Quick, who is the Illinois lieutenant governor?

It's a trick question, because at this moment the office is vacant.

The former lieutenant governor, Pat Quinn, left the office to become governor last January, following the impeachment of Rod Blagojevich.

The state's No. 2 executive post has been empty ever since, and perhaps that is a point worth discussing. With just one day left to file nomination papers, seven candidates crowd the field for Illinois lieutenant governor. Only two will remain after the Feb. 2 primary, and chances are most state residents do not know the candidates or what they are promising to accomplish in office, if elected.

That's because the office of lieutenant governor is only important when you are impeaching the sitting governor, as happened to Blago. Or, if the governor somehow becomes unable to perform the duties of office, it's time for our lieutenant to step forward.

It's a redundancy in our government that Illinois simply cannot afford in light of its ongoing state budget crisis.

If Quinn were to lose his mind tomorrow (and some might argue he already has) or became incapacitated in some other way; then we would turn to Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan to assume the governor's role. Considering the adversary power relationship between the governor and the Speaker of the House, Lisa's Dad Mike Madigan, Pat Quinn might want to watch his back in any case.

We do not need a lieutenant governor. The specific duties of the office include serving as chairman of the governor's Rural Affairs Council, chairman of Rural Bond Bank of Illinois, head of the Illinois Main Street Program, and chairman of the Illinois River Coordinating Council.

Yawn.

This is an office that is largely ineffectual in its legislative reach and primarily responsible for cutting ribbons and kissing babies when the governor is otherwise indisposed.

Yet we pay the office holder a six-figure salary, staff that office with almost 30 people, and last year put more than a million dollars in the state budget to pay for it.

It's time to tighten the belt, and cut government waste. It's time to eliminate the office of lieutenant governor.

- The (Freeport) Journal-Standard | Oct. 31

Latest loan plan more lunacy

Have you heard Gov. Pat Quinn's latest idea?

Quinn said last week he wants Illinois to take out a "short-term" loan of $900 million to get the indebted state through the winter.

This is what passes for leadership in Illinois these days. The governor seeks a 50 percent increase in the state's personal income tax, doesn't get it, then proposes borrowing another nearly $1 billion.

The money would help pay for the $205 million that lawmakers put back into a college grant program last month. But does it make sense to borrow money to put into the Monetary Award Program, which provides loans to college students that do not require repayment?

Apparently, Quinn and his fellow state leaders have not heeded the lesson that so many Americans have learned the hard way in the last few years. Why is the nation experiencing a record number of home foreclosures? Because people borrowed more than their homes really were worth and were unable to repay the money.

The state is in much the same boat, already struggling with a budget that relies on debt and putting off unpaid bills to try to plug a deficit that soared past $11 billion last summer. Quinn's own office admitted earlier this month that state revenues could fall another $900 million short of their projections.

"Short-term" borrowing is nothing new for this state government. The state borrowed $1 billion in May and another $1.25 billion in August to pay its backlog of bills. But those loans need to be paid back before the end of the next fiscal year and so would the one that Quinn now is proposing.

Illinois already has a backlog of bills of $3.7 billion, according to the State Comptroller's Office. That does not include the $2.25 billion owed in "short-term" loans.

Yet Quinn says he expects State Comptroller Dan Hynes, his opponent in the race for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination in February, and State Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias to sign off on his latest borrowing plan. Both must approve it, and Giannoulias already has said that funding higher education and paying off the state's old bills likely will outweigh concern about more borrowing.

We have one question for the governor and our state leaders: Where will Illinois get the money to repay these "short-term" loans? By borrowing more money? Where will it end?

Here's our guess. It will end with this state going broke and losing its "house," just as so many Americans have done already.

- The (Alton) Telegraph | Nov. 2

Quinn should sign campaign finance bill

The campaign finance reform bill passed by the Illinois General Assembly last week has been decried by some as "a crock," "phony," "a meaningless compromise" and "a farce." The reform organizations that signed on were accused of being "bought out."

Such commentary, while rhetorically entertaining, ignores the messy give-and-take of the legislative process, improved disclosure requirements, and the first-ever approval of campaign contribution limits in Illinois something that was unthinkable just a year ago.

It is disappointing that the amount of money legislative leaders can contribute to candidates during general elections wasn't capped. But the totality of the reforms enacted over the last two years should not be ignored because one provision is absent.

While recognizing that the bill failed to sever the financial umbilical cord between members and their leaders, this page urges Gov. Pat Quinn to sign it.

Springfield is a town full of people who deal with the legislative process. Most will tell you that they don't get everything they want when they try to pass a bill. That's what happened here.

Still, it is important that the discussion over legislative leaders, their powers and the role of campaign contributions continues. Senate President John Cullerton, D-Chicago, has expended great effort trying to convince us that there is no connection between the leaders' power and the unlimited contributions they can pour into contested legislative races.

- The (Springfield) State Journal-Register | Nov. 3