Rich MillerWith the primary election just around the corner, just about everybody I know has asked me who I think will win the various races.

"The Governor, at the beginning of each annual session of the General Assembly and at the close of his term of office, shall report to the General Assembly on the condition of the State and recommend such measures as he deems desirable." - Illinois Constitution

I don't know if Governor Pat Quinn glanced at the state Constitution before he jotted down his notes, but the rambled, jumbled, disjointed mess he delivered off the cuff last week was not a State of the State address.

Governor Pat Quinn was quoted by the Associated Press last week as saying he's answered all questions about his administration's controversial, secret, and completely botched early prison-release program, so he's done talking about it.

I beg to differ.

I called the Department of Corrections soon after I saw that quote and asked a few questions that I've never seen asked.

According to two recent polls taken by Rasmussen Reports and one by the Chicago Tribune, Governor Pat Quinn has a detectable and significant problem with women voters, but a new development in the campaign might help the governor overcome this gender gap.

Rasmussen recently matched Republican gubernatorial frontrunner Jim Ryan against Democrats Quinn and Comptroller Dan Hynes. Ryan outpolled Quinn by seven points (46-39), but the former Republican attorney general trailed Hynes by two points (40-42).

What's going on? Well, the poll's internals show a stark difference among women voters. Ryan leads Quinn 45-36 among women, but Hynes reverses the result and leads Ryan 42-32 with women. That's a huge difference, but it seems to hold up when compared to other recent polling.

For years, reporters and pundits have said that Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan preferred Republican governors because Madigan wanted to be the state's most powerful Democrat.

There is some truth to that. Madigan hasn't played well at all with the two Democratic governors whom he's served under as speaker. He battled constantly with Rod Blagojevich, and he's made Pat Quinn squirm time and time again, including holding a press conference during which he repeatedly castigated Quinn for "flip-flopping."

But there was always much more going on than just Madigan's desire to be the absolute top dog. As we've seen time and time again over the decades, Madigan prefers to share the pain of governing with the other party to deflect blame from his own party. It's one way he's held onto power for so long. And it's tough to do that without a Republican governor.

Last week we all celebrated -- or bemoaned -- the first anniversary of Rod Blagojevich's arrest. After Blagojevich was impeached and removed from office, I, like most others, thought that things were going to be different with Pat Quinn in charge.

But the Statehouse bickering continues and the gridlock over the state's paralyzing and mind-boggling budget deficit is almost as bad as ever. Heck, it may even be worse.

For the past several weeks, I've been confiding to friends that I think Governor Pat Quinn has turned out to be a much better campaigner than anyone expected, and a much worse governor than everyone had hoped.

The campaign team that Quinn has put together is quite good. He's raised a ton of cash, which has paid for some well-produced television ads.

"He's had to unlearn three decades of muscle memory," cracked someone from inside Quinn's campaign a couple of months ago.

Indeed.

Andy McKennaFour years ago during the last Republican gubernatorial primary, dairy magnate Jim Oberweis was sharply and widely criticized for running fake newspaper headlines in his TV ads. Now, it's happening again with a different wealthy gubernatorial hopeful.

Republican Andy McKenna's latest TV ad stays with his original theme of former Governor Rod Blagojevich's hair. The spot begins the same as his first ad, with a visual of a Blagojevich-like wig on top of the Statehouse and a Blagojevich look-alike walking into the shot. McKenna's first TV ad placed the wig on several previous governors, including George Ryan and Dan Walker, as well as on a baby. The hair is supposed to be a metaphor for the state's history of corruption.

The McKenna ad's announcer then claims the state faces an $11-billion deficit while "Governor Quinn hides the truth." The accompanying visual is the phrase: "Quinn hides the truth," and a reference to a November 18 Chicago Tribune article.

Trouble is, the Tribune published no such article with that headline. The article itself is about a contentious public debate between Quinn and his Democratic primary rival Dan Hynes, but nowhere in the article does Hynes accuse Quinn of "hiding" anything.

The original hope of Dan Hynes' Democratic gubernatorial campaign was that it could outspend and beat up Pat Quinn on TV by Thanksgiving to the point where the governor was vulnerable in the February 2 primary.

Early benchmark polling for Quinn had him leading Hynes 54-26, with other polls showing similar results. Hynes' name ID was a relatively low 67 percent, compared to Quinn's 88 percent.

Since then, Hynes has spent close to $2 million on TV ads, but Quinn has matched him pretty much dollar for dollar. And while Hynes stopped running network TV ads on November 11 and went dark on cable last week, Quinn was up with a positive bio ad last week on both network and cable.

If you ever wondered whether Governor Pat Quinn would do whatever it takes to win re-election, all you need to do is look at his latest TV ad.

The spot is perhaps the most misleading TV advertisement of the season so far, but it packs quite a wallop. Quinn cannily "accuses" his Democratic primary opponent, Comptroller Dan Hynes, of having "signed off on every single state check."

"Now Hynes claims he'll cut the budget line by line, but as comptroller for 12 years he signed off on every single state check," the Quinn ad alleges.

The Quinn campaign claimed after the ad aired that they were trying to say that Hynes' statutory check-signing duties meant he ought to know what the budget is all about already and that Hynes shouldn't need to go over the budget line by line after he's elected to figure out where to cut waste and over-spending.

While the Quinn campaign's explanation for why they worded the attack ad the way they did is an interesting afterthought, if you watch the spot carefully you'll see that what it's really trying to say is Hynes is somehow responsible for the mess the state is in.

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