By Steve Rhodes
1. Meet the new transition team, same as the old . . .
2. Add the nation’s mayors to the list of constituencies Barack Obama has alienated.
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“And when I came to them for re-election there was no one left to speak out for me . . .”
3. And then they came for the middle class . . .
4. “Cop Shootout Highlights Problem Panhandling.”
Um, no. The primary question reporters ought to be focused on is whether the cops patted down they guy they ended up having to kill.
It’s not a complicated question. The officers know the answer. Can they be trusted to tell the truth or are they getting their stories straight?
(From the Tribune: “Police haven’t said if the two veteran officers searched Hardaman or if his hands were cuffed in front or in back, but one law enforcement source said the officers searched Hardaman but missed the gun because he wore several layers of clothing.”)
The secondary question reporters ought to be focused on is services for the mentally ill. Start with Pat Quinn, move on to Richard M. Daley, and finish with Rahm Emanuel.
5. “U.S., Chicago Gas Prices Spike 6 Cents Overnight.”
Never let a crisis go to waste.
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No, really.
6. “Medicare Fraud Task Force Arrests More Than 100 Individuals” vs. “Why Isn’t Wall Street In Jail?”
7. Watercooler Stories by UPI.
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Separately, UPI reports that “The West Michigan Whitecaps baseball team is allowing Web site visitors to vote on potential ballpark menu items including bologna lollipops.”
8. “Microsoft announced that it has signed cloud computing agreements with 16 new government and education customers at the Microsoft US Public Sector CIO Summit,” OnWindows reports.
“These include the City of Chicago; Michigan State Senate; City of Virginia Beach, Virginia; Portland Public Schools; and the State of Idaho, Department of Labor.
“The City of Chicago used Windows Azure and Silverlight to build an online map that its residents and visitors could easily use to plan a visit to the annual Taste of Chicago event.”
Isn’t there an app for that?
9. “Surprising Number of Patients Try Super Glue Before Visiting Dentist.”
10. Former Chicago athletes sell homes here.
11. “The City of Chicago recently contracted Hike Metal of Wheatley, Ontario, Canada to construct a new ‘heavy duty’ NFPA 1925 Type III Fireboat to replace its 55 year old fireboat,” the company announced today.
“This sleek new 90-foot ‘state of the art’ Fireboat is designed to break up to 12 inches of first-year ice at 3 knots and can therefore operate year-round on Lake Michigan and the Chicago River.”
12. Schaumburg Flyers evicted.
They should have tried bologna lollipops.
13. The Week in Chicago Rock.
14. A faithful Beachwood reader writes:
Please don’t be too hard on people who did not know there was a mayoral election in Chicago earlier this week – that’s the pool of people who will be on the next Blago jury. We don’t want to make enemies before they’re seated, do we?
15. At least we didn’t get Bill for mayor.
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The Beachwood Tip Line: State of the art.
Posted on February 25, 2011