By Steve Rhodes

“For the second straight year, all 50 aldermen – and state lawmakers who represent Chicago districts – have been offered the right to purchase two terrace reserved or upper deck tickets for each home playoff game at Wrigley Field all the way through the World Series,” the Sun-Times reports.
“The lucrative perk comes three years after the City Council gave the Cubs the go-ahead to rebuild Wrigley and develop the land around it and less than four months after the Cubs won the limited right to sell beer and wine on an open-air plaza next to the stadium.
“Despite the apparent conflict of interest, ‘more than 70 percent’ of City Council members have taken the Cubs up on their generous offer.”
So more than 35 of the council’s 50 members? Just say it! Not the time to use percentages.

Read More

Posted on October 4, 2016

By Steve Rhodes

I dare Bruce Rauner to claim this under oath. From Doug Finke for the Springfield State Journal-Register:

Monday’s presidential debate between DONALD TRUMP and HILLARY CLINTON drew a Super Bowl-sized viewing audience.
OK, almost Super Bowl-sized. The NFL’s championship game draws about 100 million viewers. But the debate still drew an estimated 84 million, the largest in the history of televised presidential debates.
That audience did not include at least one notable person – Gov. BRUCE RAUNER. Asked the day after the debate if he had watched it, Rauner answered with a terse “I did not,” and that was the end of his availability to the media. He didn’t say what occupied his time instead. Maybe he was continuing to talk to all of those Democratic lawmakers who he says secretly support his positions.

Read More

Posted on October 2, 2016

By Steve Rhodes

“On Wednesday, dreary weather didn’t keep away the thousands of people who turned out for the grand opening of the Whole Foods at the corner of 63rd and Halsted streets [in Englewood],” Natalie Moore reports for WBEZ.
“Some customers showed up before sunrise, and a long line formed outside the grocer’s door most of the day. In the parking lot, Kanye West and John Coltrane blasted as people tasted free samples.
“In a neighborhood with 21 percent unemployment, the persistent question has been how will residents afford to shop at the upscale Whole Foods. Robb said costs are lower because the rent is cheaper.
“At the grand opening, a cursory glance showed that made-to-order sandwiches that cost $8 in other Whole Foods are $6 in Englewood. The store is also about half the size of a typical Whole Foods.”
*
Natalie Moore has been on this story since day one, and is always worth paying attention to anyway, so go read the whole thing.
(Also, see her tweets – memorialized on the Beachwood! – from when the project was first announced. Fascinating.)

Read More

Posted on September 29, 2016

By Steve Rhodes

The Papers will return on Thursday.
–
An e-mail I sent to a friend this morning:
“I watched about 2/3 of the debate at Little Mel’s hot dog stand. My impression was quite different than what I’ve returned to in my Twitter feed. It sounds like Trump made some big mistakes that I missed, but Dems are fooling themselves if they think he wasn’t effective and HRC wasn’t a bit of a stiff. Not like it will change anybody’s minds, and she was obviously right on facts and temperament, but Trump showed a little something in how direct he is and how he doesn’t engage in politispeak, even if he speaks like a child. Just sayin’ . . . I don’t really rate it as a clear win for anyone.”
After reading his response and some of the coverage, I added this:

Read More

Posted on September 27, 2016

By Steve Rhodes

“ConAgra Foods wanted to move its headquarters to Chicago so badly that the company took a pass on an estimated $28.5 million in incentives Nebraska would have offered to keep it in Omaha,” the Omaha World-Herald reports.
“Instead the company accepted Illinois tax credits that are expected to amount to less than half of what Nebraska would have offered.
“The disparity in potential tax breaks supports the assertion of ConAgra Chief Executive Sean Connolly that business incentives did not play a big role in the decision to shutter its Omaha headquarters.”
Me, October 1, 2015: “New ConAgra CEO Sean Connolly lives in Winnetka, according to the Tribune. So, yeah, this move was really about shortening his commute.”

Read More

Posted on September 25, 2016

By Steve Rhodes

“After years of insisting Chicago police could make do without adding officers, Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s administration acknowledged Wednesday that the department needs hundreds more to combat the violence plaguing the city, announcing a plan to hire nearly 1,000 beat officers, detectives and supervisors over the next two years,” the Tribune reports.
I welcome the Tribune’s skeptical and probing voice in this piece, which stands in sharp contrast to most of the coverage I saw. But a quibble: To say that the administration “acknowledged” a need for more cops is to presume that more cops are necessary to “combat the violence.” Not everyone agrees with that approach, including some criminologists and city council members.
Using that language also in effect endorses the mayor’s plan, even amidst the (appropriate) skepticism. (Similarly, using the phrase “the mayor claimed” would cast doubt on what came next; that’s why standard practice is insistent on almost always using the word “said.”)

Read More

Posted on September 22, 2016

By Steve Rhodes

Working on it.

Read More

Posted on September 21, 2016

By Steve Rhodes

Wow, the Bears and Jay Cutler are just getting absolutely roasted today.
Here’s our entry: Tweeting The Bears | Paging Pernell The State Farm Guy.

Read More

Posted on September 20, 2016

By Steve Rhodes

“The inspector general for the Chicago Board of Education says his work has been obstructed and duplicated by a better-funded arm of CPS chief Forrest Claypool’s office, according to a report that lays out a political scuffle between the legally mandated watchdog and the mayoral-appointed administration,” the Tribune reports.
“In his report, [IG] Nicholas Schuler accuses auditors for Chicago Public Schools of ‘significant interference’ with his investigation into the alleged theft of tens of thousands of dollars worth of CTA fare cards by a district employee.
“A ‘parallel investigation’ of that case by CPS’ Office of Internal Audit and Compliance last year ‘compromised a criminal investigation by prematurely alerting a main subject, and sowing fear and confusion in the minds of key witnesses,’ Schuler said in his report, which was sent to Claypool and the school board.”
Let me pause here to say that this reiterates something I wrote repeatedly about the Independent Police Review Authority back when a lot of folks were angry at having discovered that IPRA froze its investigations if and when they were referred to the feds, for a variety of reasons including not stepping on their toes. It’s not a perfect analogy given that CPS might have intended to interfere, but it’s an analogy nonetheless.
Now back to the story:

Read More

Posted on September 19, 2016

By Steve Rhodes

Read More

Posted on September 17, 2016