Did that get your attention? It sure got mine when I read the same headline from Yahoo! News. A study done by Alexander Ortega at University of California’s School of Public Health reports that “Illegal Latino immigrants do not cause a drag on the U.S. health care system as some critics have contended and in fact get less care than Latinos in the country legally.” The report goes on to break down the presumed nationalities of illegals and what percent of the population they make up. Here is the particularly interesting part of the report:

 As most people know, there has been a decade long debate on whether to tear out the rail line over the Keller Branch and convert it to a recreational biking/walking trail or not. Last week, the Surface Transportation Board (STB), the federal agency that has jurisdiction over railroads, ruled against the adverse discontinuance of the line. Thus, the Keller Branch shall remain an operating railroad.

 Today I attended the ground breaking ceremony for the new alternative school in the old Social Security building on Knoxville Ave, representing our neighborhood association.  I’m not sure yet what the official name the district will eventually give this school, but the program is called Transition to Success. It is for grade school students who, for a variety of reasons, are far behind in their academic studies. The program is currently housed at Manual High School, but program has need for more space to accommodate more students. In attendance where several of the School Board members, recovering superintendent Ken Hinton, associate-deputy-co-superintendent Cindy Fischer, the schools principal Mrs. O’day(sp?), a couple of the teachers, the architect for the building, and City Council member Van Auken. This school was slated to open at the beginning of the current school year, but the district lost the funding for this project twice already. It is now slated to open at the beginning of the next school year.

 Frequent readers of this blog will know a few things about me. One is that I have been steadfastly opposed to an Illinois Constitutional Convention (Con-Con). Second, that I believe I have a good understanding of the federal Constitution. I acknowledge that my understanding of the Illinois Constitution is somewhat less than that of the federal one. I have been studying the federal Constitution for several years and the state Constitution for only a few short years. It has been one of the goals of this blog to educate the readers of both Constitutions.

A few weeks ago I attended an out of state conference where Alan Keyes was a surprise key note speaker. He was literally a surprise in that not even the conference planners knew he was coming until an hour before the opening of the conference. The conference was on leadership training, and as a former ambassador to the United Nations and current Presidential hopeful (www.alankeyes.com), Alan Keyes spoke to the crowd about principled leadership. He spoke for about an hour and covered a broad range of topics included in the leadership principles he was promoting. Later, I got to sit down with him person to person over lunch.

As most every American surely knows by now, the Boston Red Sox baseball team has won the World Series.  The New England Patriots football team, based just outside of Boston, remains undefeated through more than half the season so far, looking as though no other team has the capability of stopping them on their way to the Super Bowl.  This past weedend, NASCAR Busch Series driver Carl Edwards clinched the championship title for that sport.  His team is owned by Rousch-Fenway, that is the same Fenway as in Fenway Park in Boston.  Now can the Boston Celtics NBA team and the NHL Boston Bruins keep up the pace for this town?  Of course only time will tell, but the Celtics look like they could have a good shot at the playoffs.