Illinois Republican Party Chair Pat Brady resigned last week just as a new statewide poll showed big trouble for his political party's brand.

Brady had been under pressure to resign ever since the disastrous 2012 elections. The pressure increased publicly after Brady announced his support for a gay-marriage bill. Multiple attempts to oust Brady were unsuccessful.

The way forward is unclear, to say the least. Some party leaders have a list of more than 25 people to consider. This could easily turn out to be a total mess.

And this all comes at a particularly bad time for the GOP. A new Capitol Fax/We Ask America poll found that 52 percent of likely Illinois voters have a negative view of the Republican Party. Just 25 percent have a positive view, while 24 percent were neutral.

(Editor's note: This essay is a response to this commentary.)

The scene in Boston on April 18 and 19 was awesome.

By that, I don't mean it was cool. Rather, the mass law-enforcement action to shut down the city and search for the brothers Tsarnaev was "awesome" in the dictionary sense of "awe": "dread ... and wonder that is inspired by authority."

In his commentary in the May 2 issue of the River Cities' Reader, John W. Whitehead announces that the situation showed that "the police state has arrived." Certainly, anybody who's doubted warnings about the police state should have been struck by the swiftness, scope, coordination, and force of law-enforcement actions those two days following the bombs that exploded at the April 15 Boston Marathon. Even though television viewers didn't see much beyond reporters breathlessly saying that something was happening, it was readily apparent that the combined resources of federal, state, and local law enforcement are a fearsome instrument that can be unleashed quickly and without regard for rights.

So if you have the misfortune of seeing your picture above "Suspect Number 1" or "Suspect Number 2" on TV, I hope you did something truly evil, as this is the man- and firepower you'll face. And if you decline to let police search your home in a scenario similar to what happened in Boston, good luck.

But this was not a "police state" as most people think of it - a brutal, proactively oppressive regime. It would be more accurate to say that the Boston metro area on April 18 and 19 was a vivid demonstration of our potential for a police state through a single, short-lived, but widespread instance of de facto martial law.

Yet it was also a visible reminder of a more persistent underlying condition: the security state that has been built steadily in the United States since September 11, 2001. It's ostensibly designed to prevent terrorist attacks, but it proved last month that it's much more adept at responding to them.

Boston showed what our police state could look like. Now we need to decide whether it's what we want.

A new statewide poll shows a majority of Illinoisans favors concealed carry. But an overwhelming majority in every area of the state also says it's okay with them if Chicago and Cook County police have additional authority over who gets to carry in their jurisdictions.

The Capitol Fax/We Ask America poll of 1,284 likely voters found that 52 percent say they approve of allowing concealed carry.

"Illinois lawmakers are debating proposed laws that would allow some citizens who are properly licensed to carry concealed firearms," respondents were told. "In general, do you approve or disapprove of allowing licensed citizens to carry loaded, concealed firearms?"

The poll, taken April 24, found that 46 percent disapprove and just 2 percent were neutral or had no opinion. The poll had a margin of error of 2.7 percent. Twenty-six percent of the numbers called were cell phones.

During the House floor debate over the National Rifle Association-backed concealed-carry bill last week, I was told by an intimate of Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan that the speaker wanted to make sure the bill received no more than 64 votes. Because the bill preempts local-government home-rule powers, the bill required a three-fifths majority of 71 votes to pass.

The anti-gun forces had been demoralized the day before when their highly restrictive concealed-carry proposal received just 31 votes, so Madigan wanted to do the same to the NRA, I was told. The idea, the source said, was to show both sides that they couldn't pass their bills on their own and that they needed to get themselves to the bargaining table and work something out.