The event that brought us together was a news conference by Pat and Lisa, in the Jim Thompson Center - State of Illinois Building in downtown Chicago, which Mike also attended, to discuss transparency in state government and the need to clean up numerous messes that were left behind after ex-Governor Rod Blagojevich was impeached and removed from office.
I attended to ask Pat and Lisa about one of those messes: The Pilgrim Baptist scandal. Mike's appearance was a bonus that allowed me to talk to him about the Capital Bill scandal.
As always when I attend news conferences, I attended as a professional journalist, not as a social activist, and limited my questions during the news conference to legitimate issues pertaining to the subject for which the news conference was called.
Tomorrow, in Part Two of this four-part report, I'll tell you about the very pleasant and productive conversation I had with Speaker Madigan regarding the Capital Bill, and the progress we made in dealing with the scandal.
The following day, in Part Three of this report, I'll tell you about my three conversations with Governor Quinn regarding Pilgrim Baptist and the Capital Bill, and the tactics that Pat used to evade transparency regarding one of those issues.
Then, the next day, in Part Four, I'll tell you about my conversation with our wonderful Attorney General, Lisa Madigan, who is always nice to my family and me whenever we see her, and how we made progress on the Pilgrim Baptist matter. Lisa and I sometimes disagree on policy and legal matters, but she is always a class act when we are together.