Jim Dey: More bad news on the home front

May 6—It's time once again to dive in to another round of quick takes on the people, places and events that were being talked about over the past week:

Phony numbers?Gov. J.B. Pritzker, understandably, hates it when there's bad news about Illinois.

He particularly resents it when the U.S. Census Bureau reports that more people are leaving Illinois than moving in. So it was no surprise when he pushed back at the results of an Internal Revenue Service study that reported those leaving Illinois have higher incomes than those moving in.

The IRS reported that Illinois lost $10.9 billion in Adjusted Gross Income (AGI) in 2020, the third worst in the country. Illinois' out-migrants earned, on average, $44,100 more per year than those moving in.

California lost the most AGI — $29 billion.

The decline is another setback for Illinois because it reflects an erosion of the state's tax base.

Pritzker, however, was having none of it, leading to a statement from his spin doctors asserting that "this is not migration data — it's data for where people file taxes compared to prior filing periods — its scope is limited, and there are a lot of caveats. The census report is the standard for determining domestic migration."

Pritzker, of course, doesn't like U.S. Census Bureau reports, either.

Many people will, of course, believe the governor's calming assurances because they know that no Illinois politician would ever shade or misrepresent the facts.

The IRS information was released in the agency's "Migration Data User's Guide" that it describes as an "important source of information detailing the movement of individuals from one location to another."

Flashing againUniversity of Illinois economist J. Fred Giertz isn't officially predicting a recession, but he appears to be getting nervous about the future.

"In the ongoing recession watch, the needle has moved more toward a recession later this year, according to many observers," he said in his latest University of Illinois Flash Index.

That's hardly a full-scale embrace of such a negative prospect, but Giertz said Illinois' economy continues to slow. His Flash Index declined slightly from 103.1 in March to 102.9 in April.

Translated into normal-people speak, that means the economy is still growing but at a slower pace. He said "any index value above 100 indicates expansion."

But for how long? That's a question on which economists have disagreed for months, mostly because of mixed signals.

Giertz said Gross Domestic Product (GDP) slowed to 1.1 percent even as rising interest rates "remain near their post-WWII low." There have been massive layoffs in some industries, but federal and state unemployment rates remain low.

GDP is a "monetary measure of the market value of all the final goods and services produced and sold in a specific time." It is used to determine economic health.

The Flash Index represents a weighted average of state growth rates in corporate earnings, consumer spending and personal income. They are adjusted for inflation before being calculated.

Giertz said the three components "were all down" from April 2022 "as were individual income tax revenues."

What does that mean for the future? People can and do predict, but no one really knows. So hang on and buckle up.

He's backOne of Illinois Democrats' favorite punching bags will return to Springfield next month.

No, not former President Donald Trump. It's former Gov. Bruce Rauner.

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Reporter Hannah Meisel reports Rauner has issued invitations to various friends and political associates for a June 11 "barbecue, live music and portrait print showing" at the Danenberg Family Vineyard in New Berlin, a small town in Sangamon County.

She said the occasion surrounds the "the unveiling of his official gubernatorial portrait."

Although some good things happened on his watch, Rauner was not a successful governor. He alienated conservative Republicans by signing legislation that authorized taxpayer funding of abortion. But his lengthy budget battle, one Rauner lost, with former House Speaker Michael Madigan drove Democrats to previously un-reached levels of rage.

The self-made multimillionaire business entered politics determined to change Illinois' political culture, but he never came close.

Look for Democrats to go out of their way to hurl insults in his direction. At the same time, Rauner's complaints about Illinois' deeply corrupt politics and Madigan's role in it can be expected to come up in the aftermath of the guilty verdicts in the ComEd conspiracy case.

There's a new Edgar working the same side of the street as Jim Edgar and the Edgar Awards.

Jim Edgar is the former governor of Illinois. The Edgar Awards — named after writer Edgar Allan Poe — are presented annually by the Mystery Writers of America to authors.

The latest Edgar is a haircut popularized in California, New Mexico and Texas that has spread to the Midwest.

Supposedly named after former Major League Baseball star Edgar Martinez, it's guaranteed to achieve the primary goal of teen males everywhere — shocking and appalling adults, particularly their parents.

The Chicago Sun-Times reports that the style became "a viral meme on a social media" during the coronavirus pandemic.

It's not a good look, unless the wearer's goal is to sport a bad look. Described as having "Mexican and Indigenous roots," the Edgar is variation of the bowl cut sported by Moe (think Larry, Moe and Curly) leavened by the style of backwoods country folk in the movie "Deliverance."

Although characterizing it as "divisive," The Sun-Times characterized it as "divisive" and urged readers to "picture a bowl cut with the bangs straight across — and the sides shaved clean."

The bangs are virtually non-existent — much of the forehead exposed.

Happy anniversary!Chicago Cubs fans — at least some of them — celebrated an unusual anniversary this week.

It's been 40 years since then-Cubs manager Lee Elia, angry after another loss, directed an epic, obscenity-laden tirade at Cubs fans for booing his players.

A Chicago Tribune columnist described the incident, recorded on audiotape and played relentlessly with bleeps on local TV and radio, as follows.

"Other than the rare championship moments, the Elia tirade stands out as one of the biggest single events in Cubs history, alongside the "Called Shot" home run by Babe Ruth, the so-called "Bartman game," the "Homer in the Gloamin'" and Kerry Wood's 20-strikeout game," the Trib's Paul Sullivan wrote.

He went on to say that "it's such an iconic moment that Nisei Lounge, a Wrigleyville bar, holds a Lee Elia Day every April 29." He added former White Sox first baseman Paul Konerko "was obsessed with the incident" and knew "most of the lines."

Elia breached a cardinal rule in sports — never insult paying fans, no matter how stupid or mean they are.

Elia was ordered by then-Cubs General Manager Dallas Green to issue an insincere apology. But baseball fans everywhere should have thanked him. In its own enraged way, Elia's soliloquy was a great gift to baseball's madcap tradition — an unintentionally hilarious display of frustration and anger by a losing manager.

Those who haven't heard of the Elia tape or heard it should look it up on Google. It's clearly the equal of former Indiana basketball coach Bobby Knight's surreptitiously recorded blast at his players over their purported poor play.