Dawn Clark Netsch, an iconic Illinois political presence for more than six decades, died Tuesday morning from complications from ALS. She was 86.

 
 
Netsch made Illinois history as the first female nominee for governor, paid the state’s bills as comptroller and battled for civil rights and ethics and fiscal responsibility in government. She served as legal adviser to Gov. Otto Kerner in the 1960s, when no woman had held such a post, and was an architect of Illinois’ current state constitution.
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Former congressman Joe Walsh (R-Ill.) says he will sue the Chicago Sun-Times for publishing a story about his effort to reduce his child support payments.
 

 
Walsh’s child support payments have been in the news before and led to charges during his 2012 reelection campaign that he was a “deadbeat dad.”
The Sun-Times reported in a story posted online Monday that Walsh sought to stop making child-support payments after losing his bid for reelection, which has left him without a job. An attorney for his ex-wife told the paper that the former congressman continues to …

The son of Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle is facing a misdemeanor battery charge for allegedly kicking a man and “punching him in the face several times,” court records show.

The board president was in a South Side courtroom Monday morning when her son Kyle Preckwinkle, in his early 30s, appeared before Judge Tommy Brewer in the municipal court’s Branch 34 at 51st and Wentworth, sources said.
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Hat Tip Mike Houlihan for keeping this story alive

Rep. Mike Quigley (D-Ill.) snagged a coveted seat on the House Appropriations Committee on Friday. If Quigley had not been tapped, Illinois otherwise would have lost representation on the influential panel–where now former Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill.) served before his resignation.

House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) announced Friday the final round of appointments for the new Congress that started on Thursday.
Pelosi told the Sun-Times, “Quigley will bring the values of his district, the aspirations of his constituents, and a strong commitment to fiscal responsibility and job creation to his …

The city has mile after mile of underutilized lakefront park, and it made no sense to destroy Meigs just to add a few hundred yards more.
So ruining Meigs was a mistake, and Daley doing it in his I’m-the-King-of-Chicago-I-can-do-what-I-please manner made it worse.

 
Time is a balm, however. Asked if digging up Meigs was the right thing to do, Emanuel initially said, “It is right, yes, on this level, this way: Meigs Field is no longer there.”
But that seemed to be saying that the ends justify the means. Whatever works, just do …

Five Chicago government pension funds have won a six-month court battle to fire the money-management firm founded by a friend of President Barack Obama and a nephew of then-Mayor Richard M. Daley.

Chancery Court Judge John Noble ruled last week in Delaware that the pension funds had sufficient cause to fire DV Urban Realty Advisors, which was formed by Obama’s friend and onetime employer Allison S. Davis and Daley nephew Robert G. Vanecko.

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After his 2008 conviction, Rezko voluntarily went to jail to begin serving his time. Again, he was put into solitary confinement despite repeatedly petitioning to be placed in the general population, he said.

“I asked a number of times,” Rezko said. “My attorneys sent letters saying we’ll take the liability.”
The warden refused, he said. A spokesman for the Metropolitan Correctional Center had no comment.
“I believed it was by design,” Rezko said of spending 10 months in the hole before he was moved. “The same time I was there, [there] was a …

Proposed Campaign ad for Anita Alvarez.
On the screen, we see an unattractive, overweight, middle age woman. THe woman begins to speak: “Hi, you may not know me, but I am Mayor Daley’s sister, Mary Vanecko. My son, RJ, slugged a young man who was one foot shorter and 60 pounds lighter than he was, resulting in his death. When citizens tried to get justice for the dead man, only one woman came to our aid–Anita Alvarez. That’s right, Anita Alvarez stood by our family. She helped us to ensure …

But after reading Quinn’s comments posted on the Sun-Times website Saturday, the bishops that met with Quinn issued a written statement saying Quinn characterized the meeting wrong: The primary purpose of the sit-down, they said, was to admonish the governor for using his Catholic up-bringing to justify views that they say aren’t supported by the church. It was the second time in the past two months the bishops have issued a statement blasting the Catholic governor.

“We share the Governor’s concern for the poor,” they wrote. “From our point of view, …

The same federal judge who sentenced Rod Blagojevich to one of the longest corruption sentences in Illinois history has recommended a prison rehab program for the ex-governor that could help shave time off his staggering 14-year sentence.

U.S. District Judge James Zagel, referencing a report from the U.S. Probation Department, on Tuesday recommended that Blagojevich be placed in the U.S. Bureau of Prisons Residential Drug Abuse Program, said the former governor’s lawyer, Shelly Sorosky.
But Sorosky said he didn’t know what type of drug or alcohol use Blagojevich would be treated for …