Chicago -
Barack Obama’s speech announcing his candidacy for president, as told by CNN’s real-time graphic summary.
JUST IN
Obama: Fired Up.
JUST IN
Obama: You Believe We Can Be One People.
JUST IN
Obama: I’m Fired Up.
JUST IN
Obama: In Face Of War, You Believe There Can Be Peace.
JUST IN
Obama: You Believe We Can Be One People.
Posted on February 10, 2007
By The Beachwood Olympic Committee Affairs Desk
“Tens of millions of U.S. dollars have been wasted in Iraq reconstruction aid, some of it on an Olympic-size swimming pool,” the AP reported this week.
We size up Chicago’s new competition for the 2016 Games.
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Chicago: Starter pistol supply not expected to be a problem.
Baghdad: Starter pistol supply not expected to be a problem.
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Chicago: Billions of dollars over budget on construction projects.
Baghdad: Billions of dollars over budget on reconstruction projects.
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Chicago: Road in from airport deadly.
Baghdad: Road in from airport deadly.
Posted on February 1, 2007
By The Beachwood Political Affairs Desk
The new Democratic majority in the U.S. House set out an ambitious “first hundred hours” agenda to pass measures that would tighten lobbying ethics, implement the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, raise the minimum wage, expand stem cell research, lower prescription drug prices on behalf of Medicare patients, roll back oil industry subsidies, commit to pay-as-you-go budgeting, and cut interest rates on student loans.
Here are some of the lesser known accomplishments of the House Democrats’ first hundred hours.
– Rid chamber of “Hastert smell.”
– Now abusing the girl pages, not the boys.
– Confederate flags in old leadership offices sold on eBay; money used to upgrade access to series of tubes known as “the Internet.”
Posted on January 26, 2007
By Steve Rhodes
Barack Obama endorsed Mayor Richard M. Daley on Monday, saying among other things that the city had made great strides in overcoming corruption. Forgive Obama, he hasn’t been in the state much since being elected senator.
Just where does Obama see improvement? Daley is now finishing his worst term since the one in which more than 700 people died in the 1995 heat wave that he so badly mismanaged. Perhaps Obama hasn’t heard of the Hired Truck Scandal, or that Robert Sorich, the mayor’s former patronage chief, is on his way to jail. And that’s just the top of the shitpile; there are also the revelations of Daley’s extensive patronage machine; stalled efforts at CPS and CHA; a CTA that is literally running off the rails; soaring property taxes; and the stain of that pesky Burge Report, whose whitewashing managed in reverse to make the mayor look guilty.
Now, to be sure, Obama’s endorsement had very little to do with Daley’s re-election campaign (except to help satisfy the mayor’s thirst to positively crush his opponents and critics), but everything to do with Obama’s presidential campaign.
And that’s what’s troubling.
Posted on January 23, 2007
By Steve Rhodes
I’m not anti-Obama. He’s quite likable on the surface. I haven’t made up my mind about him. But I’m against hype, and particularly media hype, and that’s what’s going on. When I was the political reporter at Chicago magazine, my editor rejected both my proposals to embed with Obama first in the primary and then in the general election in order to write insider campaign accounts – win or lose.
After Obama caught fire, I proposed a story examining his legislative record, which still has gone largely unexplored. Also rejected. I proposed a story about “How Obama became Obama,” namely how the circumstances of his U.S. Senate campaign, his speech at the Democratic National Convention, and the tenor of media coverage helped create the man who might be president. Also rejected.
Any story, in fact, that might be a serious journalistic enterprise including critical thinking was rejected.
But my editor, Richard Babcock, the editor of the magazine, desperately wanted an Obama story nonetheless, so he could put him on the cover and sell magazines. The cover decision had been made; now we just needed a story to go with it. And of course, that meant a puff piece, which is what they got.
Posted on January 18, 2007
The Beachwood Police Raid Affairs Desk
A comparison.
Tank: Encroaches in the neutral zone.
Troutman: Encroaches on zoning.
Tank: In wrong place at wrong time.
Troutman: In wrong ward at wrong time.
Tank: Money for sacks.
Troutman: Money in sacks.
Tank: Stops the run.
Troutman: Vows to run.
Tank: Allegedly affiliated with gangs.
Troutman: Allegedly affiliated with gangs.
Posted on January 18, 2007
By Kiljoong Kim
To most of us, concepts like globalization and global citizenship seem so far removed from our daily lives that they seemingly have no impact. In fact, we hardly consider the possibility that such concepts can determine our friends, neighbors, and co-workers. Most of us also think of immigrants in very simple terms: Mexicans from Mexico, Poles from Poland, Asian Indians from India, etc. In most cases, immigrants do come from where they were born. But there are also others who have roamed the earth before arriving in our state. Some have settled in Illinois upon their travels and some are simply passing by.
Historically, people often moved for political and economic reasons. Many have fled Cuba, Bosnia, or a number of African nations to seek political asylum. And many have left the Philippines, India, Poland, and many other nations seeking economic opportunities. Today we travel with far greater frequency and over far greater distances than ever before. After 1965, when the Immigration and Naturalization Act was passed, Asian Indians who used to live in England during colonization and Koreans who were in Germany seeking coal mining and nursing opportunities moved to United States. In fact, in the 1970s, a third of Korean immigrants into the Chicago area came from Germany.
Posted on January 8, 2007
By The Beachwood Dead Presidents Affairs Desk
Bob Woodward has released tapes of a 2004 interview with Gerald Ford in which the former president revealed that the invasion of Iraq was “a big mistake.” Ford gave Woodward the interview on the condition that his comments not become public until after his death. Here are less-publicized excerpts from the Ford interview.
– “I wanted to call it, ‘Beat Inflation into a Whimpering, Bloody Pulp and Roast Its Still-Beating Heart Over a Pile of Burning Horse Dung,’ but the ‘experts’ had a better idea.”
– “Estes Kefauver is a cocksucker, and you can quote me on that once I’m dead.”
– “So we were lounging around the White House pool one afternoon and he [Kennedy] asked us if we’d ever ‘taken a trip.’ I thought he was asking if we wanted to check out the yacht, you know [laughs]. But I’m glad I did it. Acid opened some important doors for me, awakened me to my creative self. [inaudible] Yeah, like the single-bullet thing, very psychedelic. Arlen was the real guru on that, dude walked around for a year with pupils the size of exit wounds.”
Posted on December 29, 2006
By The Beachwood Obit Affairs Desk
James Brown vs. Gerald Ford.
Brown: Sex Machine
Ford: Golf Machine
Brown: Feels good.
Ford: Feels wood.
Brown: Exorcised demons.
Ford: Pardoned a demon.
Posted on December 27, 2006
By The Beachwood Holiday Affairs Desk
1. “Little Drummer Boy”
Here comes the savior, Ba-rack-o-ba-ma
He’s our new favorite, Ba-rack-o-ba-ma
He transcends race, Ba-rack-o-ba-ma
His ears are too big for his face, Ba-rack-o-ba-ma
Posted on December 18, 2006
