Tea Party Friend John Bambenek Seeks Appointment to 53rd Senate Seat Vacancy

Email from John Bambenek dated November 5, 2010

Friends-

We achieved many great victories this November and sadly a few races
that did not go our way. For that, all of you should be proud of what
we have accomplished. Among other big wins, Illinois has gained a
great State Treasurer in Dan Rutherford. However, we have also lost a
great Senator. As he intends to resign his Senate seat in January, I
wanted you all to be among the first to know that I have asked to be
appointed his replacement.

John Bambenek Seeks Appointment to Illinois 53rd Senate Vacancy

As many of you know, I’m a strong fiscal and social conservative that
has been active in many causes we all hold dear. Illinois simply
cannot continue spending billions more dollars than we have. Our
pension debt, now the worst in the nation, has become unsustainable.
Those systems will become insolvent by 2018, if not sooner. Illinois
needs a health dose of fiscal sanity that I believe I can help
provide. At the same time, Illinois is a jobs-hostile state. I will
pursue the issues of tort reform as much as possible and more
importantly, strive to bring about reform to worker’s compensation in
Illinois.

For many years, I have also been active in trying to bring
transparency, accountability and reform to Illinois government. I
authored the forensic audit resolution in the Senate and House and
have worked side-by-side with Adam Andrzejewski to promote that issue.
Not only have our finances gone out of control, but under the
Blagojevich years, billions of dollars of secret deals, patronage
promotions and corrupt board appointments were made. And we still do
not know the extent of the fraud, corruption and waste that still
corrupts out state budget and continues forward to this day. There
needs to be an accounting for all those who willingly went along with
Blagojevich’s shady deals.

Map of the 53rd Illinois Senate District

Several other people have also stepped forward. Some I know better
than others, but mostly they are solid conservatives who hold many of
the same values we all share. Make no mistake, if any of them are
chosen, I believe Illinois will still be greatly served.

I believe there is one issue, however, where I am uniquely qualified.
As it stands, Mike Madigan will have essentially unchecked power come
redistricting. With my previous work in redistricting reform over the
past few years, I intend to fight back hard against Mike Madigan who
will seek to control the results of our elections by controlling the
maps. I believe that our maps should be drawn fairly, respecting
political boundaries, promote competitiveness and are contiguous and
compact. While the Republicans are in the majority in both chambers, I
plan to fight back hard by uniting Republicans, Democrats,
Independents and everyone who believes in free and fair elections and
demand a fair map drawing process that doesn’t take party into
account.

With your help, we can push back and, I believe, we can win.

I do not intend to become a career politician. There are a handful of
issues like redistricting and pension reform I want to pursue and then
return to private life.

I ask for your support in this endeavor. If you live in the 53rd
district, please feel free to contact me for the tele-townhall I will
be conducting 9pm Monday, November 8th. For those outside the
district, feel free to express your support by joining my Facebook
page at: http://www.facebook.com/JohnBambenek

I look forward to earning the opportunity to serve the 53rd district
and to earn your support and trust. If you have any questions, feel
free to contact me at john@johnbambenek.com

Sincerely,

John C. A. Bambenek

http://facebook.com/JohnBambenek

http://twitter.com/bambenek

Source:  email from John Bambenek Fri, Nov 5, 2010 at 4:48 PM