The Illinois primaries have a few squeakers tonight. It looks like Alexi Giannoulias will beat David Hoffman, but they haven’t called it yet. That’s the senate race. The governors races are tight on both sides. The incumbent Pat Quinn is leading challenger Dan Hynes by about 6,000 votes with over 90% reporting. On the Republican side, less than 3,000 votes separate first place from third place. State Senator Bill Brady has about a 1,000 vote lead on Kirk Dillard and Dillard has about a 2,000 vote lead on former Illinois GOP chairman Andy McKenna. Assuming that Bill Brady pulls this out, he’ll make an interesting general election candidate. That’s because he’s insane:
Brady is not for abortions in cases of rape and incest nor when just the health of the mother is at risk. The only time he said an abortion should be permitted is if the mother’s life is at stake.
He opposes gay marriage and civil unions. He voted against the state law passed in 2005 that banned discrimination against gays and lesbians in matters of housing and employment.
On education, he supports allowing local school boards to teach creationism. Brady wants to eliminate the quasi-independent State Board of Education or, avoiding a constitutional fight, limit it to an advisory role in favor of a down-sized agency answering to the governor.
Brady supports tougher contribution limits than the campaign reforms Democrats pushed into law. And he backs limits on the number of terms for statewide officials as well as House and Senate lawmakers. He backs reducing the size of the House and Senate by a total of 13 lawmakers and reinstating the cumulative voting system that ensured at least one Democrat and Republican per legislative district.
Brady won’t release his income tax returns or reveal his net worth. State economic interest statements outline holdings that include property management, an Amish furniture store, a Days Inn in Danville and an interest in the Bloomington indoor football team. Florida records showed he owns a Fort Lauderdale condominium that he said he bought in recent years for $380,000.
Brady thinks his business acumen would help close the state’s vast budget gap.
To bolster the economy, he would eliminate the sales tax on gas, the state estate tax and multiple taxes and fees imposed by Blagojevich. But he estimates savings of $7 billion a year largely through privatizing Medicaid and making across-the-board spending cuts, a difficult mission if Democrats keep control of the legislature.
I bet Bill Brady could fuck up Illinois bad enough that it resembled California. Go GOP!!
If you’re worried about the U.S. Senate seat, one good sign is that about 770,000 votes have been counted so far in the Democratic primary compared to about 610,000 in the Republican one. That’s a 56%-44% split.
