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Armed robber: "Your money or your life." Very long pause. "Well?"
Jack Benny: "I'm thinking, I'm thinking."
Jack Benny was one of America's most popular radio comedians and movie stars of the 1930s and 1940s who was also popular on television in the 1950s and 1960s. He was born with the name Benjamin Kubelsky at Chicago's Mercy Hospital on St. Valentine's Day, Feb. 14, 1894.
The IR blog is a crossroads of the conservative community in Illinois. But there seem to be as many definitions of the word "conservative" as there are people who describe their own beliefs with that label. That is not surprising given that many conservatives are individualists. Conservatives are far from monolithic as is demonstrated on this blog every day. There is healthy diversity among conservatives and honest differences of opinion as to the merit of different candidates and positions.
So is there a common denomiator of basic principles for most conservatives? I think so, and that is the idea that indivudal freedom and responsibility are very high values. Economic conservatives stress the free market while social conservatives stress the importance of the Creator, church, and family in our society. But both groups agree on the whole and for the most part in the bedrock constitutional principles of America and the rule of law.
I have not recently seen a cohesive statement of general conservative principles even as many people discuss their principles by references to a particular issue of the moment. But I do recall one from almost a half century ago that still resonates with many today.
The Vote Values '06 information project reports that four Democrats thus far have responded to their 10-question survey: Incumbent House members Esther Golar (D-Chicago) and Frank Mautino (D-Spring Valley) and House challengers Jeffry Kettelsen and Gail Russell.
A pertinent and timely question Vote Values '06 included for this election cycle was, "Do you support or oppose withholding state (and federal) funds from units of local government that choose not to cooperate with the federal Immigration & Customs Enforcement Agency in enforcing U.S. immigration laws?"
Vote Values '06 reports every candidate -- both Democrats and Republicans -- responding to the immigration law enforcement question put an "X" in the "Support" column.
The results of Vote Values '06 state and federal candidates' surveys will be released online September 15.
"Everything that I learned of importance in my life, I learned here in Illinois." -- David S. Broder in 2005 at Southern Illinois University in Edwardsville.
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author David Broder is the dean of American political columnists. His syndicated column appears in thousands of newspapers all over the world and he has been a frequent commentator on television news panels for such programs as Inside Politics, Meet the Press, and Washington Week in Review.
by Fran Eaton
A group called Consider Homeschooling says Christian parents have no business sending their children to public schools, especially since a California court just ruled that pro-homosexual curriculum can now be dictated in taxpayer-funded schools.
"Instead of the traditional 3 R's in California's public schools, children are learning Rebelliousness, Relativism, and an R-rated lifestyle," said Charles Lowers, Consider Homeschooling's founder.
"Christian parents have been misguided in thinking their children can be 'salt and light' in the public schools when in fact, the opposite has occurred. Public school is no place for innocent little kids. If they don't get molested by the John Karr's who are in the system, their minds and hearts will be molested by the curriculum."
Pretty strong language for a Christian. . .
Continue reading "Should parents pull their kids from public schools?" »
by Cal Skinner
House Republican Minority Leader (and once Speaker) Lee Daniels’ chief of staff Mike Tristano is enjoying his last days of freedom this year.
It’s off to Federal prison at the end of the month--but not for long.
Assuming good behavior—and there is no reason to believe Mike will not be compliant—he’ll be able to be with his family again in less than a year.
As I have written previously, Tristano was identified as “Official One” in Roger Stanley’s May 9, 2003, plea agreement. At the time I could only narrow it down to Daniels or Tristano. I was told that day that “Committee One” was the House Republican Campaign Committee.
Continue reading "Lee Daniels' Former Chief of Staff Off to Prison" »
While the Protect Marriage Initiative continues to push in federal court for a November statewide ballot spot, traditional family values activists continue to make the definition of marriage as between a man and a woman an issue with candidates, both at the federal and state levels.
Many believe the only answer is for the marriage definition to become a part of the U.S. Constitution.
The problem is not the definition of marriage, Republican candidate in the 17th CD Andrea Zinga suggests. In a recently released position paper on the topic, Zinga suggests the real problem is judicial activism, not the definition of marriage.
Continue reading "Maybe this proposal will fix the Constitutional problem . . . " »
The current crop of Illinois General Assembly candidates are divided almost 50/50 in their responses to one of ten questions raised on a General Election candidate survey, Vote Values 06 reports today.
Answering the question, "Do you support or oppose providing state scholarships for elementary and secondary students to attend private schools chosen by their parents?" half of those responding said they "support" and half said they "oppose."
Vote Values '06 plans to publish the full survey results online September 15.
By Mark Rhoads
The biography of Chicago-based entreprenuer, broadcaster, publisher, author, and actress Oprah Winfrey reads like a 19th Century Horatio Alger (1832-1898) rags to riches success story. Alger wrote more than a hundred books on the theme that through honesty, hard work, and strong determination, the American Dream was available to anyone willing to make the journey. Oprah Winfrey has made that journey so far all the way from an early childhod in the rural poverty of Mississippi to the status of being America's first black billionaire and listed as one of the 270 richest Americans. She is also a philanthropist who recently was listed by Business Week as the 32nd most generous individual donor in the country with gifts to many causes totaling about $250 million in
It has come to my attention that State Senator Peter Roskam has received the endorsement of the Free Enterprise Fund (FEF) PAC. FEF is a leading advocate for tax relief and reform, fiscal restraint, limited government and a pro-growth economic agenda. All are issues Roskam has been committed to, and advocated, while serving his constituents in the General Assembly for the past 13 years.
In an effort to support area military families, the Kane County Young Republicans raised over $3000 Monday night for the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors (TAPS).
Mark Vargas, president of the Kane County Young Republicans, said he was disgusted when he heard about war protestors conducting 12-hr hunger strikes, and wanted to show support for our soldiers fighting the war on terror.
Continue reading "Kane County Young Republicans raise $3000 for TAPS" »
By Mark Rhoads
"The handicap of deafness is not in the ear, it is in the mind." - Marlee Matlin
Academy Award-winning actress Marlee Matlin was born in Morton Grove, Illinois on August 24, 1965. She was born with normal hearing but became deaf at the age of 18 months due to a disease called Roseola Infantum. She performed at the Children's Theatre of the Deaf in Des Plaines and starred as Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz at the age of 7.
It was still light when Penny Pullen and I reached our meeting point near Sioux Falls with State Rep. Roger Hunt, sponsor of the abortion bill being voted upon in South Dakota this fall.
I was pretty amazed at how a legislative study committee had prepared a 72-page report based on hearings at which proponents and opponents were given the exact same time to testify. Many testified by telephone.
Continue reading "Penny Pullen Meets with South Dakota Abortion Bill Sponsor Roger Hunt" »
Sunday, Chicago Minutemen's Rick Biesada attempted to enter Chicago's Adalberto United Methodist Church, which continues to act as a sanctuary for immigrant rights' activist Elvira Arellano.
Arellano, a Mexican, is fighting deportation back to her homeland.
Check out more on this story below, with additional photos taken by Rick Biesada, who's scheduled to appear on Geraldo Rivera's Fox News show Monday.
Continue reading "Immigrant controversy continues in Chicago" »
With the deadline for responding passed, word is that thus far, Vote Values '06 candidate surveys indicate that two Democratic candidates and two Republicans oppose requiring doctors to obtain a parent or legal guardian's consent before performing any medical or surgical procedure, including abortion, on a minor.
All other responders clearly support parents' knowing beforehand their minor children are undergoing medical procedures, something Illinois presently does not require in the case of abortion.
How would you prefer your lawmakers respond to that question?
Illinois Review will soon provide a direct link to the Vote Values 06 survey results. Keep watch for updates and news. More to come. . .
By Mark Rhoads
Frederick Weyerhaeuser was born in Niedersaulheim, Rhine-Hesse in what is now Germany in 1834. He emigrated to Erie, Pennsylvania at the age of 18 in 1852 where he met and married Elisabeth Bladel. The couple moved to Rock Island, Illinois in 1856 where Frederick helped to supervise a sawmill and a timberyard. He was a highly reliable young worker trusted by associates and employers. He once wrote, "The secret lay simply in my will to work. I never watched the clock and never stopped before I had finished what I was working on."
Continue reading "Illinois Hall of Fame: Frederick Weyerhaeuser" »
Chicagoans from the Lincoln Park area who visit London and take a tour of Westminster Abbey just might have a surprise in store for them when they come out the front entrance. Look to the right and across the street about sixty yards and you will see outside another church in Parliament Square an exact full-size bronze replica of The Standing Lincoln that was first dedicated by Abraham Lincoln II in Lincoln Park in Chicago in 1887 and still stands there today.
The replica in London was made from the same original mold that was produced by the great 19th Century sculptor Augustus St. Gaudens. The president's grandson, Abraham Lincoln II was called "Jack" by his family. Jack dedicated the statue in Lincoln Park when he was only 15. His father Robert Todd Lincoln was asked by President Benjamin Harrison to be the U.S. Ambassador to England in 1889 and his family was living with him in London in 1890 when Jack suddenly died at the age of only 17. The London statue of Lincoln was dedicated in 1920 by church members of several denominations who admired The Great Emancipator. Robert Todd Lincoln urged the Londoners to use the St. Gaudens prototype rather than another Lincoln statue in Cleveland.
All the way to the Missouri River, the dividing line of South Dakota, we saw signs advertising Wall Drug.
Former State Rep. Penny Pullen and I attended a planning meeting of the Vote Yes on Referral Law 6 campaign at the riverside resort.
She brought tears to at least one of the S.D. legislators who supported the bill when she spoke of how they were in the “vanguard of the end to legalized 
abortion in America.”
Because those in favor of abortion are so profit-motivated, they will have plenty of money to finance its campaign. If you want to help the pro-life side of the campaign, you can do so at the web site linked to above.
In the mid-1950’s, our family visited the establishment and it didn’t really impress me too favorably. It had all sorts of souvenir-type merchandise.
And, that’s pretty much all I remember.
I’m glad we stopped, because it certainly has become famous from all the signs it has put up.
Oh, by the way. Did you know the number of abortions in South Dakota are almost exactly the same number as the population of Wall, South Dakota?
Jackie Joyner-Kersee is a member of the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame who is widely regarded as the best all-around female athlete in the world. In four consecutive Olympic games from 1984 to 1996, she won three Gold, one Silver, and two Bronze medals in track and field events. She once held the six highest scores in the world for the Olympic heptathalon and has held the heptathalon world record for the last twenty years. According to family legend, Jackie was named after First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy because her grandmother wanted her to be "first lady of something." She was born in East St. Louis, Illinois on March 3, 1962. Her parents struggled to provide a warm and safe home in a very tough neighborhood.
Continue reading "Illinois Hall of Fame: Jackie Joyner-Kersee" »
By Mark Rhoads
Avery Brundage was a successful builder of Chicago skycrapers, one of the foremost collectors of Asian art in the world, and a philanthropist who left an art collection to San Francisco and a scholarship fund at the University of Illinois. But he was best known worldwide for his advocacy for amateur sports and sometimes for controversial decisions affecting the Olympic Games. He was so controversial at times that some of his most severe critics would argue that Brundage would be an apt candidate for a Hall of Shame for some of his actions. Other historians would acknowledge his flaws but would not be as harsh in their judgments. There is no doubt that he was one of the most famous Illinoisans on the global stage in the middle part of the Twentieth Century.
by Fran Eaton
Having a son-in-law serving his second stint in Baghdad now, I am especially high on the Kane County Young Republicans' effort to "Feast for the Troops" Monday night, August 28, in Batavia.
I know firsthand how much sacrifice our young men are making in being away from their loved ones, and how difficult it is for the wives and babies they leave behind. They all deserve our support and appreciation.
Jon and I correspond almost daily via Yahoo Messenger, and he tells me each day that it's 120 degrees there and that he's proud of what he's doing. He never complains about the Cindy Sheahan's of the world. He's focused on doing his job and getting back home once again.
That's why I plan to spend $15 to "Feast for the Troops" with Mark Vargas and the Kane County Young Republicans next Monday night in Elgin. I hope you'll be there, that I get to shake your hand, and that we'll altogether raise lots of money for the military families left behind.
I've noticed a lot of discussion about the Roskam/Duckworth race on Illinois Review. With only 73 days left until the election, I thought it might be interesting for those at the crossroads of the conservative community to understand Duckworth's positions on some important issues.
Of course to understand Duckworth's position would require her to actually take one. So far all she's done is express "concern" about issues. Thanks Tammy. How about some solutions, or policy proposals, or....dare I say it...leadership? Saying one is "concerned" about an issue without taking a position on that issue shows that one doesn't really understand the issues.
Let me give some examples:
By Mark Rhoads
Over a period of 150 years, Chicago has been a world-class leader for outstanding examples of architecutural innovation and urban planning. The list of famous architects who have lived in Illinois and have done their most significant commissions in the state is a long one that includes William Le Baron Jenney, the father of the skycraper; Louis H. Sullivan and Dankmar Adler, leading lights of The Prairie School; the founder of landscape architecture Frederick Law Olmsted; Frank Lloyd Wright, a prolific designer who left more examples of his work in Illinois than in any other state; and Ludwig Mies Vander Roe, the designer of the campus of the Illinois Institute of Technology.
Boy, am I getting old.
About 15 years ago, I was so proud of Illinois’ Republican state representatives. (I was still in remission between my 8 years in the 1970’s and 8 years in the 1990’s.)
When riverboat gambling was proposed in Illinois, not one GOP House member voted for it.
I even went to the Legislative Printing Unit and, after arguing that I was merely asking them to reprint a roll call in a different format, their printers produced a card which showed the names of all the Democrats voting “Yes” and all the Republicans voting “No.”
Now, Republicans are mainlining contributions from casino interests and wanna-be casinos (read race tracks, off-track betting parlors and, who knows, maybe even Shell Oil).
Continue reading "Is Judy Topinka to Land-Based Casinos What Richard Nixon Was to China?" »
Last October at the National Book Fair on the Mall in Washington, DC, I helped pass out Illinois Heritage Maps at the Illinois State Library table in the huge Tent of the States. Thousands of children came by to get their maps of the U.S. stamped with the Illinois stamp. The goal of each was to visit every state table to win a prize. The Illinois stamp was just the outline of a stove pipe hat. That's it, just a hat. We asked every child who appreared to be under the age of ten, "Whose hat is that?" In the four hours that I was there, not one child even hesitated. Every single child said, "It's Lincoln's hat." And the way they said it was with great admiration and enthusiam. It was an incredibly heartwarming experience to know that Lincoln is still so universally loved and admired both in America and overseas. Thousands of books have been written about him. A new book is a terrific survey of the cabinet of Lincoln during the Civil War written by Doris Kearns Goodwin. It would be presumptious to try to cover the most famous Illinoisan of all time in a blog entry when so much has been written about his life. Every reader of Illinois Review already knows a great deal about him. So I am asking for your comments below as to why you think Lincoln was a great leader.
He was born in Hardin County, Kentucky on Feb. 12, 1809. Exactly one hundred years later, the Lincoln penny became the first U.S. coin to bear the image of a president when it replaced the Indian Head penny. The Lincoln page on The White House web site has a good short biography of his life and presidency. After childhood years in wilderness areas of Kentucky and Indiana and losing his mother, Lincoln split rails and worked and read for the law in New Salem, Illinois. He lived in Illinois for the next 31 years of his life from 1830 until he left Springfield for the last time to live in the White House in 1861.
Thousands of overseas tourists travel all the way to Springfield every year just to visit his tomb and his home. Why? There is a statue of The Standing Lincoln across the street from Westminster Abbey in London made from the same identical mold as the one designed by Augustus St. Gaudens in Lincoln Park in Chicago. Why does the life of Lincoln remain so appealing to people all over the world today? In your opinion, what qualities or accomplishments of Abraham Lincoln made him a great leader? Thank you in advance for your ideas.
Florida congressional candidate Mike Flanagan's suggestion that Muslim airline passengers as profiled as potential terrorists is being decried by Arab groups today.
Flanagan said in a statement Monday, "It is a fact that over the past thirty-four years, starting with the Munich Olympics, the majority of terrorist attacks have been carried out by Muslims."
"It defies logic to pull out elderly ladies and young children, while those who fit the profile of a terrorist walk right through at the airport," he added. "We must stop playing games with security in the name of political correctness."
Flanagan is the third GOP candidate to raise the issue in the past few weeks.
Should airline passengers be profiled based on appearance? Should they be asked questions about their religious beliefs? Would it be foolish to focus all suspicious on Muslim-looking persons?
What do you think?
by Fran Eaton
I'm disappointed in LaRaza reporter Vicente De La Cruz's take on the ongoing voter registration drive controversy found here. I'm insulted by the story's accusations that I was part of a conspiracy to entrap undocumented immigrants.
Hopefully, Mr. De La Cruz will consider a followup story which includes quotes from my perspective found here. I'm hoping the current online story was published before he interviewed me Tuesday morning, and that a more balanced response will be available on the LaRaza website soon.
I'll emphasize the point I tried to make in the now-controversial posting (here): All U.S. citizens 18 years and older who are not convicted felons should be registered to vote.
Now, if that displays bigotry, I'm sure I'll hear from 17 year olds, murderers and non-citizens who are not yet qualified to vote.
Why do I feel like I'm living in the Twilight Zone here?
UPDATE: At 9:52 am, Mr. De La Cruz emailed me to inform me the LaRaza story had been updated to include my reaction. I note the addition at the bottom of the story.
