By Steve Rhodes

“As Illinois Republicans gathered yesterday to organize their convention delegation, the absence of the state GOP’s highest-ranking officeholder did not go unnoticed,” the Tribune reports.
“U.S. Sen. Mark Kirk, who suffered a major stroke in January, is sitting out the Republican National Convention as he recovers.”
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Mark Brown of the Sun-Times has a not uninsightful column today about Kirk’s “not well-known, behind-the-scenes role as an architect of a political strategy to return Republicans to power in Illinois.
“Before the stroke, Kirk had been moving forcefully to use his position as the state’s highest-ranking GOP elected official to consolidate power as unofficial leader of the state party.”
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See also: Who Is Mark Kirk?

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Posted on August 28, 2012

Anatomy Of An American City

Toni Preckwinkle was right.

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Posted on August 27, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

“The son of Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan is forging a successful insurance career in the Chicago suburbs with the help of mayors who look to his powerful father to advance their political and legislative agendas,” the Tribune reports.
“Andrew Madigan, 26, joined the powerhouse Chicago firm Mesirow Financial in 2008 after interning with the company during college. Since 2010, he has worked in business development for the company’s insurance division, where he is now a vice president.
“His job: connecting with decision-makers, laying the groundwork for new business and then handing over the details to teams of Mesirow insurance brokers who seal the deals.”
Oy.

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Posted on August 23, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

“When Google Inc. announced Monday it would slice Motorola Mobility’s payroll by 20 percent, the cutback represented a reversal of fortune for Emanuel, who less than three weeks earlier trumpeted the smartphone-maker’s decision to move its headquarters, with its 3,000 high-paying jobs, to Chicago,” the Tribune reports.
“Motorola’s backpedaling is the most recent and dramatic example of how Emanuel’s jobs announcements – aimed at creating buzz that he’s kicking the city into high gear, pulling businesses from the suburbs and elsewhere in the country – don’t all live up to their billing.”
And how.

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Posted on August 20, 2012

By The Chicago 8

The motion picture The Chicago 8, centered around famed political protestors Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin, will premiere theatrically in North Carolina September 4, 2012, minutes away from the 2012 Democratic National Convention, at the EpiCentre Theater.
The movie is the true story from the notorious 1968 trial that resulted when seven leaders of a Vietnam anti-war movement, including Hoffman and Rubin, and a member of the Black Panthers, were charged with conspiracy to incite devastating riots in Chicago during the 1968 DNC.
Desperate to stop what they saw as an “immoral war,” this group was ready to take on the establishment and express their freedom of speech by all means necessary while paying a price for their actions.
“With recent demonstrations on Wall Street and in the Middle East, The Chicago 8 is timely with its message of being non-apathetic and fearless when it comes to standing up for your rights,” says director Pinchas Perry.

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Posted on August 9, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

Worse than Bush.
1. It’s Fucked Up.

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Posted on August 8, 2012

Sheila Simon As Presented By The BGA And The Onion

“Lt. Gov. Sheila Simon welcomes The Onion to its new home in Chicago with a song about Illinois corruption at a Better Government Association Young Professionals Board fundraiser at Paris Club (July 31, 2012).”

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Posted on August 2, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

“City of Chicago debt payments are expected to soar by $278 million next year to the record level of $1.55 billion, according to a city financial analysis released Tuesday by Mayor Rahm Emanuel,” the Tribune reports.
I hope we’ve learned by now not to trust any numbers coming out of the Emanuel administration, but then again, not learning that lesson helped get us into this mess in the first place.
“The debt problem began to grow a decade ago, under former Mayor Richard Daley. Overall city long-term debt has nearly doubled during the past 10 years as the city borrowed money to expand O’Hare International Airport, upgrade its sewer and water systems, fix streets and build new libraries and police stations. More than $1 billion also was borrowed to pay retroactive police and fire raises and cover legal judgments against the city. Payments are expected to surge in 2013 because of the way the debt is structured.”
At the same time, while Daley was hardly a prudent or even attentive manager when it came to spending, these stories always forget the enormous fact that it was Wall Street’s recklessness and greed that imploded the economy and is chiefly to blame for turning manageable problems into unmitigated disasters.
Now, however, we have every right to judge officeholders – including the president – for how they respond to crises we know they inherited but we hired to solve.

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Posted on August 1, 2012

By Steve Rhodes

“A Chicago alderman wants to kill Chick-fil-A’s plans to build a restaurant in his increasingly trendy Northwest Side ward because the fast-food chain’s top executive vocally opposes gay marriage,” the Tribune reports.
“Ald. Proco ‘Joe’ Moreno announced this week that he will block Chick-fil-A’s effort to build its second Chicago store, which would be in the Logan Square neighborhood, following company President Dan Cathy’s remarks last week that he was ‘guilty as charged’ for supporting the biblical definition of marriage as between a man and woman.”
But wait: Moreno had no problem supporting Barack Obama even though he had the exact same position until earlier this year – and then only went so far as to back leaving gay marriage up to the states, validating North Carolina’s (and others’) decision to ban it.
In fact, Illinois doesn’t allow gay marriage! Get the state out of the 1st Ward!

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Posted on July 25, 2012

By Cora Currier and Suevon Lee

When Barack Obama took office, he banned torture, shut down the CIA’s network of black-site prisons and pledged to close Guantanamo. But exactly where terror suspects should go continues to be a legal and political challenge for the administration. So we’ve rounded up some of the best reporting on rendition and detention under Obama. Got others? Add them in the comments.
Why Obama Hasn’t Closed Guantanamo Camps, Foreign Affairs, January 2012: Miami Herald Guantanamo reporter Carol Rosenberg analyzes the combination of political, security and bureaucratic obstacles that have thwarted Obama’s plans to shut down the prison. ProPublica has also covered the dilemma of indefinite detention at Guantanamo.

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Posted on July 16, 2012