New Senate will only add to gridlock

As a firmly liberal-side voter, I found last week's election results very concerning. I'm not a fan of either Bruce Rauner or Mr. Madigan, so I look forward to seeing the irresistible force go hammer and tong against the immovable object in Illinois politics.

Mr. Madigan knows how to use the next few months to try to hogtie the Illinois governor's office as much as possible. And I assume Mr. Rauner is studying his new powers like the "line item veto" of Illinois legislation to come his way.

Will Mr. Madigan have enough votes to override Rauner vetoes?

Since I was very keen on Pat Quinn, I will miss him and his logical, hard working, pragmatic efforts most of all. A sad day for Illinois.

On the national level President Obama, and the current Democratic Senate will have to push through massive numbers of appointments to judicial and other vacancies held vacant by Republicans in the Senate for years. Unfortunately, Obama will be unable to appoint any more even purple judges, liberals or women to the Supreme Court now that the Senate is Republican.

If we thought our federal government was in gridlock because of Tea Party House members, our new Senate may double the gridlock.

Finally, our most pressing single problem is global warming, and we have elected more "flat earth" thinking congressmen. What these folks don't understand is that if the humans on our planet don't massively cut carbon emissions quickly, no amount of gnashing of teeth, last-minute efforts, praying, spending of the green pieces of paper we call money, nor politicians yelling at one another as if their power meant anything anymore can reverse the immutable laws of nature and avert the sixth mass extinction in the geologic history of our planet. A mass extinction is the loss of approximately 30 to 90 percent of all life-forms on the planet in a relatively short space of time.

Jim Peterson

Hoffman Estates