I once heard of an Illinois politician’s gaffe to the effect that high crime figures for Illinois were misleading because “Chicago skews the results” – as if Chicago were not really properly part of Illinois. Well, perhaps that would be for the best. Let the consolidated-metro State of Chicagoland deal with all the urban and suburban and exurban problems of that metro area; and let the government of the remainder of Illinois deal with its small-city and small-town and rural problems, no longer using Chicago’s tax base, and no longer spending money or worry on Chicago’s problems either.