I mentioned to a friend the other day that the Speaker of the Illinois House, Michael Madigan, was going to be working hard to get the Democratic candidate for Cook County Assessor elected. Some background for those of you who do not live in Cook County: First, Speaker Madigan’s law firm has a big practice in property tax matters. Second, Joseph Berrios, the Democratic candidate for Cook County Assessor, is also the chairman of the Democratic Party in Cook County (and has been on the Cook County Board of Review, the people who review appeals from what the assessor determines for the past 22 years). Third, Republicans can no longer win a county-wide race in Cook County, but Forrest Claypool is running as an independent, and some people think he has a chance to win. I am sure Speaker Madigan very much wants to see the Mr. Berrios get elected. Forrest Claypool might not be good for business.*
In any case, when I made the comment, this person said that I must have been reading the Chicago Tribune (because they have raised questions about Speaker Madigan’s law practice). I have been reading the Tribune, but mostly just about Mike Quade being named manager of the Cubs. In any case, because I’m a Republican, I guess my friend thought I was just spouting the Tribune line.
Actually, I have gotten tired of politicians on both sides of the fence, not just the left side, because so many of them seem to be only interested in what’s in it for them and their cronies and in using government money to get themselves re-elected. Consider two issues, one federal and one state.
First, the federal issue: Earmarks. Readers of this blog know what I think of earmarks. They need to be abolished. Earmarks are given for money; they are given for contributions; they are given for votes. And people in both parties do it. We are told by members of both parties that representatives and senators know what their district or state needs much better than some faceless bureaucrat. While Representative Paul Ryan of Wisconsin has said that, if the Republicans get control of the House in November, they will abolish earmarks, former Representative Bob Livingston of Louisiana, another Republican, wrote a lengthy article in The Wall Street Journal** explaining why earmarks are not only good, they are necessary for the party which doesn’t control the White House.
There probably are a few legislators in Washington who could be trusted to distribute earmarks for the public good, as opposed to their own good or the good of their friends and contributors. Representative Frank Wolf of Virginia, a Republican, seems like he could be trusted. The problem is, too many of them can’t. If it’s not for a friend or a campaign contribution, it’s at least an attempt to look good to the voters back home, and who cares if the money is being well spent or actually doing something useful.
Second, a state issue: Tuition waivers. I have talked about this before, too. Every year each legislator in Illinois gets to award two four-year tuition waivers to any of the state’s universities. It’s not a lot of money, but at a time when the state is running out of money and the universities are in a deep financial hole, they cannot be justified. Legislators claim that they give the waivers to poor students who wouldn’t be able to go to college otherwise. And that may be true in some cases. For example, Mike Frerichs, a Democratic state senator from Champaign-Urbana, wanted to abolish the waivers, but he couldn’t get enough other Democrats to support him. (I don’t know if he could have gotten enough Republicans either.) Senator Frerichs seems like somebody who could be trusted to hand out the waivers properly, but lots of the legislators can’t. They say they will give them to needy kids, but then you find out that a relative of a big campaign supporter is really needy.
Both earmarks and waivers are defended on the grounds that they don’t cost much. If we got rid of all of them, it would only save only a few billion dollars (even less for the tuition waivers). We can’t balance the budget by getting rid of them, so why do it? But as I have said before, earmarks and tuition waivers are a symbol. If you can’t cut earmarks and tuition waivers, how are you going to be able to cut anything?
They are also corrupting. They are so easy to use for political purposes that it is unrealistic to expect most legislators to resist the temptation. It is almost like Josh Hamilton, an outfielder for the Texas Rangers. Josh has had some serious substance abuse issues in the past. So when the Rangers celebrated their victory in the playoffs, his fellow teammates didn’t spray Josh with champagne, they sprayed him with ginger ale. His teammates didn’t want to tempt Josh. That’s what we need to do with our politicians. We need to not tempt them.
But, honestly, it’s not just our politicians who need to be not tempted. It’s us voters, too. Lots of us like earmarks; we like tuition waivers. We like the contracts or the buildings or the special projects for our state or district that our senator or representative earmarks for us. We like it that our child or a friend’s child doesn’t have to pay tuition to go to college. And when it comes time to election time, too many of us will vote to re-elect our representative or senator because of those earmarks or waivers.
Earmarks and tuition waivers corrupt our politicians. They corrupt our system. They corrupt us. We need to get rid of them – completely. Because that is the only way to stay clean.
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* If you are wondering how the Speaker of the Illinois House could be making tons of money representing people who are appealing their property tax assessments and one of the people deciding on those appeals is the head of the Cook County Democratic Party, the answer is simple: We don’t do conflicts of interests in Illinois. If we did, our politicians wouldn’t be able to make an honest living.
** Bob Livingstone, “The Tea Party Is Wrong About Earmarks,” The Wall Street Journal, October 22, 2010.
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