Chicago -
By Steve Rhodes
Not everyone is impressed by Barack Obama’s sudden conversion to the cause of gay marriage. Progress? Undoubtedly. But pay closer attention, please. The man just endorsed North Carolina’s right to do what it just did.
You have to hand it to Obama: He runs mean game.
Posted on May 10, 2012
By Steve Rhodes
Here’s an idea for a new Chicago motto: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me over and over and over again and we’ll make you king.
So while the mayor takes a victory lap over passage of his infrastructure bank proposal, let us jump once more unto the breach of lies, obfuscation and spin, my friends, where we will also find astonishingly simple questions still lying in wait.
1. “Mayor Rahm Emanuel talked up his Infrastructure Trust proposal during a Marketplace Morning Report radio interview that aired on WBEZ three weeks ago today,” Deanna Isaacs writes for the Reader.
When asked how the Trust would differ from Mayor Daley’s infamous parking meter deal, he responded with a specific example:
“The Cultural Center, it’s 100 years old – when we’re done, we’re going to save about $30,000 a year in energy costs. But we still own the Cultural Center. We’re not privatizing it, we’re just literally using private money to build out the energy efficiency.
After that broadcast I tried to find out exactly what work is planned for the Cultural Center. Here’s the response from the Mayor’s Office and the Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events:
“There are no specifics, nothing has been approved . . . the mayor was merely using the building as an example.”
Paging Mike Daisey!
There isn’t a single rational listener in the world who would have taken Rahm’s example as anything other than established fact. It turns out, however, that he was just fibbing. He made it up. Or there’s a secret plan whose existence he’s already denied.
Either way, add it to the list of Rahm’s lies. (See item Rahm’s Pants Still Aflame.)
Posted on May 8, 2012
By Steve Rhodes
The hugely profitable Chicago health-care debt collection company under fire for its (allegedly) unsavory practices – led by a devotee of Ayn Rand and Milton Friedman – has also been a recipient of generous taxpayer subsidies including millions of dollars in TIF funds.
“The City of Chicago has approved a $6 million subsidy to a company promising to create 650 jobs over the next 10 years,” Fox Chicago News reported in 2010.
“The money will be going to the Accretive Health Company, which manages the collection of medical bills. The money will provide the company with tax breaks and other incentives to expand the offices it already has on Michigan Avenue.”
Last year the company reported $29 million in profits.
Posted on May 1, 2012
