Category: Economy

Motion Filed Accusing Todd Stroger of Political Hiring and Firing

Posted on by TL

For a while, I was actually feeling sorry for Todd Stroger. I was concerned he might lose his home, and, much as I disagree with the manner with which he has conducted himself while in office, those differences are political. Then he paid his taxes.

Now, however, we hear disturbing allegations of political hiring and firing based on political considerations:

An attorney who has battled political hiring and firing in government claims Cook County Board President Todd Stroger violated political hiring more than 150 times since the start of 2008.

In a motion filed in U.S. District Court, Michael Shakman said the Stroger administration altered the list of jobs not covered by a ban on hiring and firing based on political considerations.

Shakman alleges the Stroger administration has been hiring people and putting them in so-called exempt jobs, even though the positions do not appear on the court list.

Todd Stroger Pays His Taxes

Posted on by TL

I really don’t want to comment on Todd Stroger any more. He will not be re-elected as President of the Cook County Board, and I’m happy with that. Some local pols are still fuming over that, angry at people like me who took Todd to task. However, from his first few weeks on the job when he fell more for the trappings of the office – remember the roped-off elevator? – it was apparent that Stroger was not ready for the big chair once occupied by his father.

That being said, I haven’t really paid much attention to President Stroger recently, but, sometimes, I feel like the Prophet Jeremiah:

I say to myself, I will not mention him, I will speak in his name no more. But then it becomes like fire burning in my heart, imprisoned in my bones; I grow weary holding it in, I cannot endure it. Jeremiah 20:9

So I have to write.

From the Chicago Sun-Times:

Outgoing Cook County Board President Todd Stroger has paid his $11,668 federal tax debt.

The Internal Revenue Service recently filed a “certificate of release of federal tax lien” with the Cook County Recorder of Deeds that shows Stroger and his wife, Jeanine, paid the debt as of July 7. The payment settles what the Strogers owed the government since May 19, 2008, records show.

The IRS filed a lien on the Strogers’ South Side house in March 2009 — a move that usually follows multiple attempts to collect tax debts. The Chicago Sun-Times found the lien about two months later, and Stroger initially refused to discuss it, other than to say through a spokesman he’d worked out a payment plan to settle the debt.

I’m happy for Todd and his family. I don’t want to see anyone lose a home in this economy, and I certainly understand economic struggles.

Will the Chicago Tribune Die in the Aftermath of the Bush Recession?

Posted on by TL

Okay, so take some points away from me for sensational headlines.

But, still, the Chicago Tribune, the only newspaper I faithfully subscribed to at the University of Notre Dame in the 80s, remains in trouble.

From the SUN-TIMES:

The Tribune Co.’s plan to emerge from bankruptcy has unraveled in the wake of an independent report concluding that talks leading up to the company’s 2007 leveraged buyout bordered on fraud, attorneys said Friday.

The report released last month by a court-appointed examiner forced Tribune and its creditors to rethink a settlement agreement that formed the basis of its reorganization plan.

Under Tribune’s plan, JPMorgan Chase and distressed-debt specialist Angelo, Gordon & Co. would have been among the new owners of the company’s media properties, which include the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, other daily newspapers and 20 broadcast stations.

But attorneys told Delaware bankruptcy judge Kevin Carey on Friday that JPMorgan and Angelo Gordon had dropped out of the agreement, and that talks on a consensual reorganization plan had broken down.

"The debtor has tried mightily to bring the parties together," Tribune attorney James Conlan. "That has not happened."

Conlan also confirmed that Tribune had not been party to separate negotiations among its creditors.

The Tribune Co. sent a memo to employees saying the restructuring plan “is moving more slowly and has become noisier than we had hoped.” The memo, signed by Tribune Co. CEO Randy Michaels and Chief Operating Officer Gerry Spector, noted that all of the Tribune Co.’s media businesses are profitable, and that the company’s monthly operating report for July will show that its financial results are strong.

The memo thanked employees for their creativity, innovation and dedication, and urged them not to get distracted.

Look: I hope the paper survives. And I hope the news industry finally gets the guts to lock down its online content for subscribers only. Free online content is the killer, right now.

I hated it when the Pittsburgh Press went under. I really did. Even though I delivered the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette from age 13 through the end of high school.

Competition is good. Competition is healthy. And I don’t want to be left with just one news company for the Chicagoland area.

But then, if they all go under, we’ll always have ENEWSPF.

I’m just sayin’.

Yet Another Bush Recession Casualty: Restaurants

Posted on by TL

As the nation still struggles to emerge from the Bush Recession and avoid a double-dip, we discover yet another industry suffering: restaurants (…and why, by the way, are my conservative friends hoping for a double-dip, exactly? They’re not rich, and they’re likely to end up in tents with the rest of us if we do double-dip. Are they that eager to see Obama and America fail???)
.

From the Chicago Tribune:

With consumers and businesses keeping a lid on expenses, more and more small and mid-size restaurants are throwing in their dish towels and closing up shop.

Southern California lost nearly a thousand more restaurants than it gained during the 12 months that ended in March, representing a net 2% drop that was twice the national average, according to the New York research firm NPD Group.

Nearly all the closings were among independently owned restaurants: small, family businesses that just couldn’t hold on as customers held back. Earlier in the year restaurants reported modest increases in business, but the jumps in sales were too little too late for many.

"We were going in reverse," said Ken Rausch, who last month made the wrenching decision to close his family’s 65-year-old San Gabriel Valley restaurant, Edward’s Steakhouse. The restaurant had weathered previous recessions, but this downturn drained the family’s resources — and showed few signs of letting up, Rausch said.

Other well-known haunts have also succumbed: Orso on 3rd Street near Robertson Boulevard, a trattoria popular with the entertainment crowd, closed last winter after a nearby movie studio laid off a big chunk of its employees; across the nation, Koo Koo Roo, Bennigan’s, Bakers Square, Tony Roma’s and other chains have shut dozens of locations.

Even in good times, the restaurant business is a difficult one. Many close simply because they fall out of fashion or favor, and most run on slim margins. But this downturn seems especially brutal.

We’ve lost a few in the south Chicagoland area, but many have survived, some developing creative ways to stay afloat. The Big Apple Pancake House in Chicago Heights opened its table tops to advertising.

I know: we eat too much in Chicago already. Still, it’s good to know that many places here have survived.

Still, nationwide, the trend is not good.

I’ll be George W., King of the "have-mores," is eating well, though.

Chiacgo’s ShoreBank Fails but Will Reopen as Urban Partnership Bank

Posted on by TL

From the Chicago Tribune:

Chicago-based ShoreBank, which for more than three decades made loans to South and West siders who might not have gotten financing elsewhere to buy homes, apartment buildings and start businesses, failed Friday. It had struggled for months to raise sufficient funds to stay afloat.

Its deposits and most of its assets were acquired by a consortium of major U.S. financial institutions and philanthropic groups and will reopen under the name Urban Partnership Bank.

ShoreBank was the 15th Illinois bank to fail this year and the 118th to be seized by federal and state regulators nationally. Its failure is expected to cost the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. $367.7 million. The FDIC, which is funded by the banking industry, said it received only one bid for the bank.

The beat goes on.

Greenspan Turns Left: Calls for Repeal of All the Bush Tax Cuts

Posted on by TL
Alan Greenspan

Former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan has officially moved to the left of President Obama on taxes. And that’s something, coming from a self-described lifelong Republican libertarian.

From the New York Times:

It was not enough, it seems, for Alan Greenspan, the former Federal Reserve chairman and a self-described lifelong Republican libertarian, to call for stringent government regulation of giant banks, as he did a few months ago.

Now Mr. Greenspan is wading into the most fierce economic policy debate in Washington — what to do with the tax cuts adopted, in large part because of his implicit backing, under President George W. Bush — with a position not only contrary to Republican orthodoxy, but decidedly to the left of President Obama.

Rather than keeping tax rates steady for all but the wealthiest Americans, as the White House wants, Mr. Greenspan is calling for the complete repeal of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, brushing aside the arguments of Republicans and even a few Democrats that doing so could threaten the already shaky economic recovery.

“I’m in favor of tax cuts, but not with borrowed money,” Mr. Greenspan, 84, said Friday in a telephone interview. “Our choices right now are not between good and better; they’re between bad and worse. The problem we now face is the most extraordinary financial crisis that I have ever seen or read about.”

Mr. Greenspan, who led the Fed for 18 years until he retired in 2006, warns that without drastic action to increase federal revenue and reduce the long-term growth in health care costs, bond investors could make a run on Treasury securities, driving up the nation’s borrowing costs and leading to another global economic crisis. This is not the first time Mr. Greenspan has urged fiscal restraint; he warned in 2008 that the country could not afford the tax cuts proposed by Senator John McCain, the Republican presidential candidate. But his sweeping call for rescinding the Bush tax cuts, which he has articulated in a recent appearance on “Meet the Press” and an interview with The Financial Times, among other settings, has rankled former colleagues.

I never understood Trickle-Down Economics. Cutting government revenue never results in economic growth. Instead, the richest of the rich buy bigger yachts, and the national debt increases, often exponentially. Republicans never had the discipline to cut spending. Democrats fund projects that offend the G.O.P. and libertarians, but also balance budgets, repairing damage done by the G.O.P.

I’m with Harry Truman and Bill Clinton: "If you want to live like a Republican, VOTE FOR DEMOCRATS."

Sometimes, it’s that simple.

Thanks, Alan.

G.O.P. Myth #1: The Unemployed Don’t Want To Work

Posted on by TL

Who are the unemployed in America? Do they really not want to work, as the Republicans have been arguing?

Had a bit of a chat tonight with someone on Facebook who I haven’t seen since 1981, when we graduated high school in Pittsburgh. He still lives in Pittsburgh, went to college in Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh is someplace special, but it’s good to gain perspective.

I love Pittsburgh, but, for a number of reasons, I’m glad I moved years ago. Pittsburgh is still very, very segregated, racially and socio-economically. My former high school classmate is stuck in Supply-Side Voodoo Economics land, “Imagine how good our economy will be when everyone is out of work! Reduce government spending, cut taxes, encourage entrepreneurship. That’s how to create jobs. Unemployment checks…please!”

Reduce government spending — okay, but what government spending? Cut taxes? How will we pay for everything President George W. Bush spent, especially when we’re still paying for everything President Ronald Reagan spent?

Want to get to know the unemployed a bit? Read what they’re writing here, at Unemployed-Friends. Unemployed Friends is a busy, busy forum. These are real people out of work because Republicans trashed the economy. Pure and simple.

And they want to work.

The G.O.P. is wrong wrong wrong for the economy. Always have been. Always will be.

White House to Step Up Push for Extension of Long-Term Unemployment Insurance

Posted on by TL

From ENEWSPF:

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs told reporters today discussions with Democratic leadership included talk of extending unemployment insurance for the long-term unemployed.

Gibbs emphasized that this recession was different than previous lulls in the economy, "I think I’ve said this over the past couple days as we’ve gotten into more of this political discussion, I think there is, rightly so, a great frustration in this country with where we are economically, and understanding the depths of the numbers of jobs that were lost, the length of this recession, what it has meant for people on Main Street, what it has meant for — what we’ve talked about in this, the types of unemployment range much differently than would in a normal recession. You see this affecting not just lower-skilled workers, but higher-skilled, college-educated workers in a way that we haven’t seen in previous recessions."

Admitting that the President was frustrated over the state of the economy, Gibbs said the President is going to go to Michigan on Thursday and talk about investments that have been made in the Recovery Act that are creating jobs through entirely new industries that we’ve brought to this country.

"We’re going to continue to work, as I talked about a minute ago, on ensuring that we have an extension of unemployment insurance to deal with the long-term unemployed; increased lending to small business. All this stuff is going to take some time because it took us quite a bit of time to get into the economic situation that we’re in today." the press secretary said.

Read Gibbs’ complete remarks here.

At Turning Left, we’re hoping this is a fight the White House will stick to.

In spite of the rhetoric from the far right, this benefit is necessary to keep the economy stable.

Recession Aftermath Takes Bite Out Of Chicago’s Taste

Posted on by TL

As the Great Recession continues to fade and recovery happens all-so-slowly, we have less money in our pockets to spend. Those of us who still have credit cards are wisely refraining from using them. Those of us just spending cash are learning to budget anew.

That means less "disposable income" to use for such things as the Taste of Chicago. More of us stayed home or celebrated elsewhere this year, compared to years past.

From the Sun-Times:

The 2010 Taste of Chicago drew 2.65 million people, about 700,000 fewer than the 3.35 million who attended the summer chow-fest in 2009.

The 21 percent attendance drop was mainly because the city canceled the July 3 Grant Park fireworks, an event that would bring more than 1 million downtown and through the Taste booths on that day alone, said Cindy Gatziolis of the Mayor’s Office of Special Events.

"People were coming in droves," Gatziolis said of the July 3 fireworks, which were canceled this year after 35 years in favor of three July 4 shows spread out along the lakefront. "They were filling up every available space."

The July 3 fireworks annually brought numbers that one of the Taste’s most attended musical acts, the 2008 Stevie Wonder show, couldn’t rival. Gatziolis said 350,000 people attended the Taste the day of Wonder’s concert.

And there was the crime. As of Sunday, 55 people had been arrested at the Taste as of Saturday night, and nine of those were charged with felonies, the Sun-Times reports.

Memories of Republican Rule Will Help Dems in November

Posted on by TL

What’s worse than two more years of a Democratic majority in Congress?

A return to the disaster plan of the GOP.

From the Washington Post:

Architects of President Obama‘s 2008 victory are braced for potentially sizable Democratic losses in November’s midterm elections. But they say voters’ unease about a GOP takeover will help their party maintain congressional majorities.

"I think the prospect of a Republican takeover — while not likely, but plausible — will be very much part of the dynamic in October, and I think that will help us with turnout and some of this enthusiasm gap," said David Plouffe, who was Obama’s campaign manager two years ago and is helping to oversee Democratic efforts this fall. Still, he put all Democrats on notice, saying: "We’d better act as a party as if the House and the Senate and every major governor’s race is at stake and in danger, because they could be."

Plouffe and other Democratic strategists say Obama will play an important role in making the case that the Republican Party is one of obstruction and indifference. But they think the outcome in November will depend as much on the skill of candidates in mobilizing potential supporters who are now disinclined to vote.

The GOP, architects of the Great Recession. Republican leadership in Congress would double-dip us right back down.