Illinois voters have been forced to endure a lot over the last year–a former governor indicted, Democrats locked in a civil war over the state budget and a Republican party in such disarray that leaders are seemingly unable to persuade anyone to run for U.S. Senate.
Frankly, they expect nothing less from their politicians.
“There’s been an awful lot of shenanigans going on for a long time in Illinois,” said Irv Hemmerle, 64, a comptroller for a tool manufacturing company, as he enjoyed a cigar in downtown Naperville. “I don’t know that it’s ever been considered a squeaky clean place.”
A burgeoning scandal involving the agency that approves hospital expansions, the Illinois Health Facilities Planning Board, hasn’t helped matters. That one is proving to be an equal-opportunity headache for both parties.
But the GOP, in particular, is going through a rough stretch, voters said in dozens of interviews last week across the state, from Chicago to Carbondale.
“It’s a freaking mess,” said Jim Pitzer, 54, the Republican manager of a Smith Barney office in Bloomington.
“There’s the smell of corruption all through the Illinois Republican Party,” Pitzer said. “It’s just disappointing. It’s been there some time.”
Many party loyalists say they don’t care what was in former U.S. Senate candidate Jack Ryan’s divorce files–the ones that said he took his wife to sex clubs against her wishes. Now they blame party leaders for deserting him and essentially conceding the race to a tough Democratic opponent, state Sen. Barack Obama.
The names floated as possible replacement candidates are hardly registering with voters.
“If you’re not going to have a winning candidate, it might as well be [Ryan] as anyone else,” said Glen Nordholm, 60, a Republican who owns an insurance firm in Decatur. “I guess it’s hard to understand why the Republican Party came down so hard on him. Not that that’s not a bad thing, but who are they going to put in there now?”
Many voters across the state say they didn’t get as worked up about the allegations Ryan’s former wife made in the divorce files as the media and political circles. After all, they’ve already seen a president impeached for lying under oath about his affair with an intern.
“Maybe it was kinky and a little silly,” said Robin Poston, 32, a Republican occupational therapist from Normal who had supported Ryan. “At least it was with his own wife, unlike our former president.”
Most of the locals gathered at a cafe in the southern town of Richview agreed that what Ryan does in his personal life is his business and nobody else’s. And even the divorce file details didn’t faze them.
“After Clinton, no, nothing shocks me anymore,” quipped Betty Schnake, 75, a Republican farmer from Hoyleton, finishing her coffee.
Not everyone is so jaded.
“I vote for morals more than anything else,” said Mike Bland, 54, a retired serviceman from the farming community of Pana. “It definitely affected me.”
Many Republicans think the problem could have been precluded had party leaders better screened their candidates–particularly after the indictment of former Gov. George Ryan.
“It seems like there’s a lot of skeletons in the closets of these guys that don’t come out till it’s too late,” said Deb Schrek, 51, a Republican surgery scheduler for a Rockford hospital, as she loaded groceries into her car. “I don’t know, probably easier said than done.”
Governor’s residency blasted
Though the Jack Ryan scandal piqued almost everyone’s interest, fewer voters took interest in the ongoing budget deadlock between the first Democratic governor since 1977 and a Democratic majority legislature. Democrats seem more interested in discussing the Iraq war and the presidential campaign–while many Downstate residents want to take Gov. Rod Blagojevich to task for where he lives.
“I know it’s a little thing, but why didn’t he move to Springfield?” asked Laura Ruff, 46, a Republican court reporter from Gridley. “If he’s going to run the government, he should run the government from down there.”
“We have a governor of Chicago right now,” said Kim Weber, 38, a physical therapist from Heyworth who votes Republican.
And that budget business in Springfield that looms like a political battle to the death? Well, many who are following the standoff displayed an almost breezy confidence that it will be resolved.
“We’ve been here before with the budget,” said Terry Aversa, 72, stopping for coffee as he walked his dog in Elmhurst. “It always gets worked out though. It’s amazing,” said Aversa, who has voted independent.
Blagojevich “is not doing anything different than I do with my family, what he does with his family, what you do with your family,” said Democrat John Vanooteghem, 49, a pipefitter, between hands of euchre at the American Legion hall in Ottawa. “When you’re in debt, you’ve got to tighten up.”
Some Republicans were less willing to accept the prolonged standoff–and the $17,000 a day it costs the state each time the governor calls lawmakers in for a special session.
“It’s breaking down again the trust level,” said John D. Smith, 65, a former 5th-grade band teacher from DeKalb and a trombonist in a band called The Shenanigans. “The people we elect have a job to do and they need to start with the bottom line and say, `How can we get this done in the shortest amount of time?'”
Some pockets of the state are following the budget problems especially closely.
The Vandalia Correctional Center employs 447 people in the southern Illinois town of about 7,000, making it the largest employer in the area. The governor has threatened to close the prison to save the state an estimated $32 million a year.
But residents here say that would devastate the local economy. Countless signs are posted throughout town urging the state to keep the prison open–even on the theater marquee, where “Save VCC” is just below “Spider-Man 2.”
Steve Bartlett, 39, a correctional officer for 8 1/2 years, says Vandalians constantly discuss the latest twists and turns of the budget process, leaving many of them stressed. Bartlett put his 5-acre home across the street from the prison up for sale about a week ago, saying he and his family will rent a home until the issue is decided.
“I’m worried that if it stays open this year, [Blagojevich] may come back next year and do the same thing,” he says as he takes a break from a game of catch with his 9-year-old son, Mike. “This year, I didn’t even plant a garden because I didn’t know if I could see it through.”
Karen Elyea, 36, the owner of Minglewood, a coffeehouse and boutique in downtown Rockford, used to be a civil rights and environmental activist. “I’m sure they’ll pass the budget. It’ll all work out,” she says, leaning across the counter. But then she adds, “I’ve been trying not to follow it; it was making me depressed.”
Drama doesn’t surprise many
Perhaps, voters simply have become accustomed to the drama of Illinois politics–the ebb and flow of comedy and tragedy. What’s more, many say the shady dealings are par for the course.
“The corruption has always been about the same as far as I’m concerned,” said Chicagoan Howard Toney, 39, who works for United Parcel Service, as he waited for a bus outside the Ford City Shopping Center. “Nothing’s really changed. It’s just a new set of players.”
“What state isn’t tainted?” asked Jim White, 58, a Democrat and retired schoolteacher in Bloomington.
“It’s probably the same as anywhere else, not counting Chicago,” said Darryl Vancil, 42, a Republican farmer as he set up a stand outside Downstate Du Quoin to sell sweet corn for $2.50 a dozen. A few moments later, he said, “They need to get someone with a different name in there. George gave Jack a bad name. There’s too many Ryans out there.”
But the weight of all the Ryans, the scandal, the corruption and the gridlock has inspired a different reaction in some voters: apathy and ambivalence.
Sue Orsini, a Naperville mother of three, said the Jack Ryan commotion reaffirmed her feeling that politicians of both parties are flawed–so much so that she’s not sure if she’ll vote in the November election at all.
“It doesn’t matter who I vote for because there’s going to be a scandal behind everything,” said Orsini, as she browsed a sidewalk sale in Naperville. “It’s almost like you don’t care because you can’t trust.”
Tina Shingles, a Verizon administrative specialist in Bloomington, reached a different conclusion.
“We have power, we just don’t use it. If you don’t want someone in power, they don’t have to be there. We can vote them out,” she said. “They work for us, not the other way around.”
