Last week's election gave Illinois Senate President Emil Jones more bragging rights than anyone else at the Statehouse.

Jones' Democrats picked up five seats on Tuesday, giving them one more than the minimum needed for a veto-proof majority. Jones' 37 seats compare to just 22 for the Senate Republicans.

To say that the Senate Republicans are now irrelevant for at least the next two years would be putting it mildly. The Senate Republicans won't be able to stop anything, including bills for new state construction-bond programs, which require a minimum of 36 votes.

Corrupt political insider Stu Levine was hit with so many federal indictments earlier this year that he was literally facing a life sentence behind bars.

Last week, he copped a plea that will let him walk free after five years and seven months in what will probably be a minimum-security prison - in exchange for his cooperation.

We can discern one of two things from this: (1) Much of the federal case was weak, and letting Levine off relatively easy was a face-saving move by U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald; or (2) Levine has agreed to help the feds reel in some very big fish and used that prospect to negotiate a much better deal.

As with George Ryan before him, I'm really finding it difficult to believe that Governor Rod Blagojevich is as clueless as he claims.

Blagojevich says he had absolutely no idea that Tony Rezko was up to no good. Rezko is a very close friend of the governor who raised millions of dollars for his campaign, put lots of people into important positions in Blagojevich's administration, and was a business partner with Mrs. Blagojevich for eight years.

Governor Rod Blagojevich and his staff have attempted to muddy the waters on the question of that now-infamous $1,500 check from his friend by seizing on the flip-flopping of the friend's wife, Beverly Ascaridis.

Mrs. Ascaridis, you will recall, got a state job about the same time that her husband, Mike Ascaridis, wrote the governor a check for $1,500. The governor has admitted to directing his chief of staff to find Mrs. Ascaridis a job, but claims that the check was for his daughter Amy's college fund. He has so far refused to provide any supporting documentation that the check was ever deposited into a college fund, however.