# ILLINOIS SUPREME COURT: CONSTITUTION NIXES PENSION CUTS !

voiceofdetroit It is a summons to defend it”–Justice Lloyd Karmeier, Illinois Supreme Court ... Under established and uncontroverted Illinois law, the state of Illinois ... Flag as irrelevant
9news.com.au Australian opposition party proposes gay marriage law Quincy Herald Whig CANBERRA, Australia (AP) - Australia's political opposition hopes to harness momentum from the Irish gay marriage referendum after it proposed a ... Flag as irrelevant Litigation tourism is bad for Illinois Madison County Record Each year, people without a meaningful connection to Illinois flock to the state to file lawsuits in the hope of a big payout.Illinois law makes it easy for ... Madison County Record Flag as irrelevant

The #Justice Department Is Giving Away Your #Money (Without Your Permission) ! @Heritage

Paul J. Larkin Jr. / March 15, 2015 

The U.S. Justice Department has engaged in the dubious practice of giving away the public’s money when it settles a case, by sometimes conditioning a settlement on a company’s agreement to donate money to a third-party of the government’s (or the defendant’s) choosing.

For example, the Justice Department settled cases last year with Bank of America and Citigroup over unlawful mortgage lending practices. The settlements required the banks to pay money to outside organizations—such as legal aid societies—from a government-approved list. In another instance, the Gibson Guitar Corp. had to contribute to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation to end a criminal investigation.

That practice is of questionable legality and clearly is bad public policy. Government attorneys are obligated to represent the interests of the public, not those of selected groups. Moreover, when federal agencies collect money, that money should be spent as Congress directs that it be spent, not according to the whim or the agencies.

http://goo.gl/vcnDsj

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Year-End #Tax Planning 2014

CHICAGO NEXT BIG CITY BANKRUPTCY?

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 07/28/2013While everyone's attention is focused on the Detroit bankruptcy, and just what assets the city will sell in lieu of raising a DIP loan, perhaps it is time to refocus attention to the city 300 miles west: Chicago. According to the Chicago Sun Times, Obama's former right hand man, Rahm Emanuel, closed the books on 2012 with $33.4 million in unallocated cash on hand — down from $167 million the year before — while adding to the mountain of debt piled on Chicago taxpayers, citing year-end audits. In addition to a liquidity problem, Chicago may also be quite insolvent as the city's total long-term debt soared to nearly $29 billion. That’s $10,780 for every one of the city’s nearly 2.69 million residents. More than a decade ago, the debt load was $9.6 billion or $3,338 per resident. Of course, in a world in which debt is "wealth", this is great news... at least until debt becomes "bankruptcy."

Ironically last year, now-retiring City Comptroller Amer Ahmad argued that the city’s debt load was not “troubling” because, "We still have a very strong bond rating. Our fiscal position is getting better every year and we are aggressively managing our liabilities and obligations" (very much along the lines of what the ECB's Mario Draghi tells the world when he gives the periodic monthly update of European stock markets during the central bank's press conference). It is ironic because last week, Moody’s downgraded Chicago from Aa3 to A3 in an unprecedented three notch cut in the city’s bond rating, citing Chicago’s "very large and growing" pension liabilities, "significant" debt service payments, “unrelenting public safety demands” and historic reluctance to raise local taxes that has continued under Emanuel.

http://www.governamerica.com/news/1044-chicago-next-in-line-for-bankruptcy

http://goo.gl/HQrCo4

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SFSU profs met with terrorists tied to American deaths on taxpayer’s dime

Robert Spencer May 30, 2014 at 12:46pm academia, Useful idiots

Professors Rabab Abdulhadi and Joanne Barker met with Leila Khaled of the Marxist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and the jihadist Sheikh Raed Salah of Hamas. But relax: “Responding to charges a professor engaged in Mideast politics on the taxpayer dime, San Francisco State University officials offered bland reassurances that the school investigates ‘any allegations that a member of the University community misused state funds.’”

This is why respect for academia is at all-time low: professors aren’t genuine educators anymore. They’re just propagandists for the Left and Islamic supremacism.

http://goo.gl/cMQyrp

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ARE ILLINOIS TAXPAYERS GETTING MORE OR LESS BANG FOR THEIR BUCK?

KEVIN HOFFMAN  

APR 23, 2014 57 0

For Illinoisians, the month of April — or at least part of it — means the onset of warmer weather. It’s also the month where millions of taxpayers hand over their hard-earned money to pay local, state and federal taxes. And, depending on which state you live in, you may be getting a higher or lower taxpayer return on investment (ROI).

Geographical and ideological differences play a significant role in the varying tax burdenresidents of each state face. WalletHub’s latest report, “States with the Best & Worst Taxpayer ROI,” attempts to answer the question of whether citizens in high-tax statesbenefit from superior government services, or if low-tax states are simply more fiscally efficient?

To determine a state’s taxpayer ROI, WalletHub contrasted “state and local tax rates to thequality of the services that are funded at those levels, which [were] separated into six main categories – Infrastructure, Education, Health, Safety, Economy and Pollution – that collectively consist of 27 metrics.”

http://rebootillinois.com/2014/04/23/uncategorized/kevin-hoffmanrebootillinois-com/wallethub/6891/?utm_source=dailytip_20140423&utm_medium=email&utm_content=&utm_campaign=

IRS DOCUMENTS SHOW LOIS LERNER WANTED TO SIC THE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT ON TARGETED CONSERVATIVE GROUPS

By: John Hayward  
4/16/2014 08:41 AM

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Judicial Watch has been chipping away at the IRS stonewall with Freedom of Information Act requests, and just released some new emails that show Tax Exempt Organizations director Lois Lerner was talking to the Justice Department about criminal prosecutions for the groups targeted by her organization.  She was also trying to get the Federal Elections Commission – where she used to work, under similar suspicionsof politicized abuse of her authority – involved in the witch hunt.  Judicial Watch previously discovered that the IRS handed tax returns for conservative groups over to the FEC, an action of both questionable utility and dubious legality.

The new documents released by Judicial Watch include this May 2013 exchange between Lerner and Nikole C. Flax, who was chief of staff to Acting IRS Commissioner Steven Miller.  (Both Lerner and Miller have since retired from the IRS, with Miller’s departure briefly and falsely portrayed as a disciplinary measure, back when President Obama was pretending to be concerned about the abuse of power at Internal Revenue.)

http://www.humanevents.com/2014/04/16/irs-documents-show-lois-lerner-wanted-to-sic-the-justice-department-on-targeted-conservative-groups/

Aldermen search everywhere for alternatives to property tax hike

Chicago Ald. Will Burns (4th, left) and Ald. Bob Fioretti (2nd) confer during the City Council meeting in March. | Chandler West/For Sun-Times Media

FRAN SPIELMAN

A London-style congestion fee on motorists who drive into downtown Chicago during weekday business hours.

A new and lower sales tax on high-end professional services performed in Chicago.

Going along with Gov. Pat Quinn’s plan to make permanent a temporary increase in the state income tax, only if municipal revenue sharing is restored to bring Chicago $150 million-a-year.

http://politics.suntimes.com/article/chicago/aldermen-searching-everywhere-property-tax-alternatives/tue-04152014-225pm

Do the Poor Pay Their Fair Share of Taxes?

Written by  Laurence M. Vance

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The loud and persistent cry we hear from Democrats, liberals, and progressives is that “the rich” aren’t paying their “fair share” of taxes. What they really mean is that “the rich” aren’t paying their “fair share” of federal income taxes, since “the poor” are certainly paying Social Security tax of 6.2 percent and Medicare tax of 1.45 percent on every dollar of their income, as well as state sales taxes and federal excise taxes on things like alcohol and gasoline.

Yet, contrary to this claim, the IRS says that about half of Americans pay no income tax. Since that half is made up of the poor, it appears that it is the poor that are not paying their fair share, not the rich.

According to the latest data from the IRS, in tax year 2010, the top 1 percent of taxpayers (in terms of adjusted gross income) paid 37.38 percent of all federal income taxes. The top five percent of taxpayers paid 59.07 percent. The top 10 percent of taxpayers paid 70.62 percent. The top 25 percent of taxpayers paid 87.11 percent of the taxes, and the top 50 percent paid a whopping 97.64 

http://www.thenewamerican.com/economy/commentary/item/18040-taxes-are-the-poor-paying-their-fair-share

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And of course let's not forget the enormous problems faced by Chicago, which had big problems in this area. The Land of Lincoln is a disaster area when it comes to tax revenues, and with such poor economic growth and the continued exodus of business from this state, its only bound to get worse.

To add to the idiocy, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emmanual wants to raise Property taxes to meet Union Pension Fund obligations - a really dumb idea when part of Chicago are finally beginning to recover from the scourge of crime that liberal Democratic policies have wrought.  Yes, it's what happened in Detroit and other big cities, but we are coming back.

But since the "Poor" constitute certain racial groups, anyone who points this glaring fact out is branded as a racist by the ultra-liberal left.

I wonder what HONEST ABE would think?

http://www.thenewamerican.com/economy/commentary/item/18040-taxes-are-the-poor-paying-their-fair-share

Like Share Print More Taxpayers Filing from Home Computers in 2014, Many Taxpayers Eligible to Use Free File

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More Taxpayers Filing from Home Computers in 2014, Many Taxpayers Eligible to Use Free File

IR-2014-28, March 13, 2014

WASHINGTON — More than 27 million taxpayers have filed their tax returns from home computers so far this year, an increase of almost 6 percent compared to last year.

These 27 million taxpayers used a variety of software products to prepare and e-file their own returns. However, the IRS reminds people that they can prepare and e-file their federal tax returns online for free through Free File at IRS.gov. Free File has an option for almost everyone, either through brand-name software or online fillable forms.

The Free File program is a public-private partnership between the IRS and the Free File Alliance, LLC. The Alliance is a consortium of 14 leading tax software providers who make their products available exclusively at IRS.gov. All Free File members meet security requirements and use the latest in encryption technology to protect taxpayer information.

http://www.irs.gov/uac/Newsroom/More-Taxpayers-Filing-from-Home-Computers-in-2014--Many-Taxpayers-Eligible-to-Use-Free-File

Illinois Now Has the Second-Highest Property Taxes in the Nation - and Rahm wants to double it!

In the last decade, the state has been climbing the charts—and could pass New Jersey this year.

BY DENNIS RODKIN

PUBLISHED JAN. 2, 2014

Average Property Tax as a Share of Home Price, Five Year Average: 2007–2011. A county-by-county tax rate chart for the years 2007–11 shows a band of highest-tax counties in Illinois and Wisconsin. (A 2012 map was not available.) SOURCE: “RESIDENTIAL PROPERTY TAXES IN THE UNITED STATES,” BY BENJAMIN H. HARRIS AND BRIAN DAVID MOORE, URBAN BROOKINGS TAX POLICY CENTER, NOV. 18, 2013.

With all the snow this week and the brutal cold forecast for Chicago next week, it’s no wonder so many of us are dreaming of Hawaii right about now. But if you own your home, those daydreams may not only be weather-related: in Hawaii, homeowners are taxed at about one-eighth the rate that Illinois homeowners pay.

http://www.chicagomag.com/real-estate/January-2014/Illinois-Now-Has-the-Second-Highest-Property-Taxes-in-the-Nation/

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Rush Limbaugh was reporting this morning on his show (11:00 AM CST on WLS AM 890) that despite this phenomenal property tax rate, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emmanual has plans to double it and raise rates even higher.  Why would he commit such lunacy?

Chicago is facing a deadline soon to pay up on its belated Pension Bill.  City workers, such as Cops, Fireman, Streets and San and more have a sweet pension deal that pays them 100% of their salary after 15 years on the job.  So, many work the required time, and retire at an early age (45 if you started at 30).

This has led to a crisis for the City, and the bill is about to come due.  The State has the same problem, and uses the same sort of system to keep its army of political patronage flunkies happy.  But as long as the Democratic machine runs things in Springfield and Chicago follows suit, all is well - UNTIL THE PIPER MUST BE PAID!

But if that means a BIG PROPERTY TAX INCRASE, IT'S CURTAINS FOR CHICAGO NEIGHBORHOODS like Wicker Park, Logan Square and the Near South Side that have been experiencing a welcome re-birth after decades of slumber, decay and crime.  With a nascent High Tech corridor, a small but vibrant film industry and bio-tech linked to Chicago universities, not is a terrible time to give Chicago a punch in the gut like this would be. 

Of course Chicago City Hall could care less about property owners since most are WASP's. It's a hot issue, and WTTW is discussing it at this moment. 

The "Pension Crisis" is one of the issues in the upcoming Illinois Primary, with only Bruce Rauner offering a real solution to change this taxpayer-funded political payola.  But any attempts to change the system are met with a fight from the Unions and their politcal beneficiaries:

lllinois Social Media Law

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Illinois pension reform battle brewing after law passes
December 4, 2013 (SPRINGFIELD, Ill.) --  The pension bill in Illinois is headed for the governor's desk, but the fight to stop is just beginning. The Illinois House and Senate passed the bill Tuesday, a major overhaul aimed at addressing Illinois' $100 bill...

Illinois pension reform battle brewing after law passes

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If anyone has additional information on the Broadcast that Rush did this morning, please let us know, o