Illinois Raids Welfare for Videogame Legislation

jcgam69 writes "Recent hearings revealed that the State of Illinois spent $1 million defending their unconstitutional video games legislation. The story gets even worse when you learn where the money came from. 'Some of the areas money was taken from included the public health department, the state's welfare agency and even the economic development department. A state representative who attended recent hearings on the issue said that Gov. Blagojevich's staff simply spread the legal bills around by sticking them to agencies which had funds left in their budgets--even if the agencies had nothing to do with the issue or the litigation.'"

Comments

As long as it's for the children!!

[faloi]

This shouldn't come as a big surprise. I expect a lot of government offices/officials snake money from areas that still have some cash to pay for other interests. It's one of the biggest reasons agencies tend to spend all their money...if they have some left over, there's a chance someone will decide they don't really need that budget money and shift it to some other agency.

Well, yes and no

[Anonymous Coward]

Normally you try to spend all of your budget in a given year so that the "powers that be" don't cut next year's budget because you obviously didn't need all that money. This is the first I've heard where (apparently) they took already-allocated money back to pay for their stupidity. That sucks even more because you can't even count on the money you already have - you never know when the higher-ups will just change their mind and give it to someone else.

Re:This really isn't a surprise.

[XxtraLarGe]

On the other hand, I can see exactly why this was done, and why it might be ok. It is the taxpayer's money, and it's expectd to be used. They spent it very poorly yes, but it's there to be spent. If the public is upset about it, they need to make that known, by tossing those dips out of office. If they don't do that, then no bitching from you. Either change it or stfu. You're right, it isn't a surprise. In another story about how Municipal Wi-Fi is failing, I posted "Harry Browne said it best... Government Doesn't Work!" and I got modded -1 off-topic. This is another example of government not working. There are tens of thousands of instances of government not working that are in the news every year, doesn't matter if it's democrats or republicans in charge. Then the people go to the polls, bend over and say "Thank you, sir! May I have another?" We really need to get away from the two-party Big Brother mentality. If you want to save this democracy, vote against the incumbent, and vote for 3rd party candidates whenever possible.

No, the funds shouldn't come from anywhere.

[raehl]

The problem is (as an Illinois native) elected officials in Illinois have a history of using their current elected position to campaign for the next one. A good example of this is the Secretary of State - the first thing the guy elected Secretary of State does is plaster "John Doe, Secretary of State" on EVERYTHING in the state. Tollway signs. DMV. Courthouses. Whatever. You can't go into a state building in Illinois without knowing who the secretary of state is.

And Blagojevich is a just plain corrupt governor. Sometimes I wonder if there really is a conspiracy between the two parties - the only reason Blagojevich got reelected, even though most people BELIEVE he's corrupt, is that the Republicans somehow managed to field a candidate that was SO BAD that corrupt Blagojevich was actually the better choice! I wish I had been paying more attention, as *I* could have gotten elected governor running against those two.

Anyway, this is just Blagojevich campaigning for Senate or President, using state dollars. You can see the campaign commercial already: 'When Blagojevich was governor of Illinois, he worked to protect vulnerable children from violent video games....'

Re:Hard to say this is bad

[Anonymous Coward]

If any of that were true, how come the US, which has a much smaller social-welfare apparatus than most other developed countries, has more crime, poverty, teen pregnancies, &c.?

Re:This really isn't a surprise.

[XxtraLarGe]

Ever think about how many things they do get right? Remember, something is only news if it's out of the ordinary. Yes, as a matter of fact, I do. In fact, I know that millions of drivers licenses are renewed successfully each year and billions of pieces of mail are delivered successfully every day, etc.

Now I have to ask you "Do you think about how many things they do wrong that you never hear about?" I used to be a contractor on a government project for nearly 3 years. Lots of good people doing the work they were supposed to. But there was also A LOT of poor decision making, especially when it came to spending--I'm talking $800 toilet seat type spending. When you'd point out that we could get what they needed for far less, the reply was often "it's not my money". Also, it seemed that many people in the top of the bureaucracy were quite incompetent. It was usually all of the small stuff was o.k., but when bad decisions were made, they were show-stoppers. Of course, most of the stuff they did didn't make the news, but when a whole group of people didn't get the child support checks they were expecting for over a week because somebody forgot to see if our new system was compatible with another agency's system, it did. Now maybe my experience is atypical, but I'd be willing to bet that it is not.

The only thing...

[Jess (geek-chick)]

It is the taxpayer's money, and it's expectd to be used.

If it's Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF, or welfare if you will) money, a lot of it comes from federal block grants. I'm not familiar with Illinois TANF policy, but according to my state, Oklahoma: "Federal money is provided by block grant funding in accordance with federal laws and regulations relating to the TANF program. These state and federal funds are used for assistance and administration under the plan."

IANAL or work in auditing, but the Governor could get his state into a lot of trouble spending money that was earmarked for that federal program, methinks. I'd hope that during their next federal audit (which happens every year here) they get to the bottom of it and punish just the people responsible, while not impacting the needy families with fines or cuts to the state's grant.

Rob from the poor to protect the rich

[Nitack]

I find this incredibly interesting the class warfare going on in Illinois. Video games are an item that falls into the discretionary spending category. You have extra money and you get the new game for your kid. The people who buy these games, at least for the most part, have the money to cover the necessities in life and then some. So in order to protect these reasonably well off people you are going to take money away from the downtrodden and underprivileged? "We need to protect all of these suburban kids from what they see in their video games. But where do we get the money for the fight? Oh, those poor kids don't need to eat this month..." God bless the yuppies