The [Tuesday] Papers

"With their bats in a deep slump," the Sun-Times explains on its front page today, "the White Sox needed a 'slump-buster' - a gimmick baseball players use to change their fortunes. Sox spokesman Scott Reifert said players have 'burned bats, kissed bats, slept with their bats, blessed their bats, you name it.' This time, the Sox placed bats around two blow-up sex dolls with a sign that read 'You've got to push.'"

Let's just be clear about what a slump-buster is:

- Via Urban Dictionary.

- Slump Buster Trucker Hat.

- Slump Buster Store.

That's Ozzie
Ozzie Guillen defended his players saying "Everyone in the clubhouse, 100 percent of the people in the clubhouse, they are 18 years old."

Including the manager.

10-1
Those are the odds that the governor will actually deliver on his $150 million anti-violence package. After all, past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior.

The Daley Show
What is there left to say about Richard M. Daley? The ironies of his complaints about a new coalition of those opposed to moving the Children's Museum to Grant Park are so blindingly obvious that I can't even work up any enthusiasm about pointing them out.

Hope
Long live the Spindle?

CeaseFire Power
Alex Kotlowitz wrote a mostly glowing cover story about Gary Slutkin and his CeaseFire project for the New York Times Sunday Magazine, but the word I've been hearing is that it's effectiveness - and money management - is much more suspect than the great media that seems to follow it around.

I'm waiting (hoping) for my friend Tracy Jake Siska to weigh in over at Chicago Justice, but in the meantime, he's written a compelling post about the violence in our fair city. Among the highlights:

"I would love to say that we have free access to crime statistics to determine how this seemingly outrageous rash of violence is different then we have experienced over the last several years."

-

"The situation that the citizens of Chicago and its police department find themselves in is not unique."

-

"What we must guard against is using our police force for missions they cannot possible complete. The CPD was never designed to prevent violence; the CPD is a reactionary tool and it is beyond their capabilities to be a preventive force as currently designed."

-

"The criminal justice system in Chicago and Cook County is wholly incapable of dealing with these sociological problems. Our response to these crimes must be centered on long-term sociological cures and not political expediencies. Without redress the continued joblessness and lack of education will only fester and motivate replication of these crimes for years to come."

-

"Even if the CPD is able to repress violence, they are not curing any social realities that are the root cause. We are continually stuck in a circle of violence and repression caused by gangs and our criminal justice system. Policy makers need to have the courage and change course from the doomed one we cannot find the strength to turn off of."

Kid List
Where would the Children's Museum rank among Chicago's best underground children's attractions? Find out!

Mighty Mice
"WGN didn't lead off last night's 9 p.m. newscast with more Clinton/Obama drama," Chicagoist notes. "Instead, they started the newscast with Jackie Bange's discovery of an advanced rodent civilization in Terminal 1, Concourse C of O'Hare Airport."

Bye Bye Benson
The Cedric Benson Drunkenness Metric.

Of course, if he was as good as Lance Briggs . . .

*

Hey, these guys are all 18 years old.

Where Have You Gone P.J. Soles?

Greg Kot and Jim DeRogatis will be on hand this Friday at the Music Box for a special presentation of Roger Corman's Rock 'n' Roll High School. Mary Woronov, who played the principal, Miss Togar, will also be there. Doors open at 7:30 p.m., movie starts at 8. You can buy tickets here.

The Beachwood Tip Line: Have some kicks.