14 Feb 2007

Leaders Have Big Agendas, but Where Will the Money Come from?

By Rich Miller

Governor Rod Blagojevich has said he wants billions more a year for a universal-health-care plan. Last week, a coalition of business and labor groups called on the state to put $5 billion a year into transportation for five years. The Regional Transportation Authority estimates it needs $57 billion over 30 years to maintain, enhance, and expand transit services.

07 Feb 2007

Other Ways of Moving People Around

By Administrator

proposed railway map Passenger rail to the Quad Cities is part of a larger discussion about how a community moves its people. While our transportation policy most often focuses on how to move automobiles from one place to another, alternative transportation has frequently been ignored.

That's shifting. An aging population, traffic congestion, air-travel hassles, high fuel prices, and concern about global warming have all sparked renewed interest in mass-transit options such as passenger rail (getting from city to city) and commuter rail (transportation within a city).

07 Feb 2007

Hush and Rush Characterize Davenport's Modus Operandi

By Administrator

Here's the question: If eliminating the Davenport City Council's Thursday-afternoon standing-committee meetings is a positive change for Davenport citizens, then why all the hush and rush?

07 Feb 2007

The Legal Basis for Abortion

By Carol Brown

It was the Gisswold v. Connecticut case in 1965 that struck down state laws prohibiting married couples from using birth control; the law was ruled unconstitutional because it violated marital privacy, a right protected by the Constitution.

07 Feb 2007

Governor's Action Portends the "Mother of All Legislative Wars"

By Administrator

For months, most Statehouse observers have predicted a battle royale between the state's three top Democrats: Governor Rod Blagojevich, Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, and Senate President Emil Jones.

The three men haven't been getting along, and the relationships between Madigan and Blagojevich, and between Madigan and Jones, are particularly strained. So far, Jones and Blagojevich are doing okay together, but that could change in a heartbeat if Blagojevich and Jones tangle over school funding. Jones wants a lot of money for schools, but Blagojevich refuses to raise taxes.

31 Jan 2007

Governance Committee Rears Its Ugly Head Again

By administrator

On August 4, 2005, the publisher of the River Cities' Reader, the Quad-City Times city-hall reporter, and an Argus/Dispatch journalist strategically positioned themselves outside the doors of City Hall, just as the city attorney unlocked them at 6 p.m., allowing the media through, then re-locking the doors behind them. They had finally gained entrance to the elusive "Governance Committee" meetings.

31 Jan 2007

Leader's Power Might Not Translate Into Promised Education Reform

By Administrator

Senate President Emil Jones talked for several minutes during a media availability the other day about his war theories.

Among other things, Jones recalled how Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev pounded his desk during the United Nations debate over whether to allow China into the organization. Khrushchev failed to persuade the international body to admit his fellow Communist nation, but, as Jones said, not long afterwards China detonated a nuclear bomb in the atmosphere and the UN quickly relented, bringing China in and forcing Taiwan out.

25 Jan 2007

The Legal Basis for Abortion

By Carol Brown

It was the Gisswold v. Connecticut case in 1965 that struck down state laws prohibiting married couples from using birth control; the law was ruled unconstitutional because it violated marital privacy, a right protected by the Constitution.

24 Jan 2007

Green Versus Green "Lite"

By Administrator

The article "Buildings That Breathe" makes some great points overall, but the homesteading movement is not dead, and not just in California. (See River Cities' Reader Issue 616, January 17-23, 2007.) There are many alternative building/energy conferences one can go to in Wisconsin, Iowa, and Illinois focusing on straw-bale construction, log construction, and alternative heating/energy for the cabin set. There are many publications that cater to the modern homesteader.

24 Jan 2007

Is Obama the Next JFK?

By Rich Miller

My grandmother tells the story of when she met John F. Kennedy.

It was back in 1959, as Kennedy was still gearing up for his presidential run. Grandma and my grandfather, an active Teamsters Union member and a Democratic precinct committeeman in Kankakee, traveled to Chicago for a labor event featuring JFK.

Kennedy, the story goes, was working the room, and when he made it over to my grandparents he put his arm around my grandmother, kissed her on the cheek, and told my grandfather that he had a "beautiful wife."

Grandma swooned, of course, and decades later when I asked her how she reacted, she joked that she didn't wash that kissed spot on her face for two weeks. To this day, you can't say a bad word about JFK in front of Grandma for fear of risking the evil eye.

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