Richest campaign ever uses state employees

Your vacation is over there, John!

This picture in a nutshell should tell Illinois voters all they need to know about the bandit administration of Rod Blagojevich.

Already stocked with the biggest warchest of campaign money of any governor in state history, Blagojevich decided to save a little of it today by hurrying out a taxpayer-funded state employee to respond to a political press conference. The picture above (courtesy CBS-2 Chicago), shows campaign spokeswoman Sheila Nix directing Blagojevich budget director John Filan to a hastily called press conference in front of the James R. Thompson state building in the Loop.

Filan was responding to Judy Baar Topinka's comprehensive proposal unveiled today to dig the state out of the financial mess that Rod Blagojevich and Filan created. Topinka's proposal was political and it would be illegal to use state employees on state time to respond politically.

When called on it, the Blagojevich campaign said Filan was on vacation today -- although most people I know don't wear clothes like that on vacation.

Filan told everyone there that he was taking a vacation day so JBT's campaign knows that — there is no question about taxpayer dollars. Also, since JBT's announcement was about the budget, it makes sense to have someone who really understands the numbers and process give an opinion on its credibility.

I wonder if U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald will find this explanation satisfactory. I also wonder whether those detailed rebuttals to Topinka's plan that Filan is holding in his hand also were done by state budget employees on vacation. Those rebuttals showed up in the in-boxes of political reporters about two hours after Topinka's announcement.

Guess it was just lucky that today a bunch of state budget crunchers happened to be on vacation on the same day and were not sightseeing or sipping margaritas on a beach like most vacationers so they were available on their "home" computers to dissect Topinka's plan.

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