Illinois Review

A Pentecostal Lesson for Politics Too

By John F. Di Leo -

The feast of Pentecost is the celebration of one of the most important moments in church history.  It commemorates the day when, after the Resurrection of the Lord, the Holy Spirit gave the Faithful a special ability to speak to crowds of different nationalities in their own languages.

Now, we don’t know exactly what happened that day – whether the Apostles instantly learned other languages, or their audiences instantly learned to hear them in their heads as if they had.  All we know is that the leaders of the Church were suddenly, miraculously, able to reach people, and this was new.   They were used to being the Lord’s followers – He did the speaking, not them – and now they were called upon to take on the role of the preacher themselves, and spread the Word.

There was to be a bit of an ongoing debate in the years to come – should we just preach the Word to the Jews, so that all Jews understand that Christ is “our” Messiah?   Or should we reach out to everyone, the gentiles too?   The way this particular Pentecost miracle worked out – the Apostles being heard and understood not just by Jews, but by everyone within earshot, whatever their ethnicity and religion – helped to settle that debate.  The message was for everyone on earth, and the order was clearly to get to work spreading that message.

The uncommon concerns surrounding Common Core

By Irene Starkehaus - 

The Illinois State Board of Education has begun the process of informing taxpayers of the new federally benchmarked Common Core Standards Initiative that has been adopted by 45 states (including Illinois) and the District of Columbia. Implementation of Common Core by these states came about as a result of the $4.5 billion "Race to the Top" stimulus spending as it was rolled out by Secretary of Education Arne Duncan back in July of 2009. "Race to the Top" is a contest that was created by the Department of Education to allegedly spur creative solutions to education problems at the state and local levels of government.

By accepting funds from the Department of Education, states had to agree to the Common Core standardized testing as a way of determining the effectiveness of "Race to the Top." In addition to stimulus funds, states also received "No Child Left Behind" waivers if they agreed to adopt the Common Core State Standards Initiative.

The Illinois Board of Education offers a webpage which describes the need for the Common Core testing standards that will eventually lead to dictated curriculum models from the Department of Education. The entire point of this stimulus spending was to break the states' monopolies on education by using federal purse strings to bribe states into handing over control of curriculum standards to the Department of Education. The New Illinois Learning Standards page of the Illinois Board of Education explains the Common Core emphasis on standards in this way:

• Fewer and clearer
• Internationally benchmarked
• 21^st century skills
• Evidence based

That's exactly quoting from the website and the ambiguity of the minimalistic "evidence based" may leave you with a touch of vertigo, but if you are wondering what on earth these four bullet points compare to as this information is apparently not worth including on the Board of Education website, then you will be happy to know that you are not alone.

Rauner and Six Degrees of Bill Ayers

By Sam Pierce - 

If your lifestyle isn't one of a certain level of snootiness, you may be familiar with the game, "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon." In this game, one thinks of an actor and then tries, in six or fewer steps, to link him or her to Kevin Bacon. Take Gene Hackman for example:

1. Gene Hackman starred in "Hoosiers" with Dennis Hopper.
2. Dennis Hopper appeared in "Easy Rider" along with Jack Nicholson.
3. Jack Nicholson played the heroic figure (but not by the libtard Hollywood standards) in "A Few Good Men," with Kevin Bacon.

  The same sort of game could be played with Bill Ayers taking the role of Kevin Bacon and Illinois Republicans such as husband of Emily's List donor and aspiring gubernatorial candidate, Bruce Rauner taking the place of the chosen actor.

Did stomping on the name of "Jesus" really hurt anyone?

By Cranky Housewife - 

The Left has coached the American citizenry on the subject of compassion with a tedium that lives at the heart and soul of the social sciences. But contrary to popular opinion, this effort really never has been about cultural diversity. It's about achieving cultural suppression under the guise of policing diversity. From the Left's perspective, the best way to move their cultural agenda forward is by making everything that is and has been philosophically, politically and economically successful seem either trivial or evil. This is achieved best by convoluting honest debate with the most specious arguments available and by viewing any attempt at compromise as a cultural surrender and a signal to advance their agenda forward.

Is there anything more emotionally exhausting than honestly attempting to reason with jesters who argue foolishness as a way of wearing you down? For goodness sake. It's like debating with Roger Rabbit, although to be fair, at least Roger Rabbit genuinely meant no harm. More exhausting than debating farce is the realization that the foolishness is nothing more than a tactic for fatiguing and breaking down one's opponent and when you recognize this you can finally accept that you are, in fact, the opponent. That's all you are and that's all you are ever going to be.

The vaccine debate continues

By The Cranky Housewife -

Let's start this out by reaffirming that I am not a doctor. I am not here to advocate for or against any particular medical decision or medical treatment. I do not know enough about biology or chemistry to advocate for anything other than a good night's sleep and the wellbeing that moderation has been known to produce, but since I have also disregarded both sleep and moderation from time to time, that makes me (at best) a hypocrite so take that particular medical advice with a grain of salt…just a grain, mind you. We wouldn't want to get the hypertension crowd riled.

There is a new study out by the British Medical Journal (BMJ) that links the Pandemrix flu vaccine with a sleep disorder known as narcolepsy – this condition apparently occurs primarily in children and young adults who have received the flu vaccine. Upon further research, the vaccine principally causes problems for people of European descent who are for some reason more genetically prone to narcolepsy in the first place.

O'Brien: Over-rated White People, Feminists' War on Men, and Media Malpractice

By Teri O'Brien - 

In some ways being well-informed in the Age of Obama can be a frustrating curse. The afflicted watch millions of their fellow citizens unable to connect some very obvious dots, a fact that allows the current occupant of the Oval Office to comfortably coast along, blissfully unaccountable for the consequences of his leftwing ideology and the policies that result from it. We are still scratching our heads over Barack Obama’s re-election. How in the world did that happen? At least three reasons spring to mind, and we’ll talk about them today.

On today’s show, we’ll explore that question, and do more of that dot connecting with our guests, David Freddoso and Suzanne Venker.

David is Editorial Page Editor of the Washington Examiner, and he has appeared on the show before to talk about his previous books, The Case Against Barack Obama: The Unlikely Rise and Unexamined Agenda of the Media's Favorite Candidate and Gangster Government: Barack Obama and the New Washington Thugocracy. His latest book, Spin Masters: How the Media Ignored the Real News and Helped Reelect Barack Obama, is loaded with stories that the Lame Stream Media didn’t find worth covering during 2012, when important stories like Big Bird allegedly in peril, Mitt Romney’s dog during a family vacation in the early 1980’s and supposed racist “dog whistles” took precedence over the worst economy since the 1970’s and lies about the murder of four Americans in Libya.

Barack Obama and the Zone of Misguided Promises

By John F. Di Leo - 

On a winter day in 2013, Barack Obama flew home to Chicago and tried to channel Jack Kemp.

As the Democratic Party and the Main Stream Media do his bidding, focusing their coverage on the “gun violence” of America’s cities, Obama attempts to ride this manufactured PR wave with a new political issue as his snowboard, the establishment of Promise Zones.

The idea is to take the worst neighborhoods – the cities most in need of help – and revive them with a public-private partnership of new businesses and more – much more – government assistance. The plan is to use government largesse to drive mini-recoveries in the cities, providing tax credits for new businesses to move in, and more federally funded pre-K schooling, mandated increases in the minimum wage, and focused job training for the jobs he dreams might someday appear in their midst. Surely such a program will save these troubled neighborhoods, right?

Surely these gang recruiters wouldn’t have been successful in attracting children to their gang lifestyle of drugs and luxury cars, gold jewelry and cool clothes, if only the kids had been introduced to “See Spot Run” and “Meet Dick and Jane” at four instead of at five. That year of pre-school simply must make all the difference…

O'Brien: Three Takeaways from The Dear Reader’s “Early Education” Scam

By Teri O'Brien -

For years, I have been telling you that when liberals want to take away our money and our freedom, they protect themselves from criticism with kiddie human shields. Their policies are always “for the children,” and if you oppose their plans, then you must not care about all the innocent, wide-eyed little moppets who will benefit from bigger government and more of your paycheck going into the federal black hole.

During Tuesday evening’s State of the Union liefest, the Dear Reader announced his desire for a new federal intervention in education.

O'Brien: Snoop Dog Was Right. Michelle's Got a Plentiful Posterior

By Teri O'Brien - 

At any given second here on Planet Earth, somewhere a liberal is outraged about something. It’s a law of nature. You could look it up. Well, you could if there were places to look stuff like that up. At this point, you’re going to have to take my word for it, which is great authority, since I know liberals as well as Chris Christie knows the hours and layout of every Krispy Kreme store in New Jersey. Outrage is one of their identifying characteristics, one of the things that tell you what you’re dealing with. It’s like those scary barrel shrouds that tell people like Rep. Carolyn Maloney that she’s looking at an “assault weapon,” or it would if she knew what a “barrel shroud” is.

Are liberals more evolved than conservatives?

By Cranky Housewife - 

Humanity is on the precipice. We are teetering on the verge of our next evolutionary leap.

I've heard various iterations on this theme echoed over and over by liberal elites ever since Barack Obama was inaugurated this last Monday – but nowhere was it better highlighted than by John Kass as he gently chided a caller to his radio show, "Are you saying to me that the more liberal a person becomes, the more evolved he becomes?"

Gun control – there’s a bad mood on the rise

By Cranky Housewife -

Yes, may CCR forgive my malapropism. Frankly, I certainly would prefer to be wrong about our little doe-see-doe to gun control, but when all is said and done and if the Left is able to play their hand well, I suspect that even the Second Amendment advocates will find themselves wondering if gun rights are worth the fight.

We're back to that old "it's for the children" theme that I keep harping on and you all know how I can't stand the banality of it, but the children are exactly the individuals who are most vulnerable this the gun control debate – not because guns are evil or wrong but because there are enough short sighted fools in the world who are willing to take on the necessary roles of ghastly provocateurs in this progressive farce and all for their five minutes of disgraceful fame. This willingness of egoists to act badly as has been prescribed by liberals puts the whole of society at the brink of chaos and even though anarchy may be an everyday occurrence under the slipshod and corrupting rule of the Chicago Machine, mobocracy is maybe a little less popular in the suburbs, ex-burbs and rural areas of Illinois. That dislike of chaos is exactly why progressives intend to stage their most effective battles outside of urban areas. The suburbs and rural communities are where the Left intends to fight this War on the Second Amendment.

Head Start: When the Government Fails Completely

What happens when a government program simply does not do what it is supposed to do?

Head Start, the federal preschool program, says it "promotes the school readiness of children ages birth to 5 from low-income families by enhancing their cognitive, social and emotional development." But the government’s own evaluations have shown that it just does not do this.

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) released its latest findings of a long study that followed Head Start kids all the way to third grade.

The findings: "by third grade, the $8 billion Head Start program had little to no impact on cognitive, social-emotional, health, or parenting practices of participants. On a few measures, access to Head Start had harmful effects on children."

Five Mainstream Republican Resolutions for 2013

By John F. Di Leo -

Time once again for a list of New Year’s Resolutions for the Republican Party. The party leaders haven’t taken my advice these past few years, so there’s no reason to believe they shall this year, but who knows? Perhaps if things get too dire, they’ll start looking to bloggers for solutions to the problems that their top consultants haven’t been able to solve. One can but hope.

1.  Learn the Meaning of Compromise

This isn’t entirely fair, but it’s still a good place to begin. Republicans are notorious for conceding defeat before negotiations begin.

Let’s say for example that the Republicans know that a 30% tax rate cut would be the best thing to spur the economy, create jobs, and restore upward mobility to all demographics. But the Democrats are still clamoring for a 30% tax increase because they’ve drunk so much Keynesian kool-aid that their veins run purple with the stuff.

Pave Reagan’s house...put up a parking lot

By Cranky Housewife - 

Don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got till it's gone? The American Spectator and the Washington Examiner reported this week that the University of Chicago's Medical Center intends to bulldoze the childhood home of Ronald Reagan by the end of 2012 so that it can put up a parking lot…I only wish that I had the kind of creative genius necessary to make this kind of stuff up but it turns out that (at least in this particular case) the truth is stranger than Joni Mitchell – or at least that's my opinion.

Reagan's Chicago home, Photograph by Marathon Pundit

Welfare spending up 32%, reaches all-time high of $1.03 trillion

WASHINGTON DC - Despite the Obama Administration's costly job stimulus plans, over the past four years, welfare spending jumped 32%, the Congressional Research Service reported Thursday.  Federal spending on more than 80 low-income assistance programs reached $746 billion in 2011, and state spending on those programs brought the total to $1.03 trillion.

The biggest federal welfare expense was Medicaid, which rose from $82 billion in 2008 to $296 billion in 2011. The next biggest item was food stamps, which hit an historical high of $75 billion in 2011, nearly doubling since 2008.

More at Washington Times

Viola Davis "Won't Back Down" - and neither should CPS parents

CHICAGO - Friday, Moody's downgraded the Chicago Public School system's credit ratings because they were unable to fight back the suffocating debt the Chicago Teachers Union strike negotiations thrust upon them. A lower credit rating means every borrowed dollar will cost more to repay, and that means taxpayers not only in Chicago, but state- and nation-wide will be forced to pay more.  And for what? A system in which only 60 percent of the students complete a minimal high school diploma.

A controversial new release bolstering students and parents is hitting theatres this weekend. Teachers' unions are blasting it, no surprise. If only this movie had come out in Chicago three weeks ago.

But one of the stars of "Won't Back Down," Viola Davis defended her participation in the movie and her involvement in promoting school choice with this comment to Jay Leno -

I am a parent. And as a parent, I have a child and I know that the only way she's going to get a part of the American Dream is through education. And so if that great education is a public school, I'm going to send my kid to the public school. If that great education is a charter school, I'm going to send my kid to a charter school. If it's a private school, I'll send her to a private school. I think that it's about wanting do what's best for your kid.

Six reasons it's tougher to "move on up" these days

Heritage Foundation -

Occupy Wall Street's pathetic first birthday last week confirmed that the longstanding reports of the movement's death have not, in fact, been exaggerated. So why are we keeping it alive by talking incessantly about income inequality instead of focusing on what really matters -- opportunity and upward mobility?

...Rather than focus on those at the top of the ladder we should be concerned about the hurdles that threaten those struggling to achieve the American Dream. “Defending the Dream” draws attention to six factors that most threaten upward mobility:

1. Statism: The modern administrative state entangles businesses in a suffocating web of regulations and laws. All of this red tape takes a toll on the economy, which in turn leads to fewer jobs being created. And fewer jobs means fewer opportunities for those most in need of jobs.
2. The Collapse of the Family: The decline of marriage, especially among the poor, has devastating, long-lasting consequences on children and their prospects for success. When it comes to the American Dream, the family is not a tangential social or religious issue; it is a crucial economic one that is deeply intertwined with mobility.

A meditation on the Chicago Way

By Paul Kersey, Illinois Policy Institute - 

A few parting observations, lessons to be learned, and things to watch in the future:

American victimhood - is Romney right or wrong?

By The Cranky Housewife -

It's rather an interesting philosophical impasse that we're experiencing if you think about it. I'm kind of hoping that the Democrats keep hammering away at their most recent Mother Jones class warfare gotcha story because it may actually serve the nation well to have an open discussion about the growing problem of dependency in this country.

Here we have Mitt Romney in a video talking about 47% of the population not wanting tax cuts because they find themselves financially dependent on government in one way or another.

He laments that a large portion of Americans won't even consider the idea of not voting for Barack Obama because Obama gives or at least makes a show of "giving" (because you can't give what never belonged to you) money that was confiscated from the taxpayers and then redistributed in the name of the US Government. In turn, those recipients remain emotionally disconnected from the true patrons of these social programs and the mounting debt that the taxpayers face.

Chicago Teachers Union members say they're souring on Obama

CHICAGO - Barack Obama's silence on the Chicago Teachers' Union strike frustrated teachers picketing in Chicago over the weekend. "His education policy sucks," one teacher said in EagNews.org's interview, saying his lack of attention could cost Obama votes in major swing states: