The Jeanne is out of the bottle

Early in their campaigns, Bruce Rauner and Jeanne Ives faced each other before the editorial boards of Chicagoland's major newspapers, vying for an endorsement ahead of the Republican primary election. One columnist compared the interviews to a baseball game. Ives, according to this columnist, had hit a home run into the upper deck, sending the governor's "re-election dreams" bouncing in the seats.

Gov. Rauner betrayed his base by signing a sanctuary-state bill and by expanding taxpayer-funded abortions, and by, oh, watching helplessly as the state income tax rate grew by a third. He is fixated on Mike Madigan as the Dark Lord of Springfield, while ignoring his own Hobbit-like naiveté. No, to fight Madigan, we need a champion with heart, not one who relies on purse-strings and a self-defeating mantra.

"I'm not in charge," Rauner is fond of repeating - and by golly he intends to defend with his political life his right not to be in charge.

Now Rauner has saturated the airwaves and clogged people's mailboxes with ads depicting Jeanne Ives as a "lackey" of Madigan. To anyone who knows Ives' record and ideology, the accusation is laughable. It is obvious Rauner found it impossible to match, or even attack, Ives' conservatism, and so was obliged to misrepresent her positions. The sound bites of Ives employed in Rauner's ads, taken out of context, are proof of Rauner's intellectual dishonesty and political vacancy.

"Beware the Ides of March," the soothsayer whispered to Caesar. The Ides of March, in ancient Rome, was the deadline for settling debts - the 15th of March.

On March 20, this year, the Republican primary will be held in our own beleaguered state. We will either begin to recover, or else continue our decline and fall.

Be warned, Governor - beware Jeanne Ives in March.

Alexander Lee

West Chicago