Dan Seals Still Doesn't Get It?

My opponent, Dan Seals has run for congress in the Illinois 10th once already but he continues to show that he doesn't understand the district. That is no surprise, the man has never lived in the 10th district. He has also shown that he may not be up to speed on American politics. According to 10th district blogger TA at Team America's Tenth District Blog, Mr. Seals has been sending out e-mails decrying the use of earmarks in the latest budget passed by the House. Somebody should probably tell Mr. Seals that the Republican Party is no longer running the US House of Representatives, that of course means that Rep. Mark Kirk (R-IL) is not in a leadership position that could put a stop to earmark abuse. The use of earmarks was a Democratic strategic argument during the last election, the one that Mr. Seals lost. Thus it is more than a little strange that he would try that strategy again, especially when the Democratic Party leaders are to blame for any earmarks in this budget. Mr. Seals is running as a Democrat.

It is noticeable that the earmark system has become much more opaque since the Democratic takeover of Congress just 12 months ago. Many of the commenters at Team America's Tenth... have taken Mr. Seals to task for stating that he would have voted against the earmarks that represent needed projects for the Tenth District. But seriously folks, why the heck should Dan Seals care? He lives in Janice Schakowsky's district.

TA rightly recalls that Rep. Kirk helped to kill the infamous "Bridge to Nowhere" that Flying Debris commented on here after finding that Dan Seals' biggest supporter, Ellen Beth Gill of Ellen's Tenth District Blog had taken Rep. Kirk to task for cutting off that pork-barrel project in an inane post titled "Imagine No Way to Get to O'Hare". Because Ms. Gill was so confused about O'Hare, Flying Debris wrote the following in order to help Ms. Gill understand the Chicago are economy:

As a friendly note to Ms. Gill; O'Hare is a serious piece of infrastructure that affects millions of people in the tri-state area and around the nation; and I'm not even talking about the air travelers. To see an example of O'Hare's importance to the non-traveler Ms. Gill and her cohorts may want to take a drive along the southern boundary of O'Hare Airport. Drive down Irving Park Road west of Narraganset and take a look (to the north) at the traffic coming out of the O'Hare shipping terminal. For some further education they should trail some of those trucks that leave O'Hare and follow them down to the Joliet area, a booming trans-shipment are for the entire Midwest. It could be an educational field trip of sorts. Then they could try the same exercise in Ketchikan, the amount of industry that is reliant on air transport is underwhelming and it is hard to imagine the industry that would rush to take advantage of easier access to the Ketchikam airport other than tourism. I guess that somebody has to stick up for the wealthy fishermen of the 10th district and their desire to catch (non Lake Michigan) salmon and Ms. Gill fits the bill.

Bridge to Nowhere Finds a Supporter

Yep that's right, while reading some of the the worst of the blogosphere yesterday I found what could be the only supporter of Republican Senator Ted Stevens' infamous "Bridge to Nowhere". The pork-barrel project that became a cause celebre to both fiscal conservatives and power hungry Democrats has had little to no open support from anybody in the lower 48 states and the earmarked spending has become shorthand for all that is wrong with congressional finances.

Strangely this single supporter is a Democrat. Maybe not all that surprising after reading her blog, Ellen's Illinois Tenth Congressional District Blog (succinctness is not a strong point over there) has been maintained by attorney Ellen Beth Gill who was a representative to the 2004 Democratic Convention from the IL 10th. Ms. Gill (if I may call her that) is currently blaming her, um, nemesis Congressman Mark Kirk, the Republican who currently represents the IL. 10th. Ms Gill has something to blame on Mr. Kirk nearly every day (sort of pathetic but hey it's her life) and last weekend she has resurrected a post from June '06 in order to blame the Republicans in general and Mark Kirk specifically for the, ahem, infrastructure problems of South East Alaska. Ms. Gill was helpful in pointing out the post from last year as it is hysterical; the post is titled "Imagine, no way to get to O'Hare".

Comparing the air field in Ketchikan, Alaska to one of the world's busiest airports is utterly inane but a few peeks at her comment sections show that she knows her readership, very well. On Sunday Ms. Gill blamed Mr. Kirk for helping to defund a bridge for 20 people a day but is now very happy that our nation may, in the end, spend millions of dollars to save time for a few Alaskans and a few wealthy tourists.

As a friendly note to Ms. Gill; O'Hare is a serious piece of infrastructure that affects millions of people in the tri-state area and around the nation; and I'm not even talking about the air travelers. To see an example of O'Hare's importance to the non-traveller Ms. Gill and her cohorts may want to take a drive along the southern boundary of O'Hare Airport. Drive down Irving Park Road west of Narraganset and take a look (to the north) at the traffic coming out of the O'Hare shipping terminal. For some further education they should trail those trucks that leave O'Hare and follow them down to the Joliet area, a booming trans-shipment are for the entire Midwest. It could be an educational field trip of sorts. Then they could try the same excercise in Ketchikan, the amount of industry that is reliant on airtransport is underwhelming and it is hard to imagine the industry that would rush to take advantage of easier access to the Ketchikam airport other than tourism. I guess that somebody has to stick up for the wealthy fishermen of the 10th district and their desire to catch (non Lake Michigan) salmon and Ms. Gill fits the bill.

If it matters I attended Joseph Sears School and New Trier East High School with Mark Kirk.