Chicago's new mayor Lori Lightfoot|Chicago Reader photo
CHICAGO - Chicago will welcome its first black, female and openly-gay mayor into office Monday.
Lori Lightfoot and her wife Amy Ashleman will welcome visitors to Lightfoot new office Monday afternoon - a furniture move that will have been provided by an all-women moving crew, Lightfoot's office said.
SPRINGFIELD - The Illinois Trial lawyers won another victory last week when Governor Pritzker signed into law a bill that expands the state's workers' compensation program - making an already-dreaded liability monster even bigger and more powerful. Pritzker signed SB 1596, lengthening the time for which Illinois employers will be responsible for employees' medical conditions connected with toxic substance exposure.
The new law lifts the 25-year statute of limitation on claims for people diagnosed with latent diseases after exposure to toxic substances (such as asbestos, radiation, beryllium) in the workplace. And that's a good thing, the Illinois Trial Lawyers Association says.
Minimum wage laws hurt minorities. Bill Wirtz writes:
Prior to the Fair Labors Standards Act (FLSA), which instituted the first federal minimum wage of 25 cents per hour, the black-white unemployment gap did not exceed 1 percent. Today, the black unemployment rate is twice that of whites. Raising [the minimum wage], as is suggested by multiple Democratic presidential candidates, would only accelerate this phenomenon.
Continue reading "3 Groups of People Disproportionately Harmed by Minimum Wage Laws" »
By Andrew Klavan -
Every war is two wars, a war of ideas and a war for terrain. The war of ideas is won by argument and demonstrations of good will. The war for terrain is won by brute force.
Democracy is not supposed to be a war. It’s supposed to be all ideas all the time. You make your case. I make mine. Maybe we find compromises. The voters decide.
But for the past I-don’t-know-how-many years, one side, the left, has also been fighting a war for terrain. We on the right have been deploying our ideas, trusting in our institutions and assenting to the process. But they on the left have been using pure, brute force in an attempt to take over the intellectual terrain on which ideas are discussed.
Universities, the news media, entertainment outlets, social media — all have fallen to the pressure, blacklisting, and occasional violence of the Left. Rioters and hecklers keep conservatives off campus. The news and entertainment media blacklist conservatives, and small numbers of “boycotters” puff themselves up like adders and scare off conservative sponsors. People are fired — lose the means to support themselves and their families — for such crimes as believing that there are two genders or supporting Donald Trump. ....
.... This is what Donald Trump understands that too many conservative intellectuals miss. The belligerent and obstreperous Trump was called to the presidency by voters who know that, while the war of ideas can and should be waged politely by American friends, a war for terrain is a much uglier business.
More HERE
Judicial Watch announced today that it obtained 44 pages of records from the State Department through court-ordered discovery revealing that the Obama White House was tracking a December 2012 Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request seeking records concerning then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s use of an unsecure, non-government email system. Months after the Obama White House involvement, the State Department responded to the requestor, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), falsely stating that no such records existed.
Judicial Watch’s discovery is centered upon whether Clinton intentionally attempted to evade the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) by using a non-government email system and whether the State Department acted in bad faith in processing Judicial Watch’s FOIA request for communications from Clinton’s office. U.S District Court Judge Royce Lamberth ordered Obama administration senior State Department officials, lawyers, and Clinton aides, as well as E.W. Priestap, to be deposed or answer written questions under oath. The court ruled that the Clinton email system was “one of the gravest modern offenses to government transparency.”
Continue reading "Records Reveal Obama White House Tracked FOIA Requests for Clinton Emails" »
Public transportation is a declining industry. Randal O’Toole writes:
Nationwide transit ridership in the first quarter of 2019 was 2.6 percent below the same quarter in 2018, according to data released by the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) last week. Transit’s most recent downward spiral began in 2014, and ridership over the twelve months prior to March 31 was 8.6 percent below the same twelve months four years ago.
Ridership is declining for all major forms of transit travel. First quarter bus ridership was 2.1 percent below 2018 while first quarter rail ridership declined by 3.2 percent. Commuter rail, light rail, heavy rail, and streetcars all lost riders. [...]
SPRINGFIELD – Seven cases of measles in Illinois launched a vaccine effort of at least $3.5 million in taxpayer-funded grants to local health departments, Governor Pritzker's office announced Friday.
Pointing to the number of measles cases nationwide, the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) is "taking action to prevent cases of measles and increase vaccination rates. Recent actions range from direct outreach to communities with low vaccination rates, new grants for local health departments, and public education campaigns," Pritker's office reported.
Continue reading "Seven measles cases in Illinois launches $3.5M+ statewide vaccine campaign" »
WASHINGTON DC - Friday, President Donald J. Trump took historic action to protect the American automobile industry, its workforce, and American innovation.
Following an extensive review of the Department of Commerce’s Section 232 automobile report, President Trump today issued a proclamation directing the United States Trade Representative to negotiate agreements to address the national security threat, which is causing harm to the American automobile industry.
More on the proclamation and its desired effect on the US automobile industry here: TMANews.com
By Randy Rossi -
Those of us that have competed with and/or done business in China have been very frustrated with the fact that most Americans didn’t understand that China is the greatest cheating and stealing nation on Earth which is also the greatest strategic threat to America there is according to our government. We are thrilled that we finally have a president that is willing to stop China’s massive attack on our economy and national security.
Here are just a few critical facts that should make every rational American understand this massive Chinese threat and why President Trump’s tariffs on China are the right thing to do:
Continue reading "Rossi: Why Trump is so Right regarding China Tariffs" »
Allow kids to get vaccinations without parental consent, writes Marlen Garcia in a Sun-Times op-ed. Twelve-year-olds addicted to drugs or alcohol can get treatment without parental consent. Young girls can get abortions behind their parents' backs with judicial bypasses. Minors that are parents can make health care-related decisions.
So, "it's time for the Illinois Legislature to allow kids to be vaccinated without parental consent."
She must not know that since 2013 it's already been legal in Illinois for 12 year olds to get HPV vaccines without their parents' knowledge. Someone tell her.
Read her Opinion column here and read Illinois Review's stories on the issue:
Capitalism is more likely to break up big tech than the politicians. “Big Tech,” writes James Pethokoukis, “doesn’t act like they exist above or outside the dynamic churn of American capitalism,”:
Just look at what went down during the recent earnings season, as reported by the [Wall Street Journal]. Facebook reported better-than-expected revenue and profits, but boss Mark Zuckerberg is now promising a business model shift toward small groups and private message. Google parent Alphabet posted its slowest revenue growth since 2015 as “it’s once-untouchable online-advertising operation took a body blow, hurt by mounting competition and struggles within its increasingly high-profile YouTube unit.” Apple posted its first back-to-back drop in quarterly sales and profit in more than two years thanks to falling iPhone sales and is now trying to “morph itself into a services company fueled by app and entertainment sales as much as hardware.
Continue reading "America’s monopolistic tech sector seems pretty competitive and dynamic" »
Sunset rules in action. James Broughel writes:
Something rather remarkable just happened in Idaho. The state legislature opted to—in essence—repeal the entire state regulatory code. The cause may have been dysfunction across legislative chambers, but the result is serendipitous. A new governor is presented with an unprecedented opportunity to repeal an outdated and burdensome regulatory code and replace it with a more streamlined and sensible set of rules. Other states should be paying close attention.
The situation came about due to the somewhat unconventional nature of Idaho’s regulatory process. Each year, the state’s entire existing body of regulations expires unless reauthorized for an additional year by the legislature. In most years, reauthorization happens smoothly, but not this year.
SPRINGFIELD - The one activist group that consistently focuses on opposing gambling expansion - the Illinois Church Action on Alcohol and Addiction Problems (ILCAAAP) - is alarmed at the state lawmakers' focus to expand gambling even more this legislative session.
Sports betting is at the top of the agenda, with more video gambling up next, ILCAAAP says in a recent newsletter to supporters.
Continue reading "Illinois looks at sports betting and more video gambling" »
By Nancy Thorner -
There is not now, nor has there ever been, any scientific evidence proving mankind has affected the climate on a global scale, yet our media and “scientific community” tell us otherwise.
The world can warm and cool in natural cycles without any human interference. For the past million years this has occurred over again many times at approximately 100,000-year intervals. About 80-90,000 years of ice age with about 10-20,000 years of warm period, give or take some thousands of years, but now the claim is that CO2 is leading the warming.
MARION - In a state that's among the highest in the nation losing residents on an annual basis, the governor of Illinois celebrated announcing several hundred new jobs coming to southern Illinois.
Having begun the process of location shopping two years ago - before Pritzker became governor - he joined Centene and IlliniCare Health at their new Carbondale Service Center this week.
Continue reading "Pritzker celebrates new jobs in southern Illinois" »
This week, former State Rep. Jeanne Ives (R-Wheaton) sent out the following email to supporters, encouraging them to step up expressing their concerns about proposed legislation as the General Assembly moves towards the end of the session.
By Jeanne Ives -
Decisions being made in Springfield right now will change the direction of the state for better or worse.
The month of May is when Madigan and company like to pass $38 billion dollar plus budgets in two hours. Taxpayers need to be on guard.
Continue reading "Ives: Which Direction is Illinois Going?" »
The Postal Service used to lose money slower. Eric Boehm writes:
The U.S. Postal Service lost more than $2 billion during the second quarter of the fiscal year, putting it on track to finish the current year more than $7 billion in the red—way worse than the nearly $4 billion in losses it posted last year.
In its quarterly fiscal report, published today, the Post Office reported small decreases in mail volume and overall revenue compared to the same quarter of 2018. Its big losses are driven by a sharp increase in expenses, primarily workers’ compensation costs, pension liabilities, and payments for retirees’ health benefits.
APPEALS COURT METAMORPHOSIS: "The Senate confirmed Michael Park to be a judge on the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday, making him the 39th circuit court judge to be confirmed under President Trump in a process on a record pace that is steadily reshaping the bench. ... With two more vacancies by this summer as judges take senior status, Mr. Trump will soon have a chance to flip control of the circuit, which currently has seven Democratic appointees. Mr. Trump flipped the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals earlier this year."
More at: The Washington Times
Politicians care about votes and most voters most of the time are not sick. Tim Evans writes:
Against the popular view that the NHS provides free and unlimited health care, history demonstrates that the supply of NHS services has always been limited in significant ways. Experience shows that people have never had an absolute right to free and equal treatment on demand:
What they have had instead is an unlimited right of access to a waiting list from which (with a few exceptions) they will not be excluded. This right of access is not equivalent to a right to treatment, as any notional right to treatment has little value in practice if it is available only at the end of a two-year waiting time. The right to healthcare is unlimited in the long term but is strictly limited in the short term when healthcare is actually required, at the very least, to relieve pain or discomfort.
Today, many hundreds of thousands of people are on NHS waiting lists, and countless tens of thousands are trying to get on a list. After decades of reforms and extra tens of billions of pounds invested, out of four million patients admitted to NHS hospitals for routine treatment in 2007, more than half still had to wait at home more than 18 weeks before receiving that treatment.
Continue reading "London Calling: Don’t Commit to Nationalized Health Care" »
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Illinois Congressman Darin LaHood's 18th District is made up of huge manufacturers like Caterpillar and farmers that are struggling as the President and his Administration increase tariffs on China’s imports from 10% to 25%.
Continue reading "LaHood district torn between the good and bad of Chinese tariff dispute" »
