When we first started the Illinois Mirror to critique media bias, we thought our task would be somewhat difficult.
Silly us.
The Illinois media’s bias in favor of Democrats, labor unions, the minimum wage, nearly every social program to be initiated, re-appropriated, or otherwise funded is supported full on, regardless of past performance or in the face of common-sense economics.
So it came as no surprise to us that a front-page piece in Sunday’s Chicago Tribune about how House Speaker Mike Madigan used accounting trickery to protect school funds for his district and the districts of other leading Democrats, was met with awe by a press corps that should be outraged as such budget shenanigans, regardless of party affiliation.
“School money flows to Madigan district while state dollars tight” is the headline on a piece written by veteran Springfield reporter Ray Long.
At a time when Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner has frozen state spending and cut the budget, a $35 million state grant got paid in full last month that helps build a 1,500-student school in the district of House Speaker Michael Madigan.
The grant went through thanks to a longsighted legislative maneuver by Madigan and his fellow Democrats, who tucked the money away more than a year ago so that no governor could touch it: They sent it to the office of Secretary of State Jesse White, a party loyalist.
Unlike other grants Rauner halted in the budget he inherited from Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn, the $35 million sought by the cash-strapped Chicago Public Schools was never in jeopardy because it sat safely in the account of another statewide officeholder.
Pardon us for having a memory, but isn’t this the same Illinois media that were outraged — OUTRAGED!! — when it learned that Gov. Bruce Rauner was paying staff salaries out of department budgets? Budgets, the media were quick to point out, designed to help the poor and downtrodden of the state. Never mind that salary “offshoring” — there’s even a term for it — has been something other governor’s have done before. The media, like “Casablanca’s” fictitious Captain Renault, were “shocked” to learn that the governor, whom they had painted as the worst kind of greedy, out-of-touch capitalist during the campaign, was resorting to such a trick.
Of course, there’s a word for what Mike Madigan is doing as well; it’s called “budget trickery,” but you’ll never find those words nor anything else negative in the Ray Long story. Just the opposite; Long admires Madigan’s budget acumen.
The money trail provides a case study into how Madigan deftly works the system to get what he wants — enabling the money to reach schools in his district and those of his allies even as others saw funds from the state disappear. The results underscore Madigan’s ability to stay not just a step ahead in the political game but to see several steps down the road.
The front-page piece also makes clear that it’s not just Madigan’s district that is protected.
An elementary school in the neighboring district of Rep. Dan Burke will get $6.5 million for roofing, masonry and other work, and $5.5 million will go to two schools in House Majority Leader Barbara Flynn Currie’s South Side district. The remaining $10 million is slated for air conditioning — an expansion of which Mayor Rahm Emanuel is pushing — in 35 schools elsewhere in Chicago.
Had Bruce Rauner done something like this, the media would be shocked — shocked like “Casablanca’s” fictional Inspector Renault — that such things were going on in Springfield. Mike Madigan, who’s been in charge for more than 30 years and more to blame than anyone for the state’s fiscal dilemma, gets admiration.
Amazing.
But we’ll keep watching…and reporting.
Publius
