Free Republic

HUDSON — Brandt Group of Companies is now in business in McLean County. The Canadian agriculture manufacturer has started making grain-conveying and grain-handling equipment with 75 employees at 19500 N. 1425 East Road in rural Hudson after spending the last few months preparing the plant, Brandt President Shaun Semple told The Pantagraph on Tuesday. "We took two products to get the initial management team up and running," said Semple. "Our hope is to be at 150 (employees) by the end of the first year of production. ... We could get up to 250 or 300 by the end of the...

Connecticut’s legislature has passed a bill that would give the state’s Electoral College votes to the presidential candidate who wins the popular vote nationally. The state Senate voted 21-14 on Saturday to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, which includes 10 states and the District of Columbia. The state House passed the measure last week, 77 to 73. The compact requires its members to cast their Electoral College ballots for the presidential candidate who wins the national popular vote. The agreement goes into effect once states representing at least 270 electoral votes — the number needed for a candidate...

On 26 April, 2018, the United States District Court for the Southern District of Illinois held that some felons have the right to keep and bear arms. Larry Hatfield was a perfect test case. From reason.com, Hatfield v. Session (formerly Hatfield v. Lynch) Plaintiff Larry Edward Hatfield wants to keep a gun in his home for self-defense. But the Government bans him from doing so, because 28 years ago, Hatfield lied on some forms that he sent to the Railroad Retirement Board: a felony in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1001(a). Hatfield later pled guilty to one count of...

New reports reveal a deadly wave of gun violence in Chicago. A 15-year old boy, a young mother, and even a four-year-old girl sitting on her porch have all been shot dead. These are just a few of the nearly 40 people who were gunned down in Chicago over a mere three-day period this week. This level of violence is usually not seen until the middle of summer in Chicago, but as temperatures reached into the 80’s this week criminals were drawn into the streets. On Monday, one person was shot dead and nine others were wounded. A day later,...

Like many union workers, Oberbroeckling voted twice for former Democratic President Barack Obama before backing Donald Trump and other Republicans in 2016. Now he has buyer’s remorse - and plans to support the Democratic challenger to Rod Blum, the Republican congressman in this blue-collar, eastern Iowa district. “Trump is for the rich,” said Oberbroeckling, 37, sipping a rum-and-coke. “Blum’s for big business. They said they were for the workers, but they’re not.” That sentiment should encourage Democrats, who saw their once-reliable labor vote help send Trump to the White House after he vowed to revive Rust Belt factories with trade...

Full Title: Deputy Consul General Of Israel Allegedly Forced Out Of Uber Ride For Speaking Hebrew On Phone. CHICAGO (CBS) – The Deputy Consul General of Israel to the Midwest, Itay Milner, says he was ten minutes into his Uber ride on Lower Wacker Drive Thursday night when he was thrown out by the driver. Milner wrote in a Facebook post, “I just had the worst experience of my life. I was just thrown out of an Uber in the middle of the highway only because I answered my phone in my mother tongue.”

The Land of Lincoln finished dead last among the 50 states in passing a concealed carry law. And like California, Illinois enjoys a lot of misguided thinking from those who look at guns like fresh dog droppings. Now, the Democrat majority brain trust in the Illinois House passed a bill that would replace armed school resource officers with social workers, Yes, Illinois state representative Chris Welch (pictured above) introduced HB-4208 with lots of his fellow Democrats as co-sponsors. The bill would award grant monies to districts that did away with armed school resource officers and replaced them with social workers....

Rap superstar and culture critic Kanye West accused many in the black community of hypocrisy by focusing more of their outrage on white violence against black people or his decision to wear a Donald Trump campaign hat than the problems in black communities. “Black people have a tendency to focus and march when a white person kills a black person or wears a hat, but when it’s 700 kids being killed in Chicago it’s O.K.,” Kanye West said during a lengthy and wide-ranging interview with TMZ boss Harvey Levin on Tuesday. The Grammy-winning rapper-producer’s words infuriated Van Lathan, a black...

A poll by the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University showed nearly three-quarters of those asked support a tax that “would be lower for lower-income taxpayers and higher for upper income taxpayers.” When asked if they would support a tax that “would result in single filers earning over $17,300 to pay more in taxes,” support drops to 14 percent. The Illinois Policy Institute asked that question in a poll in late March and early April. “We know we have to increase revenue to get our state out of it (economic trouble) and I believe this (progressive tax)...

--(snip) The filmmakers then follow the seven teachers on a visit to a gun range. One teacher is a military combat veteran, while several others have never touched a gun in their lives. They shoot this gun and that gun, carefully supervised by a pro, trying to hit a target shaped like a person. They cry out when the gun recoils and flinch when an empty shell ejects. Is this an appropriate classroom role for a teacher? (snip)

Rapper Kanye West is expected to announce as early as Friday a major philanthropic project aimed at improving the lower-income neighborhoods in his home town of Chicago. West launched Donda Social in 2012 and said at the time that the organization was intended to "pick up where Steve Jobs left off." He tweeted the announcement of Donda, named after his late mother Donda West, and said it would operate as a "design company which will galvanize amazing thinkers in a creative space to bounce there [sic] dreams and ideas." However, West's recent tweets this week , including an endorsement of...

The most popular place to put a city park is, increasingly, on a highway. Cities looking to boost their downtowns, or to improve downtrodden neighborhoods, are creating “highway cap parks” on decks constructed over freeways that cut through the urban center. Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Denver and Dallas have deck parks underway. Atlanta, Houston, Minneapolis and Santa Monica, California, are among the cities considering similar projects. In crowded cities, highway deck parks are a way to create new acreage and provide green space that can spur downtown development. Capping a highway to create a park also can reconnect urban neighborhoods sliced apart...

"No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other." (Matthew 6:24) The verse refers to money, but in light of today's debate about the unaccountable devotion many Christian leaders have for President Trump it is not a stretch to apply it to their relationship with him. Last week at Wheaton College in Illinois a number of Christian pastors and leaders gathered to discuss the future of "evangelicalism" in the Trump era. Some who were not there claimed it was a forum...

Prince's heirs are suing Walgreens and the Illinois hospital that treated him after he suffered a drug overdose just a week before he died. Prince was 57 when he was found in an elevator at his Paisley Park estate on April 21, 2016. He died from an accidental overdose of the powerful synthetic opioid fentanyl. About a week earlier, his plane made an emergency stop in Moline, Illinois, when he suffered from an opioid overdose and had to be revived by paramedics...

The North Korean state media made a historic announcement Friday evening that Kim Jong-un and the Democratic People's Republic of North Korea would be suspending its nuclear missile and long range missile testing. In addition they will also be closing down their nuclear test site. The announcement comes ahead of President Trump's meeting with Kim Jong-un, a potbellied dictator he once nicknamed "Rocketman," in May. By all accounts, President Trump has been the driving force behind North Korea's sudden change in their willingness to stop their nuclear weapon program. Now, Rep. Luke Messer (R-IL) is calling for President Trump...

Harvey. Illinois is in the midst of a financial crisis that represents the tip of the iceberg ... The city of 25,000 in the far northwest suburbs of Chicago is suffering from high unemployment (22%). An astonishing 32% of the population lives below the poverty level. This is a deadly mixture that has caused catastrophic shortfalls in revenue, leading to a crisis in funding pensions for the city's retired workers. Since state law prohibits municipal bankruptcy, Harvey has been forced into a situation Illinois has never seen. In February, the state began to garnish Harvey's revenue to fund its pension...

Rahm Emanuel has tried almost everything a lefty anti-gun big city may can think of to cut back on the murder epidemic in his violent city. He’s fired and hired police superintendents, he’s tried (unsuccessfully) to eliminate gun stores within city limits, he’s tried (unsuccessfully) to keep shooting ranges out of his town, he fought concealed carry to the bitter end, and he’s mumbled meaningless platitudes like “public-private mentoring partnerships” and wrung his hands over the perpetual need for more “neighborhood resources.” He’s tried bogus “violence interruptor” programs, basically paying gang bangers (with city tax dollars) to stop banging. He’s...

Good news, ‘Caddyshack’ lovers: Actor Bill Murray and his brothers recently opened a restaurant that’s themed after the 1980 hit film. The Murray brothers -- Bill, Joel, Johnny, Ed, Andy and Brian -- officially opened the restaurant on Tuesday, which is located in the Crowne Plaza Hotel on River Road in Rosemont, according to WGN. The restaurant's motto? “Eat, Drink and be Murray.” "The fact that it is called Caddyshack means it has something to do with golf," the actor said at a press conference at the restaurant's unveiling, according to the Chicago Tribune. “That feeling of casual fun, I...

Lots of people just talk about soaking the rich, but Donald Trump and the GOP actually did it — in California, anyway, although they won’t be alone. The controversial phase-out of the state and local tax deduction (SALT) will drop like a bombshell on high-tax-rate blue states, which is one reason why Democrats so staunchly opposed it. According to an analysis from California’s Franchise Tax Board, the Golden State will be Ground Zero: President Donald Trump’s tax cuts will be anything but for about 1 million California taxpayers who will owe Uncle Sam more money a year from now.They’re...