It's probably not a good sign that at least two prominent speakers at the state fair's Republican Day event last week felt it was necessary to insist that the Illinois Republican Party is not dead. Other speakers worked hard to reinforce the not-dead theme by helpfully pointing out several possible signs of life.

I have a lot of respect for Illinois Senate Republican Leader Frank Watson, but I think he's gone off his rocker. Watson strongly supports the candidacy of Alan Keyes for U.S. Senate in Illinois. One of his lieutenants, state Senator Dave Syverson (R-Rockford), was the guy who recruited Keyes in the first place, talked him up to the media, and then helped convince the GOP state central committee to offer the vacant Jack Ryan slot to him, over the objections of party chairperson Judy Baar Topinka.

It's been an opportunist playground," a top Republican Party official sighed last week. Every time somebody floats his or her own name for the vacant slot for Republican U.S. Senate candidate and then "withdraws," the media paints it as yet another disaster for the state party, the clearly annoyed official complained.

Slowly but surely, the state legislature is being replaced by five guys in a back room. It's old news that the four legislative leaders and the governor have totally hijacked the budget process. For years now, the governor, the House speaker, the Senate president, and the House and Senate minority leaders have met behind closed doors to hammer out the state's spending plans.