Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
BY ANTHONY MARTINEZ
Work got you stressed? Before you blow off some steam, take a look at Illinois state
representative Mike Bost and an explosive rant Tuesday, which gained national attention.
Here’s CBS.
“These damn bills that come out of here all the damn time, come out here at the last
second! And I got to figure out how to vote for my people!”
“Ooh, he’s getting a little loud in the Illinois State Senate.”
So, how did this all get started? ABC takes it from the top.
“Bost...unloaded on Democrats led by House Speaker Mike Madigan for setting votes on
pension reform bills without providing enough time for lawmakers to assess the measures
after they emerged from committee...He then took the papers that settled near him and
threw them at his colleagues.”
The loud lawmaker was disgruntled about the recent changes to a bill that passed in a
pension hearing committee hours before. The Southern reports.
"Bost said his outburst came after he received an overnight, Madigan-staff rewrite of pension
reform, about 300 pages long, about 7:40 a.m. — only 20 minutes before the House was to
convene..."
Bost says the rewritten plan...
"...ignored Republican attempts to relieve school districts from assuming pension costs."
Bost also made a few “Ten Commandments” movie quotes. He shouted biblical references
to Madigan saying, “let his people go.” All this frustration and turns out--he wasn’t
alone. WLS Radio reports...
““When I left the floor, many Democrats from around the state, even Chicago Democrats
came in and said ‘We want to say this but we can’t,’ because such power controls
their elections,’”
Madigan has a different take. Illinois’s live coverage blog Capitol Fax has his comments.
“There’s a lot of frustration here in the House of Representatives and the General
Assembly. We experience it all the time on a whole variety of issues — frustration,
tension, interaction with different personalities pursuing different agendas. That’s life
in the General Assembly. That’s life in the House of Representatives.”
Bost says he received so many emails from national media that his phone actually stopped
working.