When someone who has been out of office over ten years is the most outspoken person trying to pin the 88% toll tax tail on the Pat Quinn donkey, the Republican Party is lost in the suburban wilderness.
I’m prompted to write this after Algonquin Patch reporter Gloria Casas wrotethe following about my opposition to Pat Quinn’s 88% toll tax hike:
Cal Skinner, a former legislator from Crystal Lake, said anyone who uses the toll pays twice, in motor fuel taxes and tolls. The tollway should be thinking outside the box and tap into other revenue sources like the motor fuel tax and federal aid, he said.
Instead of seeking money from those sources, the tollway is asking motorists to pay an 88 percent toll increase on top of the increase in the state’s income tax passed earlier this year, he said.
“This is a Pat Quinn toll increase,” Skinner said. “You are representing him at this meeting.”
Here are the top hits for "toll, Republican, Quinn." Where are suburban state representatives and senators?
Don’t Republican Party leaders and officials know that they represent the suburbs and that suburbanites are the ones who will be paying most of this 88% toll tax increase?
Where are the state legislators screaming like Joe Walsh does against the Federal government’s not being able to finance 41% of Federal spending by borrowing (as it is this year)?
That this is a real issue was brought home to me by my wife, who commutes pretty much daily to her office in Rosemont.
“Why don’t we recall Quinn?” she asked at dinner Sunday night.
I told her that under State Rep. Jack Franks gubernatorial Recall Amendment no Illinois governor would ever be recalled. (See “The Jack Franks’ Recall Amendment Fraud.) At the bottom of this article, I shall reprint the piece of garbage Franks purports to call a “recall amendment.” Read it and tell me how likely its provisions are to be met with anyone but Rod Blagojevich.)
I then suggested she contact the Northwest Herald’s Chris Krug, who wrote vigorously about the need to recall Quinn after he raised the state income tax 67%.
She suggested an online petition and I told her that petition web sites existed.
The point of describing this conversation is that she is one commuter who is white hot mad.
It may be a “Network” experience for the toll tax slaves.
"I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore!" is the highlight of the movie "Network." I ask why suburban Republican legislators can't tap similar anger from Illinois Toll Tax Slaves.
And they don’t even know that it is part of a long-term Downstate plan to siphon money out of their toll tax paying pockets to build roads outside the six-county Chicago metropolitan area.
That’s because all of the Motor Fuel Tax and Federal highway assistance that comes to Illinois goes into a statewide highway pot from which over 55% of the money goes to build and repair roads outside of the Chicago metro area.
When the toll tax proposal first was made she said she would take Route 12 home, rather than the Tollway if the tolls almost doubled.
There are a lot of people like my wife out there who could be reached by radio as the go to and from work.
Radio ads would work, but, of course, they cost money and the Illinois Republican Party is so poor that it has just closed its Springfield office and moved in with Senate Republicans.
But, there are also newscasts.
They are free.
Tell me Republican legislators are not capable of getting on Chicago radio on an issue that takes their suburban constituents to the cleaners as much as this toll tax does and I’ll reply that if they can’t, it’s time to elect new ones.
= = = = =
The worthless recall constitutional amendment sponsored by State Rep. Jack Franks:
INITIATIVE TO RECALL GOVERNOR (emphasis added)
(a) The recall of the Governor may be proposed by a petition signed by a number of electors equal in number to at least 15% of the total votes cast for Governor in the preceding gubernatorial election, with at least 100 signatures from each of at least 25 separate counties. A petition shall have been signed by the petitioning electors not more than 150 days after an affidavit has been filed with the State Board of Elections providing notice of intent to circulate a petition to recall the Governor. The affidavit may be filed no sooner than 6 months after the beginning of the Governor’s term of office. The affidavit shall have been signed by the proponent of the recall petition, at least 20 members of the House of Representatives, and at least 10 members of the Senate, with no more than half of the signatures of members of each chamber from the same established political party.
[Like that will happen in the lifetime of anyone alive today.]
(b) The form of the petition, circulation, and procedure for determining the validity and sufficiency of a petition shall be as provided by law. If the petition is valid and sufficient, the State Board of Elections shall certify the petition not more than 100 days after the date the petition was filed, and the question “Shall (name) be recalled from the office of Governor?” must be submitted to the electors at a special election called by the State Board of Elections, to occur not more than 100 days after certification of the petition. A recall petition certified by the State Board of Elections may not be withdrawn and another recall petition may not be initiated against the Governor during the remainder of the current term of office. Any recall petition or recall election pending on the date of the next general election at which a candidate for Governor is elected is moot.
(c) If a petition to recall the Governor has been filed with the State Board of Elections, a person eligible to serve as Governor may propose his or her candidacy by a petition signed by a number of electors equal in number to the requirement for petitions for an established party candidate for the office of Governor, signed by petitioning electors not more than 50 days after a recall petition has been filed with the State Board of Elections. The form of a successor election petition, circulation, and procedure for determining the validity and sufficiency of a petition shall be as provided by law. If the successor election petition is valid and sufficient, the State Board of Elections shall certify the petition not more than 100 days after the date the petition to recall the Governor was filed. Names of candidates for nomination to serve as the candidate of an established political party must be submitted to the electors at a special primary election, if necessary, called by the State Board of Elections to be held at the same time as the special election on the question of recall established under subsection (b). Names of candidates for the successor election must be submitted to the electors at a special successor election called by the State Board of Elections, to occur not more than 60 days after the date of the special primary election or on a date established by law.
(d) The Governor is immediately removed upon certification of the recall election results if a majority of the electors voting on the question vote to recall the Governor. If the Governor is removed, then (i) an Acting Governor determined under subsection (a) of Section 6 of Article V shall serve until the Governor elected at the special successor election is qualified and (ii) the candidate who receives the highest number of votes in the special successor election is elected Governor for the balance of the term.
(Source: Amendment adopted at general election November 2, 2010.)
