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The [Friday] Papers

By Steve Rhodes

At least Chicagoland this week roused itself from its two-week slumber to become incredibly aggravating again; nothing is worse than being a bore.
Of course, that means a return to fact-free hagiography of Rahm Emanuel and Garry McCarthy.
And hey, enough Liz Dozier, huh? We get it.
The antidote: Tweeting Chicagoland | Episode 5: Back To Black.


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Of course, Tuffy and the Angry Aussie will dissect the latest episode on Beachwood’s regular Saturday evening podcast. Other issues on the docket: Fort Hood and fake Cuban Twitter.
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Also, we will debut a new podcast – possibly as early as this afternoon/evening – called The Beachwood Radio Hour, recapping the week on the Beachwood and in the news, including special guests and musical interludes.
The Week In Juvey Justice
Snowballs In Chicago, Spring Breakage, Rahm The Expunger, Downstate Dilemma, Tulsa Two-Step, Malta Meal, The Real World India and more. In my weekly review at The Chicago Bureau.
‘Tried To Calm Shooter’
“An Effingham-born soldier was killed during a mass shooting at Ford Hood on Wednesday, a relative confirmed today,” the Tribune reports.
“Timothy Owens, who was born in Effingham and later moved to Missouri, died after apparently being shot at close range, said Darlene ‘Dee’ Humphrey, the stepmother of Owens’ wife, Billy.
“He was one of 19 people shot, three of them fatally, before the alleged gunman turned the gun on himself Wednesday afternoon at the Texas military facility.”
Reframing Rahm
“What the City of Chicago spent in each of the last several years on tax-increment financing funding exceeded what it owed in pension costs, so any proposal to raise property taxes to fund pensions should consider TIFs, wrote the authors of a study to be released Friday titled, Putting Municipal Pension Costs in Context: Chicago,” the Sun-Times reports.
Imagine that.
“For 2012 alone, the city owed $385.8 million to its pension funds while putting $457 million in property taxes into its TIFs, wrote Thomas Cafcas and Greg LeRoy, of Good Jobs First, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank that examines public subsidies. ”
TIFs take from the poor and give to the rich. Using property taxes to make up budget shortfalls adds insult to the injury. Cutting pensions along the way finishes the job. The poor are devastated, the middle-class is destroyed, and the wealthy have more money than they can spend – all the while moralizing about everybody’s else’s broken character.
Kill Metra
“Metra Making ‘Nuts And Bolts’ Changes To Win Back Trust, CEO Says.”
“450 Metra Non-Union Workers [Read: Management] Will Get Raises To Slow Exodus Of Bosses.”
Help me out here: Are those raises nuts or bolts?
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One of our special guests on The Beachwood Radio Hour will be Natasha Julius, offering insight you haven’t heard elsewhere on the big transit task force report released this week.
For a primer, check out her October series. Lotsa cool maps.
Chicago Public Silliness
CPS Is Just The Worst.
Power Trip
Is your electricity 70 percent better? Because that’s how much of a raise Exelon just gave its CEO.
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Maybe bring some of these folks back.
What The Proposed NSA Reforms Wouldn’t Do
Contrary to reports, the president’s plan would not end the bulk phone records collection program. Here’s a primer.
Businesses Love Bucky
And so do we. Our Final Four preview.
Beachwood Photo Booth: Specials
Mattress season in Chicago.
Exile On Fullerton Avenue
In Local Book Notes.
The Week In Chicago Rock
Featuring: Born of Osiris, We Came As Romans, August Burns Red, Ghost Beach, Trentemoller, The Movits, Alesana, Mac Demarco, Blouse, The Dum Dum Girls, Todd Rundgren, Asking Alexandria, The Sounds, Get Scared, Switchfoot, Bastille, Jamie Rojo, and Juan Wauters.
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BeachBook
* New York Times Documents How Smoking and its Consequences Are Increasingly Confined to the Poor – A Trend Which Was Pointed Out Forty Years Ago!
Tobacco taxes, then, are also hugely regressive. Also, the vast majority of smokers are addicts.
* State Department Leaker Gets 13 Months.
A former State Department arms expert who leaked classified information to a Fox News reporter was sentenced Wednesday to 13 months in prison after a pointed courtroom debate about the Obama administration’s aggressive pursuit of unauthorized disclosures of top-secret information.”
* Two MillerCoors Executives Investigated For Embezzlement.
Of money, not beer.
* FBI Seizes Artifacts From Indiana Home.
Insert your own joke about Indiana here.
* Theo Tells 100-Year-Old Cubs Fan To Be Patient.
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TweetWood


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The Beachwood Tip Line: A hot dish for the soul.

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Posted on April 4, 2014