As I expected, Lynne Strathman was picked by Winnebago County Board Republicans Tuesday night to be a District 1 board member. She’ll be sworn in at Thursday’s board meeting.
Strathman will replace Randy Olson, who exited the board to work for the county as a helicopter pilot in the multi-county LEAC [...]
Winnebago County Board Republicans meet tonight (Tuesday) to interview candidates to replace “Chopper One,” aka Randy Olson, for the District One seat from which he just resigned. Olson is now a county employee working full time for the LEAC helicopter law enforcement consortium.
Candidate to replace him are Richard A. Sneath, [...]
All the news reports on the explosion at Belvidere’s NDK plant mentioned the fact that the building was designed so that in the event of an explosion, the exterior walls would detach and hurtle themselves away from the structure.
“The building was designed so that panels will fly away in an [...]
So, what have we, a surge, or what? President Obama is sending an additional 30,000 troops to Afghanistan, 10,000 fewer than Gen. McChrystal requested, but when the 7,000 more troops to be supplied by our allies show up, the total is 37,000, close to what the general asked for. Soon [...]
The White House “Jobs Summit” is neither. First, for those of the liberal persuasion, the president has ruled out another federal stimulus bill to boost government job growth, which is good because we can’t afford it.
Second, for those of us who believe the only way to create real wealth is [...]
I like Mike Huckabee, but I’m afraid his future presidential ambitions have just become a giant Willie Horton TV ad. Politico has the story.
[...]Once again, The Guardian (of London) serves up first class political analysis — of American politics. Called “Glenn Beck — the renegade running the opposition to Obama,” it’s the most thoughtful piece I’ve seen about how Glenn Beck inparticular and Fox News in general personifies a large political movement that [...]
Dubai is the latest to stumble from the world wide financial crisis, says The Guardian. Normally I’d say, “So what? A bunch of rich guys become slightly less rich.”
However, since all economies are now linked, the Dubai situation has ramifications that could make our own recession deeper and last [...]
Every network, newspaper and cable station in the U.S. is doing stories on the massive jam expected at the nation’s airports because of the Thanksgiving holiday weekend.
I finally saw a piece on one of the network news shows tonight that confirmed my suspicion that T’giving weekend is not the busiest. [...]
Not all Republicans have lined up in opposition to the federal government buying Thomson state prison and using it as a federal maximum security prison with a separate wing for Taliban and Al Qaida terrorists currently housed at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. President Obama has pledged to close the U.S. [...]
U.S. Rep. Don Manzullo, R-Egan, joined the Bachmann-Levin Overdrive rally Thursday on the steps of the U.S. Capitol, to denounce the Democrats’ 1,990 page health care bill, which Speaker Nancy Pelosi will call for a vote Saturday.
(Bachman is U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minnesota, and Levin is neocon radio host Mark [...]
Dan Hynes, who is running for governor against Gov. Pat Quinn in the Feb. 2 Democratic primary, is running a TV ad that features a statement Quinn made at an April 23 meeting of the RRS Editorial Board. (Hynes is the Illinois comptroller.)
In the snipped of the meeting Hynes’ ad [...]
Before anyone starts crowing about Democrat Bill Owens’ win in New York’s 23rd Congressional District, he did win with 49 percent, a large minority, but still a minority.
This was more a grudge match between moderate and conservative Republicans for the soul of the party; Owens was the beneficiary by default.
This [...]
Tuesday’s off-year election victories for Republicans in Virginia and New Jersey should send a caution signal to Democrats who run Congress and President Obama: You’ve gone too far left, come back to the center-right, where the majority of the country’s voters are.
Frankly, I’m horrified at the Democrats’ idea of health [...]
It’s become an item of faith among conservative commentators that Ronald Reagan’s 1987 speech at the Berlin Wall — “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall” — resulted in the actual wall coming down two years later, when he was out of office.
That is not how former President George H. W. [...]
I see that Winnebago County is synchronizing the traffic lights on Perryville to make it easier for drivers to go from north to south and vice-versa.
That’s nice. Now, whatever happened to the synchronized lights on East State Street? Remember, it wasn’t that long ago when the city of Rockford ballyhooed [...]
Congressman Don Manzullo, R-Egan, has filmed a video of himself, commenting on the House Democrats’ 1,990 page health care reform bill. Manzullo doesn’t like what he’s reading. The bill contains a hefty tax on medical appliances, which will add to the cost of health care for everyone, he says. It [...]
Want to read the new, House of Representatives health care bill? It was just introduced today. The new bill has nearly doubled in page-count from the old one. The new bill, which does contain a mild version of a public option, is a whopping 1,990 pages.
And if you have a [...]
Andy McKenna, who quit the Illinois Republican chairmanship last summer, has joined the race for governor in the February 2010 GOP primary.
McKenna comes with a pre-packaged lieutenant governor running mate, state Sen. Matt Murphy, R-Palatine. McKenna says he’s against raising taxes and says the state must make serious spending cuts. [...]
U.S. Rep. Don Manzullo, R-Egan, makes it official Monday: He’s running for another term. Manzullo was first elected in 1992 and has been easily re-elected every two years since then.
Manzullo has no opposition in his party. Last week, Freeport Mayor George Gaulrapp surprised everyone — especially Manzullo — when he [...]
Soupy Sales, 83, has died.
The slapstick comedian who threw whipped cream pies in people’s faces, was watched by millions of Baby Boomers on TV. I never cared too much for Soupy, but I did watch him sometimes. I think his show was on Saturdays at noon. (I was more of [...]
Here’s a news release Rockford Legal Director Patrick Hayes just sent out. It’s written in a language I’m calling “Purple Hayes”:
ROCKFORD – October 22, 2009 – The Rockford Police Department announced the
withdrawal of electronic control devices from daily use by the department effective
on the commencement of today’s afternoon [...]
Gov. Pat Quinn was supposed to stop at Chicago Rockford International Airport late Thursday afternoon on his airborne trip around the state to announce his candidacy for governor.
We got the word in the News Tower from a veteran Democratic official, not from Quinn’s campaign. We waited for something from the [...]
Did you know Winnebago County has a song? Neither did I.
Chuck Newburg from down the block came across this song in a book published in 1902. It was one of three songs under the title of “A Trinity of School Songs, the county, the state, the nation.” The song lyrics [...]
One year ago Derek Bergsten was a fire captain on Engine Co. 2. On Nov. 14, he was transformed into Rockford’s fire chief, overseeing a $37 million budget and a full-time emergency response force that includes 270 sworn members, 255 of whom staff the city’s 11 fire stations around the [...]
“Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.” Chinese General Sun-Tzu, circa 400 BC.
“Michael, you have to learn to keep your friends close, and your enemies closer. “Don Vito Corleone to Michael Corleone in
The Godfather II.
“Mr. President, what were you thinking?” Me.
The lesson taught by Sun Tzu and Don Vito [...]
Rich Carter, U.S. Rep. Don Manzullo’s press secretary, sent along this man-bites-dog news story from AP — Democratic unions opposing the Max Baucus health are plan that passed the Senate Finance Committee this morning on a 14-9 vote:
Says Carter: “The Baucus bill is supposed to be the one that [...]
BELVIDERE — State Rep. Ron Wait, R-69th, who has been in the House for all but two years since 1983, is stepping down from that job and will instead run for the newly-created position of Boone County judge.
Wait’s exit clears the field for a new representative in the district [...]
Saturday night’s prayer and praise service — the Concert for Peace and Unity — held at Heartland Community Church’s Colonial Village campus, was an example of the kind of ministerial leadership and community building that I’d like to see in the Rockford area. An estimated 1,500 people from all over [...]
Barack Obama has won the Nobel Peace Prize. Although initially at a loss for words about why this could or should be, I’ve thought of something.
As the dying Captain Tom Miller said to Private Ryan, “Earn this.”
[...]The owners of Road Ranger Stadium are seeking a tax break from local taxing districts on their ballpark. They should not get one. In this economy, such an idea is unthinkable. No bailouts for ballparks.
The ballpark owners took a risk and moved from the Park District’s Marinelli Field, which they [...]
I knew that sooner or later the Democrats in Congress would propose sweeping new taxes to pay for increased government spending.
THE HILL reports that Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the House, is considering a European-style VAT. Read it and weep.
[...]I hate to break it to you, but the U.S. is no longer the essential nation — the world is learning to do without us. This ominous story in the (UK) Independent points out how Middle Eastern, European and Asian nations plan to drop the U.S. dollar when dealing in [...]
It’s nice to see that NOW, the National Organization for Women, is taking to task its Hollywood allies in the feminist movement for defending the despicable child rapist Roman Polanski, who is guilty of drugging and raping a 13 year old girl at Jack Nicholson house. Planski fled the U.S. [...]
I wrote in a recent post that I think Rio will get the 2016 Summer Olympic Games.
Today I heard a different theory from Wally Haas, our editorial page editor, who heard it from someone, I think it may have been Jim Ryan, Rockford city administrator.
This theory says that The International [...]
A few years ago the Republicans gave a tremendous subsidy to the drug industry with the Medicare prescription drug benefit, paid for by borrowing money.
Now, the Democrats are set to give an even bigger subsidy to the health insurance industry by delivering to them 40 million currently uninsured people who [...]
So, police union leader Aurelio De LaRosa thinks Mayor Larry Morrissey is “a threat” to Rockford because the city has lost tax revenue and needs to make some minimal trims in city staffing.
Puhleease. Spare me the drama. These are miniscule compared to the cuts in staff that many other cities [...]
When it comes to restoring Amtrak passenger trains to northern Illinois, Rockford and Belvidere officials came close to making the perfect the enemy of the good when some insisted that intercity trains use the Union Pacific line through Belvidere, not the Canadian National line through Genoa, the route preferred by [...]
Don’t get me wrong. I’m a fan of bringing “Da Lympics” to Chicago in 2016. It would not only be good for Chicago, it would help all of Illinois and the Midwest as an economic development bonanza.
However, I think that Mayor Daley sending in President Obama to make a last-ditch [...]
By Chuck Sweeny
ROCKFORD REGISTER STAR
Rockford lawyer Dan Lewandowski withdrew his candidacy for state Senate in the 34th district Friday afternoon. The move allows Rockford city attorney Jennifer Cacciapaglia to be the Democratic nominee to oppose Republican incumbent Dave Syverson in the November 2010 general election. Syverson has been [...]
A million here, a million there, pretty soon you’re talking real health care coverage.
For years we’ve heard that the U.S. has 45, 46 or 47 million people who lack health insurance.
But Monday night on David Letterman, President Obama said there are 30 million without health care? What happened to the [...]
Senator Max Baucus’s “health care reform” bill is in reality the insurance industry bonanza bill. He’s taken so much money from insurance companies he might as well be an agent. They’re in good hands with Baucus.
His ridiculous bill needs to be labeled dead on arrival. To cover all the new [...]
Yes, it’s wonderful that TV’s Extreme Home Makeover is building a new house for those unfortunate folks in the Lena area who lost their house in a fire.
But in what motorists are calling an extreme road closure, the state highway geniuses at IDOT have shut down U.S. 20 for the [...]
NOW THAT THE CITY has learned the state of Illinois won’t fund two development requests for developments in Rockford, it’s time to ask our state legislators, what did they do to try and get the money? According to City Administrator Jim Ryan, Zion Development Corporation requested about $7 million in [...]
President Obama got partisan Thursday night in his health care speech, blaming Republicans for funding the Iraq war and tax cuts by borrowing money. At least one GOP congressman, Joe Wilson of South Carolina, didn’t believe him when he said illegal immigrants won’t be covered by his reforms. Wilson yelled [...]
Union Pacific Railway, which just a few years ago opened its Global III intermodal yard in Rochelle, is building a fourth Chicagoland intermodal facility, to be up and running in 2010.
The Joliet facility will be able to handle 500,000 ocean-going containers and vastly increase the railroad’s intermodal capacity from [...]
If you’re curious about what President Obama is going to say to school children Tuesday, you can read the full speech now, online at whitehouse.gov.
If any of you were expecting scary, left-wing propaganda, you’ll be sadly disappointed. Don’t worry, though, I’m positive that Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity [...]
President Obama speaks to the nation Wednesday night from the House of Representatives. He’ll make a renewed push for health care reform, or insurance reform, or whatever he’s calling it this week.
He probably won’t take my advice, but what I’d like him to do is scrap the current bills being [...]
Baptist Pastor Steven Anderson of Tempe, Ariz, says he doesn’t advocate violence, but he hopes that God gives President Obama brain cancer “so he can die like Ted Kennedy.”See the video.
[...]When Pan Am 007 bomber Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was sent home to Libya by the Scottish government for humanitarian reasons — he’s dying of prostate cancer — the British government in London said it wasn’t their fault, blame Scotland.
The wrath of the civilized world descended on Scotland, with threats of tourism [...]
Larry Morrissey strongly courted the black vote in his April re-election campaign. Rockford’s independent mayor put a campaign headquarters at on the southwest side at South Main and Morgan streets, the first time that’s ever been done to my knowledge.
At the opening ceremony he was surrounded by influential black [...]
I remember when Ted Kennedy was first elected to the Senate in 1962. He was 30 , barely meeting the age requirement for the national legislature’s upper chamber. I was in 8th grade at the time, but had followed politics since 3rd grade.
That was the era of “Camelot,” when his [...]
Memories are short among politicians — some politicians, anyway. Back in 2004, when state Comptroller Dan Hynes was running for the U.S. Senate, he courted support from fellow Democrats. One of them was Doug Scott, mayor of Rockford. Scott backed Hynes’ candidacy strongly. Ultimately, Hynes, the most lackluster campaigner I [...]
Anybody who has read my columns knows I am a proponent of charter schools. They’re not a panacea, but our one-size-fits-all public schools model obviously isn’t working in the U.S.A.; student proficiency in this land is abysmal compared to other modern countries. IF that trend isn’t reversed, the country will [...]
When I went to AirFest 2009 Saturday,I made sure to arrive early, at 9:30 a.m. Cars were already backing up on the bridge from South Main, and later on I heard tales of traffic backed up to the U.S. 20 Bypass trying to get into RFD.
I told my wife I’d [...]
Amazing. I have not seen this many people turn out to a “town hall” meeting since then Senator Barack Obama came to Rockford in October 2006 and took questions from people in an audience of 1,000 at RVC.
There were about that many people who came to hear and talk to [...]
If it’s August, it’s guess what team Brett Favre thinks he can play for now. Last year he thought he could play for the NY Jets. This year he thinks he can play for the Minnesota Vikings, his old Green Bay Packers’ arch-rival.
I enjoyed watching Favre as a Packer. There [...]
There’s a lot to do in the Rock River Valley, enough to keep a “staycationer” busy — and exhausted at the end of the day.
The Boone County Fair just wrapped up, and the Winnebago County Fair in Pecatonica picks up the fair action Tuesday. On Saturday and Sunday there’s AirFest [...]
America is not a nation of small businesses. Americans are not competitive with the rest of the industrialized world and have not been for a long time. We are the “no vacation” nation and work long hours with not much to show for it. Don’t blame me for this — [...]
The British are getting angry — not too much, though, they’re British — about the Republican Party’s relentless trashing of the UK’s National Health Service, the country’s socialized medical system that provides coverage to everybody.
However, they haven’t responded much to the criticism because officials don’t want to involve themselves in [...]
Tired of all the hype surrounding the health care bill? Me, too. Unfortunately, that’s about all we’re hearing, from both the right and the left.
Please read the bill. It’s easy to do, but it will take some time, because it’s more than 1,000 pages long. Find it at www.thomas.gov., the [...]
“Organizing For America,” which is President Obama’s permanent campaign, sent me an e-mail Sunday, urging me to visit my congressman, Don Manzullo, a Republican, and urge him to support health care reform, which the White House is now calling insurance reform.
They told me:
“All this week, OFA members like you will [...]
I’m doing more hunting, and from what I can gather Fitzgerald has been appointed chairman of a group he was already a member of. I believe he was appointed to that group by President Bush. So far I’ve seen nothing to indicate he’s losing his job as U.S. attorney for [...]
A regular letter writer and op-ed contributor to the Register Star called Editorial Page Editor Wally Haas Tuesday and said “Obama has just fired Patrick Fitzgerald,” meaning that President Obama had let go U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, the Chicago-bsed federal prosecutor who locked up disgraced former governor George Ryan, Tony [...]
When I was a kid my parents sent me to St. Patrick’s School, back when that school had 972 students, and was the largest school in the Rockford Diocese. We had two sites in those days — the early 1960s — the “new building” on School Street and the old [...]
U.S. Rep. Don Manzullo, R-Egan, has pushed for sometime for his legislation that would provide government cash in the form of dealer vouchers to anyone buying a new car — any new car. Democrats didn’t like that, and instead came up with “cash for clunkers,” a program to provide $4,500 [...]
According to Politico, a new poll shows that 58 percent of Republicans either don’t believe President Barack Obama is a citizen or aren’t sure.
I asked U.S. Rep. Don Manzullo, R-Egan, for his take on the president’s status, and here is is reply:
“Numerous claims have been made that President Barack [...]
Somebody ought to be fired over this. Way back in 2007, the Rockford region reached agreement on a railroad line from Rockford to Chicago to be home to Amtrak trains.
Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Il., officials of Illinois Dept. of Transportation, leaders of the R-MAP planning group, and other city and county [...]
Uh, oh. There’s a cancer growing in the charter school movement — unionization. The teachers unions are on the march and they’re organizing charter schools, including three of 12 schools operated by Chicago International Charter School, which has the School Board’s OK to set up a school in Rockford.
What’s special [...]
One question I have for the “birthers,” who are stoked by black helicopter websites into believing passionately that Barack Obama cannot be president because they say he wasn’t born in the U.S. :
When Obama was born in 1961, his birth announcement was published in two, Honolulu newspapers. I have never [...]
Be forewarned, Rockford School Board: The president of the United States is making a serious push for education reform, and that includes charter schools. When I say “serious push,” I mean the threat of withholding federal funds if districts don’t embrace the president’s idea of reform embodied by Sec. of [...]
Maybe President Obama is just under a lot of stress lately, but his off-hand remark about Prof. Henry Gates’ incident with the Cambridge, Mass. police was, well, stupid. He admitted he didn’t know the details and then said the police acted stupidly.
Sgt. Crowley, who was alone, was responding to a [...]
I attended a two-hour meeting Tuesday of the mayor’s “ad hoc” committee to study entertainment venue funding. Actually it should be called the “in hock” committee, because I learned the Redevelopment Fund is maxed out.
The answer is not to raise taxes first, the answer is to streamline operations among the [...]
Saturday was an unusually cold day in northern Illinois, but rail fans saw a sight to warm their hearts: the reappearance of the famed steam engine SP 4449 in Rochelle. The engine, manufactured in 1941, was among the last mainline steam locomotives to be built. The 4449 and others like [...]
State Rep. Dave Winters, R-Shirland, is a pilot, and to get to and from Springfield he flies a two-seat, one propeller plane. This week, though, he landed at Springfield’s airport on a wing and a prayer when his plane’s alternator quit.
See the video here from Capitol Fax
[...]I don’t know why Chicagoans are upset about the Sears Tower changing names. It’s now Willis Tower, and the Willis company is moving in with 500 jobs. That’s quite a commitment, compared to Sears, which beat retreat to Hoffman Estates in 1992 thanks to a $160 million donation by the [...]
Let no good deed go unpunished. The Red Cross wanted to get out of the homeless shelter business. Rather than see a need go unmet, the Rescue Mission stepped in, agreed to take over the homeless shelter and remodel it for women and children, seeing as they lost their original [...]
My column on the revival of the Trask Bridge Picnic was supposed to contain an on-line photo gallery. There has been a delay getting that published, but I’ve been assured that it will be up soon.
In case you missed it elsewhere, here it is again:
[...]Could Mayor Larry Morrissey’s attempt to unilaterally whack the library workers’ pension contributions from the 2010 city budget, also be a veiled threat to the fire and police unions?
Could be. I predict will see the four-versus-three men on a truck issue come up again, and that the mayor will ask [...]
Can it be 40 years since Neil Armstrong became the first human being to walk on the Moon? Indeed it can be, and July 20 is the day.
It was one of those “where you when” days for people who are old enough to remember. I can still picture my surroundings [...]
This is the best analysis I’ve seen about the forces that toppled Sarah Palin, at least temporarily. Every Palin basher needs to read it, and think about it.
Let me know what you think — after you’ve read it. Click here.
[...]The politics mavens are all agog over AG Lisa Madigan’s decision to seek re-election in 2010 instead of running for the U.S. Senate or governor.
So, now that Lisa’s decided, we can get ready for the March of the Wannabes, headed by a gaggle of DuPage GOP’ers.
Excuse me, but it’ll take [...]
The 2010 race for state Senate in the 34th district is heating up. Well, at least the Democratic half is heating up.
The only announced Demo candidate, lawyer Dan Lewandowski of Rockford, posted a cryptic comment on his FACEBOOK page Monday morning. Here’s what Dan-O said:
“I want to personally thank Mayor [...]
Mayor Morrissey, in an attempt to cut costs as the city continues to see revenues fail to meet expenses, wants to end the long practice of the city subsidizing library workers’ pensions. The library has a separate levy from the city, and Morrissey says the library will have to make [...]
The 2010 race for state Senate in the 34th is heating up. Well, the Democratic half is heating up.
The only announced Demo candidate, lawyer Dan Lewandowski of Rockford, posted a cryptic comment on his FACEBOOK page Monday morning. Here’s what Dan’O said:
”I want to personally thank Mayor Morrissey of [...]
“Passing partial budgets is not what adults do.” Gov.Pat Quinn, June 30, 2009.
Wrong, governor. You are acting like the old Pat “Gadfly” Quinn who stands outside the Capitol and shakes his fist at the evildoers inside.
You are the governor, now. But you’re saying that if you don’t get your own [...]
The appalling “cap and trade” bill comes up for a vote in the U.S. House Friday. Disguised as an environmental bill, this is actually a huge tax on Americans, who ultimately will pay thousands of dollars a year for the forced reduction in carbon emissions. And we don’t even know [...]
Way back in 1969, I was turning 20, and lamenting the breakup of The Beatles, which I blamed on Yoko. One day, my sister, who was 10, got a record (remember them?) of a new group called The Jackson Five, fronted by a 10 year old boy named Michael.
“1-2-3, easy [...]
Now we know why South Carolina’s Gov. Mark Sanford disappared over the weekend and went to Argentina without telling anyone, including his family. Read about it in The State.
[...]South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford, who has his eye on the GOP presidential nomination in 2012, has some ’splainin’ to do, first to his wife and children, then to the people of South Carolina, and then to the rest of us.
The governor, who tried to reject federal stimulus funds, only [...]
I was wondering when the Rockford School Board would get cold feet on charter schools. It approved three of them in a rather routine manner, then, Tuesday night, reversed course and voted down GreenTek, 5-1, and voted down Sigma Beta in a 3-3 tie.
The board has a past history with [...]
The neocons are whipped into a frenzy over Iran’s nuclear program and Obama’s assertion that Iran, like other countries, should be able to develop peaceful nuclear power.
Know whose policy that is? Dwight D. Eisenhower’s, that’s who. Ike created the Atoms For Peace program in 1953, designed to help nations get [...]
Chicago Rockford International Airport impresario Bob O’Brien scored a coup when he garnered Oprah Winfrey’s 1,500 employee excursion to Spain. When the talk show diva has treated employees to trips in the past, the flights have originated at O’Hare.
But O’Brien convinced Oprah’s people that RFD is much more convenient for [...]
When the Show of Shows was ending late Friday night, master of ceremonies Mike Robinson warned people to stay away from the area of South Mulford and Sandy Hollow roads. Big train wreck, he said. Burning tank cars of ethanol, he said.
Right. As soon as the show was over I [...]
The Phantom Regiment’s Show of Shows went on Friday night, sort of. After debating whether to cancel the drum corps competition because of monsoon-like rain that started a little after 6 p.m. and was still going on at 7:30, officials finally started the event at 8:30 p.m., but with a [...]
Today I have an example of how a perfectly sensible discussion has been blown way out of proportion as it has made the rounds of the talk radio circuit.
For some time now, there’s been serious discussion among urbanologists that some of our older, industrial cities should be downsized.
The poster child [...]
Bobby Jindal, Louisiana’s conservative governor, and liberal almost president Al Gore, are working together to bring a factory to that state that produces energy-efficient cars. Read it here
[...]
