“The overall approach looks more like garbage from the two garbage haulers who work for a bankrupt company.” (Mike Madigan/Chicago Tribune)
CHICAGO, June 7, 2012 — In a land far, far away, in a desolate wasteland of America known as “flyover country,” there is a place called Illinois.
For almost thirty years one man has ruled Illinois. One man has been the most oppressive power in the Land of Lincoln. One man has ruled an evil empire of corrupt Democrats and perfidious Republicans.
When he started his reign of evil all voices of dissent were ruthlessly silenced or bought off.
That man is Michael J. Madigan. Madigan represents a large swath of Chicago’s South Side. He rules the whole state with an iron fist. He is the Speaker of the Illinois House of Representatives.
There is only one law. Madigan’s Law.
Madigan is the Chairman of the Illinois Democratic Party. He is the capo de tutti capo of the Chicago Democratic Crime Family.
Illinois is under one-man rule. One man writes the rules.
Mike Madigan just is. He is a force of nature, an omnipotent power unto himself.
Madigan is the Chicago Democratic Machine. He is the heir of Anton Cermak, Jacob Arvey, and Richard J. Daley. No one is more powerful in Illinois than Mike Madigan. No gets elected in Illinois unless he approves it. No one. Democrat or Republican. If he does not want you, his lawyers, who wrote the election laws, will keep you off the ballot. There are exceptions in outlaw Republican strongholds. Eventually they will be conquered.
He controls the Illinois House, Senate, and Illinois Supreme Court. They are elected through his largesse. Madigan controls the governors, no matter their political party.
Mike Madigan’s Chicago Democratic Machine runs Illinois. It is a cornucopia of corruption and a culture where ethics is just a little used word in dictionaries.
Mike Madigan owns the Illinois Republican Party. Make no mistake. There is only one party in Illinois, the Combine*. It is a nefarious non-partisan group of politicians, donors, state contractors, bond underwriters, vendors, attorneys, non-profits, union bosses, and others who profit handsomely off the taxpayers.
Outlaw Republicans and reformers are few. No matter how hard they try no one pays attention to them. They are minor entertaining irritants. The reason? The Republicans, who hold the purse strings, the whale contributors, feed the Democratic Party behemoth with campaign contributions.
Republican leadership refers to GOP reformers as clowns.
Mike Madigan is the puppet master. Illinois politicians and bureaucrats dance to the manipulations of his grubby hands. Taxpayers are serfs. Giving up their hard earned money to finance waste, fraud, inefficiency, incompetence, and corruption.
There is no will to revolt. Apathy has been beaten into the populace. They pay high sales taxes on every good and service they receive. They pay through the nose through the nefarious state income tax. They are being bled by ever rising property taxes. They pay and pay and pay. They get little in return.
Why is all this important? Illinois is run from Chicago, which is in Cook County. Chicago is where the wealth and power are concentrated. The big moneymen, Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals, call the shots. They give to those who give back. Mike Madigan gives back.
It is important because there are over 1.5 million guaranteed Democratic voters in Cook County and Chicago. There are thousands of Republicans who vote Democrat in general elections. That affects national elections.
If you are one of the chosen ones you will prevail in any election, no matter which party you claim to represent. Even Mayor Rahm Emanuel needed to get Madigan’s blessing to run for Congress, then for Mayor of Chicago.
If it weren’t for Mike Madigan President Obama would be just another community organizer and law school lecturer. He joined the Machine after losing his first election to the preferred candidate.
If Chicago Tribune reporters are garbage haulers, then Mike Madigan and his party are the garbage. Rotting, odorous, foul, vile, maggot infested garbage.
Illinois is a reeking cesspool of bipartisan corruption. It is an evil empire run by one man.
Madigan is a property tax attorney. While driving the state into bankruptcy and raising taxes on the populace he makes millions of dollars from corporate clients, major real estate developers, and other moneyed power brokers by lowering property taxes on their commercial properties.
Madigan assured his actions would never be investigated by electing his daughter, Lisa, as the Attorney General of Illinois. He controls the political appointments in that office. He is immune from state scrutiny. Even the United States Department of Justice leaves him alone.
You have to understand something about corruption. There are three types; the obvious illegal corruption, ethical corruption, which may or may not be illegal, and the gray area in between, where the most sophisticated people ply their trade.
In Illinois that gray area is a multi-lane highway. It is the Michael J. Madigan Tollway.
Reporters should be proud to be called garbage haulers. Illinois needs more reporters who are fearless garbage haulers. Illinois and Chicago needs the disinfectant of sunshine to clean out the garbage in Madigan’s dump, a place called Illinois.
*Attributed to former Senator Peter Fitzgerald, Barack Obama’s predecessor in the United States Senate.
Peter V. Bella is a retired Chicago Police Officer, freelance journalist and photojournalist, cook, and raconteur. He likes to be the irreverent sharp stick that pokes, prods, and annoys. His opinions are his and his alone. Mr. Bella is a member of the National Press Photographers Association and the Society for Professional Journalists.
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