Chicago - A message from the station manager

The [Monday] Papers

By Steve Rhodes

1. McCain’s Moment.
Going viral in the last 24 hours and certainly memorable, though not representative of McCain’s 2008 campaign, which was as despicable as any other in its own way:

“He’s an Arab,” a woman said of Barack Obama to John McCain at a campaign event in 2008. “No, ma’am,” McCain replied.

Assignment Desk: Go find that woman today!


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I bet she still thinks Obama is an Arab – not that there’s anything wrong with that.
2. Paging Otto.
“Low unemployment crossed with a commercial truck driver shortage is causing headaches for an adjacent industry: school buses,” Crain’s reports.

Vice President Keith Lane heads human resources at North America Central School Bus in Joliet. Each day on his 4-mile commute along Interstate 80, he passes four billboards advertising jobs in commercial trucking. They remind him of the challenge he’s going to face at work.
Employment in the school bus industry has dropped for four straight years in the Chicago area. Meanwhile, wages are rising steadily as private vendors operating fleets for school districts scramble to ensure they have enough bus drivers to serve customers. “This is probably the worst we’ve seen it in over 25 years,” says John Benish Jr., chief operating officer at Cook-Illinois in Oak Brook, a school bus fleet operator. “The trucking industry is very, very short, and it trickles down to school buses.”
Three of the 10 largest school bus contractors in the country, as measured by fleet size, are based in metro Chicago. British transportation company National Express has its U.S. and Canadian arm headquartered in Warrenville. It counts 21,500 buses in its fleet and reported $1.31 billion in revenue in 2017. North America Central School Bus in Joliet has 3,004 buses, and Cook-Illinois has 2,225, according to trade journal School Bus Fleet. Executives at both companies decline to provide revenue.

Every piece of journalism – even the most deadly serious – should be arted and accompanied by something from The Simpsons or Family Guy.
In this case, “Hail to the Bus Driver.”

I did a story about a bus driver shortage in the summer of 1988, when I was an intern at the New Haven Register. Is there ever not a bus driver shortage?
3. Canadian Cities Don’t Offer Tax Incentives.
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Go, Canada, my home in place of draft
I’ll flee to you
’cause they’re not gonna shoot at my ass
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Canadian Alcatraz.

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New on the Beachwood . . .
SportsMonday: Bears Owe Fans An Apology
They sold them a sham on Saturday.
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Chicago Comicon 2018
Wizard World, better than the world we have.
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Lawsuit Demands Return Of Stateville Prison Debate Program
Reportedly cancelled – after WGN feature – because state corrections officials didn’t like giving prisoners access to press their issues with state legislators.
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Tapper Relents On Medicare For All Fact-Check
“To determine whether the study says what Sanders says, you need to read it and independently judge that. If you are not capable of doing that, which most journalists aren’t due to the complexity of the matter, then you need to talk to a lot of people from different sides who have read the report and have the skills necessary to describe it to you,” Matt Bruenig writes. “Instead, journalists like Tapper have decided to only ask [the Mercatus Center’s] Blahous, who has an incentive to deceive people, what the report says rather than asking neutral experts or experts from different political persuasions to describe the report.
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Mt. Pleasant’s Michael Kopech
“His homophobic, racist tweets are not the lone blemish on his ledger,” our very own Roger Wallenstein notes. “He received a 50-game suspension for a banned stimulant in 2015, and a year later he punched a teammate in spring training, breaking his hand.”
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Technology Hasn’t Killed Public Libraries – It’s Inspired Them To Transform And Stay Relevant
“As vital as libraries are to individuals, their value is also connected to broader civic agendas. Libraries have deliberately sought to change perceptions of themselves from spaces of collection to spaces of creation.”
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The Beachwood Radio Sports Hour #214: The Cubs Are El Mago
Strap it down for a rough – but possibly glorious – ride. Plus: Daniel Murphy Does Not Agree With The Homosexual Lifestyle; Michael KKKopech; Bears Media Talking About Practice; and Fire Fires Fans.
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From the Beachwood Music Desk . . .
The Weekend In Chicago Rock
Featuring: Jonah Matrango and Friends, Godflesh, Rehasher, and Young and Dumb.
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Catching up with . . .
Last Week In Chicago Rock
Featuring: Efrim Menuck, Daniel Wyche Quartet, Dimmu Borgir, Dark Thoughts, Arctic Flowers, Judas Priest, The Mighty Mighty Bosstones, and Deep Purple.
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The Weekend Before That In Chicago Rock
Featuring: Beach House, Even in Blackouts, Hot Science, Batushka, Suspirians, Blood Licker, Machine Gun Preacher, Earth Wind & Fire, Whitney, NE-HI, Bleach Party, and Henhouse Prowlers.
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ChicagoReddit

ChicagoFest sticker found in Humboldt Park from r/chicago


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ChicagoGram


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ChicagoTube
Chicamoca Jam Chicago Edition l Finals Pep-c vs Kate.

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BeachBook
Change The World, Not Yourself (Or, How Arendt Called Out Thoreau).

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All Career Advice For Women Is A Form Of Gaslighting.

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A Man Fell Into Anish Kapoor’s Installation Of A Bottomless Pit.

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How Bogus ‘Eco-Friendly’ Products Trick You.

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The Lebowski Property Tax Break.

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TweetWood
A sampling.


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The Beachwood Tronc Line: Considerably.

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Posted on August 27, 2018