By Steve Rhodes
1. “It’s crunchtime for Tesla,” the New York Times reports.
The electric carmaker has vowed to turn a profit in the second half of this year and has apparently increased production of a key driver of revenue, the fledgling Model 3 midsize sedan. But analysts are not yet convinced that Tesla and its chief executive, Elon Musk, will turn the corner in this quarter.
“I’m skeptical,” said Efraim Levy, an analyst at CFRA Research who follows the company. “It will be challenging on an operating basis to be profitable in the third quarter.”
And new questions have arisen with the disclosure of an effort by Tesla to renegotiate agreements with suppliers to achieve price reductions on work already underway.
The issue arose in a report Sunday night by The Wall Street Journal that Tesla had asked some suppliers to refund a portion of payments made since 2016. The report cited a memo to a supplier saying Tesla was asking for cash back to help it become profitable.
Yup, Musk is getting desperate alright:
I’m sorry their heads are cut off, it was the best I could do. This isn’t even Photoshop.
2. “Voter Purges, a new report by the Brennan Center, highlights the systematic purging of voters from rolls by state and local officials around the country. These are not random, isolated cases,” the Root notes.
“It is a methodical effort that disproportionately affects minority voters.”
3. In case you were wondering, as I was, what Willie Wilson is a doctor of:
“Wilson is the recipient of a Doctor of Divinity degree from Mt. Carmel Theological Seminary, a Doctor of Humane Letters from Chicago Baptist Institute International, Honorary Doctorate in Humanitarianism from Swisher Bible College and a Doctorate in Humanitarianism from Denver Institute of Urban Studies and Adult College.”
So he’s four doctors in one! No wonder he’s so rich.
4. Lovie Smith Has A Beard Now.
He’s had it since at least January, so it’s really just news to me.
5. “A controversial plan to sanction the sport of pigeon racing in Chicago may be grounded before it’s even cleared for take-off.”
A pigeon is not a plane, these kind of leads are hacky not clever, and it doesn’t even make sense. Good thing this flight has a barf bag.
6. Like Cola!
7. “The owners of one of Chicagoland’s most unusual single family homes have vowed to rebuild after a fire severely damaged the famous Gold Pyramid House in north suburban Wadsworth,” Curbed Chicago notes.
8. Softball Players At Ridge Need To Use Blue Bins.
9. “A firestorm of comments on social media led Bourbonnais police to release a post Wednesday on Facebook about the suspicious activities a man directed toward a woman in late June or early July,” the Kankakee Daily-Journal reports.
“The comments didn’t pertain to the department’s investigation but rather to claims of strangers in the area possibly being approached for human trafficking purposes in recent months.”
To be sure: “[T]here is no credible evidence of human trafficking at this time.”
10. From a really interesting Vulture interview of Billy Joel:
Now, I do have an idea for a farewell tour.
What is it?
The stage is a living room set: couch, TV, coffee table, food. And there’s bulletproof glass between me and the audience. Then I come out and lay down on the couch. I grab the remote and start watching TV. The crowd after a couple minutes goes, “Fuck this,” and starts throwing shit at the glass.
And that’s the whole concert?
Yeah. I’ll have created a bond between me and the audience where I know they will never pay another nickel to see me again.
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New on the Beachwood today . . .
Disrupting Education The NFL Way
Introducing the Rooney Rule may not solve the problem on its own, but it can help to change a culture of racism and discrimination that’s blocking black and brown teachers from helping students get to the goal line of graduation.
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ChicagoGram
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ChicagoTube
Chicago’s Lighthouses: Shedding Light On Artists With Disabilities.
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BeachBook
Mortgage, Groupon And Card Debt: How The Bottom Half Bolsters U.S. Economy
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TweetWood
A sampling.
“I’m alone, sadly, in the journalistic pursuit of this story. Where is the Chicago Tribune? Where is the Chicago Reader? Where is the national media?” –@JimDeRogatis https://t.co/TcmFrOvMqY
— Morning Shift (@WBEZmorning) July 24, 2018
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Good morning! Don’t forget that the oldest Millennials are 38 at this point, so that snarky think piece you just wrote/read/shared is probably all wrong and just full of someone who hates the attributes of youth that have been a constant kind of since forever.
— Sam Sanders (@samsanders) July 24, 2018
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Oh sorry for the confusion, they mean it like home equity https://t.co/oPfJ2J75eT
— Sec. Lord Voldemort (@Voldemort4Mayor) July 24, 2018
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And that speech his done. It was not extremely honest.
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) July 23, 2018
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Former head of intelligence law at the NSA > https://t.co/pV989mVrTG
— Natasha Bertrand (@NatashaBertrand) July 23, 2018
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What no one’s mentioned is how curious it is that Trump insisted on conversing with Putin alone when, he didn’t insist on conversing with Theresa May alone… He didn’t insist on conversing with Angela Merkel alone… He didn’t insist on conversing with Justin Trudeau alone… 🤔
— Cyrus McQueen (@CyrusMMcQueen) July 22, 2018
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The President of the United States held a private two-hour meeting with the President of Russia amidst a massive investigation into possible collusion to win an election, and we don’t know what was said.
— Beachwood Reporter (@BeachwoodReport) July 24, 2018
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The Beachwood Tronc Line: Not dead yet.
Posted on July 24, 2018