Next Friday is the last day an IL Gov’s Office will occupy the 16th floor of the James R Thompson Center. In honor of that I will be using this thread to amplify the things we will miss on behalf of the generations of state employees who occupied these walls. First entry…this:
These mid-century modern trash cans used to collect water from the ceiling.
I call this the Death Plant. No idea where it came from and no previous administration has been willing to admit to acquiring it.
We found this in a dark corner in an old cabinet, lurking like a festive Chucky. So many levels of disturbing here. Who did this? Who brought this to Illinois? Show yourself and answer for this monstrosity.
I call this The Beach. Sometimes I come out here to think. And to try and figure out who died on this loveseat.
Doesn’t everyone like their conference room entrance to be a 1970’s rec room accordion door?
Here we have the Throne Room of the Flying Spaghetti Monster - a sacred site for pastafarianism. Long may his tentacles reign.
I have no comment here.
This is a door with no handle. Not sure where it goes. Not sure what’s behind it. I assume that it’s the JRTC’s Room of Requirement and it opens when Illinois most needs it.
This is Emily. She is our Policy Director. It’s 48 degrees and raining outside in Chicago today and yet she needs a rotating fan in her office for the ambient temperature to be bearable.
Someone once made a choice to design a conference room this way.
This concludes my tweet 🧵. I am taking suggestions for a fitting ceremonial exit from the building next Friday. Note that property destruction is not allowed. Preference will be give to suggestions from Illinois residents and former 16th floor residents. Ty.
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Tim Walz is a great guy and a great Governor but this is an appreciation thread for someone else in Walz world - his chief of staff @chrisschmitter.
During Covid, I would join the chiefs for Governors Walz, Whitmer, Evers (Chris, JoAnne, and Maggie) on weekly calls to try and figure out how to make sense of the world. The check ins were a crucial info sharing opportunity- but they were also therapy for us four.
No one else could understand what we were going through every day. Not our families, our friends, and even, at times, our bosses. So they were an opportunity to talk with each other in a more honest fashion - and they helped immensely in those days.
This was my mother, Nancy Caprara. She died 30 years ago today. This is my favorite pic of us together. She’s teaching me how to roller skate in our kitchen on Christmas morning. I kept falling & every time I fell we laughed harder which made it harder to get up on the skates.
This was her a month before she died, learning how to boogie board in Sea Isle, NJ. My brother @jcaprara & I taught her. She got me up early the last morning of the trip to hit the water “before the lifeguards shut us down.” The memory of that morning remains my best.
Kids who lose parents young spend a lifetime asking themselves what of the person they become is from the person they lost. It’s an ethereal question, made harder by the impossibility of thinking you can keep yourself from asking it.
I want to take a moment today to talk about how the right wing misinformation machine works, how it churns up outrage, how supposedly “civil” Republicans fuel it...and what the real world consequences are for innocent people caught in its trap.
Last week a ton of people sent me a screenshot from a Twitter/Instagram account called @deuxmoiworld. They track supposed celebrity sightings - basically a completely unverifiable gossip account.
The particular post in question claimed to be a picture of the daughter of @GovPritzker at a restaurant in Chicago seated outside in a large group of people for a birthday party. Only problem is that’s not the Governor’s daughter (and doesn’t even look like her.)
I usually leave this stuff alone & I am not going to dignify the insane column I just (mistakenly) read in a local opinion section with a retweet. But it’s been a long few months & I ain’t just going to let this one go:
Early on in the pandemic, two of the modeling experts we consulted with about how to respond to this virus showed us a table. This was March. The data was still shaky and the progression of the virus was not well understood. But that table was very clear.
It was a comparison of modeled deaths in Chicago if mitigation efforts were taken versus if no mitigation efforts were taken.The 2nd number was 6 times higher than the 1st. The Governor & I stared at that piece of paper for a long time.Soon after,JB issued the stay at home order.
Hi 👋 It’s your friendly political friend here with a brief & hopefully pleasant public service announcement as we get into political ad season. There are lots of ads running at the presidential level right now that are tweeted & retweeted here on the Twitters.
Truly this is every campaign manager (and former campaign manager’s) favorite time of the year. The time when EVERYONE becomes a political media consultant. We love it. (This is sarcasm font.)
But I implore you, before you share an ad you like (which is totally ok - I love to see what the group of people on this website find cool) with a comment like “why isn’t this running everywhere???!!!” & “why haven’t Dems made ads like these before??!!” stop & take a deep breath.