Chicago Newspapers Keep Up Drum Beat for $200 Suburban Family Sales Tax Hike

The use of news sections of Chicago newspapers haven’t been so blatantly biased since the 1974 Regional Transportation Authority referendum.

Doesn’t Wednesday’s front page of the Chicago Sun-Times look like the beginning of a screaming mob?

And Thursdays!

“FIX IT
NOW!”

With “CTA” in the middle of the “O” in “Now.”

Not just a bit over the top, but worse than any blog I have ever seen.

Opps.

I missed the top line.

It says, “A Sun-Times Editorial.”

I guess Wednesday’s “COUNTDOWN TO AGONY” wasn’t an editorial. Or, maybe the staff, just forgot to put up the disclaimer.

But, the Sun-Times’ front page Thursday wasn’t enough.

Page 3 was all about what the Sun-Times Govern Rod Blagojevich’s $24 million payday loan to the CTA:

CTA BAILOUT NOT A DONE DEAL

screams the headline. The subhead features a bus and

3 DAYS
UNTIL CTA’S
‘DOOMSDAY’

I guess I should be satisfied “Doomsday” was put in quote marks.

Below is a photo of a student who takes mass transit 12 miles to school.

It just occurs to me. Why do we outside of Chicago pay property taxes to bus our kids to school, and have to pay sales taxes to subsidize getting Chicago students to school?

And, then there is the Sun-Times editorial page.

It’s about the CTA also.

The title is

“A FIRST-RATE MESS”

It also has a nifty color cartoon of Mayor Richard Daley riding a bicycle and Governor Blagojevich holding a barrel of money with a red cross on it sitting in a tunnel with a rapid transit train hurtling down the tracks at them. There are little blind inspector rats with white canes inspecting the tracks, in a curtsey to the NTSB’s scathing report on last year’s train crash.

A little insert points out that none of the four legislative leaders took mass transportation in the last week.

Try finding it in Kendall County or Greenville.

And, who with family incomes like Mike Madigan and Emil Jones rides the CTA?

Wednesday night WTTW tried to add to the pressure by featuring bill sponsor Julie Hamos (D-Evanston) and Republican Sid Mathias from Buffalo Grove.

No opponent to the bill was offered a seat at the interview table. No surprise there.

Compared to the Sun-Times, the Chicago Tribune was mild.

True, the Trib’s front page upper right hand corner story was about Blagojevich ‘s advancing $24 million that the CTA would have received anyway, but it wasn’t the red ink journalism of the Sun-Times.

The Tribune’s lead editorial was about

“Doomsday Postponed”

It was really about prying more money out of the suburbs ($200 per family in McHenry County) to solve Chicago’s problem, even though that was not mentioned.

It points out that what the governor did merely moves the deadline to November 4th.

There’s something very appealing to that date.

It’s the day before the filing deadline for state representative and state senator.

If the General Assembly can stall that long, marginal members may be convinced to vote for the bill knowing that the odds of an outraged potential challenger getting 500 (state rep.) or 1,000 (state senate) signatures within a day are slim.

So, how should the CTA raise more money, if it is really needed?

Tune in tomorrow at McHenry County Blog for a logical answer.


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