Presidential candidates set the turnout. That’s the race voters care about the most by far, so everybody else who’s running down-ballot essentially has to work within the structure of that year’s presidential-turnout numbers.

The Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) is reportedly mulling whether to settle a civil-rights lawsuit filed eight years ago by the Chicago Urban League. The suit essentially claims that Illinois’ education-funding system violates minority students’ rights because a disproportionate number of those kids reside in areas with the lowest property wealth and also attend schools with majority-minority enrollment. They’re basically getting shafted by the state, so they sued.

Since his inauguration, Governor Bruce Rauner has consciously aped Washington, DC’s notoriously noxious battle to “win” the daily media spin cycle. Rauner has a set base of talking points based on tried and true poll-tested topics, and he rarely if ever deviates.

Somebody should familiarize Rock Island Mayor Dennis Pauley with Aesop’s Fable “The Farmer & the Viper,” which famously ends with a snake biting a man who showed it kindness: “Did you not know that a serpent in the bosom, a mouse in a bag, and fire in a barn give their hosts an ill reward?” In other words, you knew I was a snake.