Below are links to news stories of interest from newspapers that came up during a search today. These links were active at the time of this e-mail, but should you want to save a story, printing it or cutting and pasting the entire article and saving it to your computer is recommended.
State News
Local superintendents react to ‘Race’ proposal with skepticism, questions Chicago Daily Herald – At a news conference Tuesday, US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan gave broad strokes for plans for the district-specific competition. …
Harrisburg School Board makes several possible cuts
Harrisburg Daily Register – In all, the board arrived at $458,000 in possible cuts and decided not to fund pre-kindergarten if there is no state funding for the program next year. The list will be sent to the Harrisburg Education Association for required impact bargaining, although the cuts themselves are still the final decision of the board, most likely at the March meeting.
School cuts: State fiscal crisis is root of problem
Harrisburg Daily Register – The drastic actions being taken by the Harrisburg school board are being considered because of the deepening financial crisis faced by the state. The state is behind as much as $5 billion on its bills and facing $11 to $13 billion deficits in the
St. Charles students’ choice: Band or exploratory courses
Arlington Heights Daily Herald – Parents and students were unsuccessful in begging the St. Charles school board Thursday to not make middle-school students choose between band and exploratory courses. But there was a small compromise, in that the board decided to keep small-group instrumental
State funding shortfall threatens transportation for Project HELP
Mattoon Journal Gazette – School bus transportation could end soon for some students in an early childhood at-risk program, as Charleston school officials say they can’t pick up the cost.At Wednesday’s school board meeting, Superintendent Jim Littleford said the Eastern Illinois Area of Special Education asked member districts if they’d pay for bus service to Project HELP
Teacher Strike Could End in Dist. 111
Chicago WFLD (Fox) 32 – a teachers strike in Kankakee School Dist. 111. Teachers walked off the job earlier this week in a dispute over pay and health benefits. Union leaders worked out a tentative agreement with the school board yesterday. Teachers will vote on the deal today and if it is approved, school will re-open on Monday. There will be no classes today.
Southeast High teacher to appear on Oprah show Friday
Springfield State Journal Register – A Southeast High School teacher will appear on The Oprah Winfrey Show today to talk about texting and driving. After Robert Nika, a driver’s education instructor at Southeast, had learned about Winfrey’s No Phone Zone campaign, urging people to put their cell phones away while driving, he visited the show’s Website
Probe: Lavish Spending By School Board Presidents Former Chicago School Board President Michael Scott and his predecessor, Rufus Williams, decorated their offices with expensive artwork …
Political News
It boils down to this for voters? The audio version of this column is available here, at my podcast feed. It didn’t take long for the debate between Gov. Pat Quinn and state Comptroller Dan Hynes to clatter down onto the low road. About 45 seconds into opening statements of Tuesday night’s gubernatorial primary forum on ABC-Channel 7, Quinn demanded, “Why did things go so wrong at Burr Oak Cemetery?” Quinn repeatedly attempted during the hour-long debate to blame Hynes for the scandal at the cemetery near Alsip — plots resold, bodies moved and so on. And it reflected far more poorly on Quinn than on Hynes.
As attack ads fly, Ill. candidates deny attacking Chicago Tribune – ?Both Democrats in the increasingly bitter race for Illinois governor are denying they went on the attack by airing new, negative ads. …
Kass: Illinois voters being taken for a ride
And now Illinois can see him, too, boss of the Illinois Democrats, with eager law clients rushing to retain him, clients that often benefit from the warm embrace of government Madigan leverages at his whim after more than 25 years as speaker of the House. He must make a fortune. But we really don’t know. He won’t say. What Madigan does say, through his mouthpiece Steve Brown, is that it’s all completely ethical. Sure it is. It must be so
Is this how Quinn should respond? Chicago Tribune (blog) – ? Deep into the Capitol Fax blog’s vigorous comment thread concerning the new Dan Hynes commercial showing vintage video of former Chicago Mayor Harold …
Key aide to Harold Washington says mayor was disappointed with Quinn While Gov. Pat Quinn’s campaign accused his leading opponent of misusing footage of former Mayor Harold Washington to make political points yesterday, a key insider in the Washington administration says the mayor’s comments reflected a heartfelt disappointment with Quinn.
Harold Washington rips Quinn from grave in Hynes ad
Chicago Sun – “Who are you gonna believe, me, or your lying eyes?” Richard Pryor coined that phrase, but it has become Gov. Quinn’s stock reaction to his opponent’s campaign ads. After being hammered by Comptroller Dan Hynes for secretly releasing hundreds of dangerous felons from prison early,
Hynes uses Harold Washington’s words against Quinn
Chicago Tribune – Harold Washington in a blatant maneuver to mislead voters,” Quinn spokeswoman Elizabeth Austin said in a statement. “That Dan Hynes would use a 24-year-old news clip of a beloved figure to attack Gov. Quinn shows there is no limit to his negative campaigning. There also is no limit to his hypocrisy.” The politically risky ad hits on two leading themes of Hynes’ campaign.
Quinn, Hynes unveil new ads aimed at black voters
Arlington Heights Daily Herald – Comptroller Dan Hynes’ one-minute ad unleashes video of Harold Washington, Chicago’s first black mayor, explaining why he fired Pat Quinn as the city’s revenue director in 1987. The governor’s 30-second spot blames Hynes for failing to catch alleged misdeeds at a historic black cemetery in suburban Chicago.
Budget, Not Blagojevich, Dominates Governor’s Race
Chicago WBBH (CBS) 2 – Quinn, who has made conflicting statements about the program, blamed his corrections chief and halted the program. But he has been unable to stanch the flow of criticism from his opponents. “Gov. Quinn is hiding, and his lack of transparency has put our systems at risk,” said Republican Bill Brady, a state senator from Bloomington. All this could all add up to trouble for Quinn
Schillerstrom dropping out of gov.’s race, backing Ryan Naperville Republican Bob Schillerstrom is giving up his bid for governor today and throwing his weight in DuPage County to former state Attorney General Jim Ryan, according to a GOP source.
Hynes has twice as much campaign cash as Quinn
Springfield State Journal – Incumbent Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn had less than half as much money as his Democratic opponent heading into the final weeks before the primary election, according to campaign finance records. Dan Hynes ended the six-month reporting period Dec. 31 with $3.1 million, compared with Quinn’s $1.5 million, the records show, largely the result of the three-term state comptroller’s huge head
Race Track: Governor hopefuls spent nearly $10 million in six months
Streator Times-Press – The race for Illinois governor is expensive. With less than two weeks before the primaries, candidates seeking the state’s highest office have released their financial reports for July through December 2009. Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn’s campaign spent more than $2.3 million during those months, according to his semi-annual report to the Illinois State Board of Elections.
College to state rep: Give us our $25,000 statue back Michael Sneed: Is state Rep. Monique Davis one brick short of a load? Sneed has learned Davis, who already is in hot water for a $500,000 bill allegedly owed to the Chicago Board of Education, is now refusing to return a $25,000 sculpture of an African slave, which is owned by Chicago State University!
National News
WHY TEXAS SKIPPED THE “RACE TO THE TOP” National Center for Policy Analysis – ? President Barack Obama’s $787 trillion failed stimulus included a $4.3 billion set aside for Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s “Race to the Top” fund. …
Businesses, unions freed to spend big on elections
Washington Post – A bitterly divided Supreme Court vastly increased the power of big business and unions to influence government decisions Thursday by freeing them to spend their millions directly to sway elections for president and Congress. The ruling reversed a century-long trend to limit the political muscle of corporations, organized labor and their massive war chests.
TIME.com Today’s Top Stories
Fighting Words: Can Obama Profit from a Wall Street Crackdown? Obama’s proposals to crack down on Wall Street signal a somewhat new approach to financial reform — and a very new approach to politics and governing: more populist, more confrontational, less deferential to Congress, less eager for common ground
At a Haitian Factory, Working Through the Grief Just outside Port-au-Prince, one factory got back to business the day after the earthquake and became a place to take refuge from personal mourning
Are Face-Detection Cameras Racist? Why several consumer cameras and webcams are being called out by customers for failing to recognize non-Caucasian features and faces
Is the Campaign Finance Ruling Good for Democracy? Depending on which very, very long opinion in the campaign finance case you prefer, the Supreme Court either struck a blow for the First Amendment or sold American politics into bondage to soulless corporations
RIP: Air America Goes Off the Air Born to defeat George W. Bush, the lefty radio network dies a year and a day after Obama’s inauguration
Washington Post
Mr. Brown goes to Washington
Scott Brown left the truck back in Massachusetts. At 9:30 on Thursday morning, the Republican state senator arrived by US Airways shuttle at Reagan National Airport, though he rode a GMC-driving everyman image and a wave of Tea Party-stoked, establishment-financed frustration into the U.S. Senate…
(By Jason Horowitz, The Washington Post)
Court rejects corporate political spending limits
Support or opposition in campaigns is free speech, justices rule
(By Robert Barnes and Dan Eggen, The Washington Post)
In ‘Volcker Rule,’ a shift away from Geithner
(By David Cho and Binyamin Appelbaum, The Washington Post)
Panel on Guantanamo backs indefinite detention for some
(By Peter Finn, The Washington Post)
Obama proposes stricter rules for the largest banks
A BRAKE ON EXPANSION
Investments would have to benefit customers
(By Michael D. Shear and Binyamin Appelbaum, The Washington Post)
Panel on Guantanamo backs indefinite detention for some
A Justice Department-led task force has concluded that nearly 50 of the 196 detainees at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, should be held indefinitely without trial under the laws of war, according to Obama administration officials.
(By Peter Finn, The Washington Post)
Obama proposes stricter rules for the largest banks
A BRAKE ON EXPANSION
Investments would have to benefit customers
(By Michael D. Shear and Binyamin Appelbaum, The Washington Post)
Rebound awaited in an American manufacturing hub
JOB LOSSES CLIMBING
Obama in Ohio to offer assurance of turnaround
(By Michael A. Fletcher, The Washington Post)
What the court’s ruling does
(The Washington Post)
Politics & The Nation
(The Washington Post)
Word of the Day for Friday, January 22, 2010
prevaricate \prih-VAIR-uh-kayt\, intransitive verb:
To depart from or evade the truth; to speak with equivocation.