Democratic candidates in the U.S. Senate race aren’t demanding resignations over the handling of the Laquan McDonald case.
Protesters have called for Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez to leave office since the footage of McDonald being shot 16 times by a Chicago police officer was released.
Congresswoman Tammy Duckworth (D-Hoffman Estates) argues they shouldn’t, saying she thinks he should do the right thing instead of just talking about it. In the meantime, she said, she wants to hear less talk and see more action.
One of her primary rivals, Andrea Zopp, takes a similar position, but takes it one step further by calling for a special prosecutor to be appointed in the case of the officer who shot and killed McDonald, Jason Van Dyke.
In other State news, fewer of us were using Amtrak in the twelve months ending Sept. 30, compared to the prior fiscal year.
Gasoline prices tell part of the story, says rail spokesman Marc Magliari. He said when gas prices start ticking upward, people look to Amtrak as an option.
More of the story, he says, is track improvements on the Chicago-St Louis route that forced riders onto buses.
The Chicago-St Louis route saw a five percent drop. The decreases for the routes connecting Chicago to Carbondale and to Quincy were four percent and two percent, respectively. With national ridership off about a half percent, the Illinois ridership was off four percent.
Still, Magliari says – counting the route between Chicago and Milwaukee – two million riders is a lot of riders.
