Illinois House Speaker Proposes Purge

Worth Clicking: Blasts from the past wound Romney

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May 07, 2009

Illinois House Speaker Proposes Purge

Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan (D) wants to "fumigate" state government with the wholesale dismissal of all appointees of ex-governors Rod Blagojevich and George Ryan -- some 3,000 agency officials, and board and commission members, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

The measure "would give Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn 60 days to decide which holdover from his two predecessors he wants to keep in his administration. He would be able to re-appoint those people. The rest would be summarily fired, on grounds that they were brought in under two governors whose tenures were hopelessly tainted by scandal."

"Blagojevich, a Democrat, is awaiting trial on federal corruption charges. This predecessor, Ryan, a Republican, is serving a federal prison term for corruption."

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Taegan D. Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites.

Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.

Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country, including the Washington Post, USA Today, Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle, Chicago Tribune, Philadelphia Inquirer and Christian Science Monitor.

Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.

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May 07, 2009