By Steve Rhodes and J.J. Tindall
Chicago’s city council and school board met at the same time this week and the laws of quantum decency were violated in innumerable ways. Plus: Barry Gibb Is Brilliant, Karen Lewis Is Super Smart, David Vitale Is Sleepy and Exene Cervenka Is Batshit Crazy.
SHOW NOTES
00: Left of the Rail.
* See a Little Light.
* Bob Mould plays the Pritzker Pavilion at Millennium Park on June 23rd.
* The high on Friday was 79.
* TrackNotes: Murderous Marketers.
* Correction: This was the opener, not the encore.
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* Peter Guralnick.
11:45: Headlines.
* Southwest Fined For Advertising $59 Atlanta-Chicago Fares That Didn’t Exist.
* Karen Lewis Says CNN Tried To Stage Chicagoland Scenes With Her.
* Rahm Emanuel Is An Angry Black Woman.
[Ald. Scott] Waguespack is one of five aldermen who in January asked the city’s inspector general to investigate the mayor’s controversial $99 million contract for janitorial services at O’Hare Airport. (Last November, the Sun-Times reported that the owner of the janitorial firm, United Maintenance Company, has alleged Mob ties; the firm also made an undisclosed change in ownership structure that resulted in the privatization of union jobs.) Waguespack says that he and his colleagues did so only after the mayor’s office wouldn’t adequately answer their questions about the contract. “We felt like we were getting the runaround,” he says.
The result was a confrontation in a council hallway that started with a mayoral aide screaming at Waguespack and ended with a red-faced Emanuel exploding in a way that will sound familiar to those – such as Chicago Teachers Union president Karen Lewis – who have experienced being Rahminated. “He just came up a couple, three times and grabbed my arm a couple times, squeezed my elbow,” Waguespack recalls. “He dropped the f-bomb a few times . . . no big deal. He did it in a way that was meant to be ‘I’m the tough guy.’ It just shows you what we’re doing has an effect, and it makes him very angry, I guess, just for asking questions and asking for an outside opinion.”
I sensed while reporting this that it was a bigger deal than Waguespack let on, but he didn’t really want to make an issue of it.
16:20: GOTHAM.
21:22: News.
* Pat Quinn’s Neighborhood Recovery Initiative May Have Gotten Him Elected Four Years Ago And May Get Him Unelected This Year.
* Barack Obama’s Leather Bomber Jacket.
* The City Council Spends More Time On Honorary Resolutions Than Binding Ordinances.
* School Board President Caught Sleeping In Class, So Parent Trying To Talk To Him Is Thrown Out.
33:20: The Week In Juvenile Justice.
* Ridgewood High School Students Denied Diplomas After Throwing Caps In Air.
* High Schoolers Facing Criminal Charges For Ballistic Taco Mayhem.
You just gotta keep livin’ . . . L-I-V-I-N.
42:14: Exene Cervenka Is Batshit Crazy.
* Says J.J.: I’m second left coming out from behind the silos (faux mohawk, tank top, Doc Martens). Goes by quick . . .
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45:21: The Ledge.
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Comments welcome.
Posted on May 31, 2014