Illinois citizens who have refused to be bamboozled by their politicians provoked two important changes of heart this week:
* On Monday, Senate President John Cullerton acknowledged that lawmakers need to reform how state government spends money before they raise taxes. Meeting with the Tribune editorial board, Cullerton spoke about legislators taking such sensible steps as creating a less generous pension system for new state employees, asking retirees to shoulder more of their health costs, and moving Medicaid recipients to a more efficient system of managed care. All good ideas. Without those and other permanent reforms on the spending side of the ledger, Illinois lawmakers will keep lurching from one financial crisis to the next.
* On Thursday, Gov. Pat Quinn vetoed a campaign finance bill he previously described as a “landmark” reform. He was gravely wrong when he said that — and although we’ve strongly criticized him for changing his mind on too many issues, the end result here is for the best. It was a lousy bill — a phony attempt by legislators to mollify angry voters without significantly changing business as usual in Springfield.
In both of these cases, the credit for the reversal goes to citizens who keep pounding on Illinois lawmakers. All those phone calls, e-mails and face-to-face confrontations have awakened some of this state’s politicians. They see that what began last December as public fury over all matters Blagojevich has coalesced into the most dangerous of forces: More Illinoisans than ever are paying attention to state government — and demanding real reforms.
Give credit, too, to reformers with such groups as the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform, Change Illinois! and the governor’s Illinois Reform Commission. They refused to be bamboozled by the politicians, too. And now the pols are asking them for help.
Quinn’s news conference looked like a pilot for a TV series, “Dems on the Run.” There stood the governor, Cullerton and House Speaker Michael Madigan, the three Democrats who make or break legislation. There, too, stood the Republican legislative leaders, Sen. Christine Radogno and Rep. Tom Cross. Radogno and Cross have refused to buckle in their insistence on a menu of reforms — a recall amendment, an end to gerrymandering of legislative districts, later primary elections, and special elections to fill future vacant U.S. Senate seats — that’s more than most Springfield Dems want.
Cullerton generously put on a game face to concur with Quinn that negotiations among legislators and reform advocates could produce a new campaign finance bill for the fall veto session. Cullerton did, though, sound defensive answering a question about what flaws need fixing in the bill that Quinn was about to thwack with his big veto stamp: “I didn’t say there are any flaws,” Cullerton retorted archly. “I said it can be improved.” As you like, senator.
Madigan, who spent most of the news conference obscured from view behind Quinn, looked like a man passing kidney stones: He betrayed his reaction to any bill that could limit his power to raise campaign cash by … refusing to answer any questions (yes, at a news conference !), skulking to a dark corner — and then scurrying into an anteroom with Cullerton in tow before reporters could corner either of them.
No, the Democrats who run Illinois don’t wake up eager to limit the tremendous advantages their incumbents enjoy in raising money. The goofy bill Democratic legislators sent to Quinn actually would have increased those advantages.
We’ve never favored contribution limits, because donors and candidates easily evade them. We do, though, favor immediate electronic disclosure of all donations — a simple task this bill wouldn’t have achieved. We were encouraged when Cullerton told us he wants more immediate disclosure than the now-vetoed bill would have provided.
All in all, some positive signs. But those who want reform in this state’s politics and in its finances will have to keep pounding on our lawmakers.
That relentless pressure — coupled with Republican legislators’ resolve — has had a big impact, as this week’s changes of heart attest. The Democrats who bragged of passing more reform than in fact they’ve delivered know that their game of pretend didn’t work. We’re all watching their actions — and inactions — as we’ve never watched before.
