The Illinois budget crisis just drags on and on, and gets worse and worse. Any solution seems more and more remote.
But there isn't more and more outrage. Why not? We seem almost to have adjusted to and accepted this dire situation, this crisis. Why is there not more outrage? Why no greater sense of urgency?
Perhaps it is because this is a slow-motion, incremental crisis, rather than an abrupt, explosive disaster. A few people laid off here and there. A private social services contract not renewed.
And the most damning explanation of all? The people most intensely affected seem almost invisible. It is as if they don't exist. They belong to no organized interest group. They are the powerless, the defenseless. So what can be done?
Well, the veto-proof Democratic majority in the legislature could adopt a budget, spending all they want. But they would have to fund it with tax hikes to meet the balanced budget requirement. So, instead, they pass spending bills knowing that the governor will veto them.
So both sides play a high stakes game of chicken -- and in the process lay an egg.
I'm Bob Evans, and that's my perspective.
