Pritzker acts recklessly, jeopardizes first responders
Gov. J.B. Pritzker spent $17 million to purchase face masks but it turns out they were fake and useless, another example of his poor leadership as Illinois governor. That wasted money and his excessive taxes that he imposed on Illinois taxpayers has created an unjustified burden on the state’s residents
By Ray Hanania
Normally, if a public official spent $17 million in taxpayer monies on fake merchandise during a crisis, they would be hounded out of office.
But Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker is no normal person. His ego is so big that missteps, poor decisions, and punitive policies like increasing taxes on hardworking Illinois residents mean nothing to him.
Pritzker’s updates on the coronavirus pandemic usually consist of repetitive news, things we’ve heard but somehow Pritzker feels he has to announce himself.
What Pritzker doesn’t address at those daily self-promotional live press conferences is his mishandling of the state, like purchasing $17 million in KN95 face masks that are supposed to protect first responders working hard every day in this pandemic but instead are worthless. Yes indeed, Pritzker did just that.
If anything warrants an investigation by the Illinois Legislature of a governor’s abuse of power, it is purchasing $17 million in worthless protective gear. Maybe the leaders of the Illinois Senate and the House might convene a bi-partisan investigation to look into how that happened?
Maybe the first clue that the masks were worthless might have been the fact that Pritzker ordered them from China, where the coronavirus got its start supposedly at a wet animal market in Wuhan that happens to be across the river from the Wuhan Institute of Virology that many suspect is the real source for the outbreak – the Chinese weaponizing of a virus in an experiment that went wrong.
Well, you can’t get truth out of China, especially since biased media like CNN, the Washington Post and the New York Times are more concerned with twisting every bit of information possible to help get former Vice President Joe Biden, whose memory continues to slip, elected over their most hated President Donald Trump.
What you can get out of China, besides lies, and that Pritzker has shown us, is fake and useless KN95 masks.
Pritzker grew up watching the popular TV show Dallas which featured “J.R.” Ewing, the criminal bully who skirted the law. Maybe that’s why Jay Robert Pritzker doesn’t use his real moniker, “J.R” and uses a variation with less meaning, “J.B.”
Maybe he just prefers the name “Jay Bob,” the proper source for “J.B.”, although it sounds a little too country-ish. A backwoods name like that might not allow him to exercise the total control he has over the Illinois Legislature, running rampant while the legislature is off on a coronavirus hiatus.
It isn’t like Pritzker purchased bad Black Cat Firecrackers from China. Everyone knows that Black Cat firecrackers often misfire. That’s the Chinese manufacturing way. Produce cheap junk that sells at high prices in Western countries like America to make a huge profit.
He bought badly needed, essential face protections for our most coveted public servants, First Responders and medical personnel who are struggling through the horrible impact of this devastating virus.
Illinois is the second worst State when it comes to the number of coronavirus cases, behind New York which is the worst, and slightly ahead of California, which has more people. More than 39,000 cases as of writing this column. The numbers keep growing but Illinois is doing a great job staying near the top of the heap.
Illinois is more importantly the 4th worst when it comes to the number of deaths behind New York, New York’s neighbor of Massachusetts and Michigan.
So, the misspending of $17 million on fake face masks is a big deal. It involves life and death.
Pritzker isn’t the only elected leader in Illinois. We have a Senate and a House and just maybe the leaders of the legislature might bring together a bi-partisan committee to investigate Pritzker’s mishandling of the purchase.
An investigation by the Illinois Senate and House might also get Pritzker to stop using his daily soapbox to make political statements attacking the president. Who knows, it might humble him so much the spoiled rich kid might start thinking about the hardworking taxpayers whom he has slammed with some of the worst tax hikes in Illinois history.
If anything, the first person who needs to follow the Illinois Stay-at-Home order is Gov. J.B. Pritzker himself. If he did, Illinois might be better off.
(Ray Hanania is an award winning former Chicago City Hall reporter and political columnist. This column was originally published in the Southwest News Newspaper Group in the Des Plaines Valley News, Southwest News-Herald, The Regional News, The Reporter Newspapers. For more information on Ray Hanania visit www.Hanania.com or email him at rghanania@gmail.com.)
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Hanania also writes about Middle East issues for the Arab News, and The Arab Daily News criticizing government policies in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Hanania was named "Best Ethnic American Columnist" by the New America Media in November 2007, and is the 2009 recipient of the SPJ National Sigma Delta Chi Award for column writing.
Email Ray Hanania at rghanania@gmail.com.
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