Of the 40 seats up for election this year in the Senate, 13 are contested:

Of 40 a mere 13. An Illinois Blues moment. Really?

As in a Democrat town hall meeting in Oak Park, July 17, 2013, reported in Illinois Blues: How the Ruling Party Talks to Voters.

A Certified Public Accountant shifted tone considerably, urging [Sen. Don] Harmon to “do something about corruption in our very corrupt state.” He specified “gerrymandering” and complained, “The way it’s set up, candidates know they will win,” continuing at length in this vein.

“Each of us is vulnerable in a primary,” Harmon said. When an opponent surfaces, he might have added. [Rep. Camille] Lilly, appointed in 2010, had run unopposed in primary and general elections in 2012 and would do so again in 2014. Harmon had run unopposed in the general every year but one since he was elected in 2002.

Really.

via Illinois Senate endorsements – Chicago Tribune

Presented as a service:

Global warming. Gun rights. Capitalism. War. Immigration.

These are just a few of the hot button issues of this year’s presidential campaign—and next Tuesday, when the vice presidential nominees take the debate stage, liberal Catholic Tim Kaine will be representing the wrong side of many issues. What’s the truth about Catholicism? Do the teachings of the Catholic Church really support the anti-business, pro-abortion positions of the Left?

In The Politically Incorrect Guide to Catholicism, John Zmirak refutes misrepresentations and misconceptions about the Catholic Church and separates rumor from truth when it comes to Catholic traditions, faith, and controversial leaders. No, Zmirak says: the Catholic Church is not the Democratic Party at prayer—in fact, it’s one of the most conservative institutions in the world.

In The Politically Incorrect Guide to Catholicism, you’ll discover:

• Why the Church defends private property as a natural right—and has always condemned socialism

• Why Catholic “social teaching” is more conservative than you think—and is based on limiting the power of the state

• How St. Thomas Aquinas discovered the free market before Adam Smith

• Why Catholics believe both in an inherent right to self-defense and a positive duty to defend others (maybe that’s why there are so many Catholic cops, soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines)

• Why the pope can’t change Catholic Doctrine

The Reverend C. J. McCloskey calls The Politically Incorrect Guide to Catholicism“a funny, readable, and convincing book that marks off faithful Catholicism from political attempts to hijack and distort it.”

What you call an unpaid ad. You’re welcome.

This book has everything for the sensible Catholic. For instance, 

CHAPTER 1 The Church: What It Says about Itself, the World, and What Will Happen to You When You Die

The Roman Catholic Church is like the weather: everybody talks about it, but nobody does anything about it. They can’t, not in the most fundamental sense, any more than they can change earth’s climate.

The truths that the Church teaches about God and man, right and wrong, and the purpose of human history are simply there. You can embrace them enthusiastically as liberating and beautiful. (What the saints do) You can reluctantly admit that they are probable, and obey them to be on the safe side. (What most of us “bad Catholics” do)

Or you can insist that some or all of them are false. (What non-Catholics do) What you can’t do is alter those truths. (What liberal Catholics try to do)

Not even a pope can manage that. Catholics believe that the Holy Spirit would intervene and prevent him, exercising the divine veto power that we call “infallibility.”

Zmirak, John (2016-09-26). The Politically Incorrect Guide to Catholicism (Kindle Locations 267-269). Regnery Publishing. Kindle Edition.

Bring it to your next Tim Kaine rally.

via The Politically Incorrect Guide to Catholicism: John Zmirak: 9781621575863: Amazon.com: Books

Well, well, well.

. . .  courtesy Sun-Times, where the reporting is excellent and the customary liberal viewpoints are acted out with adequate geniality and occasional glimmers of right-wing light. 

              5 hours Man wanted in U of I shooting surrenders to police Sun-Times Wire

              6 hours 3 dead, 8 wounded in city shootings Thursday Sun-Times Wire

              6 hours Austin shooting leaves 1 woundedSun-Times Wire

              6 hours Woman wounded in Hermosa drive-by Sun-Times Wire

              8 hours 1 critically hurt in Roseland shootingSun-Times Wire

              9 hours 17-year-old boy shot in Grand Crossing Sun-Times Wire

              9 hours Man shot in Austin Sun-Times Wire

              10 hours Emergency pothole repair completed on Stevenson Expressway Sun-Times Wire

              11 hours Man in custody after Humboldt Park stabbing Sun-Times Wire

              11 hours Home invader points gun at person in driveway in Bristol Township Sun-Times Wire

Special attn. to be given to this Austin event:

A 25-year-old man was shot Thursday evening . . . about 8:20 p.m., in the leg, butt and arm in the 200 block of South Lotus Avenue.

This writer lived in the 300 block of North Lotus in 1968-69, until he and his wife emigrated to Oak Park in the wake of burglary and arson in their building, by the way.