are acting like the petulant six-year-old who never learned how to share.

TEXANS EVEN WENT so far as to use that convoluted Internet petition process the White House created by which they can force the president to issue a response on the issue.

We have a situation that truly is a silly fight between the states – Lincoln vs. Lone Star. Personally, I’m not sure who’s being more ridiculous. As much as I’d like to defend my home state, I don’t think I can.

A part of me thinks that if anyone ought to have possession of the leg, it ought to be someone with Mexico’s interests. Send it back home!
 

What would general think of fake leg?

Except that within Mexican history, Santa Anna’s record isn’t all that clear. He had some positive moments during terms he served as Mexico’s president.

BUT HE ALSO is regarded as the inept buffoon who allowed himself to get captured and thereby lost Texas as a Mexican state, and who later was responsible at least in part for Mexico’s inability to defend itself from U.S. invaders (remember the first line of the “Marine Corps Hymn?”) in the Mexican-American War.

He spent various parts of his life living in exile in Jamaica, Colombia, Cuba and even Staten Island in the United States, and was tried for treason by Mexico in absentia.

Send the leg back to Mexico? It probably would get refused and stamped “Return to Sender. Address Unknown."

This is one war relic that probably best would have been lost decades ago, to be eaten by termites.

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Leaving Illinois? It’s Keats’ loss

KEATS: No longer one of us

I don’t doubt the sincerity of Roger Keats, who says he has sold his long-time North Shore home and has plans to move to Texas because he doesn’t like the direction he thinks Illinois is headed.

But I’m also not swayed by the argument made by the long-time state legislator who tried last year to make a comeback to electoral politics – becoming the Republican who ran a token campaign for Cook County Board president against Democrat Toni Preckwinkle.

KEATS, WHO SERVED 16 years in the Illinois Senate, sent out a letter to his friends and political allies that amounts to one last pot-shot at the Democratic political establishment before he leaves. It was meant to stir up the anger of Illinois’ conservative ideologues.

One of those ideologues in turn distributed that letter via e-mail to various other people to spread the word – including one such e-mail sent to this weblog.

As Keats wrote, “the leaders of Illinois refuse to see we can’t continue going in the direction we are and expect people who have options to stay here,” referring to increases in the state income tax and the bond rating of state government – which isn’t so hot these days.

He also came up with a convoluted bit of logic that tries to make it seem as though Illinois is withering away into irrelevance – instead of acknowledging the continued growth of the Chicago metropolitan area.

“I REMEMBER WHEN Illinois had 25 congressmen. In 2012, we will have 18,” Keats wrote. “Compared to the rest of the country, we have lost 1/4^th of our population.”

Actually, Illinois these days with its 12.83 million people is at an all-time high. It is the quirk of the way congressmen are distributed among the states that causes the smaller states whose population growths account for large percentages actually get the additions to their representation.

When Illinois has 25 members of the House of Representatives back in the 1950s, its population was only 8.71 million. So instead of losing 1/4^th of our population, we’ve actually gained 50 percent since those days.

My point being that his point misses the point.

BUT THEN AGAIN, it doesn’t surprise me to learn that Keats would be feisty in his rhetoric. He was still a state senator from the North Shore suburbs back when I was a beginning reporter-type person, and I still remember one time I interviewed him by telephone (I was with the now-defunct City News Bureau of Chicago back then) when he turned our interview into a lecture about the “realities” of partisan politics.

I remember he got disgusted with a question I asked that implied Senate Republican leader James “Pate” Philip was inclined to use his influence to pressure the Republican caucus into taking a certain stance on an issue (which escapes my memory).

He proceeded to tell me that the Republican caucus of the state Senate back then (early 1990s) was a group of naturally conservative officials who agreed on issues, and that it was THEY who would wind up telling Pate Philip what it was the caucus could do.

He then went on a diatribe against the leadership skills of Philip, whom I specifically remember used the word “baboon” to describe the long-time senator from DuPage.

IT WAS A moment I didn’t write up back then, but it was one I remembered repeatedly throughout the years as Philip and the state Senate used strong-arm tactics to try to keep Democrats and their urban interest in its place.

Any man willing to risk being quoted using such derogatory terms toward his legislative leader is someone who is more than willing to engage in outrageous talk at a moment’s notice. Which means I’m not the least bit surprised he would write a “drop dead” letter to Illinois now that it is blatantly apparent that the Democratic Party’s officials have gained a stronghold over the state’s government operations.

In short, it has taken the exact opposite direction from the days when Keats was relevant politically and the state government was supposedly the mechanism that tried to keep the city under control.

As Keats put it, “we live in the most corrupt big city, in the most corrupt big county in the most corrupt state in America.” That statement strikes me as rhetorical nonsense, perhaps even more outrageous than his personal thoughts about Pate Philip personally.

I CAN’T HELP but wonder what he will make of the political culture that exists in Austin. It’s not like the Texas Legislature has a history of good government ideals. Or will he be willing to forgive such behavior, provided that it is being done by people who share the same “R” after their names that he used to have.

I also wonder what Keats is going to think of Texas, which is experiencing population growth big enough to gain two more members of Congress primarily because of a significant Latino population that threatens to overturn the Republican establishment that currently controls that state’s government. The Lone Star State’s GOP status quo isn’t going to last forever.

Will he someday see a changed situation there, and will be writing a letter to the Texas political establishment, telling them how their state has declined and how he’s leaving? Where will he go? Eventually, he’s going to run out of places to live.

Then, maybe he’ll want to come back to Illinois, which in its variety offers a unique lifestyle that ought to appeal to everyone. That even includes our weather. He’s going to learn how hot Texas can be in summertime, particularly for someone who writes, “I love four seasons.”

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