Dan Rutherford

JO JOHNSON , 40, of the 500 block of West Canedy Street, places some signs easily visible from the street whenever she thinks the governor will be running by.

There are a couple of campaign signs for FRANK WATSON of Greenville, the Senate GOP leader; a sign left from state Sen. BILL BRADY ’s 2006 GOP primary campaign for governor; a couple of “No Gross Receipt Tax” signs, which include a red slash mark through the letters “GRT;” a homemade job denouncing the governor’s health-care proposal by saying “IL Covered is bad public policy;” and some hand-written signs placed on top of garage sale sign. Those say “No new spending; no new taxes” and “small govt=good govt.”

Johnson stresses that her message is issue-based and that she created the display as a private citizen on her own time — though she happens to be legal counsel to Watson’s chief of staff, BRIAN McFADDEN , who used to be right-hand man to former Springfield mayor KAREN HASARA .

There’s also a bumper sticker on Johnson’s front door that, shall we say, goes beyond policy differences in how it lampoons the governor’s name. But Johnson thinks that’s probably too small for Blagojevich to notice as he runs past.

“I personally abhor what he’s doing policy-wise,” Johnson told me Thursday, minutes after the governor had run by her house, heading back toward the Executive Mansion. “I believe in limited government.”

Johnson was kicking herself because she missed the gubernatorial run-by.

“I was fixing my supper,” she said.

But she had conversed a bit with the governor before from her porch.

“I just said, ‘Illinois Covered is just plain wrong,’” she recalled. “And he said, ‘It’s the best thing that’s ever happened.’ Then, of course, I moved the Brady sign out further for his return trip.”

Johnson said she also told the governor one evening that “you’ve ruined my summer,” but she’s not sure he heard that.

Legislative staffers, of course, must work at the Statehouse on special session days, and the governor has called lots of them this year in trying to get the legislature to craft a budget to his liking.

Having heard he might be in the neighborhood, I saw the governor run past the house on Thursday, before Johnson came outside. I asked Blagojevich what he thought of the signs.

He continued his run — with a state trooper pedaling a bicycle just behind him — and noted that he had told the story about the house the day before, apparently at a meeting with legislative leaders.

“I think tomorrow they’re putting a Madigan sign out,” he said, apparently referring to House Speaker MICHAEL MADIGAN , D-Chicago, who also hasn’t been on the same page as the governor on a number of budget issues.

Clearly, however, the governor is proud of how much running he’s been doing. He said so in a telephone message Friday to Mike Matulis , editorial page editor of The State Journal-Register, because he knew Matulis had wondered if he had any comment about the signs on Canedy.

With permission of the governor’s office, I’ll relate part of that message:

“Say what they will about me,” Blagojevich said, “I think history can conclude only one thing — and that is, of all the governors who’ve ever served in Illinois, I have run more miles through the streets, through the parks and on the trails in Springfield than any governor in history. They say I don’t spend enough time here, don’t sleep here enough. But what governor has run more miles through the communities in Springfield than me? I bet you can’t come up with one. Not Schadrach Bond, not Richard Oglesby, not Richard Ogilvie, not Dan Walker, and certainly not George Ryan. ”

“Things are good,” he added. “We’re moving along here. …”

So there.

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