By Steve Rhodes

State of the Union.
*
Jim Webb vs. Barack Obama. Discuss.
*
We already know that George W. Bush’s foreign policy has been a disaster. But you have to wonder if there’s a single thing this president has done right when the Tribune editorial page cites as the president’s two key domestic achievements “the No Child Left Behind law that introduced a powerful culture of accountability to public education” and “the succession of tax cuts that provoked the American economy into a flush era of job creation, market growth and rising government revenues.”
Yes, thank God we were rescued from the Clinton economy. That sucked.
*
Apparently the editorial board doesn’t read – or doesn’t believe – its paper’s own reporting.
*
Neat trick to cite “rising government revenues” (I thought conservatives wanted to starve government) instead of “a mind-blowing out-of-control deficit.”
Scooter Pie
“I. Lewis Libby Jr., the vice president’s former chief of staff, was made a scapegoat by White House officials to protect the president’s longtime political adviser, Karl Rove, Mr. Libby’s lawyer asserted in his opening statement on Tuesday,” The New York Times reports.
Just to make sure you read that right – that’s Libby pinning Plamegate on Rove, not the prosecution.
Olympic Fever Dreams
Fran Spielman transcribes her recording of Pat Ryan’s press conference.
The Tribune‘s Kathy Bergen reports the news.

Read More

Posted on January 24, 2007

By Steve Rhodes

1. “We have a quarterback who’s lucky he made it through college,” a Barrington contractor tells The Indianapolis Star.
2. Barack Obama’s endorsement of Mayor Richard M. Daley has very little to do with the mayor’s campaign, but everything to do with Obama’s campaign. Is Barack Obama just a pretty new face on the same old politics?
3. Mark Brown says the private correspondence of former Daley patronage chief Victor Reyes, made public in the court files of Robert Sorich’s appeal, shows how the city really works, but that there’s no smoking gun. It’s all a smoking gun! That’s like saying we found the bullets, and we found the gun, and we found the fingerprints, and there’s a dead body, and there is a motive, but there’s no smoke coming out of the barrel so we can’t be sure. I mean, c’mon!
4. My favorite Brown finding: Rosemarie Andolino, who is in charge of the bungled O’Hare expansion, reminds Reyes in a letter “of her upcoming family vacation to Caracas, Venezuela, and that she had spoken with him about asking the lobbyist for American Airlines to upgrade their four seats.”
Nice.
A real mayor would send Andolino packing.
5. “Hillary’s Reputation Both Helps & Hurts 2008 Bid.”
Other candidates unburdened by strange paradox.
6. Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s lottery dreams made the front page of The New York Times. The Times wasn’t clear about the news peg, but Crain’s reports that on Monday the state released “a 17-page request for qualifications from interested bidders, who are required to respond by Feb. 20.”
The Beachwood Lottery Affairs Desk is already preparing its offer.
7. Richard Roeper once asked Rich Little if he did impressions of anyone still alive.

Read More

Posted on January 23, 2007

By Steve Rhodes

Who dat gonna beat dem Bears!
Beara Culpa
I don’t think I’ve been more wrong about anything in the past year than the Bears. I honestly really thought, deep in my heart, that the Saints would blow them out.
Bearish
Though there’s still one more chance for me and Emery to say we told you so.
Colts 45-13.
Gentleman Jay
“I could be a real jerk and call them the worst 15-3 team to reach a Super Bowl,” Jay Mariotti writes this morning. “But that wouldn’t be true.”
A) Second-worst. I mean, the 1985 Patriots, pee-yeww!
B) The “real jerk” part, he means.
C) Because they’ll be 15-4!

Read More

Posted on January 22, 2007

By The Weekend Desk B Team

The “B” team is holding down the Weekend Desk this, um, weekend, while Natasha Julius is away on a post-juice fast secret mission. Here are the stories we’ll be tracking in her absence.
Super Bowling
The contestants are yet to be decided, but Prince has signed on as halftime entertainment for the Super Bowl. Word has it he’s been rehearsing a new song called “I Can’t Hear You” about the president’s Iraq strategy.
Saints Bowl
Still under water.

Read More

Posted on January 20, 2007

By Steve Rhodes

I have a multitude of things to attend to today, and it’s already been an exhausting week here at Beachwood HQ, so The Papers will return on Monday.
In the meantime, though, please check out these fine new Beachwood offerings.
* Scott Buckner is positively on fire as our new chief What I Watched Last Night writer (submissions welcome, as they are for all of our ongoing features). I don’t mind telling you that our TV criticism is the best in the city. The first installment of our rolling Mid-Season Review is here.
* Barista! has recovered from the holidays and is back with another fine installment. If you haven’t been reading her column, you’ve truly been missing out.

Read More

Posted on January 19, 2007

By Steve Rhodes

No one will be rooting harder for the Bears on Sunday than President George W. Bush. Do you think he really wants two weeks of worldwide Katrina retrospectives and footage of an entire American city still decimated and virtually abandoned by his administration?
Not to mention it’s New Orleans, not Kansas City or Des Moines. It’s a city of world renown, except that now it’s barely a city.
A Saints victory might be the best thing that can happen to New Orleanians if it brings them not only the short-term pleasure of having a team in the Super Bowl, but a renewed public policy effort spurred by the renewed attention the city will get.
Which doesn’t mean Bears fans should feel guilty rooting for their team on Sunday. But on the other hand, you’re either with Bush or you’re against him. Let the unity of a new political culture begin.

Read More

Posted on January 18, 2007

By Steve Rhodes

Between the Bears and Obama, I think the Chicago media might spontaneously combust. In fact, my Chicago Sun-Times is bursting into flames at this very moment.
News Review
Tribune: “What Obama Must Do To Win” represents one of the worst attributes of modern political reporting: the insistence of journalists to assume the role of political strategists. In so doing, the media moves onto a different playing field with a different set of rules and values and forgets to do its job. For example, when journalists advise that a certain candidate will have to move right or left during a primary and then to the center during a general election campaign, they are playing the role of political strategists. But the role of journalists is to detect – and decry for its dishonesty- such movements and expose them to the light of day. Political strategy is almost always dishonest and manipulative. The job of the journalist isn’t to show savvy by demonstrating an understanding of the sophisticated techniques involved, but to expose the manipulations for the lies that they are, and stand on the side of citizens demanding transparency and honesty.
Sun-Times: In “Move Offers 2 Chances To Get Coverage,” local Democratic strategist Kitty Kurth explains why Obama is announcing just an exploratory committee now, and will announce his actual candidacy later: “It gets you two bites of the apple at getting press. You guys will cover this, and when he does announce, you guys will cover that.”
In other words, because the media are a bunch of suckers who are consistently outsmarted by the people they cover, yet continually fail to adjust.
But why stop at two bites of the apple? Why doesn’t Obama just keep issuing numerous proclamations about running in order to maximize content-free but cost-free publicity? Oh wait, that’s what he’s been doing.
Homers
Besides, I thought there was no cheering in the press box.
Or do you want to be known as just the latest example of a local backwater press corps that had to rely on the national media to properly vet one of your own?

Read More

Posted on January 17, 2007

By Steve Rhodes

1. “The game opened with the Chicago Bears as 3-point home favorites over the New Orleans Saints, but by Monday morning the odds were all over the place,” reports Covers.com.
That’s because the only thing that prevents the Saints from being the favorites is the Bears’ home field advantage.
2. And yet, this year’s Saints are better on the road (6-2) than at home (5-4).
So this is where it ends, Bears fans.
3. Thought while looking at Paige Wiser’s Golden Globes red carpet report in the Sun-Times: Black-and-white newspaper pages might as well be black-and-white TVs.
Especially when it comes to, um, a photo-driven feature. Newspapers: Bringing you yesterday’s technology tomorrow.
4. “We’ve got a fight on our hands on every issue that we bring to City Hall,” local union leader Dennis Gannon tells the Tribune.
5. “I can ‘Bearly’ contain my excitement over the Bears kicking the Seattle Seahawks’ butt on Sunday with a 27-24 victory that went into overtime,” writes a well-paid adult columnist for a (theoretically) major metropolitan newspaper. “Words simply can’t describe this city’s collective glee and joy over that win, which puts our Bears in the NFC Championship Game Sunday against the New Orleans Saints at Soldier Field. I am ‘Beary’ happy . . . because they are ‘UnBEARlievable!'”

Read More

Posted on January 16, 2007

By Steve Rhodes

Editor’s Note: Due to the holiday, we have an abbreviated version of The Papers.
1. American Hero.
2. American Pharaoh.
3. The CTA will have regular weekday service today. So expect delays.

Posted on January 15, 2007

By Natasha Julius

Factional Playoff Series
The long bomb is a favorite offensive tactic of some of the teams still in the running for the ultimate prize this weekend, although it’s met with mixed results in the past. With the Over/Under on strikes at 5, here’s our picks from the leading targets:

Read More

Posted on January 12, 2007