•December 28, 2016•

By Jim Nowlan
NP Guest Columnist

At the risk of tiring readers (so what’s new, they muse) at holiday time, I turn yet again to the Illinois state budget impasse, the most important visible problem facing the state.

I continue flummoxed in efforts to understand the efficacy of the strategy(ies) Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner is employing in his all-out war to force nemesis House Speaker Mike Madigan to knuckle under, so the guv can figuratively plant his booted foot in triumph on the breast plate of a prostrate Madigan.

For two years, Rauner has been holding a state budget solution hostage, as if it were somehow akin to Madigan’s first-born, demanding that Madigan accede to a “turnaround agenda” of popular, business-friendly changes.

That might otherwise make sense, except that Madigan obviously cares more about his political power than about Illinois.

Insiders say Rauner’s real strategy is to play a multi-election “long game” aimed at taking control of the Illinois General Assembly.

That is sure a legitimate political objective, yet not one a budget resolution can await.

I worry that Rauner as well as most lawmakers and certainly the Illinois public all fail to appreciate the staggering magnitude of what will be necessary to straighten out the state’s finances.
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