Keith Lake

Follower of Christ, husband, father. GO ILLINI!

[Rev Snow @RevSnow67]

I think we've solved the mystery of why we struggle to put on a 250th celebration of independence that is even a pale shadow of what we managed for the 200th.

[Keith Lake @KeithALake]

A a sad case study - indictment, really - of the short-term thinking and misguided populism of many government leaders today. And not just in Illinois.

[Yogi @Houseofyogi]

Chicago lost the Bears this week. A team that's been in the city since 1921.

They didn't lose them to a bigger market or a better deal. The Bears decided they'd rather be a tenant in Indiana than deal with Illinois for one more year.

Think about how badly you have to run a place for that to be the smart move.

They lost them for two reasons.

The people running Illinois would rather villainize a builder than keep one. And they're bad at their jobs.

In 2021 the Bears spent $197M on the old Arlington Park racetrack.

Before they could break ground, Cook County valued the empty lot at $192M (Bears said $60M). They were salivating at the chance to extort a building that didn't even exist yet.

That fight dragged on for years.

The Bears were ready to put $2B into the stadium. All they wanted was a promise the county wouldn't reassess them into oblivion, plus $855M for infrastructure everyone uses. Roads, transit, utilities. A $3B project, two thirds of it private money pouring into Illinois.

Springfield had since 2021 to get this done. They dragged it to the final night of session, passed it through the Senate at 3:39AM, and the House went home without voting.

So now it's all gone.

The funniest part? This started because Cook County tried to grab the tax early. They knew a built stadium would pay $53M a year. Now they get under $4M on a vacant lot. No jobs, no buildout, no new anything.

Congrats on fighting for scraps and losing the whole prize.

Pritzker: they're "an $8.5B valued business" that doesn't need propping up.

But be smart for a second. Almost every NFL city throws in public money for a stadium. Not charity. The return is real. Tourism, hotels, restaurants, jobs, game days, property tax on a huge development. The math works.

Indiana did the math. While Illinois sat on it for years, Indiana passed a bill in months, put up $1B, and took the team.

And the Bears took a worse deal to get there. In Illinois they were going to own their stadium. In Indiana they rent it from the state. A team that wanted to build its own home gave up ownership just to escape Chicago.

Nobody won but Indiana. The Bears lost their stadium. Illinois lost the team, the $2B, and $53M a year in taxes.

Pritzker after they left: "I wasn't willing to give up billions of dollars of taxpayer money to give it to a billionaire-owned family or team."

There it is. "Billionaire-owned."

That's how Democrats talk about any business right before they run it out of town. Call them a billionaire, act like you're saving working families, take a victory lap while the tax base drives across the state line.

Meanwhile they're running the whole state into the ground. And you already know how this ends. You're living in it.

Pensions are $143B in the hole, worst in the country and not close. You pay $6,285 a year in property taxes, double the $2,969 national average, for a city that's $1.15B in the red. The mayor called its finances "the point of no return."

When you run things this badly, you sell what's left.

They leased the parking meters for 75 years to Morgan Stanley and a sovereign wealth fund in Abu Dhabi. Took $1.15B and burned through it in two years. The investors already made it all back, with 58 years left to collect.

Sold the Skyway. Sold the downtown garages. Every asset that made money, gone for one check.

But a fixed property tax rate for a team that's been here 106 years? That's "propping up billionaires."

Companies are leaving. Boeing for Virginia. Caterpillar for Texas. Citadel for Miami. In 2023 alone Illinois lost 56,000 people and $6B in income to other states. The ones who left earned a third more than the ones who moved in.

Indiana didn't outbid anyone. AAA credit, 16 years straight. A $676M surplus. Fourth-lowest debt per person in the country. They just weren't a disaster.

Illinois could have collected $53M a year. It chose zero. Ignore all the bad management but make sure to stick it to those evil, pesky billionaires.

[Keith Lake @KeithALake]

@PaulTripp Thank you. I needed this reminder today.

[Keith Lake @KeithALake]

@casualbigten @IlliniMBB Love it. Can you do Malcolm Hill?

[BoboBowe697(PARODY) @BoboBowe_697]

@Super70sSports Is there ONE pro sport that isn't worse now than it was 40 years ago?

[Keith Lake @KeithALake]

@ABC Aren't all 435 members of the House at risk of losing their seats?

[Keith Lake @KeithALake]

@MorganTrau They’re not lawmakers anymore. The answers to those questions are, “these are policy choices.” These are not questions for judges to decide. Aren’t they supposed to be focused on legal merits & constitutionality?

[Keith Lake @KeithALake]

Acknowledging God as the source of all blessings, the formula should probably be ‘10-60-20-10.’

“Honor the Lord with your wealth, with the firstfruits of all your crops.”

-Proverbs 3:9

[EarlyLifeInvestments @EarlyLifeInvest]

How the viral '70-20-10 rule' could help you build a better budget https://t.co/03PRR0589Q

[Keith Lake @KeithALake]

@ALionEye Same as everyone else. Except for fans of these teams themselves, no one will watch.

[Keith Lake @KeithALake]

"The good news is that more parents are becoming aware of weed’s dangers, such as increased risk of mental illness."
https://t.co/TagKsOilvV via @WSJopinion

[The Vigilant Fox 🦊 @VigilantFox]

Bill Maher asks how the government is “failing the poor so badly” when he pays “60 PERCENT” of his earnings in taxes.

“Last week was tax day… I paid the government probably almost 60% of what I earn. That’s a lot.”

“And I… wouldn’t mind if Bernie Sanders would stop saying the rich don’t pay taxes.”

“The top 10% pay 72% of all federal income taxes. And the bottom half, 3%.”

“The Democratic Socialists talk about socialism like we don’t already have a lot: Social Security, unemployment, Medicare, nutritional assistance, Medicaid, Obamacare, disability, housing subsidies.”

“How can you be soaking the rich and failing the poor so badly? How can it be that the federal government alone took in over 5 trillion in taxes last year, and we still need that?”

“Are we really this incompetent and corrupt?”

[Keith Lake @KeithALake]

What an absolute joke. Shameful.

[End Wokeness @EndWokeness]

Dems will now control 90% of districts in a state they only won by 5%

For the sake of "fairness"

[Kentucky Association of Health Plans @KyHealthPlans]

Health plans are cutting prior authorization requirements & taking steps to improve the healthcare experience for patients. @AHIPCoverage highlights a broader push for plans & providers to eliminate manual processes & adopt real-time data sharing. https://t.co/qJAvTAtJ3Q

[Matt Downen @amdownen]

@JWerner247 Can’t bring myself to vote

[Matt Smethurst @MattSmethurst]

What the cross is all about. One of the most beautiful statements I’ve ever read.

[Jeremy Carl @realJeremyCarl]

I'm going to keep posting this Alstair Begg clip "The Man on the Middle Cross" (less than four minutes in length) every Holy Week, because its message is true in 2026, it will be true in 2036 and it will be true in 3036.

"If i take my eyes off the cross, I can then give only lip service to its efficacy while at the same time living as if my salvation depends upon me.

And as soon as you go there it will lead you either to abject despair or a horrible kind of arrogance.

And it is only the cross of Christ that deals both with the dreadful depths of despair and the pretentious arrogance of the pride of man that says you know, I can figure this out."

[Keith Lake @KeithALake]

@RandyLudlow @darreldrowland

[Keith Lake @KeithALake]

@KShermanSports @BrianAGraham42 @Under_Bradswood Hard to argue with these choices. But I feel like there needs to be room for Frank Williams somewhere.

[Keith Lake @KeithALake]

@wischlist Dee, D Will, Augie, Nick, KB