Welcome to TA's New Blog!

Hello, and welcome to the new blog created by me, Team America World Police. Please call me TA for short.

I've been commenting on other people's blog's for the better part of two years, mostly in relation to local politics, especially the 10th District here in Illinois. However, I never had the inspiration to start my own blog, given that there are already many interesting blogs out there, and I was content to simply sit back and offer comments.

Something changed recently, however, as I was recently 'kicked off' Ellen's Tenth Congressional District Blog, for no worse crime than trying to offer an opposing view to the partisan hack material that, sadly, the author Ellen Beth Gill seems to delight in publishing. Since prior to the last election, TA and Ellen have been exchanging views and engaging in lively debate on her blog. In fact, I daresay that TA had become something of a celebrity on Ellen's Blog, as acknowledged by many of her regulars, as well as the fact that nothing much really seemed to be going on over there, except when TA left a comment. When that happened, the blue dogs came out barking, and boy, was it a free-for-all. But, I'd like to think that most of the discourse was polite, respectful and reasoned. Occasionally, there were personal attacks and hateful language (by others, not me), but by and large, I thought it was quite an interesting exchange of views and ideas.

Sadly, that all changed last week. Ellen, without even acknowledging she was doing so, simply decided to start deleting TA's posts. For a short time, she left a "deleted comment" marker in place, but then she stopped doing even that.

I directly challenged Ellen to confess to her blog readers what she was doing in a series of posts directed at her, which she immediately deleted. Not sure if anyone else even got a chance to read them before they were deleted, but no matter. My satisfaction is that Ellen knows that I beat her, and she had to sacrifice her own high-minded principles of defense of free speech and openness to differing views to rid herself of that annoying TA. I guess she figured she could no longer sell her snake-oil to the masses with TA and others (I recall bloggers Badge of Honor, El Rider and others who I have not seen on Ellen's Blog lately either, come to think of it) pointing out her partisan, untruthful attacks, mostly on Congressman Mark Kirk. In any event, she knows in her heart that she has lost, and it's clear that she cannot stand behind the very principles she espouses- freedom of speech and allowing open discourse to let people decide what the truth really is.

All that brings us here to this- my new Blog. I hereby pledge to keep this Blog a place where reasoned, intelligent discourse is the order of the day, and people with differing viewpoints will not be stifled, simply because they disagree. Nevertheless, this is a family blog, and abusive or offensive commentors will be deleted and banned for life. I will strive to encourage intelligent discussion about local politics, focusing on the Tenth Congressional District and Lake County, with occasional jibes at the craziness down in Springfield, which of course affects us all. There will also probably be indirect commenting on Ellen's Blog, since anyone who does not drink the Dem Kool-Aid is not allowed there anymore.

Also look here to hopefully get the latest news about the Tenth Congressional District race. It will be one to watch, although not quite as exciting as the Dems think. If I'm lucky, maybe there will be some exclusive posts and inside news here from the campaign before anywhere else, from time to time.

So, having said all that, let's start off with an observation and a question: Q3 fundraising results for Mark Kirk, Dan Seals and Jay Footlik have just (unofficially) started to be reported in the papers. While Seals was noted in Crain's as raising just over 300K (to Footlik's rather disappointing 200K or so), Mark Kirk raised more than 525K, bringing his total this cycle to an eye-popping $1.8 million, with $1.5 cash in the bank.

So, the question is--where is the Dem money? Why is it, if Kirk is so universally hated by his constituency (as Ellen would have you believe), and is on his way out the door, that Kirk continues to shatter the fundraising efforts by his rivals? Surely, it can't be because Dan Seals is just getting warmed up... he's now been a candidate for almost two years, and his 47% of the vote in last term's election, while impressive, doesn't seem to be translating into people willing to write checks. Has the 10th lost confidence in Seals, since he couldn't seem to get the job done in a national landslide year for Democrats? Or is it just that the people in the 10th genuinely like and respect Mark Kirk, and this is a sign of how this campaign is going to develop through the next 12 months?