Spike O'Donnell in The Chorito Hog-Leg: A Novel of Guam in Time of War

25. A Homily on Targets

On March 15, 1943, just before Tim Cullen, Dick Prendergast and Jimmy Arneberg left for the Marines after early graduation, Spike O’Donnell walked south on Loomis and turned west on 83rd Street and right off the alley, between Loomis and Ada Streets, a guy creep-ed up and pumped a shot into Spike’s back. The louse tried to put one in Spike’s ear but the goof’s beezer misfired and the skunk jumped into a car and Spike crawled home to his wife Elizabeth and daughter Rita.

All this had to do with Spike’s ‘consulting work’ in the asphalt business. From the time that Spike quit the beer rackets, he had used his political clout to help asphalt paving contractors meet the right guy in Washington, when FDR started bringing the country back from the Depression with jobs. Mike Carrozza who ran the Laborers Union in Chicago was tapped as the paving czar for the PWA and he and Spike trusted and respected one another from the old days. One bright boy, a real clean good-government type, asked Spike’s help in securing the low bid for a three million dollar paving job for which Spike’s fee was agreed to be $ 70,000 the Cook County States Attorney and the Chicago Street Commissioner were already in the pocket of another bidder and tried to freeze Spike’s guy out; so the do-gooder reneges on his fee to get back in the good graces of the other pigs; so Spike gives the lying bastard a slap-around in front of his employees and the States Attorney has Spike pinched. Reason prevailed and the do-gooder louse woke up to the fact that Spike saved his hard-earned cash and thousands of dollars for Father Steve McMahon and Little Flower Parish by walking into the failing bank on Ashland Ave. in October 1929 with a violin case and telling the Bank’s President ‘I want to make a withdrawal – all accounts for Mr. Edward J. O’Donnell and all accounts for Father Steve McMahon and any and all for Little Flower Parish, please And I don’t want to make two trips, see?’ Neither Mr. O’Donnell nor Little Flower Parish lost a nickel in the great crash.

The reneging Asphalt mogul did not press a charge of assault and battery against Spike O’Donnell. But neither did he pay the tough-guy consultant the fee suggested. Mr. O’Donnell made it known that the Streets Commissioner of the City of Chicago was a crook and so was the States Attorney. From September 1942 to March 1943, while Marines fought to keep a foot - hold on Guadalcanal, while Ike landed American forces in North Africa, while millions of American boys were training to fight and die all over the globe, Edward J. Spike O’Donnell of 8234 S. Loomis in Chicago, Illinois fought a jungle war against the craven interests of crooked politicians (those not in Spike’s vest pocket) and two-faced louses who vote Republican - good government phonies.

On the same day that Brutus stuck a shiv in Caesar’s kidneys, 1900 years later; some louse popped a lead capsule just to the left of 53 year old Spike’s spine that lodged in his chest. Fortunately, Spike’s assassin was paid and not honorable and took to his heels when his beezer gave out. Spike laid up in Little Company of Mary Hospital for months with Capt. Dan’ Tubbo’ Gilbert and his boys keeping visitors out on orders from the States Attorney. The Papers screamed bloody murder as most Chicagoans got a kick out of Spike who publicly gave politicians the miseries with his circular narratives, punctuated by jabs to the ribs, and always delivered out of the side of his mouth. Spike O’Donnell was a tough-guy who got tough with louses and crumbs that had it coming, or so the common man held.

When visitors were allowed, Joanie Cullen brought her Mom’s homemade Chili sauce that was sweet and cinnamon zested and went great with pot roast and beef shoulder, a Mass Card from all the Cullens and a big box of candy from Steinberg’s drugstore – now called Steinway Pharmacy. Tim dropped by to tell Spike that he had joined the Marines and Spike wanted to kiss and also clout the kid. ‘Are you soft upstairs? You should be working on airplanes or in the Navy like your brother who wouldn’t know a pipe wrench from a Mary Jane. You clowns are all gonna kill Tojo. Well, pal, let me tell you this. I been shot at – and hit because my back was turned – and it’s no roller skate date at Foster Park. You make damn sure that you know how to operate what you're shooting and you had better keep it oiled and chambered. Now listen – when you shoot at a mug you are shooting at a target and that is all. If you get all Shirley Temple and human he’ll kill you – end of story. When you take off?’
‘The end of April Mr. O’Donnell.’ Tim was impressed by his friend’s frank and forthright – though – unwitnessed, tutorial on weapons and their uses.

‘Ten years ago, when Danny McGeoghan was trying to kill me everyday of the week – over beer sales – he had a nut-job Polack tough-guy jump ship to me. The guy killed about three guys, or so he said, and he wants to get close to me. One night, the guy comes into my house for the pad to old Capt. Somerville, and one of the kids, I forget who it was, comes out in diapers crying about the loud man. Anyway I picked her up and patted her back to sleep and put her to bed. The Polack is staring green at the baby the whole time. I’m not thinking clear, see, so I leave the him in the living – this was in my nice house over at 81st and Wolcott the one the G snatched from me for taxes last year –room and I go down to the basement for some money. I go round the front of the house for some reason and while I’m in the gangway I see him in my baby’s bed room giving the baby a crack. She’s bawling and by the time I come up the front porch he’s back on the sofa - as nice as pie. “Hey Spike that Baby is really giving out since . . .” I hold up my hand and wave it off ‘No sweat Pal.!’
Two weeks later we go down to Momence for some target practice. This guy Meehan has a shit farm south of the Kankakee River, see. We set up targets but the Polack sees these goats having lunch and decides to kill the poor things for no reason. “I tell him nice shooting and ask him to set up a target for me a couple hundred feet from where the dead goats are toes-up. Before he went two feet, four slugs ran into the back of the Polack’s head – nice target. Get me?’

Tim nodded with deep appreciation and conviction as he fully understood the entire tone and temper of the parable, which Mr. O’Donnell offered without homily – take care of your weapons and hit what you aim at. The targets put themselves there.

Lovely La Lumiere School Laker LaLupaloosa!

Away from matters too silly by half - war, goofy media, politics, and lawn care - I enjoyed time with the fruit of my loins for Parents weekend at La Lumiere School.

I taught at La Lumiere School from 1987 to 1994 and cherish every moment that God blessed my life with in the most beautiful place in the Midwest - north of LaPorte, West of South Bend. East of Michigan City in Indiana and just south of New Buffalo Michigan.

My son Conor ( Football Captain and Center #55), of whom I am well-pleased, is a senior ( 6th Form) student at LaLumiere School - noted for Alums: Chief Justice of the Supreme Court John Roberts, Actor Comedian Jim Gaffigan, Director Producer Paris Barkley, District Judge Jim Flannery and Illinois Republican Chairman and one the nicest people on earth Andy McKenna.

La Lumiere School was founded by Catholic laymen in 1963 and continues to be one of the best seconday boarding and day schools in America. Headmaster Michael Kennedy, one of my former students, has developed a remarkable faculty of talented young teachers and coaches and is putting together a very smart capital campaign.

This is a remarkable place. LaLumiere School is well worth a visit just for the breathtaking beauty of the place. It is a great educational investment for any young person. LaLumiere School is a very happy place.

Click on the title of my post for more on La Lumiere School! Better yet - hop in the Dodge and take ride out there.

Lost On Kos -Lived on a Daily Basis: Our Kids Need McCain to Lead

Lost on those of us numbed by the information super-highway's endless shouts, is the continued Honor to Mission lived by the young women and men in Harm's Way.

Survivor, Grey's Anatomy, American Idol and the arrests and rehabs of America's most useless People numb Americans from the consequence of meeting our most important obligations.

The next President must not be the 'health care,' 'education,' 'economy,' or 'global warning' President. The next President must be the person to lead America in time of war on Islamist Terror. That War came home on September 11th a couple of years ago, and since that day too many of us have become distracted.

Focus.

It seems to me that the only candidate capable of leading America in this war is John McCain:

``I am obviously of the belief that the country would be safer with me as its leader,'' McCain added. He said that while he respects his Republican and Democratic opponents, ``this is all about who is best equipped to take on the challenge of radical Islamic extremism which will be with us throughout the 21st century.''

Amid signs of a potential rebirth of his weakened candidacy, McCain is emphasizing his deep foreign policy resume and military background anew - in campaign appearance and, for the first time, in ads - as he seeks to draw differences with GOP rivals Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney and Fred Thompson.

McCain spoke to the conservative Hudson Institute as his campaign rolled out the first television and radio ads in the early primary state of New Hampshire. The state is a must-win state for the former GOP front-runner whose fortunes plunged this summer. He's seeking a comeback, and, in the ads, emphasizes his war-hero biography and decades-long experience on military matters.

In the speech and in an obvious reference to Romney and Giuliani, McCain said: ``Tough talk or managerial successes in the private sector aren't adequate assurance that their authors have the experience or qualities necessary for such a singular responsibility.''

Giuliani is a former two-term mayor of New York who moved into the business sector after elective office. Romney is a venture capitalist and one-term former governor of Massachusetts. Like Thompson, their campaign speeches are filled with rhetoric about defeating terrorists although their foreign policy resumes are thin compared with McCain's.

``We have to make far-reaching reforms to our government to prepare for the long threat our enemies plan for us, and the cruel and desperate means they will employ to harm us,'' McCain added. ``You don't just talk about or manage such changes, you lead them.''

McCain argued that the next president needs ``tested experience, political courage and strategic clarity to make sound and difficult decisions'' - implying he embodies all three attributes.

From the UK's Guardian: a very Left Wing newspaper - it seems McCain makes sense to its writer; now, is time for Americans to catch-up.

I wish to thank Mr. Frank Nofsinger of Connecticut for sending me the photos of our troops posted above.

Ahmadinejad-- The Persian Outlaw Live at the UN - By Golly!

Polite applause!

'Thank you. We are more polite in my Persia. Aw - Let's all get Country! Am I Right?
Here's the Band - Ya'll!

Dave Hartoonianjamid of Gittar

Cyrus Yoronatabncantdrinkuntilpaidup! Steel Pedal!

Darius HainsleptSinsCarterleft on Bass - Yeah, that's how he rolls Pure Outlaw!

AND! Xerxes Ihattedthethreehundred - Drums and Percussion That Scares Putin the Russian!


Give up, For My Boys!

LET"S TAKE New YORK, BOYS! Yeah!



'I got news for ya'll. Davey capo it to third fret in D - that's about right - We TUNE BECAUSE WE CARE!
yEAH!

Lissey Here, Ya'll, It's been a week of surprises for all of us. We Persians - from Darius to Cyrus- like to give ya'll a homey feeling - Davey I said D - Steel pedal this sucker up! Sorry folks - long week.

Here's a number that'll give you the feelin' that I'm feelin for all of you - in a manly way -

It's called

Got None A That Here!

Ah One, two, ah One two three and Ah . . .Davey its D. Third Fret. Alright here goes.

Bass line D/C; D/C



Its landscape is dominated by rugged mountain ranges/
that separate various basins or plateaus from one another.

Got None a That here/ Got None A that Here
It's Clear not Queer/ Now Lookeee here/
Got None a That Here (Chorus)

The populous western part is the most mountainous,/ with ranges such as the Caucasus, Zagros and Alborz Mountains;/


(Chorus)
the latter contains Iran's highest point, Mount Damavand/
at 5,604 m (18,386 ft), which is not only the country's highest peak/

(Chorus) Sing Out with Me! Like The Weavers! Got None A That Here!

But also the highest mountain on the Eurasian landmass west of the Hindu Kush./ (Yeow!)
The eastern part consists Of Men Who Like Their Pleasure and there Pleasure Likes their Men!

(Chorus) That's Country! That's Kos'in it!

Goodnight New York! And God bless . . .You know what I mean!

Apologies to Wikpedia

McCain is the only Leader Running for President

I backed President Clinton for two Presidencies, I backed Al Gore; I backed John Kerry; I like and admire Senator Obama, but feel that he is being badly under served and misdirected by the very people who embarrass the Democratic Party.

I have determined to support Senator John McCain as the only Leader in America who can win the war on Islamist terror - it is not Iraq, not Afghanistan; it is a global war on Islamist terror and the Iranian Rerror Leader,its very face, spoke at Columbia on Monday.

Here is how John McCain leads in his own words.

Bolster Troops on the Ground


A greater military commitment now is necessary if we are to achieve long-term success in Iraq. John McCain agrees with retired Army General Jack Keane that there are simply not enough American forces in Iraq. More troops are necessary to clear and hold insurgent strongholds; to provide security for rebuilding local institutions and economies; to halt sectarian violence in Baghdad and disarm Sunni and Shia militias; to dismantle al Qaeda; to train the Iraqi Army; and to embed American personnel in Iraqi police units. Accomplishing each of these goals will require more troops and is a crucial prerequisite for needed economic and political development in the country. America's ultimate strategy is to give Iraqis the capabilities to govern and secure their own country.

Implement New Counterinsurgency Strategy

For most of the occupation, military strategy has focused on securing all of Iraq by establishing bases and conducting short operations from them. Ultimately, this secured only small areas of the country. John McCain believes the current force structure and power vacuum persisting in many areas of the country demands a more robust counterinsurgency strategy. Iraqi and American forces must not only use force to clear areas occupied by insurgents but to stay and hold these areas to deny them as a base for insurgent forces and allow economic and political development to occur in a secure environment. By emphasizing safety of the local population, this strategy will create strongholds in which insurgents find it difficult to operate.

Strengthen the Iraqi Armed Forces and Police



Speech on Iraq at VMI

Watch video from the Speech on Iraq

John McCain on Navy SEAL Mark Robbins



Building a capable Iraqi army is a central requirement for ensuring Iraq's ability to govern and protect itself long after American forces have withdrawn. The U.S. must accelerate the training and equipping of Iraqi armed forces and police to enable them to play a key role in securing Iraq. Only in a secure environment will the development of Iraq's political and economic institutions have a chance to succeed. Ultimately, Iraq's future lies in the hands of its people, government, and armed forces, and strengthening them is an essential requirement for bringing U.S. troops home from Iraq. Until Iraqi forces are ready, however, a precipitous U.S. withdrawal would condemn Iraq to civil war and intervention by its neighbors and energize al Qaeda and other jihadists across the globe. This would gravely jeopardize American security.

Create the security necessary for political progress and stability

John McCain believes that only by controlling the violence in Iraq can we pave the way for a political settlement. But once the Iraqi government wields greater authority, it will be incumbent upon Iraqi leaders to take significant steps on their own. These include a commitment to go after the militias, a reconciliation process for insurgents and Baathists, more equitable distribution of government resources, provincial elections that will bring Sunnis into the government, and a large increase in employment-generating economic projects.

Accelerate political and economic reconstruction in a secure environment

While it is crucial to focus military efforts on insurgents, particularly against Sunni fighters using violence to strengthen their political position, John McCain believes there must be a greater emphasis on non-military components promoting economic development and representative, accountable governance.

In territories newly secured by the "clear, hold, and build" counterinsurgency strategy, many of the critical steps to succeeding in Iraq can begin to be implemented. Massive reconstruction can go forward without overwhelming fear of attack and sabotage. A substantial employment program can begin to give hope and opportunity to Iraqi citizens. Political meetings and campaigning can take place more freely. Average Iraqis will be more secure as militias and terrorists are reigned in and violence reduced. All of this will help civil society to emerge and deepen.


"In Iraq our national security interests and our national values converge. Iraq is truly the test of a generation, for America and for our role in the world. Faced with similar challenges, previous generations of Americans have passed such tests with honor. It is now our turn to demonstrate that our power, ennobled by our principles, is the greatest force for good on earth today. Iraq's transformation into a secure democracy and a force for freedom in the greater Middle East is the calling of our age. We can succeed."

-Senator John McCain



Iraqis need to see tangible improvements in their daily lives or support for the new government will falter. Sunnis need to know that if they abandon violence they will have a role in the political process, and the Shia need to know that security will be provided by coalition and government forces - not by private militias. Kurds need assurance that their gains will not be jeopardized by sectarian violence. All Iraqis must be able to look forward to a future of growing security and prosperity overseen by a competent, representative government free of corruption and sectarian conflict.

Keep Senior Officers in Place

The Pentagon has adopted a policy of rotating our generals in and out of Iraq almost as frequently as the rotating of troops. John McCain believes this to be a deeply flawed practice. If these are, in fact, the best leaders for the task, they should remain on the job as long as possible. These generals and other senior officers with experience possess critical situational awareness and expertise necessary to prevail.

Call for International Pressure on Syria and Iran

John McCain believes Syria and Iran have aided and abetted the violence in Iraq for too long. Syria has refused to crack down on Iraqi insurgents and foreign terrorists operating from within its territory. Iran has aided the most extreme and violent Shia militias, providing them with training, weapons, and technology that they have used to kill American troops.

The answer is not to enter into unconditional dialogues with these two dictatorships from a position of weakness. The answer is for the international community to apply real pressure to Syria and Iran to change their behavior. The United States must also bolster its regional military posture to make clear to Iran our determination to protect our forces in Iraq and to deter Iranian intervention in that country.

Win the Homefront

If efforts in Iraq do not retain the support of the American people, the war will be lost as soundly as if our forces were defeated in battle. A renewed effort at home starts with explaining precisely what is at stake in this war to ensure that Americans fully understand the high cost of a military defeat. The war in Iraq is at a crossroads and the future of the entire region is at stake - a region that produced the terrorists who attacked America on 9/11 and where much of the world's energy supplies are located. Success is essential to creating peace in the region, and failure would expose the United States to national security threats for generations. Defeat in the war would lead to much more violence in Iraq, greatly embolden Iran, undermine U.S. allies such as Israel, likely lead to wider conflict, result in a terrorist safe haven in the heart of the Middle East, and gravely damage U.S. credibility throughout the world.

The American people also deserve to know that the path ahead will be long and difficult. They have heard many times that the violence in Iraq will subside soon - when a transitional government is in place, when Saddam is captured, when elections are held, when a constitution is in place. John McCain believes it is far better to describe the situation just as it is - difficult right now, but not without hope. The stakes for America could not be higher.

John McCain on Leadership

"Increasing U.S. troop levels will expose more brave Americans to danger and increase the number of American casualties. When Congress authorized this war, we committed America to a mission that entails the greatest sacrifice a country can make, one that falls disproportionately on those Americans who love their country so much that they volunteer to risk their lives to accomplish that mission. And when we authorized this war, we accepted the responsibility to make sure those men and women could prevail. Extending combat tours and accelerating the deployment of additional troops is a terrible sacrifice to impose on the best patriots among us, and they will understandably be disappointed when they are given that order. Then they will shoulder their weapons and do everything they can to protect our country's vital interests in Iraq."

- Senator John McCain

Sun Times is In Like Flint!

The Chicago Sun Times the Working Man's Pal argues to strip a fired employee of his pension benefits, that evidently, the courts feel are his - a whopping $ 30,000 per annum.


The Chicago Sun Times, unlike the other local papers, ran some stories and Tom McNamee's 'Chicago Way' yesterday germed out of G. Flint Taylor's Lotto Ticket Team Boiler Room that screach ' The City Must Pay Us NOW - It's for the Taxpayers! Somebody Think about the Taxpayers, People!'

Let's see: a guy ( Burge) gets fired that everyone is suppossed to believe is Vlad the Impaler; he has a pension - well, that's got to go! Why? - because we're not supposed to like him? He - now , Flint get this part - HAS NOT BEEN CONVICTED OF ANYTHING! That was your job, Flint, to bring him to Justice. You have been at bat - How many times? Never mind. Since when? Well before most of the Sun Times Readers were born? Evidence, my man!

I am a prosaic guy. Ants come into my house, because I forgot to call Orkin; not because of systemic racism. I got ants ! Who do I sue? I'm just joshing boys - just kidding. Don't start contacting Andy Shaw.

The Sun Times touted the City of Chicago's former ahem, ahem, epidemiologist - to spin the financials on this latest one:

Instead, the city will pay more than that just to lawyers for Burge -- a total of $16 million -- to prepare the case for him, interview witnesses, etc., says the study prepared by Steven Whitman, the City of Chicago's former chief epidemiologist.

Why not the Orkin Man? Or, I could stop by Keegan's and grab a couple of Roofers from Eddie Carroll!

Isn't an epidemiologist a man of medicine concerned with non-communicable diseases and what not? 'We got us a Burge Bug! Call the Press Conference, Sasha!'


Burge is alleged to have tortured. Tons of allegations, but no proof. No courts ( Federal, State, County, Tennis, Prom) seem to be banging down Flint's door to bring the Florida ruffian into Justice's Death Grip.

Instead - Flint plays the dopes in the media like a Stradivarius - or maybe a Stratocaster.

Today The Tribune and the Daily Southtown reported on Chicago News - you know that stuff - State Budget; People of Aurora fighting an Abortion Mill; Casinos, Museums, Bank of America Layoffs & etc. But the Chicago Sun Times is on all burners to make sure G. Flint Taylor gets a pay-day.

Before the Sun Times became an appendage of Flint's Foragers, one needed to pick up the Socialist Worker and People's Weekly World to get Flint's Palms Up!

Dear Reader, do check out the last paragraph of the excerpt from Today's Official Flint Commentary - 'We (the Readers, dear Reader) should take all the news that Abdon Pallasch and Tom McNamee have been chicken - little-ing Taxpayers about recently with a 'pinch of salt.' Mercy sakes alive! Everything they have been reporting about the sky, rocketing down on our tiny ears, was crafted by the Flint's Foragers? Hmmmm!!! Sneedless to say. N'cest Pas?

We've already urged the city to do whatever it takes to find a way to cut off Burge's $2,500 monthly pension. Now we're urging the city to settle those cases, and settle them quickly, to close an ugly chapter in its history.
. . .
There is only a 3 percent chance that the city would win every lawsuit, the report estimated. But even in that best-case scenario, taxpayers would still be on the hook for $16 million in fees to Burge's lawyers.

Those numbers have to be taken with a grain of salt, since they come from the men's legal team. But we can't argue with the premise that the city is betting millions on what looks like a losing hand. A $7 million report by special prosecutors last year concluded that Burge tortured suspects but that it was too late to prosecute him.

Are Lawyers Not supposed to win cases in Court? Mulligans are for the Links - not the Justice System. Do-Overs are for little guys - kids.

And you want to be our Latex Salesmen?

Allegations and Spent Lotto Tickets: Sun Times Wants Money for Lawyers

The Chicago Sun Times and Tom McNamee are working hard for G. Flint Taylor in his efforts to cash in on the allegations of police torture.

Today, Tom McNamee's Chicago Way - clips toe-nails into Mayor Daley's Cornflakes by linking the Children's Museum nonsense with G. Flint Taylor's efforts to bully some spineless ninnies into paying him for evidence that he can not seem to produce in any court.

You remember Burge.
He's the Chicago Police lieutenant with the magic bag of torture tricks. In the 1970s and '80s, before there was Abu Ghraib, there was a basement in a Chicago Police station where Burge could have squeezed a murder confession out of Mother Teresa.

Burge might begin by slamming a phone book to the back of a suspect's head. Then maybe a flashlight or night stick to the gut.

He might move on to a plastic bag over the head. Or arrange for the suspect to suffer a few "accidental" burns from a hot radiator.

And then he'd get down to business, flexing the alligator clips on his personal hand-cranked electric generator.

Deliver enough electric shocks to a man's testicles or anus, and he'll confess to kidnapping the Lindbergh baby, if he can stop screaming long enough.

Hold the phone: The Socialist Worker does not even go that far! Mr. McNamee argues that Burge did that as opposed to 'it was alleged' or 'claimed' 'or asserted'
or 'opined'

John Conroy who has helped write the Flint Taylor Playbook on suing the police uses much less assertive language:

(convicted murderer) Wilson sued the city, saying he'd been tortured by Burge and
detectives under his command. He wasn't the first former suspect to make this accusation,
and scores have been uncovered since. Wilson said Burge wired him up to a black box
and turned a crank that generated an electric shock. This technique bore a striking
resemblance to what American troops in Vietnam called "the Bell telephone
hour"--shocking prisoners by means of a hand-cranked army field phone. In defending
himself against Wilson's suit he ( Burge) said he'd never seen a black box, and though he'd served
as a military policeman in the Mekong delta in 1968 and '69 had never heard of field
phone interrogations. He bristled at the suggestion that Americans in Vietnam had
conducted them.

Later John Conroy admits that Burge, though in Vietnam, was in the convoy traffic division of his Unit.

Before the Chicago
Police Board in March 1992, he described his role with the MPs as "escort of convoys,
security for forward support bases, supervising security for the divisional central base
camp in Dong Tam, and I finished my tour as a provost marshal investigator." A
company roster of key personnel as of January 31, 1969, lists Burge as head of the traffic
section

But Conroy talked to many Vietnam era vets until someone brought up the telephone box torture device. Whew!

Now, at trial, Flint Taylor needed to build a torture device and demonstrate its 'chilly' effect. Where's the one Burge used? Must be lost due to the conspiracy. We (everyone Flint and McNamee are 'telling' to) are to assume that the alleged box is at the bottom of Lake Michigan - Burge owned a boat!

I'm just a guy who reads the newspapers. I read that Flint brought in a Boy Scout now in his 40's who 'stumbled upon' police torture. The problem was that the Boy Scout 'witnessed' Burge torturing a black man at the wrong police station.


Flint has been trying to cash-in allegations by using the media instead of the courts.

Flint strikes out in court. The Chicago Sun Times seems more than happy to help Flint and other police lawsuit addicted pettifoggers get a payday. That's just wrong.

Justice should be served - not fabricated. G. Flint Taylor has had how many whacks at Burge and the Police in Court? How many decades? That is some conspiracy. But whose? Who benefits from keeping this nonsense alive?

Sells papers. Gets Andy Shaw a few 'outraged' sputters on TV. Keeps Activists Active.

There are about 108 allegations of Police torture. There are millions of un-cashable lottery tickets covering the floors of Speedways. White Hens, 7/11s, and Thorntons like snow all over the country. Like the torture allegations of the self-confessed murdereres who see a means of 'getting out of jail with cash' tickets, charges are valid, until it comes time to cash them in during trial. G. Flint Taylor screams 'conspiracy and fix' before, during and after trial - that way he can not lose - just re-charge the nonsense with the help of lazy journailsts and the assumption that people can not think for themselves.

Evidence! Convict Burge - or buy a lotto ticket. Maybe the Sun Times will spring for one.

http://uic.edu/orgs/kbc/cpd/burgereader.pdf

Courtney Greve of the Daily Southtown Makes the Ordinary Extraordinary

For a number of years, The Daily Southtown - the absolute best Chicago source for the real news - has been blessed by the talents of Courteny Greve.

Recently, Courtney Greve joined Phil Kadner as a columnist who accurately reflects the events and the people who shape those events. The great Neil Steinberg explained the role of the columnist to a gathering at the Michigan City Library on Saturday September 15th that as a writer he tries to find the 'something' in a story that brings what is extraordinary to life and gave the example of a chicken processing plant where a woman would cut chicken breast fillets to the near exact 1/4 pound specifications without the use of a scale. Her art developed through practice. Courtney Greve is giving journalism an equally measured cut from life.

Today's Courtney Greve column is a masterpiece of practiced and measured presentation.

In a story about the Cook County Sheriff's Agricultural Program's Mike Taff - a wonderful man who helps convicts develop skills beyond the horrific realities of their confinement ( shank manufacturing and toilet distillation liqours) that take them into possiblities beyond CCDOC - Courtney Greve cuts a true masterpiece:

Taff, 55, is the project coordinator for the Cook County Jail garden. The program teaches nonviolent offenders in the sheriff's Department of Community Supervision and Intervention how to till, plant and weed.

Perhaps more importantly, it teaches inmates skills such as perseverance, teamwork and compassion.

"(The garden offers) a little bit of serenity where they can review their life and figure out how they can make it better," he said.

Taff stumbled into the job. After he retired from Chicago's building department, he decided to switch gears.

"I have six kids still at home, so I had to go to work," he said.

Taff and his wife, Katie, a former FBI employee, are the parents of Michael, Emily, Sara, Connor, Hannah and Natalie, ages 9 to 24.

"Besides, I made Katie a promise," he continued. "I said, 'The day you get pregnant, you never have to work another day in your life.' I'm keeping that promise."

The former Army police officer hoped to work in law enforcement.

"I loved the military and always wanted to be a policeman," he said. "This was the closest thing I could get to working with policemen."

Taff started working for the sheriff's department in 2004. About a year into the gig, he was asked to lead the garden program. The closest he had come to gardening was his parents' blueberry farm in Saugatuck, Mich.

"It was sink or swim," he said.

Taff took a 10-week master gardener course through the University of Illinois Extension Service, based at the Chicago High School for Agricultural Sciences in the Mount Greenwood community.

This season, a record number of inmates - 32, up from 14 - completed the same certificate program. Three more are planning to take the exam in October.

"This garden changes lives and lifestyles," Taff said. "They can get out of here, become a good citizen, have a trade and get a job."

So far this season, about 4,500 pounds of produce were harvested by inmates and donated to soup kitchens, senior citizen centers and other charity organizations in places such as Robbins and the city's Roseland community.

A cornucopia of crops still need to be picked - pumpkins, eggplant, tomatoes, squash, peppers and collard greens.

"We spread this (bounty) around the entire county," Taff said.

The inmates are not allowed to bring any of the food they've grown inside the jail, but they do get to sample the goods during their shifts.

Taff is pleased with the garden's success, but he has plans to make it better.

"A project stays ordinary unless you bring something new into it," he said.

There is a waterfall of writers who fill up pages of words cut to someone else's agenda and specifications, but there are a few gifted craftsmen - Steinberg, Kadner, Greve, McGrath, Kass and Boston Globe's McGrory - who really cut, trim and present a masterpiece.

Journalism has hope with Courtney Greve!

Thomas Hayes - Confronts the 'Nightmare'

Trainer and Mentor Kevin Rooney of Catskills, New York



Leo Boxing Coach Mike Joyce has been a great friend to Thomas Hayes and guiding force in the good man's life.

From April Edition of Eastside Boxing:

James Slater: Firstly, Chris, what do you know about your next opponent, Thomas Hayes?

Chris Arreola: I know he's gonna come right at me and be in my chest. I know He's trained by Kevin Rooney and is very much in the Mike Tyson mold.

You have that right, Chris. You are Boxing's self-styled 'Nightmare.' Thomas Hayes has 'come right at' the Urban Nightmare.

While a student at Leo Catholic High School in Chicago, Thomas Hayes was shot while entering the school. Thomas Hayes went to class with a .22 caliber slug between his shoulder and bicep. His teacher, Bob Schablaske, said, 'Tommy, you are hit!' Thomas Hayes recovered and played Catholic League Football, but he also became a Leo Boxer.

Chicago lawyer and Leo Alumnus, Mike Joyce molded Tommy into a Chicago Golden Gloves Supeheavyweight Champion; introduced Thomas to one ofthe kindest and toughest men in America - boxing trainer Kevin Rooney. Kevin Rooney, no stranger to Nightmares himself, had his greatest boxer Mike Tyson pinched from his pockets by Don King, immediately after bringing that troubled and gifted kid to his greatest achievement -beating Michael Spinks. Thomas Hayes is no Mike Tyson.

Thomas Hayes is a Christian gentleman and a focused, disciplined student of Boxing and maintains a personal life that confronts Nightmares on a daily basis. Thomas Hayes will soon have his college degree and has applied to take the Chicago Policeman's Examination - following in the footsteps of Boxing Legend Toxey Hall.

Thomas Hayes will face a man in the square ring that is touted as a Nightmare. Chris Arreola has the height and the reach and the weight on Thomas Hayes. Thomas Hayes is trained by Kevin Rooney and guided by Mike Joyce. Thomas Hayes brings a massive heart into Friday Night's Fight in California. I'll take heart over a Nightmare any day.

Thomas Hayes will bring it to Chris Arreola immediately. We will see what will transpire and know about confronting Nightmares in the First Round of Ten.


God Bless Both Boxers!

Riverside’s Arreola at the Doubletree in Ontario, California, can be seen by a national audience (the undefeated heavyweight standout’s clash with once-beaten Thomas Hayes is the main event of Telefutura’s “Sole Boxeo” series).

From MaxBoxing.com
http://www.maxboxing.com/Fischer/Fischer092007.asp


This Fight will be Televised on TELEFUTURA "Sole Boxeo" a Spanish Language cable channel at 7PM Tomorrow Night! I will watch the fight at Hayes' Corner Man Ollie McGarry and John Kelly's Mackell's Inn -3259 West 111th Street

773-445-9181 Mackell's Inn

'Don't Taze Me, Bro!' - Faustus 2008

David Bowie from The Prestige (Click my post title for the news link.)

O God!
If thou wilt not have mercy on my soul, 60
Yet for Christ’s sake whose blood hath ransom’d me,
Impose some end to my incessant pain;
Let Faustus live in hell a thousand years—
A hundred thousand, and—at last—be sav’d!
O, no end is limited to damned souls! 65
Why wert thou not a creature wanting soul?
Or why is this immortal that thou hast?
Ah, Pythogoras’ metempsychosis! were that true,
This soul should fly from me, and I be chang’d
Unto some brutish beast! All beasts are happy, 70
For when they die,
Their souls are soon dissolv’d in elements;
But mine must live, still to be plagu’d in hell.
Curst be the parents that engend’red me!
No, Faustus: curse thyself: curse Lucifer 75
That hath depriv’d thee of the joys of Heaven. The clock striketh twelve.
O, it strikes, it strikes! Now, body, turn to air,
Or Lucifer will bear thee quick to hell. Thunder and lightning.
O soul, be chang’d into little water-drops,
And fall into the ocean—ne’er be found. 80
My God! my God! look not so fierce on me! Enter DEVILS.
Adders and serpents, let me breathe awhile!
Ugly hell, gape not! come not, Lucifer!
I’ll burn my books!—Ah Mephistophilis!

The Tragical History of Dr. Faustus Scene XIV


Christopher Marlowe had a way of looking at bad judgment: Faustus a Student - really smart guy and an active member of Moveon.org's Wittenburg Unversity Chapter, made a compact with Mephistophilis - Lucifer's ( The Devil) lawyer.

The Faustus kid was given all the powers of his Alchemist ( Rocket Scientist) Art - he could conjure up hot Babes ( Helen of Troy) and the power to Punk the Pope - 'You Been Punk'd Dude!' Until time was up. Then, in the speech above, like our young scapegrace in Florida, Herr Meyer, Faustus got Tazed - dragged to Hell by, Lucifer's Jon Loevy-like lawyer - Satan sued the cops after getting his Fork-tailed butt kicked by Michael the Archangel - The Patron Saint of Cops. Lawyers and devils - you gotta hand it to them.

Our American universities really need to slow-down to 60MPH, open the door of the academic Volvo and kick more Finklesteins and Churchills out of teaching. Maybe then young Faustus 2008 may know when not to over-play his tiny hand, by reading what is magnificent in our Human Culture.

By the way, the Tazered Student is never heard, just like our boy Faustus, to say 'I am truly sorry for what I have done.' Marlowe knew. So, do most parents.

The Chorito Hog Leg by O.J. Simpson

The parallels between Orenthal James Simpson and Patrick Francis Hickey are not to be believed:


O.J. was born on July 9,1947
Pat Hickey on November 8, 1952

O.J. was a Heismann Trophy winning athlete
I saw the Heismann Trophy owned by Johnny Latner at Jim McKeever's House and at Boz O'Brien's Reilly's Daughter Pub in 1997.

We are both widowers and single parents.

O.J. was Acquited of Murdering his wife in a Criminal Trial and convicted in Civil Trial. I was not.

O.J. has a ghost written book out that is # 1.

I wrote the Chorito Hog Leg, Book One: A Novel of Guam in Time of War that has sold tens of copies.

O.J. is National News and locked up in Las Vegas

I am not.

Makes the hair stand on one's neck.

Moveon.org ' I Have a Glio Blastoma Tumor and I Couldn't Be Happier!'

MOVEON.ORG - FOLLOW THE SIGNS!

A Chicago Police Officer was wounded by a drug-dealer while responding to 'Community' requests to sweep out drug dealers from what is left of Ida B. Wells Projects - the news media responded by interviewing 'life-long' community residents outraged that Chicago Police responded to community requests for help. Makes sense to the media - not so much to those of us who read the news.

The Media craps on the Police and Law Enforcement in every coverage! A Police Officer is Killed and Media mopes get solemn. The Arsonist, who burns down your house, also sells Home Owners Insurance!

The Real News is that Mount Carmel upset # 1 ranked St. Rita in a wildly intense football brawl at Gately Stadium last night: MC 35- SR 19. Well played Men! Now, if that were to be reported by let's say Andy Shaw, it might read:

#1 St. Rita Rains down a Moral Victory over Mount Carmel - The Score Means Nothing!

Then there is the National News - New York Times - I never do crossword puzzles BTW and I never looked at Playboy for the articles.

Today's piece on the blow-up over the concerted idiotic smear of General Petreaus this last week over his report to Congress is consistent with my initial paragraph - 'What?????!!!'

Ok, Moveon.org attack the 4-Star General, who seemed like a pretty bright and honorable guy, making his report to Congress on the Surge in Iraq. Moveon.org decided early that it was not going to like the report so it decided to toss poison down the well before the public could pull up a bucketful full of what Petreaus had to say for himself.

Moveon .org screwed up royally as did the Democratic National Leadership who 'as stated below 'work on a daily basis' with Moveon.org. They just lost the 2008 Presidential Race. This will be the Making of a President 2008 magic moment for McCain, or any other candidate not soiled by that goofy ad. No Democratic candidate has put any miles between that ad and a Candidacy. Man, I'd hug a porcupine quicker that that association.

If FDR ran as a Democrat this go around, he'd lose.

But today - with typical Lefty TRUTHINK - Moveon.org and its media shills report 'Strength In Weakness; Victory in Loss!' All Hail Moveon.org! You've done it again! Read the whole article, but this is beaut:

MoveOn representatives also take part, as co-founders of a coalition of antiwar groups together under the umbrella Americans Against Escalation in Iraq, in a daily conference call with the Democratic leadership staff on Capitol Hill to coordinate efforts. (emphasis my own)

Click my post title for the link to the Times story -a howl, I tells ya!

Despite conservatives’ efforts to lump together the grass-roots organization and the party and to force individual Democrats to take responsibility for MoveOn’s wordplay on General Petraeus, the top American commander in Iraq, as “General Betray Us” in its advertisement in The New York Times, the relationship between the two is often complicated and, at times, shows visible fractures.

Thanks for the continued link to a stupid idea, Boys! The DNC leadership can screw up any election on their own, thank you, but it is great to have the grassroots-cyber dweebs in there pitching!

“I think Democrats understand that when we can join forces and work together, it’s very powerful,” said Eli Pariser, executive director of MoveOn Political Action. “And then when we can’t, it’s not fun.”

These guys think cancer is healthy- if they need to. . .




http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/15/washington/15moveon.html?_r=1&hp=&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&adxnnlx=1189861268-556JDwHPBZ6Y/TjEIj2ipQ

Tim Cullen - From The Chorito Hog Leg

Why do people behave in a particular way –in a manner that
is unique to them and characterized by some code, life force or
prejudice? People a lot smarter than your narrator can delve into
the psyche and come up with all kinds of answers as to why a
woman never marries and lives a life apart from the members of
her family – sisters whom she slept in the very same room with,
shared clothes with, sometimes lovers and crushes, jitterbugged
to the same music, anguished over lost loves and shattered
dreams of becoming a singer in Harry James’s Orchestra and
marrying John Agar after being received into the Poor Clares
and told that though the cloister was solace for the dear girl and
all of her religious sisters, that she could better serve God by
propagating the faith and giving her self to a man, might never
understand her estrangement from them and their brothers or
attribute that distance she chose to picking up her older brother
from an L station at 63rd & Loomis in late November 1945.
It happened to Joan Cullen. Her brother took an envelope
from her that had a Giddings, Texas post mark from a family
named Buck - Roper Buck.

That is only an action – an act that is cloaked in meaning for
a small number of people but broadens. Joanie Cullen, seventeen
in 1945 was as pretty as Audrey Hepburn would be to millionsof movie goers in a few years and built the same way. Pious and Pretty – Joanie had not missed a Mass at St. Sabina CatholicChurch from the time she was old enough to walk. Her sisters,
Maeve, Adele and Frances often went with her, but Joanie went every day. Like the day that she would pick up Tim, who had been in the South Pacific since September 1943, was home; atleast he was in Illinois, Joanie had gone to 6 A.M. Mass. PFC.
Tim Cullen, USMCR was mustering out at Great Lakes NavalStation in a small town north of Chicago.

Joanie would meet Tim at the 63rd & Loomis Chicago Transit Station which ended the L line on the south side. Togetherthey would walk to a Chicago Motor Coach street car stop on Ashland and take a street car south to the 81st Street stop and
walk east to their parent’s house at 82nd & Bishop. Tim would tell Joanie all about the war and the places he had been because his letters never said much.
Joanie seemed to change that day. What the hell that surly
bastard said to her, or revealed to her, or explained to her about
him or the ‘precious’ letter from Texas no one in the large Cullen
family knew.

But this story is really not about Joanie at all. It is about Tim
Cullen and a promise that he made to doomed but very much
alive twenty four year old Marine 1st Lieutenant at a staging
camp on the historical island of Guadalcanal, about a year
after that historic and epic battle was fought – and continues to
be re-fought by historians, novelists, film-makers (that sounds
more high toned than movie –makers), bar-flies and teachers.
Tim Cullen’s epic battle – the one that really gave shape and
dimension to the balance of his life and somehow linked the
Battle of Gettysburg, the Little Big Horn, Myles Keogh,
Wild Bill Longley, Gen. Buford , the Texas Rangers, capital
punishment, abortion, Col. Colt, the New Deal in Texas, War
Crimes, the Atomic Bomb and subsequent age, Paul Newman,
Johnnie Carson, Race Riots, nightmares, fraternal contempt,
Robert McNamara, Fire Bombings and heroic but ignored Chamorros to the slaughter of his friends and comrades of
Company A, Ist Battalion, Third Marines, Third Marine
Division at Chorito Cliff/Bundeschu Ridge on the island of
Guam in July of 1944.

Tim Cullen, now in his eighties, reads the Chicago Tribune
at his kitchen table in south suburban Chicago Orland Park and
witnesses the fact that he is still alive and the people attached
to the names in the obituaries -very familiar to Tim Cullen,
especially the ones with an American flag to the left of the
name – are not.

Shrinks and behaviorists could have followed Tim Cullen
around from the day that he got off the L-Car to meet his little
sister Joanie and chalked up his attitude, mannerisms, speech,
prejudices, humor, and decisions and rubber –stamped him as
an example of survivor’s guilt and they would be wrong. They
would package everything neatly and clinically and say – ‘Aha,
this man survived the greatest war in human history and his
friends did not and that is why his wife, children, co-workers,
employees, doctors, dentists, acquaintances and passersby love ,
dislike, or intensely dislike Tim Cullen.’ Survivor’s guilt. Others
might say that he is a racist and others that he is a Republican,
or both.

But Tim Cullen never hit, slighted, hanged, bull-whipped,
Jim Crow Legislated, gerrymandered, cheated, raped, slandered,
or maligned any black man living or dead. He laughed out loud
over Amos and Andy and the worst name that he ever called a
black man was ‘a strike-breaker.’ In San Francisco, when the
Liberty Ship Adam Clay brought Tim Cullen home from Guam,
Tim took the side of a Montford Point Marine ( a black hero)
wounded at Okinawa and being bullied by a crowd of white
Merchant Marines from another ship on the Pier. Tim did not
want to pal up with Cpl. Tedord of Moulton, PA but would not
allow any man in forest green take abuse from the bastards who
ate steak and let Navy gun crews eat shit in their own galleys,
while making about $15 an hour on hazardous duty pay.
Cullen and Tedord’s hazardous duty pay amounted to $60
a month. No steaks and no overtime for Snuffies. They did get
steaks –steak and eggs – before they landed at Red Beach 2 at
Asan, Guam.

Racist? Arguable. Republican? Let’s look on the card. Tim
Cullen voted for Harry Truman, Adlai Stevenson, John F.
Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, George McGovern, Jimmy Carter,
Walter Mondale, Mike Dukakis, Bill Clinton, Al Gore, and
John Kerry from the time he left the Marine Corps; that’s five
wins and six losses but a Republican? No, he is anti-Abortion,
Pro-Death Penalty, Pro-Union, and Anti- War – always. He
hates anti-war protestors though. He admires pickets but only
so long as they keep walking, dress like men, and fight for a
living wage – all the rest is Commie Bullshit. He reads the
Chicago Tribune and detests it as a scab-rag.

Tim Cullen is what smart people would call an unextraordinary
man. He is a successful business man (owns one
of the first and largest refrigeration service companies in all
Chicago), has three great kids and ten wonderful grandchildren,
married a girl out of MGM’s greatest dreams and never told
anyone other than his sister Joanie – now dead ten years – what
had happened to him from 1943 to 1945 and what the letter
from Texas is all about.

Everyone else, your narrator included, can only guess what
happened, make a play at explaining what happened, piece tiny
fragments of the puzzle of history, analyze the man against
the sweep and scope and violence of the historical events that
embraced Tim Cullen in the greatest drama ever staged by
Man, or ignore everything and just play life without another
thought to the guy.
Here’s my spin it. I’ll lay the story out to you and you can
accept what comes your way and consider the source. Like I said
before, there’s much smarter people out there telling you what
history and fiction means; so, why not pause for a simple man’s
consideration of history and the fiction that rises from what wecall history. I won’t slander and if I bore you, toss the book and
go watch Bill Maher.

Where do we get an understanding of history and the place
of people we know in that history? I think that it comes from a
story told by an uncle after about eight tall cans of Schlitz and a
couple of pours of Canadian Club or VO about New Guinea or
Bastogne or Inchon or Khe Sahn or Desert Storms I & II, or the
Stockyard Strike of 1904, or Cardinal Mundelein’s visit to St.
Sabina’s, or the Democratic Convention, or Super Bowl XV.
I also think that it might come from an artifact – a tooth
stored for decades in a plastic capsule, a doll’s arm wrapped in
tissue paper in your mother’s hat-box in a closet that ‘you girls
were told to never look into’, or an X-ray of someone’s lungs, the
way your mother fell backward into the table full of expensive
registered gifts when Mel Torme walked into Kitty’s shower
and stared right at her.

After all that, we seem to want to frame the talk or artifacts
and try to make a nice ‘something’ out of it. I’ll try and make
something out this story that starts with a promise between
two young men – actually things never start in the middle of
things. That is just what we do to save time. I’ll pop in and out
of what happens in order to try and balance the things that are
unfolding – I’ll do my best not to be a pest or interfere too much.
I can be a huge pain in the ass; bear with me.

Here’s my story – history or fiction or fiction with history
-scotch and soda. Which is the scotch and which the soda?
You tell me. Maybe that is how we determine history.

Neil Steinberg - Patriot - Writ Large

Thats's Neil Steinberg talking to Korean War veterans in the photo to the left. Neil's the guy in the tie and dark sport coat chatting with American heroes in Leo's cafeteria. To the right is Leo High School Vice Principal and Marine Corps Veteran Frank Wilson and Illinois Veterans Affairs Asst. Director Rochelle Crump welcoming the crowd at the Leo War Memorial. I took the photos - my apologies for the lousey lighting. Windy City Veterans, Montford Point Marines, Burbank Marines, The Triple Nickle Parachute Veterans and the Leo Alumni Association - thick with veterans - Chicago Police, Chicago Firemen, Secret Service, F.B.I. and Postal Workers are all honored and participate. But - Let's get to the meat of the matter - one of our guests is a great American: Neil Steinberg.


Today's column by Chicago Sun Times columnist Neil Steinberg is brilliant. Steinberg, one of few journalists in Chicago who takes his time to get the correct, accurate, and honest presentation of events, Neil is also one of the very few writers who gets things right.

Neil Steinberg attended Leo High School's Annual Veterans Observance, celebrated on the Friday before Veterans Day, and actually spent most of his time with 80 year old veterans of WWII, Korea, and the younger guys of Vietnam and Desert Storm and America's continuing War on Islamist Terror. Neil Steinberg was not interested in the buffet - which seems uncharacteristic for news media types; Steinberg was busy asking intelligent questions of 80+ year Merchant Marines about the Murmansk Run; and Jim Furlong and Rich Doyle about being a tunnel rat and humping gear in the rice paddies.

People reveal who they really are when they think no one is watching them. The Leo guys saw Neil at his best - and he thought no one was looking. Neil Steinberg made no small efort to make Veterans feel good that they cashed in their youth in service to their country - Vietnam Era Vets and beyond found themselves holding the bag in Southeast Asia for those of us home here going to college and protesting the War. Now, soldiers in the War on Islamist Terror find themselves in similar straits - fighting an unseen enemy in a foreign land and getting their backs peppered with the contempt of those who sneer at their sacrifices. We tolerate some lousey attitudes in our wonderful democracy.

Neil Steinberg gets it. Here's some of his great essay:

Conformity, the suburbanite's sin. So what if people aren't rushing to fly their flags? Their loss. It's a shame that patriotism is usually left to patriots, who give it such a bad name by their mistaken belief that loving the country means blindly supporting any folly its leaders can conceive and heaping scorn on any fellow citizen who misses some conformist benchmark of behavior.

Patriotism isn't cool, but it should be. Forget suburbanites; you'd think the cutting edge would embrace it. You'd think the artists and the radicals, the malcontents and the visionaries, college students and tree-worshipping cultists would be the most patriotic of all, understanding that it is this great country that accepts their deviation, while in many other places they would be stoned to death or, more likely, never even exposed in the first place to the ideas that so overwhelm them.

But no. College professors, free-thinkers, vegans, Marxists all sneer at their country. They are young, or so dazzled by the sheen of their beliefs they fail to appreciate the soil they sprouted in, and they let flag-waving, misty-eyed patriotism be dominated -- present company excluded -- by exactly the sort of narrow, hidebound reactionaries who'd thrive under any dictatorship.

We are a nation born of radicalism, living under a constitution penned by rebels. Those who fancy themselves rebels today should appreciate that.


Rebellion has been redefined by a generation that would rather sneer at a country that embraces their individuality than display some patriotism

Now, That's Working Class Values!

Today's gem should be must reading for every American citizen. This is a later day Thomas Paine's 'Sunshine Patriot' caveat to the smug and self-satisified. Neil, I am proud to know you!

Neil Steinberg - American Patriot!


Leo High School will hold its Veterans Observance on Friday November 2, 2007 at 11AM in the Courtyard of Leo High School. Join the Veterans and genuine Patriots.

http://www.suntimes.com/news/steinberg/552759,CST-NWS-stein12.article

9/11 ? We'll Be at Work!

Nora, my oldest, a journalism student ( hence her proclivilty for Java Acids - her Mom hated cigar smoke, but used Copenhagen Mint while Mary sheet-rocked the basement and I made cookies) will be working on the paper today; Conor, will be getting his shoulder checked after taking a stinger( ref took him out and Conor went back in - that's his Mother's son - I'd be wimpering for all it's worth until Saint Swithynn's Day) in Saturday's La Lumiere ( alma mater of USCCJ John Roberts) football game and remembering Boyle's Constant eight minutes after the quiz; Clare ,my Redhead, will be hitting the 7th Grade curriculum and the St. Cajetan's hardwood for practice after last night's defeat of the Warriors in the Ridge Park League ( they had the lids on our baskets for some reason last night). That's what the Hickey kids will do in response to Osama bin Laden's Grecian Formula threat to Free People last week - it's September 11th; we are well aware.

Old Dad and Bob Foster will be scaring up some funding for the young men of Leo High School. We're doing our jobs. Just like the entire country!

Everyone is at work. Might be a very few Noam Chomsky types waiting the storm out in the root cellers, but most Americans are at work. We remember. No fear of that. No fear at all.

McCain De Senctute, Part II

The noble and elderly Cato - centuries before Roma Wade began hawking Healthy Trinity - Before Geritol - Before Doc Chapman's Elixer of Political Youth - argued to young men of sense the value of age. Age and experience trump Youth. Remember - the young can often be timid -timorous, as well as audacious pains in the ass.

Steve Chapman in Sunday Chicago Tribune's Op-Ed piece calls down John McCain's chrolological age as too limiting to candidacy for Prseident. Steve read some Cicero - De Senctute - Of Old Age - Also called Catonis. Chapman even tries to make the 'little jerk' question posed by the dufus in New Hampshire appear genuine.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-oped0909chapmansep09,0,3688.column

More goofy is this non sequitur from Chapman:

In any case, he's endured more wear and tear than the normal AARP member. As a Navy pilot during the Vietnam War, he broke both arms and a leg in a crash after his plane was shot down. He spent 5 1/2 years being tortured, beaten and half-starved as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam. He's had surgery twice for melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer. All of those misfortunes exact a toll that may offset his hardy genes.

In other lines of work, has decided to raise to 65. Law firms often put partners out to pasture once they reach the golden years.everyone accepts that there is such a thing as too old. Some major corporations force chief executives and directors to step down at age 65 or so. Airline pilots have a mandatory limit of 60, which the Federal Aviation Administration (emphasis my own - due to WTF factor)

In those jobs, a fixed age limit makes less sense than it does for the one McCain wants. If a lawyer can no longer handle the work, after all, the firm can promptly cashier him or her. But the voters may never know if a president is growing befuddled by routine tasks -- or if a president, wearied by age, has simply lost the energy needed to perform well. And even if such facts became known, the public may not be able to force his removal.

( again the WTF -factor)

Steve Chapman 'EVERYONE ACCEPTS' ???????? The AARP - Age Discrimination Lawsuit Folks? Pack a big lunch, Bubba!

Mr. Chapman - 'befuddled' - you familiar with let's say . . . hmmm. Governor Blago? or Dennis Kucinich - lest I appear anti- Balkan - How about our Youthful President George Bush - Check out his act in Australia this week, Steve?

Mr. Chapman and other age conscious " Anybody but Mccain" Operatives(ABBMc) AbMiks - how's that? - read this nice passage from Cicero where Cato sets the boys right:

( switch the Youthful McCain for Cato ) and engage in willful suspension of disbelief, or prejudice. Literature is ageless - Noam Chomsky notwithstanding.

But I was going to observe that I am now in my eighty-fourth year, and I wish I had reason to boast with Cyrus that I feel no sensible decay of strength. But although I do not possess it in the same degree as when I made my first campaign in the Carthaginian war, in the course of which I was advanced to the rank of questor; or when, during my consulship, I commanded the army in Spain; or when four years afterwards I was military tribune at the battle of Thermopylae; yet I can with truth, you see, affirm that old age has not totally relaxed my nerves and subdued my native vigour. My strength has not yet been found to fail me, either in the Senate or the assemblies of the people, when my country or my friends, my clients or my hosts, have had occasion to require my service. The truth is I have never governed myself by the cautious maxim of that ancient proverb so frequently quoted, which says, "You must be old soon if you would be old long;" on the contrary, I would rather abate some years from that season of my life than prematurely anticipate its arrival. In consequence of this principle I have hitherto been always open to access whenever any person desired to be introduced to me for my advice or assistance in his affairs.

But you will tell me, perhaps, that my strength is much inferior to yours. Undoubtedly it is, and so is yours to that of Pontius the athletic centurion, but is he therefore a more valuable man? A moderate degree of force is sufficient for all the rational purposes of life, and whoever will not attempt to exert his particular portion farther than he is well able, will assuredly have no great cause to regret that he is not endued with a more considerable share. Milo is said to have walked the full length of the course at the Olympic games bearing the whole enormous weight of an ox upon his shoulders. Now tell me which would you choose to possess- this man's extraordinary powers of body or the sublime genius of Pythagoras? In a word, my friends, make a good use of your youthful vigour so long as it remains, but never let it cost you a sigh when age shall have withdrawn it from you; as reasonably, indeed, might youth regret the loss of infancy or manhood the extinction of youth. Nature conducts us, by a regular and insensible progression, through the different seasons of human life, to each of which she has annexed its proper and distinguishing characteristic. As imbecility is the attribute of infancy, ardour of youth, and gravity of manhood, so declining age has its essential properties, which gradually disclose themselves as years increase.

I am persuaded, Scipio,( Steve, or Rudy, or Mitt, or Barack or whomever) I need not tell you what extraordinary things that ancient host of your ancestors, Massinissa, is still capable of performing. You have heard, no doubt, that although he is at this time ninety years of age, he takes long journeys, sometimes on foot and sometimes on horseback, without once relieving himself throughout the whole way by alternately changing from the one mode of travelling to the other; that he is so exceedingly hardy, that no severity of weather, when he is abroad, can induce him to cover his head; and that having preserved by these means a thin and active habit of body, he still retains sufficient strength and spirits for discharging in person the several functions of his royal station. I particularise these circumstances as a proof, that by temperance and exercise a man may secure to his old age no inconsiderable degree of his former spirit and activity.

If it must be acknowledged that time will inevitably undermine the strength of man, it must equally be acknowledged that old age is a season of life in which great vigour is by no means required. Accordingly, by the laws and institutions of our country, we who are advanced to a certain age are excused from those offices which demand robust powers to discharge. Far from being compelled to undertake what is beyond our force, we are not called upon to exert our strength even to its full extent. If it be alleged that there are numberless old men so totally worn out and decayed, as to be incapable of every kind of civil or social duty, it must be confessed there are; but may not this debility have arisen from an original weakness of constitution? a misfortune by no means peculiar to old age, but common to every period of human life. How great a valetudinarian was that son of Scipio Africanus, who adopted you for his heir; so great indeed, that he scarcely ever enjoyed a day of uninterrupted health. Had he been formed with a less delicate constitution he would have shone forth a second luminary of the Commonwealth, for with all the spirit and magnanimity of his illustrious father he possessed a more improved and cultivated understanding. What wonder then if age is sometimes oppressed with those infirmities from which youth, we see, is by no means secure!

It's on everyone! Even 'little jerks.'

Happy 100th to My Cousins in Mount Greenwood

Photo - Portrait of The Blogger 9/05/07: Paddy 'Craic' Hickey

Above left is myself: I had not shaved that morning, but I am so pleased that the Fantastic Sam's Liposuction trimmed some unsightly poundage from my manly frame. It is great to have jeans fit so well once again. I felt so renewed that I decided to watch some people get some exercise in Mount Greenwood Park.
The cousins gave me the name Paddy 'Craic' because, they said, that I was such a fun guy. From Wikpedia:

In Irish English, the word crack, which recently has increasingly come to be spelled craic, means "fun, enjoyment, abandonment, or lighthearted mischief; often in the context of drinking or music".[1] In Ireland, the spelling craic is now more common[2] for this sense of the word crack.

My Cousins from the left - Dooley (Doo) Hickey, Ryder Daley, Corndog Daley, Boner Daley, Buck Keefe and Harry B. Hynd. Happy 100th from your cousin over East in Morgan Park. Happy Centennial Cousins! When not rehabing their Cape Cods and raised ranches into million dollar mansions, they work as botonists, pathologists, Airline Pilots, lawyers, massage therapists and community activists.

Chicago's 19th Ward holds Beverly, but also Morgan Park and one of the nicest places of all - Mount Greenwood. Mount Greenwood is celebrating its Centennial - that's 100 years to my cousins who live West of the two sets of tracks from me and the kids in Morgan Park.

Mary Flowers -Undisputed Champ of Leo Youth Boxing!

Mary Flowers participates in Leo High School's Annual Veterans Observance on the Friday before Veterans Day since its inception. Joining Veterans and all public service employees for this annual event, Mary Flowers Illinois 31st District Representative and member of the Education Committee has come to know the young men of Leo High School. Boxing at Leo High School has helped many young men become succesful not only in the square ring but in life.

Last year Mary Flowers sponsored a grant to expand Leo High School's Boxing Program to include Academic mentoring and guidance. Kids hit the 30 work-out stations, spar, paddles, speed & heavy bags, jump rope, mirror box and then hit the books and work-out with calculators and poetry by Claude McKay.

Leo High School Boxing Coach Mike Joyce directed the expansion of the Leo Boxing Facilty and Leo President Bob Foster directed the development of the Academic and Mentoring Program.

Leo High School works closely with Illinois Crime Commission Director Jerry Elsner's Police Athletic League and will serve as a major site for upcoming Olympic and World Boxing Programs in the next few months. This is all made possible because of a pretty and tough girl from the neighborhood - Illinois Representative Mary Flowers (D)!

Leo Grads - Thomas Hayes ( in Leo Black) works over Leo Grad and St. Xavier University Footballer Marquis Ball wearing the girdle.

Thomas Hayes, a Pro heavyweight ( 26 -1 -0) will fight ranked boxer Chris Arreola (21-19-0)on September 21st in Palm Springs California.

Leo Coach Mike Joyce and Thomas Hayes Paddle Spar in a recent workout.

Hayes pounds the Heavy Bag

Chicago Tribune Sports Editor and the absolute best prose writer in Sport, Dan McGrath asks Mike Joyce about the upcoming Hayes/Arreola fight, but mostly about the 70 Leo Men who particiapte in Mary Flowers' sponsorship of this great program - it has three rules - Mike Joyce's Rules:

1- Work Hard
2- Believe in Yourself
3- Work Hard

Thank You Mary Flowers! You are the Undisputed Champion of Leo Boxing!
Thomas Hayes - Leo High School Class of 1999:
boxer: Thomas Hayes
Global ID 145378
sex male
birth date 1981-03-16
age 26
division heavyweight
rating 232 / 1102
nationality United States
residence Chicago, Illinois, United States
stance orthodox
height 5′ 11″
US ID IL029527
won 26 (KO 18) + lost 1 (KO 1) + drawn 0 = 27