State of State? Deception and Spin

What the governor doesn't say looms larger than any 'state of state' speech

(Image courtesy of Chicago Sun-Times)

Today, virtually from Springfield, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker will address the Illinois legislature and citizens in his “state of the state” speech.

He’ll speak as politicians always do at these addresses (especially if during an election year) – with bluster and braggadocio, laying out policies to get the economy back on track, help Illinoisans becoming more prosperous and not flee the state (which they are doing in record numbers).

Any words coming out of the governor’s mouth should be met with a high degree of skepticism and repeated utterances of “yeah, right.”

With billions in underfunded pension debt and no real plan to solve the crisis other than spending federal relief money with little-to-no-oversight, Pritzker can spin whatever yarn he wants. But the objective truth remains: the state will never be free of debt and high taxes as long as the leadership is beholden to teacher’s unions and continues to grant additional concessions that further increases its obligations.

Rather than rollback expensive allowances the state can’t pay, they’ve doubled down on assistance to unions, only furthering to hamper the state and it’s tax-paying citizens.

But we won’t hear about that Wednesday from Pritzker. He will hear spin and affirmation. He’ll justify shutting down schools and businesses, while pushing relentless testing protocols and masking mandates as the “cost of dealing with a worldwide pandemic.”

(Consider this – Illinois is only state in the central time zone with an indoor mask mandate. The state closest to Illinois with such a requirement is New York. If driving west, it would take crossing the New Mexico border to find such a directive.)

(Source: Multistate)

Pritzker will likely extend the current EO that mandates masking when it expires Sunday (he has issued over 100 EO’s since March of 2020, according to Illinois Policy). Pritzker could offer some hint of relief from masking, such as mitigation rollbacks based on regional data and conditions. But politically, it wouldn’t be prudent.

His sheepish voting base demands rule-by-iron fist, a dictatorial climate emboldened by Covid and the Biden Administration. The failures of the White House to push through legislation and vaccine mandates won’t discourage Pritzker, who owns a super majority in the state legislature and receives little pushback from Republicans.

(A stronger Republican candidate for governor would help but there is little traction on that front. The most outspoken critic who can match Pritzker’s deep pockets, hedge fund billionaire Ken Griffin, is spending money, but on other campaigns. He isn’t running.)

Pritzker will talk a lot Wednesday about tax relief and of keeping citizens “healthy and safe while surviving the pandemic.” Such fictional platitudes mirror his re-election narrative, referred to in a recent Wall Street Journal editorial as the “ratchet effect”:

Once introduced, rules almost always get more expansive, seldom more limited. Taxes levied for a temporary exigency become perpetual obligations. Government agencies built to administer some specific function are absorbed into the permanent bureaucracy.

When a crisis is over, authorities may relinquish some of the powers they assumed during the emergency, but you can be sure that the government’s writ will run permanently larger than before. Wars, depressions, public-health emergencies lead to bigger government, more rules, more-onerous regulations.

The incumbent governor’s “vision for Illinois” will be just as outlined in the editorial – more regulation, more oversight, more spending and more federal relief. He’ll blame the “pandemic” when there is enough objective data available that shows that if he had kept schools and businesses open, rejected overburdensome testing and masking, and accepted an “endemic” strategy rather than a “Zero Covid” one, Illinois would be better positioned to recover investing in infrastructure and the ingenuity of the marketplace, rather than a White House bailout.

That’s something else he won’t say Wednesday – how all of it, all of the imperious tactics, were designed to get billions in federal relief money. He’ll hide behind the “health and safety” shield all the while wielding it like a winning lottery ticket.

Here’s what else he won’t talk about.

How students are struggling with anxiety and depression in alarming numbers.

According to the Wood House newsletter, over a three month span last fall, there were 14 youth mental health deaths in six Chicagoland counties.

You think Pritzker will mention that statistic in his speech? Not a chance.

Monday night, at a District 220 board of education meeting (12 schools in northwest suburban Barrington), a staff member said this about mental health support by the school:

We are offering some things, we know what we are doing for students. I don’t think we are very good at letting other people know what we do all the time…so kind of marketing. I know that is such a simple word for talking about SEL (social emotional learning) but we need to get it out there so parents are aware and can take advantage of services for their students if they feel they need them.

It’s a startling admission – that parents and students in the district are generally unaware of issues involving mental health and of services in place to assist.

How many other Chicagoland school districts have the same problem?

Not a problem?

Relentless messaging around masking and vaccinations.

At the same Monday BOE meeting, D220 superintendent Dr. Robert Hunt spent almost 20 minutes breaking down future face muzzling plans, toggling between universal/situational.

(Hunt stated how plans are contingent if/when Pritzker lifts the EO. Masking isn’t going away, not when administrators like Hunt continue to use virtue signaling language like “keeping students and staff safe” and then lays out detailed mitigations involving masking.)

One superintendent of a downstate district in Monticello, IL, Vic Zimmerman, gleefully posted this picture on social media in the past few days:

Vic Zimmerman, Supt @MonticelloCUSD

Lets’s Go! @POTUS

If I lived in that district, I’d question where Zimmerman’s priorities are.

Education or health care?

The 22 months of fear-based messaging continues at the municipal level.

I unsubscribed from one community email list after this lead item hit my inbox:

As I said on Twitter, these messages are nothing more than coercion dispatches disguised as public service.

Jon J. Kerr @jonjkerr

@LFparents @LAKEFOREST60045 coercion messaging disguised as public service. They should know better by now.

Of course, local government is taking the lead from Springfield.

And the lead dog, Pritzker, continues to spit out fear-laden language to residents and students across the state.

We won’t hear any admission of mistakes from Pritzker at his “state of state” address Wednesday. He’ll brag and boast about “keeping the citizens of Illinois safe from a deadly disease.”

Our governor will do a lot of talking.

But it’s what he doesn’t say that’s most worthy of our attention.

For story ideas, article comments/feedback, media inquiries and more, drop note to jon@jonjkerr.com, or @jonjkerr on Twitter.