Note: The opinions expressed on this page are those of the authors alone, and not of Moraine Township Democratic Organization.
Opinion
Will the Real Robert Dold Please Stand Up?
During the last election, Robert Dold was recommended by the Illinois Right to Life Committee. Dold claimed to be pro-choice when it suited his interests, but NARAL Pro-Choice America and Planned Parenthood vigorously opposed his candidacy.
Last month, Dold and his Republican colleague from Illinois, Judy Biggert, voted against defunding Planned Parenthood. Dold even gave a speech about it.
Here’s what Bill Beckman, executive director of the Illinois Right to Life Committee, said a few days ago about Dold and Biggert:
“The irony is that when they had the final bill passage, they flipped. Both voted for it. We’re playing games here in reality,” Beckman said.
“Which is better: that they voted against the amendment and for the final bill, or vice versa? I’ll tolerate those Republicans if they vote the final bill the right way, even if they want to throw a bone to Planned Parenthood that doesn’t count.”
http://www.rollcall.com/issues/56_89/-203763-1.html?zkMobileView=true
We don’t usually agree with Beckman, but he makes a good point. The bill that finally passed, the bill that actually defunds Planned Parenthood, passed with Dold’s support.
So where does Robert Dold really stand? With us or with Illinois Right to Life? As residents of the 10th district, we call on Dold to take a stand: Do you or do you not agree with Beckman? Did you “throw a bone to Planned Parenthood” with a meaningless vote in their defense? If not, how do you explain your subsequent vote to defund Planned Parenthood?”
Don’t hold your breath waiting for an answer. That’s the way Bob Dold will do it in the year-plus that remains in his two-year term as a congressman. He will throw bones to the pro-choice crowd. He will throw an occasional bone to the environmental crowd. He will toss a bone every now and then to keep the gun-control crowd happy. But if you support choice, the environment or gun control, don’t expect him to be there for you when a vote really counts.
You see, Bob Dold has been schooled in “10th District Politics 101″ or “How to be a Republican and survive in the 10th District” by the master himself. Mark Kirk did this for years. He would vote one way on an amendment, when he knew his vote wouldn’t make a difference in the measure passing or failing, and then vote the other way on final passage of the bill. That way, he would point to his votes on amendments and keep the choice, environmental and gun-control crowds happy, and then point to his votes on the final passage of bills to keep the anti-choice, anti-environment and pro-gun crowds happy.
So, how does Dold sell himself to the overall public after his votes for and against Planned Parenthood?
“Illinois’ 10th District has a long history of being represented by socially moderate Republican Congressmen going back 30 years with former Reps. John Porter and Mark Kirk,” Dold said in a statement provided to Roll Call. “I am a social moderate and fiscal conservative and fit that mold as well.”
Sound familiar? Same lines used by Mark Kirk in his ten years as our congressman. Then, when he ran for the U.S. Senate, Kirk said, as he did about his vote in favor of cap-and-trade, that he really doesn’t support cap-and-trade, he just had to vote that way to keep getting re-elected in the 10th.
It’s kind of sad. Here we sit, in what Mark Kirk frequently called the most educated congressional district in the country, and the best we can get to represent us in Congress are men who “play games” to deceive us, and “throw us bones” to keep us happy.
Wouldn’t it be nice to be represented by someone who really believes in something instead of another hack who only believes in one thing . . . his re-election campaign?
– Tenth Dems
What Is at Stake in Wisconsin?
by Gilbert Feldman
Wisconsin’s new governor, Scott Walker, and a sizable, newly elected Republican majority in both houses of the state Legislature are pushing a bill that would render public employee unions impotent. It would bar collective bargaining except on wages (with any increase limited by the consumer price index), bar dues deductions, eliminate the union’s right to charge nonmembers for the cost of the union’s being legally required to bargain for them, limit contracts to one year, and require a recertification vote every year. The proposed legislation would double the employees’ costs for their contributions for health care and would add significantly to their payments for pension benefits, resulting, in effect, in an 8% pay cut.
Such a union-busting effort is unprecedented in recent decades. President Obama has termed it an “assault” on labor unions. Public employee unions already have taken significant reductions in pay and benefits to assist in resolving budgetary problems. They have agreed to negotiate additional financial concessions but have refused to accept elimination of collective bargaining rights. Walker has refused to talk to them, insisting on passage of his plan without change. He declares that this action is necessary to balance the state budget.
Walker’s claim of a fiscal crisis is clearly pretextual. Wisconsin is not facing a crisis and need not experience a deficit for three years. Last month, Walker and his legislature gave away $117 million in tax breaks, which, according to the state’s Legislative Fiscal Bureau, eliminated a surplus that would otherwise have been enjoyed. Wisconsin is in much better fiscal shape than most other states. And the new bill exempts from coverage the police and fire unions that supported Walker’s candidacy.
So what is going on? The news media generally interpret Walker’s action as a union busting device thinly portrayed as a response to a fiscal problem. But the facts suggest much more is at stake. The Republican party hopes that success in Wisconsin will assure the defeat of President Obama in 2012 and conversion of the Democratic party into a minority party.
Similar legislative action is pending in Ohio, Florida, Indiana, Michigan, and Tennessee, also states in which Republicans gained control of both the legislative and executive branches in 2010. By making Wisconsin the lead state in this concerted action, the GOP is taking a significant gamble: the risk of electoral backlash balanced against the chance for a potentially great reward. Wisconsin is a very blue state, the birthplace of public employee unions. Unions provide not only funding for Democrats but, more importantly, the human power that does the ground work in election campaigns. Private sector unions have been greatly weakened by outsourcing and technological change and public employee unions today are the base and bulwark of the Democratic party. Other states would be much more receptive to this Republican initiative. But elimination of public employee labor unions as a powerful force in Wisconsin would make it virtually impossible for President Obama to be reelected. And if Wisconsin fell, other states that are easier conquests would soon follow.
This may be a fight to the death for American labor and the Democratic party. I hope we are up to it.
Gilbert Feldman, a Highland Park resident, is a senior partner in the Chicago-based labor law firm of Cornfield and Feldman.
The Contradiction of Bob Dold
Running for Congress in the 10th district, Bob Dold claimed to be the ‘small business candidate.’ At first glance this seems logical, considering Dold’s greatest achievement is receiving the job of president of Rose Pest Solutions from his father in 2007. However, after reading about Dold’s plans to use his small business experience to rebuild the economy, it became clear logic was not at all part of his campaign.
Dold’s resume includes two short stints in Washington at less than prestigious jobs, as well a few years at a struggling multi-million dollar communications company. Leaving behind a career at a struggling corporation to return home to his parents’ company was not very innovative. Neither is Dold’s economic policy. Dold’s proposal to rebuild the economy has two main prongs: give tax cuts to small businesses, and reduce the federal debt. The only problem with this plan is that it cannot work. With tax cuts, less revenue coming in would mean the government the deficit increases. To account for this, Dold would evidently prefer to cut spending along with cutting taxes. Add this to Dold’s commitment to fiscal austerity and reducing the federal debt overall, and the result is a giant reduction of government spending. If these strategies sound vaguely familiar, it’s because Herbert Hoover used them during his presidency – and we all know how that ended.
As any college student learns in introductory economics, the last thing to do in a recession is to slash government spending. Today, unemployment is very high. The government is not only a major employer, but a major consumer of the services and products of firms in the US. The double cuts in government spending Dold is advocating would lead to many more jobs being lost (not only in the public but also in the private sector), and would further depress the entire economy. Even with tax cuts, businesses will be discouraged from expanding if the economy continues collapsing and they are losing customers directly or indirectly due to lower government spending.
Dold’s plans for economic recovery, just like his resume, sound good for about 30 seconds. Until you realize both are pretty much worthless.
Add $4 trillion to the deficit
by Chris in Paris on 9/15/2010 11:19:00 AM
Haven’t they added enough economic problems to the US economy to last a few lifetimes? Once again the GOP plan is to rally ’round the richest Americans and then stick the bill with the shrinking middle class. This is insane. From the Washington Post:
“Even as they hammer Democrats for running up record budget deficits, Senate Republicans are rolling out a plan to permanently extend an array of expiring tax breaks that would deprive the Treasury of more than $4 trillion over the next decade, nearly doubling projected deficits over that period unless dramatic spending cuts are made.
“The measure, introduced by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) this week, would permanently extend the George W. Bush-era income tax cuts that benefit virtually every U.S. taxpayer, rein in the alternative minimum tax and limit the estate tax to estates worth more than $5 million for individuals or $10 million for couples.”
–from AMERICAblog.com
Reflections on the 2010 election
By John Hmurovic
Election night didn’t feel good. And, it wasn’t. Democrats lost a Senate seat in Illinois, and in the 10th District we lost a chance to pick up a congressional seat which we thought we could win. We lost other congressional seats in Illinois, as well. But if you get past the national level offices, if you read beyond the big headlines, if you look at the whole picture, it wasn’t as bad as it felt.
There’s no way to sugarcoat what happened on election night. We lost ground on the national level. But if you believe this election was a Republican tidal wave, that description just doesn’t wash.
In 10th Congressional District precincts, we did lose two freshman state legislators. Both State Representative Mark Walker of Arlington Heights and State Senator Michael Bond of Grayslake lost in their first re-election bids.
But, on the positive side, Daniel Biss of Evanston won a state House seat that had been in Republican hands. And despite huge sums of money spent to capture three other House seats, money which financed incredibly negative Republican campaigns, all three Democrats held on: Veteran legislator Karen May of Highland Park won by a comfortable margin; State Representative Carol Sente of Vernon Hills hung on in her first bid for election after being appointed to a vacant seat; and, first time candidate Michelle Mussman of Schaumburg won a seat which had been held by a Democrat in a very Republican area. These races raise the question: if the Republicans can’t win those seats in a so-called “tidal wave” year, in a year when they targeted those races by spending massive amounts of money on negative campaigns, when can they win?
Beyond the state legislative races, very little changed locally. Democrat Brendan Houlihan lost in his first bid for re-election for a seat on the Cook County Board of Review, but Democrat Mark Levitt won a newly created Lake County judicial seat against a strong veteran Republican judge. In every other local race on the ballot in 10th District precincts, nothing changed. The Republican tidal wave amounted to little more than an uncomfortable splash of cold water to the face.
The basic fact remains, despite everything supposedly going in their direction in 2010, Republicans are not as strong in the 10th District as the election headlines might make you think. Democrat Secretary of State Jesse White still won 70 percent of the vote in 10th District precincts. Democrat Attorney General Lisa Madigan still won 64 percent in those same precincts. A good Democratic candidate like Anne Bassi of Highland Park faced a strong Republican challenge, and still received 68 percent of the vote in her race for reelection to the Lake County Board. Even Dan Seals did better in 2010 than he did in the more Democratic-friendly elections of 2008 and 2006.
Fueled by the national trend, 2010 represented for Republicans their best shot to remake the political landscape in the 10th District. It didn’t happen, and 2012 is unlikely to provide as good a chance for them. Instead of running against President Obama and Nancy Pelosi, they will have to give us reasons to vote for whoever they nominate for President, and whether it’s Sarah Palin, Mitt Romney or someone else, they all have major weaknesses. Republicans in 2012 will also have to answer for the direction in which Speaker John Boehner takes Congress. On top of that, in 2012 we will have a new congressional district. The state legislature will redraw the congressional district boundaries, and thanks to the Democrats retaining control of the legislature the new boundaries should benefit Democrats in the next congressional race. And with a Democratic governor, instead of Bill Brady, the maps will not likely get vetoed.
In the 10th District, Democrats hit what is probably our low-water mark in 2010. Still, our heads are above water, and the good news is, it will only get better for us in 2012.
–John Hmurovic
This essay first appeared in the December 2010 issue of Tenth Dems newsletter. Reprinted with the author’s permission.