By Steve Rhodes

The Papers needs a day off but will return on Tuesday.
Meanwhile:
* The Weekend In Chicago Rock:
The Stone Foxes, As I Lay Dying, Ari Hest, AWOLNATION, Break Science, Alabama Shakes, Ray LaMontagne, The Coup, Hellyeah, In Flames, Japanther and Mike Cooley.
* The [UPDATED] Political Odds:
Guess what? The presumptive frontrunners are women: Debbie Halvorson, Toi Hutchinson and Robin Kelly.
The other side of the gender ledger is less impressive: Anthony Beale, Napoleon Harris and Donne Trotter.
Mel Reynolds? Probably not a good year to have a crime against a young girl on your record, much less bank fraud.
* QT: Die Hard With A Lethal Weapon.
Ho, ho, ho.
* SportsMonday: Jim “Coach” Coffman will break down the broken Bears later this morning on Tuesday next week.

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Posted on December 3, 2012

By Natasha Julius

The forecast this weekend? Sunny with a high of cynicism.
Market Update
When it comes to closing gaping budgetary gaps, you can take your pick: one giant looming fiscal cliff or lots of little, individual fiscal cliffs.

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Posted on December 1, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

LaShawn Ford, c’mon down!
You are the next contestant on the The Indictment Is Right.
And so far you are losing – big time.

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Posted on November 30, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

Now I understand why Mayor Rahm Emanuel has that pained, smirking grimace on his face all the time: You would too if your pants were on fire as often as his.
“Mayor Rahm Emanuel today refused to back away from his remarks that commuters can choose whether to drive or take the CTA when fares increase, instead saying his earlier comments were misinterpreted,” the Tribune reports.
“What I said is, (it’s) a choice. People have a choice between public transportation and private,” Rahm said.
Add misinterpretation to the list of things we’re defining down.

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Posted on November 29, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

“Even as Chicago prepares to test speed cameras next week, problems in Baltimore’s 3-year-old camera program are raising questions about one of the bidders for Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s controversial proposal that could target speeders in school and park zones over half the city,” the Tribune reports.
“Xerox State & Local Solutions Inc., one of two firms selected by the Emanuel administration to test cameras in Chicago, has come under scrutiny in recent months for faulty equipment and thousands of erroneous tickets issued in Baltimore over the past three years.

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Posted on November 28, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

Though nobody is really talking about it, my understanding is that Republicans (and Greens?) will also have a primary to nominate a candidate in the race to replace Jesse Jackson Jr.
Of course, nobody is talking about it because the chance of a Republican winning the seat are so slight in such an overwhelmingly Democratic district as to be ignorable, though I wonder what would happen if a wealthy African American Republican businessperson jumped in.
Anyway, I bring it up because Bobby Rush said the other day that he was worried a Tea Party candidate could slip in by edging out a diffuse Democratic field – therefore party leaders ought to settle on a candidate long before voters do and push everyone else out.
I also saw a comment somewhere – can’t remember where – speculating that Republicans would run in the Democratic primary. I suppose a Tom Swiss strategy could come into play, but really?
Anyway, we’ve got the putative field covered in the updated Political Odds.

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Posted on November 27, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

“The U.S. Supreme Court has blocked enforcement of an Illinois law that prohibited people from recording police officers on the job,” the Tribune reports.
ACLU beats Alvarez.
*
The court did not rule on whether Rahm Emanuel’s administration is allowed to commit multiple felonies by doing his own recording.
Alvarez has not said whether anyone at City Hall will be prosecuted even though guilt has been admitted, nor whether Emanuel will be investigated for allegedly instructing staff to commit such felony.
Sometimes justice is blind.

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Posted on November 26, 2012

By The Weekend Desk B Team

Natasha Julius is over the mountain and through the woods.
Rockin’ The Casbah
U.S. officials are concerned about the power grab of Egyptian president Mohamed Mursi but they’ll get over it once they get a handle on his disposition matrix.

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Posted on November 24, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

“Gov. Pat Quinn Tuesday terminated the state’s contract covering members of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union,” the Springfield State Journal-Register reports.
“In 40 years of collective bargaining, Pat Quinn is the first and only Illinois governor to terminate a union contract,” AFSCME executive director Henry Bayer said in a statement.
Well, Barack Obama promised he’d fight any effort to dismantle collective bargaining so I suppose he’ll be spending Thanksgiving back here in Illinois.

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Posted on November 21, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

More embarrassing: Squeezy the Pension Python or that Bears performance last night?
*
“Public relations strategist Thom Serafin says the governor appears to have achieved his end game of getting people to talk about pension reform,” CBS2 Chicago reports.
Wrong. The exceedingly small number of people involved in the pension reform debate are talking about Squeezy and our lame governor and more than 99.9 percent of the general population has no idea that Squeezy even exists, much less is that he (or she) is the key to our children’s future. Pat Quinn just made a massive joke of himself and likely won’t be invited back to the governor’s office in 2014.

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Posted on November 20, 2012