Former White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel has been elected mayor of Chicago, to succeed the retiring Richard Daley.
With 86 percent of the precincts reporting, Emanuel was trouncing five opponents Tuesday with 55 percent of the vote to avoid an April runoff. Emanuel needed more than 50 percent of the vote to win.
#1
Too much global warming? The drinking water in Chicago? A even more mediocre slate of candidates? Mideast-like city where voting is corrupt and voters suffer from one party hegemony for far too long.
#4
After looking at his opposition, he is clearly the least bad choice in a field of bad choices. Well, maybe not 'clearly', but you get the idea.
Posted by: Whiskey Mike ||
02/23/2011 10:16 Comments ||
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#5
Exactly what has he done that makes one think he could successfully run a large city; get pot holes filled, balance a budget, make sure the streets are plowed, etc. etc.?
Or could this just be another in the long list of steps taken to build political power and the 4377 with actually having a quality city?
Am I that cynical? Yep.
Posted by: Alan Cramer ||
02/23/2011 10:27 Comments ||
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#6
Well, it is nice to see some things never change. The corrupt political machine in Chicago is still working smoothly.
Now may all the Chicago politicians just stay in Chicago.
[WBAL] A proposal to increase Maryland state employees' pension contribution rate from 5 percent to 7 percent is getting a hearing before a House of Delegates committee.
The House Appropriations Committee will discuss the proposal on Tuesday.
Gov. Martin O'Malley is proposing changes to address $19 billion in unfunded pension liabilities.
With increased contributions from employees and the state, O'Malley has said Maryland's funding of the system would rise from 64 percent to 80 percent by 2023. Experts in the field say healthy pension systems are at least 80 percent funded.
The proposal also includes tighter eligibility criteria, with vesting beginning at 10 years instead of 5 years.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/23/2011 00:00 ||
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#1
Come on out to the private sector where we don't have a pension, and have to pay 5% to get a 4% match in our 401K. Pampered assholes, living fat off taxpayers money that's getting thinner and thinner.
#2
living fat off taxpayers money that's getting thinner and thinner. "hoping to retire & live for more years than they worked, off of promises of vast future taxes (which won't be coming in) and of vast investment income (which won't be happening)" The pension liabilities are UNFUNDED and likely to remain so, unless a miracle occurs, such as a huge solid gold meteorite smashing into a SEIU demonstration on the lawn of a state capitol.
#3
I ran an active consulting business up until recently. Any health care or retirement, I had to pay for all of it. In addition, I had to pay expenses in the business. If I needed any help, I had to contract for those services. In addition, I had to pay income taxes and self-employment tax (up to 13.3%) to the Feds.
I don't have much sympathy for these whiny cry-baby union members who don't want to share their part of the load and who believe it is their inherent right to be supported by the taxpayers. Obama doesn't give a whit about the small business owner. They are not his voting base.
I get frosted at how many times the unions have been to the Whitehouse since BO's election. The SEIU has been there some 58 times, the AFL-CIO head has been there nearly as many. They are going to have to install a revolving door in the Whitehouse and make it a bed and breakfast to accommodate the unions. They are trading votes for power.
#6
Maybe we could save some money by cutting VA (free medical benefits for life) for serving 4 years in a peacetime military.
Well, there's a catch to that. You see, you only get "free medical benefits for life" if you have a service connected disability. Otherwise you "contribute" a sizable co-pay. That changed in about 1986, I believe. Also, we have NEVER had a "peacetime military". The United States has either been at war or participating in some form of "emergency service" since 1947. Most non-military are surprised to learn that almost as many people have died in "peacetime" as did in the Vietnam War or Korea. I've known a LOT of people that died in "training accidents" over the 26 years I spent in the military. They're just as dead as if they were shot by the enemy.
The VA does provide some services to anyone who served honorable, but not everything, and not everything for "free". A lot of people have paid a high price for some of that "free" care they DO receive.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
02/23/2011 18:13 Comments ||
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#7
Maybe we could save some money by cutting VA (free medical benefits for life) for serving 4 years in a peacetime military.
If such a thing really existed. Service connected injuries and things like exposures to toxic materials, nuclear testing, etc added up over the years. Those few citizens [as compared to the total population] who were drafted and those volunteered to do the dirty work until the 80s were paid squat for their time and too many times their health and life. The government, playing the odds, offered up commitments for dispensation over the long haul much like Social Security knowing that those making the commitment weren't going to be around to pay the piper.
#8
And while you're at it Omar McBurk, the VA also provides a disability payment for service connected items. But what you probably don't know is that in order to get that VA disability, the DoD subtracts it from your retirement check, hands it over to the VA, who then cuts you another check and sends it back. the only real benefit is that the $$ the VA sends you is tax free. My 30% disability works out to a benefit of around a whopping $57 a year. Now in fairness, there is a plan to remove that set aside and those on 100% are already under it, and it iw supposed to trickle down to the rest. But i wanted to let you know before you attacked that 'benefit' also. BTW, I would gladly give up all the VA disability if only the tinnitus would go away and I could also get my lost hearing back.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
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Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
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Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Former White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel has been elected mayor of Chicago, to succeed the retiring Richard Daley.
