Illinois Review

Di Leo: What’s Twenty or Thirty Cents Among Friends?

By John F. Di Leo 

The bankrupt city of Chicago’s outgoing Mayor, Rahm Emanuel, and the bankrupt state of Illinois’ incoming governor, J.B. Pritzker, are calling for a huge increase in Illinois’ gas tax, ostensibly to fund a major transportation bill.

Illinois hasn’t raised its gas tax, now at 19 cents per gallon, since 1990.  If we were to keep up with inflation, a 20 to 30 cent per gallon increase – that is, to double it or more – would be reasonable, in their view.  They’re just proposing that it keep up with inflation since 1990, that’s all. 

Or maybe raise it a little more than that, while we’re at it, just for good measure…  I mean, as long as we’re in there anyway, may as well make it worth the trip, right?

And on its face, that does make some sense.  Look at inflation since then.   On its face, viewed in its own “petri dish” setting in a controlled environment, such an increase is perfectly logical.

But does the real world work like a controlled environment?  Can tax policy, in fact, ever be set without consideration of the real world around us?

Thorner/O'Neil: Is a "well-informed electorate" a thing of the past, or has it ever existed?

By Nancy Thorner & Bonnie O'Neil - 

We the People have been told that the most effective weapon against tyranny is a well-informed electorate.  That is true, but the problem rarely discussed today is that a majority of people believe themselves to be fully informed; more often than not they are only aware of facts provided by those with whom they most tend to agree.  Being honest with ourselves, most of us rarely research issues, even those we find most controversial.  We rarely watch, listen, or read political information by sources we know mostly offer views with which we politically disagree. We do not enjoy hearing opposition arguments, even when they are well-researched and are provided by reputable resources.  

This lack of knowing all the facts, some of which is essential to fully understand an issue, is unfortunate and unproductive. Too often we end up sharing false information, even arguing over issues when we have not attempted to examine critical facts that could change our perspective.  Democrats, Republicans and Independents are all guilty.  

Weyermuller: Caroling Pro-lifers remind abortion seekers of Baby Jesus

By Mark Weyermuller - 

One of the Pro-life Action League’s most supported events of the year is the  “Peace in the Womb” Christmas caroling day. The idea is simple: They bring the hope and joy of Christmas to one of the world’s darkest places—the abortion clinic—in hopes that the familiar sounds of Christmas carols will save a life. And, in fact, lives have been saved by the peaceful, prayerful witness when women heard our songs from inside the abortion facility and chose life for their children.

This year's "Peace in the Womb" caroling events took place last Saturday in 66 cities in 28 states. This was the fourteenth year that the Pro-Life Action League held Christmas caroling outside of abortion clinics.  The group sings with an empty manger on display as a symbol of babies that weren't born due to abortion. There was very little main stream media coverage of this important event.

UN Boss: Use “Climate Action” to “Transform World”

As the most important United Nations “global warming” summit since the 2015 confab in Paris kicked off in Katowice last week, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres declared that so-called “climate action” offers a “compelling path to transform our world.” Even your “mind” must be transformed, he said. Many other proud socialists, communists, and globalists have also called for using the man-made global-warming hypothesis to transform the world. And they are not kidding.

In fact, the man-made global-warming theorists in attendance at the UN summit here are working to exploit alarmism over the “climate” to restructure every aspect of human life. This includes the economy, industry, governance, and even your thinking, Guterres declared. The sought-after global transformation will also involve more government promotion of feminism, planetary taxes on emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2), a total transformation of governance, and so much more, explained Guterres, a longtime socialist leader who led the Socialist International before becoming UN boss.

More HERE

The technology of totalitarianism

Huawei is the doorway to China’s police state. There are reasons to keep an eye on Huawei, beyond allegations of violating sanctions against Iran, writes Dan Blumenthal:

The stakes are high, as the company is positioned to be the dominant player in 5G mobile networks. If Huawei wins this competition against US companies, much of the world’s data will pass through the mobile networks of a CCP-backed company that does business with the world’s most troubling regimes. Huawei is also the critical player in CCP General-Secretary Xi Jinping’s bid to establish a high-tech police state and to leapfrog the United States in critical technologies that will enable a host of military capabilities.

Solzhenitsyn: A Centennial Tribute

Solzhenitsyn at 100. Daniel Mahoney writes:

[Aleksandr] Solzhenitsyn wrote with “lucid understanding,” and with no small dose of scorn, about the “Progressive Doctrine,” the inhuman ideology that justified terror and tyranny as no regime or ideological movement had ever justified the killing and repression of real or imagined “enemies of the People.” He showed that the heart of Bolshevism lay in a monstrous coming together of violence and lies that gave rise not to mere dictatorship but to a totalitarianism that transformed betrayal and lying into “forms of existence.” This totalitarianism demanded fierce resistance, both for the sake of liberty and for the right of the human soul to breathe freely, with the dignity afforded it by God.

Solzhenitsyn would become the most eloquent critic of ideological revolution, the “vain hope that revolution can improve human nature,” as he said in the Vendée in the fall of 1993. He saw many affinities between the French and Russian revolutions, not least the shared hope that revolution could transform human nature and regenerate the human race. Instead, Solzhenitsyn stood for repentance and self-limitation, and for a conception of self-government (beginning with the arts of local liberty) that emphasized the importance of civic virtue. Here he was indebted to Tocqueville, to the zemstvos or nineteenth century Russian provincial and local councils, and to the experience of local liberty that he witnessed (and admired) during his western exile in Switzerland and New England between 1974 and 1994. He spoke with admiration for such local liberty in his farewell to the people of Cavendish, Vermont, on February 28, 1994. It was a tradition of liberty from the bottom up much needed in contemporary Russia, he observed. [...]

Rhoads: English Alone Is Not Enough

By Mark Rhoads-

Maybe you have tried hard to understand the English accent of a person from India or the Middle East and still not have been able to communicate. There is one English language - but many accents.

For example, you might be connected to a technical support person who is in India and you still have trouble hearing because the accent is so thick and you are from Chicago so you might as well be speaking a different language completely. You ask over and over for a person to spell out a simple email address and still cannot get it right. It is time for tech support companies to improve the training of their employees so that they can actually communicate with people who speak American English.  

Why You Should Be a Nationalist

It’s undeniable: Around the world, nationalism is on the march, and the media and reigning political elites would have you believe this is a dangerous disaster in the making. So, why is Yoram Hazony, author of The Virtue of Nationalism, unafraid? Watch to understand.

Cook County GOP Chairman responds to Rauner's post-election comments; calls for emergency IL GOP meeting

Sean Morrison condemns Bruce Rauner; calls for emergency Illinois GOP Meeting

After learning of Governor Bruce Rauner's attempts to pass off his re-election bid to at least four other Republicans, Friday afternoon Cook County GOP Chairman and Cook County Commissioner Sean Morrison sent out the following statement of outrage - a call for an emergency IL GOP State Central Committee meeting:

To learn yesterday that Bruce Rauner secretly tried to abdicate his candidacy - on several occasions - is an affront to everyone in the Illinois Republican Party and the entire State of Illinois. It is an egregious betrayal of trust that countless members of the Republican Party placed in him, and that 1.7 Million residents of Illinois had when they cast their vote for him in November.
 
I personally asked the Governor on two separate occasions before the Primary if he was committed to his re-election. Both times, to my face, he made clear that he was all in – not only for himself but for all Statewide candidates. We now know, by his own admission, that he deceived me and others.

Rauner reveals he didn't want to run again in 2018, begged four others to take his place

Had Senator Clinton won in 2016, Republican incumbent Bruce Rauner believes his chances of winning re-election would have been much better. He also begged four other Republicans to run for governor in his place in 2018.

That's what he told ABC 7's Craig Walls in an exclusive interview Thursday:

Weyermuller: Mainstream Media ignore Chicago Police's everyday heroism

By Mark Weyermuller - 

In Chicago, the police are often under constant attack from politicians, community activists, and the mainstream media. Perhaps it might be better if we show more support of the police rather than constantly criticize them?  They have a very difficult job. They are the "thin blue line" between criminals and potential crime victims.

This past Monday the Chicago Police showed huge restraint when they captured a person suspected of invading a Wrigleyville home. The suspect was running from police carrying a large butcher knife in a busy area near Wrigley Field. He had alleged assaulted a woman during the home invasion in the 900 block of West Cornelia Street. The police used tasers to subdue him, resulting in no injuries to police, civilians, or the suspect himself. The chase lasted about ten minutes, involving up to 35 police officers. I was a block away when the event unfolded and monitored police radio communications.

Thorner: Death by a Thousand Cuts must not triumph

By Nancy Thorner - 

The underhanded and corrupt way the Deep State initiated the Mueller Special Counsel investigation for the initial purpose of  looking for Russian collusion by President Trump when there was no crime to begin with, was brought home recently. It was when former FBI head James Comey admitted he knew the Democrats had financed the Steele ‘Pee’ Dossier prior to a FISA Warrant sign off which relied, in part, on the Steele Dossier to obtain a warrant to monitor Carter Page. The FBI believed Page has been the subject of targeted recruitment by the Russian government to ​ ​undermine and influence the outcome of the 2016 presidential election in violation of US criminal law. It is ironic that Trump has most likely been told should he release the FISA documents, which he at one point said he would do, that it would be considered an obstruction of justice - by the very ones that will settle for nothing less than Trump's scalp. 

Although noteworthy is that even though Rosenstein signed off on appointing Mueller as Special Counsel, it was Virginia Democrat Senator Mark Warner that planted the seed in Rosenstein’s mind of appointing a special counsel to terrorize President Trump.  According to contemporaneous text messages between FBI officials, “Warner conveyed that he wanted (a) special counsel” and Rosenstein “said he took that under advisement.”  So it came about that Rosenstein allowed a fiercely partisan Democrat to influence him into appointing a Special Counsel whose goal was nothing short of overturning American democracy.

Who Are the Most Powerful People in America?

The genius of America is that it was set up as a representative government, but increasingly, Americans are ruled over by leaders who are unelected, and very powerful. Columbia Law Professor Philip Hamburger unmasks the people who are really ruling our lives.

Illinois has #1 highest wireless tax rates

Do you know how much of your cell phone bill consists of taxes and fees?

Every year, a greater number of Americans depend on wireless service to stay connected with family, friends, and colleagues. But few stop to consider the taxes, fees, and surcharges that factor into the cost of service.

In Chicago, a typical household with four wireless phones paying $100 per month for taxable wireless service can expect to pay about$487 per year in wireless taxes, fees, and surcharges.

Overall, Illinois state residents face the highest combined state and local cell phone tax rate in the country at 20.91 percent.

That's more than double the average state and local sales tax rate in the state.

More HERE

In Defense Of ‘Dark Money’

Dark money is good for democracy. David Harsanyi writes:

When Donald Trump named Matthew Whitaker as acting attorney general, for example, CNN warned its readers that the man had once headed a “conservative group funded by dark money.” The nonprofit Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust, The Washington Post explained, had both “obscure roots” and very rich “undisclosed funders.”

While there might be plenty of good reasons to oppose Whitaker, the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust sounds exactly like one of hundreds of groups that litter Washington. There is nothing unique about the existence of an organization funded by private donors who, as far as we know, filed all its proper paperwork with IRS and broke no laws.

White House announces new council on Opportunity Zones

“From the South Side of Chicago to the Mississippi Delta, Governors across the country designate underserved communities based on their unique needs,” Ivanka Trump tweeted earlier this week. “All Americans, regardless of zip code, should have the opportunity to experience the American dream. Opportunity Zones will catalyze private sector investment that will create jobs + economic growth in overlooked communities nationwide.”

The First Daughter was referring to an executive order her father President Trump signed into effect Wednesday afternoon, which created the White House Opportunity and Revitalization Council. The group, chaired by U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Ben Carson, includes representatives from 13 federal agencies. The Council will coordinate federal efforts relating to Opportunity Zones and work to prioritize such neighborhoods for grant funding, loan guarantees, infrastructure spending, and other federal initiatives.

21 year old Daniel Baker of Tremont, IL among five Marines killed during midair collision

Cpl. Daniel Baker with cousin Hazel July 2018

WASHINGTON — The five missing Marines who were aboard the KC-130J tanker plane that collided midair with an F/A-18 fighter off the coast of Japan last week ranged from young corporals early in their service to a veteran pilot, who was the executive officer of their Japan-based squadron. On Tuesday, they were declared dead, ending days of searching for them.

One of the fallen was 21 year old Cpl. Daniel Baker of Tremont, Illinois.

Stars & Stripes features a piece about each one of the five Marines, including this by Dianna Cahn -

Di Leo: Great Britain’s Brexit Challenges, and a Lesson for Americans

By John F. Di Leo-

Have you ever hired a militant vegetarian chef to cook you a steak?

Would you hire a pacifist as Commander-in-Chief during wartime?  Or a 600 lb personal trainer to supervise your weight loss program?

This is nothing against vegetarians, pacifists, or weight-challenged folks, by the way; it’s just a means of making a point:

To get a job done, the person charged with implementing it MUST believe in it. It can't possibly go well if he doesn't, because the original outline will need details fleshed out.  If the implementer doesn’t believe in it, he or she has practically no chance of doing it the way the hiring party wanted it done.

Our neighbors across the Pond – the voters of Great Britain – are learning that lesson the hard way.

Nevins: The Illinois GOP Leadership’s Bridge to Nowhere

What the Chicago Tribune chooses to ignore, the Illinois Review chooses to feature. In our opinion, these ideas are worth contemplating: Jennifer Nevins' frank response to an op-ed advocating the struggling IL GOP stay on course. 

By Jennifer Nevins - 

Recently, in the wake of the blue tsunami that decimated whatever shreds of influence the state’s Republican Party thought it had, the Chicago Tribune featured a commentary by  Bruce Rauner campaign staffer Patrick Wohl titled, “Don’t Let Rauner Loss Spark a GOP Race to the Right.” Wohl’s essential message-- "Moderates, stay the course!" --undoubtedly  soothes many a mind in the Illinois Republican leadership. Of course, the person shelling out this advice helped usher an incumbent governor into a spectacular loss, but Wohl’s intended audience is likely blind to the irony. They have become so accustomed to their strategic failures that this familiar counsel makes good sense.

While Wohl’s message is reaffirming to Illinois’ political establishment, his message also reaffirms the IL GOP's largely conservative voting base’s view that its leadership will never take them seriously. The perennial tension between the state’s moderate and conservative flanks has now devolved into total breakdown. The author and likeminded operatives, however, dismiss the dysfunction while they smugly believe that, eventually, the conservative mutts will heel.

Illinois women’s studies dept: Abolish ICE and police

The University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign’s (UIUC) Gender & Women's Studies department shared a nine-point platform advocating for the abolition of ICE and the police.

Madeleine Hubbard, president of Turning Point USA at UIUC, called this demand “very concerning” when speaking with Campus Reform.

More HERE