On April 21, 1856, the nation’s first railroad bridge across the Mississippi – connecting the Rock Island Arsenal to Davenport – was completed. Built with more than 220,000 pounds of cast iron, 400,000 pounds of wrought iron, and one million feet of timber, the bridge was an engineering marvel.

“I ran for governor in 2018 to change our story,” Governor JB Pritzker told a Chicago crowd on Thursday as he announced his bid for a third term. “I ran for governor in 2022 to keep telling our story. And I am running for governor in 2026 to protect our story.”

I reached out last week to several members of the “19” – the Democratic House members who refused to vote to re-elect House Speaker Michael Madigan in 2021, thereby forcing him into retirement. I asked for their reaction to Madigan’s 90-month federal prison sentence handed down a few days earlier. Because it was a holiday (Father’s Day), I didn’t expect to hear much back.

As I write this, multiple news outlets have reported that the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency is preparing to deploy its Special Response Teams to five major U.S. cities, including Chicago, in the very near future. Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson’s chief of staff Cristina Pacione-Zayas told reporters last week: “There will be tactical teams, mini-tanks, other tools they use in which they plan to do raids, as we saw in Los Angeles.”

I asked Illinois House Speaker Chris Welch last week about the failure to pass an omnibus energy bill (the Clean and Reliable Grid Affordability Act) during the just-ended spring legislative session.

DCI Report on 324 Main Street Case Number 2023014262 Version 1 Cover Page

The watchers are no longer being watched by the people. At least in Scott County, Iowa, that is.

1034 June 2025 3 Faces of Uncle Scam Three Branches

Inexplicably, for decades, incurious American voters refuse to remove elected bad actors, even though we are responsible for giving them power and access. The lawlessness and corruption has gotten so over the top and still we do nothing, ever-expecting the ones who are breaking our system to fix it. This inertia is beyond wishful thinking: It is lazy, cowardly, slothful civic conduct.

 At inauguration, George Washington had been symbolically careful to wear a suit made of cloth wov

Tariffs are among the oldest of taxes for the simple reason that they are easy to collect. Just send in the tax collectors and don’t let the goods being transported move until the duty has been paid. Being one of the earliest forms of taxation, it is not surprising that tariffs produced one of the earliest forms of tax evasion: smuggling.

For quite a while now, most folks in politics have assumed that Illinois Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias and Comptroller Susana Mendoza will probably run for mayor of Chicago in 2027. The incumbent Brandon Johnson is spectacularly unpopular, and a real hunger is developing in the city (again) for new leadership.

The U.S. House’s Energy and Commerce Committee released its recommendations for budget reconciliation early last week. A preliminary review by the Congressional Budget Office projected that, if implemented, at least 8.6 million Americans would lose their Medicaid coverage during the coming decade. That translates to well over 300 thousand Illinoisans.

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