What a Crock Davenport City Council Corri Spiegel Settlement 2023

What a crock. Last Wednesday, the day before Thanksgiving, when they knew hardly anybody was paying attention, Davenport city officials announced they were giving departing City Administrator Corri Spiegel $1.6 million. The city said $1 million was for the emotional pain and suffering that Spiegel suffered, which the city council said in a statement was due to “prolonged and documented instances of harassment” by some elected officials over the past eight years. They didn’t say what the offending behavior was.

I don’t know whether or not the legislative Democratic leadership would’ve allowed a vote, but it is puzzling to me that the people behind the extension of the state’s Invest in Kids Act program didn’t at least try to run a bill that would’ve wound the program down over a period of years.

Last Tuesday, November 7, Chicago Teachers Union lobbyist Kurt Hilgendorf told the Illinois Senate Executive Committee that the union had only “one problem” with Senate President Don Harmon’s elected Chicago school board bill. Hilgendorf praised much of the bill during his testimony. But the Chicago Teachers Union has claimed for years that it wants a fully-elected school board, just like every other school district in the state. Right now, all board members are appointed by the mayor.

I told you back in January that if Governor JB Pritzker managed to help convince Stellantis to reopen the Belvidere auto-assembly plant and even expand, “He’ll have overcome some gargantuan hurdles.”

Senator Grassley Letter to DOJ Biden Inquiry Oct 2023

On October 24, 2023, Iowa Senator Charles (Chuck) Grassley sent a demand letter to Department of Justice (DOJ) Attorney General Merrick Garland and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Christopher Wray, instructing them to provide his Senate Committee on the Budget with all records and relevant information from an enumerated list of 15 items pertaining to the Biden family investigations into foreign entanglements and associated finances during the past five years. The deadline for AG Garland and Director Wray to respond is November 17, 2023.

Dogs need donated blood, too.

There are only a few things on this good Earth that can provide sustained joy – animals are at the top of the list, especially our family pets, whose instinctive sense of abundance is limitless, unconditional, and immediate.

There are various compassionate and generous efforts afoot in the Quad Cities that greatly alleviate animal suffering. Movers for Mutts is one of them, and as animals' families, guardians and stewards, we have an obligation to do all that we can to assist this worthy effort.

How much do you know about the Amish? I would like to introduce you to an Amish person who changed my life.

The blindfold is being yanked off lady justice.

Reading the words of Common Sense, the Declaration of Independence, the Federalist Papers, and the Constitution makes obvious to me how learned our founders were in governance and human nature, and how they captured both in the idea of our nation.

Back in May of 2017, Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson traveled to Springfield and promised a House committee that passing a criminal penalty-enhancement bill he favored would drastically reduce gun crimes in his city.

Pages