"The villages surrounding O’Hare have filed a detailed and sober analysis of the City’s application to tear up and rebuild O’Hare. The analysis points out several deficiencies in the City’s proposal and calls into question many of the City’s assumptions," Fitzgerald said. "I call upon the FAA to carefully consider the issues raised by the expert firm retained by the villages, and I urge the FAA to require the City to correct the deficiencies in its application."

"I believe that an objective analysis of the City’s proposal will show that it is not worth either the enormous cost or the ten years of disruption that it will cause for Chicago air travelers," Fitzgerald stated.

Highlighting the deficiencies identified in the expert report, Fitzgerald cited five primary reasons that the City of Chicago’s application for FAA approval to tear up and rebuild O’Hare is fundamentally flawed:

The City Ignores Airspace Limitations: Noting that planes are now often grounded at O’Hare because of airspace (as opposed to runway) limitations, Fitzgerald said that the City does not even attempt to make a showing that the Chicago airspace is sufficient to handle an additional 400,000 to 700,000 flights per year. Fitzgerald further noted that the City’s application simply ignores the continuing increase of traffic at Midway, DuPage, Palwaukee, and other area airports – as well as East-West traffic flowing over O’Hare. Fitzgerald said that the FAA should deny approval of the City’s plan unless the City can demonstrate that airspace limitations will not negate the multi-billion dollar investment in runways. "Chicago can add runways at O’Hare, but it can’t add any more airspace," he said.
The City’s Application Shows Less Capacity than the City Has Publicly Advertised: In selling its plan to the public, the City has publicly claimed that the revised O’Hare would be able to handle an additional 700,000 operations a year. In its FAA filings however, the City’s own simulations show that the airport will reach gridlock beyond FAA planning standards at just 1.3 million operations per year.
The City Inflated Its Numbers: The Del Balzo analysis raises several very troubling questions about the assumptions made by the City’s airport consultant, namely: The City in essence assumes excellent VFR weather conditions 90% of the time. However, excellent VFR weather conditions actually prevail less that 60% of the time in Chicago. In order to claim that the rebuilt O’Hare will accommodate 66 million passengers per year, the City assumes 88 passengers per plane, up from a current average of only 75 passengers per plane at O’Hare today. The City’s assumption is curious because the average aircraft size has been decreasing, not increasing, for several years.
In calculating likely delays at the airport, the City’s simulations ignore airspace congestion issues; ignore increased taxiing time of 3 minutes per plane; and, ignore the ten-year construction phase of the project and instead only look at the end state of the plan.

The City’s Plan Pushes the Envelop on Safety: Fitzgerald highlighted the ways that the City’s plan to rebuild O’Hare might actually degrade the airport’s safety. Said Fitzgerald, "Excessive airport traffic, an unprecedented number of runway crossings, ‘land and hold short’ landings, and ‘intersection departures,’ as well as the elimination of critical crosswind capabilities would combine to make O’Hare a truly frightening airport." In addition, Fitzgerald said the decade-long construction phase will cause constant disruptions to pilot and controller procedures and routines and thereby substantially boost the possibility of serious errors.

The City’s Report Hides Additional Known Costs: The City projects that tearing up and rebuilding the runways will cost $6.6 billion. The City ignores that in order to handle significantly more passengers in the air, expensive land-side improvements, such as doubling the terminal capacity, will be necessary. The City’s financial projections also ignore the cost of required improvements to surrounding roadways, control towers, and other FAA facilities, as well as the losses that will be incurred by the villages surrounding O’Hare.
"I hope FAA officials will look carefully at the risks and costs of the O’Hare expansion plan as outlined in the Del Balzo report. If it does, I believe that it will find that the City’s plan to expand O’Hare is not the correct solution to Chicago’s air capacity needs," concluded Fitzgerald.

The best-qualified is state Sen. Steve Rauschenberger, whose service as Appropriations Committee chairman would give him a leg up in debating any Democrat, including rising star Sen. Barack Obama. But almost any other one -- with the exception of a lordly former general and a bearded medical doctor-entrepreneur with the catchy first name of Chirinjeev -- would do . . . and even they are intriguing once you get used to them.

As good as he is, Rauschenberger has a severe disadvantage: He isn't raising much money -- only $351,000 as of Dec. 31. A full-time lawmaker, Rauschenberger emphasizes that he's not a millionaire, as are five of his competitors, but assembling a good fund-raising team is requisite for a career in politics, and so far, on a federal basis, he hasn't been very good at it. Even also-ran Democrat Joyce Washington has raised $800,000. And didn't the non-monied Paul Simon and Dick Durbin find fund-raisers to carry the load?

Quick with excuses, this bright, detail-oriented lawmaker points out a supposedly bad omen: His opponents are all non-politicians, and the last time somebody with no legislative or government experience won a Senate seat for the GOP was Chuck Percy in 1966. That won't wash, senator, because defeat also was dealt to those with experience: state Rep. George Burditt; Lt. Gov. Dave O'Neal; state Rep. Judy Koehler; former Congresswoman-Labor Secretary Lynn Martin, and state Rep. Jim Durkin.

So, don't scratch Rauschenberger, but look beyond him where the GOP field is impressive. Jack Ryan, the investment banker-turned-inner city school teacher, has disproved the rumor that he can't take a punch. He began a skirmish with John Borling on NATO that extended to a spat earlier this week on public radio. Ryan wants to cut down on troop allotments -- particularly in Europe -- and wants us to cut back our investment. Borling, an Air Force general who was assigned to NATO (in addition to having been shot down and captured in Vietnam), vehemently disagrees. Ryan didn't melt away from Borling's florid oratory -- a sure indication that the field is diverse and challenging.

A corner on the conservative vote may well be held by Jim Oberweis, the dairy owner and investment adviser. Oberweis continually emphasizes his opposition to the Bush immigration reform proposal. He is probably the best hand-shaker in the group, staging citizens' meetings in his ice cream stores. He has been criticized by opponent Andy McKenna for skating close to the line, linking his business with his politics, handing out free ice cream cones paid for out of his personal pocket. This hasn't disturbed Oberweis a bit. (Personal disclosure: Oberweis bought me a double-dip chocolate marshmallow at his Park Ridge store, where I also signed up with hundreds of others for a drawing to ''win a lifetime of free ice cream.'' Sorry, Jim: I still think Rauschenberger would be the best candidate.) To me, Oberweis tends to be overdoing it on the immigration issue, but he's leading in some polls because of his stand, and he might just win the nod. If so, he'd be a fighter, and no ice cream store ''scandal'' would do him in.

McKenna is the nicest candidate -- perhaps too nice. His message welcomes job growth, advertises his belief that because Illinois is the nation's No. 1 in job loss, the goal must be to export American goods, not jobs. His speaking has improved, but in a meeting he doesn't push himself to shake hands and ''howdy'' like Oberweis -- or Rauschenberger, or Borling. Or Chirinjeev Kathuria, for that matter. Kathuria, a handsome, 39-year-old physician-turned-businessman, is warmly gregarious: A phrase-maker, he should begin by running for the legislature in DuPage County, build a following (easy to do with his charm) and then try something bigger.

Of all the candidates -- the one who is clearly primed to face an Obama or a Hynes -- is the superbly fitted Rauschenberger, among other things the only candidate with the guts to demand that GOP National Committeeman Bob Kjellander step down for earning $800,000 in fees for arranging a portion of Gov. Blagojevich's bond issue. (It's all legal, mind you, but a conflict of interest.)

Memo to the GOP: Can't anybody play this here game? Can't anybody find a clean finance chairman for a guy who'd be the best Senate candidate of all? Hmmm . . . Having said this, I just may have lost out on a lifetime supply of chocolate marshmallow cones.

Senator McCain: "[Y]ou agree with the fundamental principle here that what we did was justified and enhance the security of the United States and the world by removing Saddam Hussein from power?"

David Kay: "Absolutely."

"It would be hard to come to a conclusion other than Iraq was a gathering, serious threat"

Senator Kennedy: "Many of us feel that the evidence so far leads only to one conclusion: that what has happened was more than a failure of intelligence, it was the result of manipulation of the intelligence to justify a decision to go to war..........."

David Kay: ".......All I can say is if you read the total body of intelligence in the last 12 to 15 years that flowed on Iraq, I quite frankly think it would be hard to come to a conclusion other than Iraq was a gathering, serious threat to the world with regard to WMD."

"Iraq was in clear violation of the terms of Resolution 1441"

"In my judgment, based on the work that has been done to this point of the Iraq Survey Group, and in fact, that I reported to you in October, Iraq was in clear violation of the terms of Resolution 1441. Resolution 1441 required that Iraq report all of its activities: one last chance to come clean about what it had. We have discovered hundreds of cases, based on both documents, physical evidence and the testimony of Iraqis, of activities that were prohibited under the initial U.N. Resolution 687 and that should have been reported under 1441, with Iraqi testimony that not only did they not tell the U.N. about this, they were instructed not to do it and they hid material."

"Iraq was in clear and material violation of 1441. They maintained programs and activities, and they certainly had the intentions at a point to resume their program. So there was a lot they wanted to hide because it showed what they were doing that was illegal. I hope we find even more evidence of that."

"The world is far safer with the disappearance and removal of Saddam Hussein"

"I think the world is far safer with the disappearance and the removal of Saddam Hussein. I have said I actually think this may be one of those cases where it was even more dangerous than we thought. I think when we have the complete record you're going to discover that after 1998 it became a regime that was totally corrupt. Individuals were out for their own protection. And in a world where we know others are seeking WMD, the likelihood at some point in the future of a seller and a buyer meeting up would have made that a far more dangerous country than even we anticipated with what may turn out not to be a fully accurate estimate."

Analysts were not pressured

"And let me take one of the explanations most commonly given: Analysts were pressured to reach conclusions that would fit the political agenda of one or another administration. I deeply think that is a wrong explanation. And never -- not in a single case -- was the explanation, 'I was pressured to do this.' The explanation was, very often, 'The limited data we had led one to reasonably conclude this. I now see that there's another explanation for it' ...... And each case was different, but the conversations were sufficiently in depth and our relationship was sufficiently frank that I'm convinced that, at least to the analysts I dealt with, I did not come across a single one that felt it had been, in the military term, 'inappropriate command influence' that led them to take that position."

"Absolutely no doubt" Saddam harbored ambitions to develop and use WMD

Senator McCain: "Saddam Hussein developed and used weapons of mass destruction; true?"

David Kay: "Absolutely."

Senator McCain: "He used them against the Iranians and the Kurds; just yes or no."

David Kay: "Oh, yes."

Senator McCain: "OK. And U.N. inspectors found enormous quantities of banned chemical and biological weapons in Iraq in the '90s."

David Kay: "Yes, sir."

Senator McCain: "We know that Saddam Hussein had once a very active nuclear program."

David Kay: "Yes."

Senator McCain: "And he realized and had ambitions to develop and use weapons of mass destruction."

David Kay: "Clearly."

Senator McCain: "So the point is, if he were in power today, there is no doubt that he would harbor ambitions for the development and use of weapons of mass destruction. Is there any doubt in your mind?"

David Kay: "There's absolutely no doubt. And I think I've said that, Senator."

"We have learned things that no U.N. inspector would have ever learned given the terror regime of Saddam"

Senator Clinton: "I think that rightly does raise questions that we should be examining about whether or not the U.N. inspection process pursuant to 1441 might not also have worked without the loss of life that we have confronted both among our own young men and women, as well as Iraqis."

David Kay: "Well, Senator Clinton, let me just add to that. We have had a number of Iraqis who have come forward and said, 'We did not tell the U.N. about what we were hiding, nor would we have told the U.N. because we would run the risk of our own' -- I think we have learned things that no U.N. inspector would have ever learned given the terror regime of Saddam and the tremendous personal consequences that scientists had to run by speaking the truth." That's not to say, and it's not incompatible with the fact that inspections accomplish a great deal in holding a program down. And that's where the surprise is. In holding the program down, in keeping it from break out, I think the record is better than we would have anticipated. I don't think the record is necessarily better than we thought with regard to getting the final truth, because of the power of the terrorist state that Saddam Hussein had."

==>Ronald Reagan