Mitt Romney has no Irish Ancestors! He's Got My Vote

"When money's tight and hard to get 
and your horse is also ran, 
When all you have is a heap of debt 
a pint of plain is your only man"  Flann O'Brien, Irish Literary Genius


Mitt Romney, unlike Richard M. Nixon, William J. Clinton and Barack H. Obama has no relatives in Dear Old Donegal.

That can't be bad. Instead of streaching Ancestry Dot Com. to breaking point in search of some relatives who may be sons and daughters of Dear Old Erin's Isle, we Celts ,to use David Lloyd George's sobriquette, can vote rest assured that Willard Mitt Romney is not related to any Knackers, Jackeens, BIFFOS, Corner Motts, Pikees, Bosthoons, Culchies, Layabouts, Bowzies, or IRA hangers-on.

A Romney Presidency might just be free of a trip to the Snakeless Shores and the requisite hoisting of pints and proud platitudes with Skinless Murphy, Baldy Knackers Quinn, Bug Bugger Hynes, Jackee-Joe Jackson, Paddy the Bat, Larry the Langer and Blind Oscar.

Saints be Praised!

Nope, he's a Proosian Morman Mexican fella with Scots/Brit Yeoman tossed in.

2012 Republican Presidential Nominee  Former Governor of Massachusetts Mitt Romney

Romney Ancestry

While Romney’s documented ancestry does not quite reach the heights of the family legend, which claimed that they are descendants of the fourth-century dragon slayer, St. George (the patron saint of England), it is still an impressive one, with some of the most celebrated thinkers (maternal great-grandfather, Parley Parker Pratt, was one of the chief literary defenders of Mormonism), famed fighters (Carl Heinrich Wilcken, a member of the Prussian army, and later, Utah’s militia) and natural leaders (Miles Romney, who founded and administered the Mormon sanctuary in Mexico in the 19th century) of post-Independence America. The family can trace their lineage to modern England, Scotland and Germany. Miles Park Romney, Mitt’s great-great grandfather (paternal), hails from Lancashire, England, while on the maternal side, Archibald Newell Hill was a resident of Renfrew, Scotland. His great-great grandfather, the legendary Prussian soldier, Carl Heinrich Wilcken, was a native of Holstein, Germany. Romney's family tree is rife with polygamists on the paternal side, though there is no indication of polygamy on the maternal side of his family. According to a research by The Salt Lake Tribune, Romney's ancestry harbors six polygamous men with forty-one wives. Romney, however, is a confirmed monogamist and polygamy has been absent in his family background for more than two generations. Note: The full name of Mr. Carl Heinrich Wilcken was provided by Mr. Ulrich Oesterle from Hesse, Germany.

Prussians and Scots and Brits for blood; it is time for a Change I Hope!

Cousin Barry needs to build a library.

Charming Retro Comix -The Little Prique, Part III - Richie Daley in the Afterlife

The Little Prique, Part III

"Jezass, God, I wuz a Alter Boy at Nutivahtee fur years.. . . Dis izza a very t'in beef!"

Chapter One - Richie Daley in the Afterlife - Richie kops a plea with the Prime Mover

With the return of such arcane comic strips like Tin-Tin and Little Nemo, I was delighted to see that a series of animated political fanasties based on the after-life of Mayor Richard M. Daley are in the offing.

Michael Phelps -Fittest Man of "All-Time," Me Arse!

Good morning, Hickey Old Son -fit man yourself!

I read with great interest a piece on a Baltimore CBS affiliate website touting Olympic Gold Medalist Swimmer Michael Phelps as the Fittest Man of All -Time.

 Fitter than Samson?

Fitter than Johnny Weismeller?

Fitter than Muhammad Ali

Fitter than Janet Guthrie?*

Fitter than . . .My broad manly arse!

Here is the fittest man ever!


Fit for the ages and with a fine crown of flesh on his noggin into the bargain!

* Have YOU ever punched a spout into an oil can with such ease?  I think not.  Old Janet must have had muscles in her stool samples.

Toni " The Crypt Keeper" Preckwinkles Midnight Madness Morgue Miscreants

Investigators caught overnight workers at the Cook County morgue sleeping and watching a martial arts movie before determining that those were not isolated incidents, according to a report released Tuesday by county Inspector General Patrick Blanchard.
"Certain intake attendants working the overnight shift routinely watched movies on county computers and certain intake attendants slept or 'nodded off' while on duty," the report concluded.

Everybody was Kung Fu Fightin', except for one little sleepy head at Toni " The Crypt Keeeper" Preckwinkle's Stiff Stackin' Warehouse ( AKA Cook County Morgue).  Todd Stroger, like President GW Bush, is not, nor has he been in office for quite some time.  Progressives, e.g. Crypt Keeper Toni, President Obama and Mayor Coon Eyes, spend their terms of office blaming their predecessors, which takes up much ink and space in Chicago's compliant news dailies face and air time on WBEZ and of course WTTW in support of the much put upon Progressive Protective Species in office. Here is pure Crypt Keeper Toni and Progressive palaver solid gold -

"You know, I wanted this job despite the bad publicity that went on prior to my tenure. So I think there are probably other people out there who would want to take on the challenge," Preckwinkle said.

Chicagoans were treated to many months of hand-wringing and sob soaked investigative reports and columns about the cord-wood staked corpses in Cook County Morgue. The medical examiner was given the same treatment as John the Baptist when Toni Preckwinkle tap-danced for the political wizards* and media apparatchiks who helped ooze Todd Stroger* into his Dad's big chair in the first place. The wife of Zeus gamboled gamely until Dr. Nancy Jones, MD had her noggin served up on a platter.

Toni Preckwinkle might very well become the governor of Illinois . . .no, really.

As Cook County Board President she has accomplished exactly . . .give me a month of Sundays . . .nope, I got nothing.  Oh, dope!  That's right!  The Crypt Keeper is cool with reefer, she hates Romald Reagan and wants to tax bullets. "Ain't she great???!!!!!!!!"

She sure is Progressive.  She has alot of time to yet to tune up Todd Stroger, pee in Governor Quinn's Wheaties and get some more boffo endorsements from the likes of Carol Marin, Bruce Dumont, Eric Zorn and Billy Dec.

The morgue seems to improved since Toni took charge, don't it?  On the up side the County Morgue workers were watching vintage Bruce Lee, thanks be to God, and not that Tea PartyRacist Chuck Norris movies. Something to think about.  Here's another . . .Governor Crypt Keeper - Somebody Else's Troubles Go Statewide!

* Lest we forgets - 

Stroger's plight and the race for governor are impacting this race directly. Stroger is the son for former Cook County Board President John H. Stroger, who often received huge campaign donations from the nation's top bond counsel, Chapman & Cutler. It so happens that Tom Hynes, the patriarch of 19th Ward politics, is of counsel to the firm, one strong link between the 19th Ward and Stroger, and a reason for the Hynes' family to dislike Gorman, who also has some strong ties to the 19th Ward.

Tom Hynes is a close relative of Patrick Maher through his father, Dave. And, of course, Tom Hynes is the father of  Dan Hynes, the Illinois Comptroller who threw his hat in fast to challenge beleaguered Gov. Pat Quinn.

It's the 19th Ward Hynes honchos who have been working hard over the past several years to install Pat Maher at the OFPD and to take control of Orland Park, which is distinguishing itself as one of the southwest suburbs more monied and affluent communities. They back another Democrat, Paul O'Grady, who took over as Orland Township Supervisor. O'Grady relied heavily on his 19th Ward ties and had 19th ward precinct captains working the election polls this past Spring.

Quinn, Quigley and Suffredin will make their endorsement of Forys at a Forys fundraiser Sept. 29 at White Eagles in Chicago, 6839 N. Milwaukee Ave. Maher just had his own fundraiser at O'Callaghan's, at 29 West Hubbard Street in downtown Chicago, too. The keynote celebrity there was, of course, Tom Hynes. 

Terry Sullivan Trio at 12 West Elm Every Month

Tommy Muellner on piano and Eric Hochberg on bass accompanied the elegant and lovely Miss Terry Sullivan's vocals this past Sunday afternoon at 12 West Elm.

 
12 W Elm St
Chicago, IL 60610

Each month the Terry Sullivan Trio graces the atmosphere of Chicago's new jazz venue in the heart of the Viagra Triangle. Check the calendar for Real Jazz on a lovely Chicago Sunday afternoon.

Debate Deux - Candy Crowley: One Big A$$ Fly on the Townhall Wall

“I understand that I’m there. I’m not a fly on the wall,” Candy Crowley CNN corresppondent who looks like the guy who blew out his brains in Dances with Wolves

The moderators’ role is always complex. Journalists and news organizations jockey to get one of the coveted slots and become, in effect, partners with the commission and the candidates. But they are, of course, also reporters who fiercely guard their independence and bristle at any actual or perceived sense that their function is controlled by the organizers or the campaigns. All parties acknowledge that Crowley’s behind-the-scenes role will be influential. She will cull the questions submitted by the voters who are invited to attend the debate, and then decide which ones will be asked and in what order.
Crowley seems unfazed by the behind-the-scenes maneuvering. Even after concerns were raised in the wake of the Malveaux interview, Crowley made additional comments that make clear she does not feel bound by any agreement between the commission and the Obama and Romney camps. On Oct. 11, the day of the vice-presidential debate, she told Wolf Blitzer, ”I’m always interested in the questions because you don’t want to — in a debate, you don’t want to go over plowed ground. Now, this is the vice-presidential candidates as opposed to the presidential candidates. So is there room there to come back to a presidential candidate and say, Well, your vice-presidential candidate said this? I’m always kind of looking for the next question … So there’s opportunity for follow-up to kind of get them to drill down on the subjects that these folks want to learn about in the town hall.” Marl Halperin

I expect things to go like this tomorrow night -

Candy - " Mr. President, in the light of allegations that your administration, according to the Romney camp of course, sir, has given a nuclear Iran the ability to have a bomb by Spring of 2012, how many victims of America's own nuke attack on Japanese civilians were there in 1945?"

         President Obama - " Well, Candy, at the risk of seeming too apologetic ( laughter) . . .
         about America's past . . .interesting that the bomb could not have been rushed into 
         production against the white fascists . . .but we can have that teaching moment in my 
         next term, Candy ( uproarious laughter from Candy)!    The answer, Candy, is 135,000
         total deaths for both Hiroshima and Nagasaki."

(applause)

        Candy - " Please hold your applause . . .in fairness to both candidates.   Romney in the same
    theme and context - a nuclear Iran - President Obama rightly identified the sum total war 
    deaths from the world's only use of atomic weapons as 135,000.     Mitt, . . .name them.

No fly on the wall, but Candy sure am one husky fly in the old vanilla icecream.


Read more: http://thepage.time.com/2012/10/14/moderator-role-under-scrutiny-before-the-debate/#ixzz29OdMlX1d

Because Felix Baumgartner Jumped at the World, Does That Mean We Must? Hmmmm?

I gottcha, Felix!!!!!!  - Fred Snodgrass*

Some one, at some time and some where, told Felix Baumgartner to take flying leap.

. . . Felix Baumgartner jumped off the edge of the space, from 127,000 feet of altitude all the way back down to Earth, breaking some world records and getting vital information for NASA in the process. Watch as he jumps out of the capsule. It's a frightening, adrenaline-fueled, historic moment.

Apres Vous, Felix, Apres Vous.

* Fred Snodgrass


*In the second, the 1912 Series, Snodgrass committed one of the most famous errors in baseball history. In the 10th inning of the deciding game, Snodgrass, who was among the National League's best outfielders, dropped a routine fly ball that put the tying run on second base. He proceeded to make a spectacular game-saving catch on the next play, but the Sox went on to score two runs in the inning to win the series.^[1]

Snodgrass before a game of the 1911 World Series

Giants manager John McGraw was not among those who blamed Snodgrass for the loss. In his book My Thirty Years in the Game, McGraw remarked, "Often I have been asked what I did to Fred Snodgrass after he dropped that fly ball in the World Series of 1912...I will tell you exactly what I did: I raised his salary $1,000."^[2]Just the same, the error became known as "Snodgrass's Muff" and also, the "$30,000 Muff."^[3]

America's Montaigne -Joseph Epstein Baffles BS in Biography

"I have never seen a greater monster or miracle than myself." --Essays Montaigne

Learning to write sound, interesting, sometimes elegant prose is the work of a lifetime. The only way I know to do it is to read a vast deal of the best writing available, prose and poetry, with keen attention, and find a way to make use of this reading in one’s own writing. The first step is to become a slow reader. No good writer is a fast reader, at least not of work with the standing of literature. Writers perforce read differently from everyone else.  Heavy Sentences -Joseph Epstein New Criterion

Mr. Epstein's ability to capture a subject in a memorable 3,000 words should be the envy of biographers, who write at greater length but sometimes with no greater effect. Biographies are vats of facts that take patience to digest; Mr. Epstein's essays are brilliant distillations. Biographers are rarely as nimble and pithy as he can be, and they labor under constraints he would surely chafe at. Indeed, the author once returned the advance for a biography of John Dos Passos that he had agreed to write, an enterprise that would surely have taxed his desire to say what he really thinks. Wall Street Journal

Yesterday I placed my order with the good folks at Amazon.com for Joe Epstein's 23rd book Essays in Biography (Axios Press $24).

I have been reading Joe Epstein for decades.  I first learned of Mr. Epstein from a professor ( a tag Joe Epstein eschews -"You mean a piano player in a Kankakee Cat House?") at Loyola University in 1974.  Dr. William Hiebel taught American Literature and Prose.  Joe Epstein had a reputation for crafting brilliant and very readable prose, which he practiced upon the contributing authors to American Scholar. Dr. Hiebel introduced me to writers who wanted people to actually understand what they wanted to say and not build verbal labyrinths to themselves -writes like Joe Epstein, Mark Harris and the much too overlooked James Salter.

Joe Epstein writes with an invitingly genuine quality that makes the reader a comfortable guest in his home.  Charm is a lousy word. To call Joe Epstein charming is an affront to his honesty.  Mr. Epstein  is not charming - he is delightful.  Charming, where I come from, is an insult.   Joe comes from the same bungalow, two-flat, raised ranch helot dwelling environs up on the top of Chicago - Rogers Park.

A Charmer is a bullshitter - a charming Billy, a grifter, a sneak.

One who delights is a like a young Dad whose whispered  words to his six year old son elicit a wild display of little-man heroics and infantile wrestling moves in a crowded Mexican fast-food joint at 43rd & Wallace. " What kind of sides you want? "

" Masha Putatahs!"

" Masha Putatahs? This ain't Schallers."

" I want Masha Putatahs!"

Ready!  Wrestle! That is delight.  Dad and lad going at it over menu selection with squeals and giggles from both indicating their delight in one another and this precious time together alone. Joe Epstein does exactly that, he delights a crowd in lunch hour rush waiting for their orders in Mexican fast-food joint.

In his recent book of stories and essays Fabulous Small Jews Joe Epstein presents a variation on Irish Alzheimers Disease* - ''Psychotherapy is what Jews have instead of golf,'' one character says. ''Gentiles try to improve their backswing, Jews their past.'' 

Joe Epstein reads broadly and deeply, be it a Mexican menu or the canon of John Dos Passos and, as a result, gives back better than he gets within his capacity to be himself -monster and miracle.  All of us know the monsters we drag around and keep at bay, for most part, in the company of people.  We do our best to be more miracle worker than monster.  We all want to be Prospero, but manage to be more like Caliban - you should get a load of me in most waking hours.  Over whom do hold dominion, my monster, or my master?  The Monster ( appetites, follies, vanities and foibles) in two falls to a submission! Maybe not.  The more we read of others and the monster we be, perhaps the more we might master ourselves and serve others better. Maybe not.  Joe Epstein helps.

I believe Joseph Epstein to be America's Montaigne ( the Dad of the essay) and it was Montaigne who gave us Caliban and the assorted anthropophagi who dominate literature from Renaissance on. I too, sprout my head below my shoulders on some very bad days.

Joe Epstein succeeds where charlatans only become celebrities.  More people know of our Norman Mailers, Susan Sontags, Michael Eric Dysons, or Gore Vidals because they never question their own personal Caliban and promote Prospero Mailer on Dick Cavet, or Sara Prospero-Paretsky on the Oprah Show ( dec.).

Joe Epstein is the real deal.  He is America's Montaigne.

* Irish Alzheimer's Disease -You forget everything but the grudges!

Sun Times' Natasha Korecki Scoops National with Jesse Jackson, Jr. Saga

The Chicago Sun Times is blessed with very talented reporters ( Dan Mihalopoulos, Chris Fusco, Tim Novak, Art Golab and especially Natasha Korecki). 

The columnists? Not so hot; with two notable exceptions -  Mark Brown and Steve Huntley are very exacting with the facts and wholly independent.  The reporters are old school fro the most part.

No reporter in Chicago did a better job of covering the hair-ball that was the Blago yarn, than Natasha Korecki. That particularly epic fabrication had more twists than a Chubby Checker retrospective on WTTW, or single Carol Marin column. 

At the core of the Blago trichobezoar remains the campaign for and election to the Presidency of Illinois Senator Barack Obama with its cast of characters* Homer would be hard-set to catalog - Tim Novak somehow managed to do so.

This weekend, the young woman who reported the Blagojevich Trials with the keenest eyes to detail, Natasha Korecki equals the tenacious pitbull Novak with a close look at Jesse Jackson, Jr. - Illinois' Congressional Howard Hughes. 

The first of two reports centers on the Federal probe of the reclusive Jackson's ( odd saying that) Congressional cash piles of taxpayer-lifted spondulices (archaic and so am I)**

The snowballing troubles of Jesse Jackson Jr. took a new turn Friday with the revelation that federal investigators have launched a probe into “suspicious activity” in the South Shore congessman’s finances.
Focusing on a completely new area of scrutiny for the son of the famed civil rights leader, the investigation is not related to former Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s attempted sale of a U.S. Senate seat, a scandal that has ensnared Jackson in the past, sources told the Chicago Sun-Times.
Rather, the probe — based in the Washington, D.C., FBI field office —is focusing on “suspicious activity” involving the congressman’s finances related to his House seat and the possibility of inappropriate expenditures, the sources said. . . .News of the probe — first disclosed by the Sun-Times — comes as questions increasingly swirl around Jackson’s absence from not only his official duties in Washington, but the campaign trail as the Nov. 6 election nears.

Citing exhaustion, Jackson, 47, stopped working, according to his staff, on June 10. His staff did not make that known until two weeks later.
He went to a clinic in Arizona then to the Mayo Clinic, which released a statement saying he was being treated for a bipolar disorder. Jackson is up for re-election Nov. 6 but has not campaigned since he won the Democratic primary in March.

The next places the hairball, not unlike Felonius  Guv doing a few semesters in Club Fed Colorado, into voter responsibility and same-old-same-old Cook County Context:

In Jackson’s South Side and south suburban 2nd Congressional District, even people who don’t like him think he will easily get re-elected.
“I don’t see how he can deal with all these problems and still deal with the district,” said South Shore resident Carlos Jones, 64. “But I believe he’s going to get re-elected and try to make amends.”
William Davenport, 29, said he knows Jackson “has definitely been in hot water with Blagojevich and has issues with his [mental] stability.” Now the new investigation “makes me wonder what’s going on with him.”
But, Davenport added, “The Jackson name carries a lot of weight around here.”
The newly disclosed federal probe is not related to the attempted sale of the U.S. Senate seat that figured in Blagojevich’s corruption conviction, but it’s focusing on “suspicious activity” involving the congressman’s finances related to his House seat and the possibility of inappropriate expenditures, sources said.
The probe was active in the weeks before Jackson took a leave from his U.S. House post on June 10.
“I don’t think this is going to affect his re-election in 2012,” said a Democratic strategist who didn’t want to be named. “I gotta believe that the day after his election, the gun goes off on his next federal primary.”
Jackson has been through the political wringer since 2008. He was initially under federal scrutiny tied to charges leveled against Blagojevich. In 2010, it was revealed that a donor to Jackson, Raghuveer Nayak, told federal authorities that Jackson asked him to approach Blagojevich with what the ex-governor believed to be a $1.5 million offer to be appointed to the U.S. Senate seat vacated by President Barack Obama.

Sun Times reporters, especially the great ones like Novak and Korecki, scoop up the hairballs of political hypocrisy and present them to the careful reader and thoughtful voter.  They do great civic service and honor their craft.

The editorial boards of both Chicago papers never seem to read, much less understand the work of gifted writers like Korecki, Novak and Kass at the Tribune.  

The editorial boards send in the clowns and vigorously licking cats; they help elect the mopes and frauds and grifters as much as the "benighted" electorate. Psssst! Read the reporters and skip the editorial pages. Well done, again, Ms. Korecki!

*The following fact pattern was out in the open long before Obama severed his ties to Rezko (sometime in late 2006): In 1983, Rezko started raising a lot of money for Chicago politicians. In 1989, he and his partner Daniel Mahru started vacuuming up deals with the city to develop low-income housing, despite having virtually zero experience in the field. They proceeded to obtain over $100 million in city, state, and federal grants and bank loans to develop 30 run-down properties into affordable-housing projects, earning $6.9 million for themselves. By 2007, the city had sued them numerous times for failing to heat these properties; over half of the properties had fallen into foreclosure, and six of them were boarded up.

Obama helped put one of these deals together during his time as a junior associate at Davis Miner Barnhill & Galland. Other lawyers at Davis Miner helped Rezko acquire half of the properties that fell into disrepair. And many of these properties were located in the district Obama represented as an Illinois state senator. Nonetheless, Obama told the Chicago Sun-Times that he was unaware of Rezko’s growing reputation as a slumlord until he read Sun-Times reporter Tim Novak’s two-part series on the subject. So we are to believe (yet again) that Obama was the last person to know what one of his longtime friends was up to. (National Review June 5, 2008)

**

spon·du·licks

   [spon-doo-liks]  Show IPA

noun Older Slang .

money; cash.

Also, spon·du·lix.

Origin: 
1855–60, Americanism ;  origin uncertain

Big Jim O'Connor - 'The Big' in the Big Shoulders Fund

Ellen and Jim O'Connor - two people who keep Chicago's shoulders as broad as they should be.

Jim O'Connor could have been a big shot, but he was not brought up that way.  He could have become a guy who snaps his fingers to summon waiters, dresses down a janitor for missing a cigarette butt, demands VIP treatment and asks all of us little folks, " Do you know who I am?"

Jim O'Connor could have been a celebrity.  Instead he became what he is today - a gentleman.  A Gentleman works at it.  A gentleman holds doors, waits until everyone finds a place in the elevator and takes the stairs if that is not possible.  A gentleman makes every person comfortable with his manner and his skills.  A gentleman remembers his place and especially the place that formed him.

Jim O'Connor is a 79th Street guy, a Little Flower parish kid whose ability and drive, as much as the support and love showered upon him in his little world between Ashland and Western Avenues on 79th Street moved him into the bigger world.  Jim O'Connor remembers the Jewish, Greek, Swedish, German and Italian merchants who hired him and his pals to deliver groceries, sell shoes and clothing, sweep out butcher shops, or trim edges in his little world to help pay for a Catholic education.  Jim O'Connor remembers who helped him be Mr. O'Connor.

Thousands of inner city boys and girls now in their 40's should remember Jim O'Connor who helped bring people together to see that they received a Leo, Maria, St. Ignatius, St. Rita, Mount Carmel, St. Benedict, St. Gregory, Our Lady of Tepeyac, Josephinium, Queen of Peace, St. Sabina & etc. education.  He did and so did many, many many other folks named McKenna, Dowdle, Crown,  Stephan, Crohan, Buck, Gidwitz, Stone, Stein, Considine, and Canning. Read Michael Ferro's story below.

Jim O'Connor could have been a Big Shot, but he is not rock-star, a political hack, an activist grifter, B-Movie actor, a media creature, pro athlete, or faded eye candy.  Jim O'Connor is a guy with Big Shoulders who rode the CTA bus and L away from 79th Street, so that he could reach back and help kids waiting for a bus at 79th & Marshfield.

By MICHAEL FERRO
Daily Splash columnist
Last Modified: Oct 11, 2012 08:22AM
Whenever I hear the expression “lead by example,” one name that always comes to mind is Jim O’Connor Sr., the retired Unicom and ComEd chairman who introduced me to the Big Shoulders Fund several years ago. Of the many causes friends have asked me to support over the years, this one is particularly special because it offers the greatest return on investment. And it’s the best possible return: the high-quality education of a multitude of students.
A little background: The fund is dedicated to preserving and supporting 93 Catholic schools that serve inner-city students. Two-thirds of these schools are supported by patrons who pledge to donate a major sum of money to a particular school over the course of three years. The money can be used for scholarships, to maintain the school property or for academic programs the principal deems critical. And students don’t have to be Catholic to attend (in many of the schools, 90 percent of the student body is not Catholic).
The results are nothing short of miraculous: Ninety-seven percent of the students enrolled graduate. Of that number, almost 90 percent go on to college.
While Jim is far too humble to take credit for the work he’s done, he is a philanthropic force in Chicago. Just a few months ago, he was part of a leadership group for a Big Shoulders dinner that raised $6.3 million — more than any single non-profit event in Chicago’s history — bringing the total he’s helped raise for the Big Shoulders Fund over the last 25 years to $225 million.
Jim has chaired the fund since its inception, when he co-founded it at the urging of Cardinal Joseph Bernardin with three other local business leaders: Andy McKenna Sr., Barry Sullivan and the late Edmund Stephan. When they started, there were 140 Catholic schools in the program, and many of them were at risk of closing. While not every school has been saved, in other cities the losses have been much steeper (in New York, last year alone 27 Catholic schools closed).
On average, more than 60 percent of the kids enrolled in these schools come from families living beneath the poverty line. Parents are expected to fund a portion of the students’ tuition, but most receive significant scholarships and support. “They really need to have somebody give them a hand up,” Jim said. “That’s what this is all about.”
Supporters include many of Chicago’s civic leaders: John Canning (who is currently co-chairman of the fund along with Jim), Lester Crown, Ron Gidwitz, Art Velasquez and many more. The patrons’ generosity knows no bounds; fifteen years ago, one donor pledged $10 million to help subsidize families struggling to put two or more children through Catholic schools. And like the recipients, not all of the donors are Catholic — in fact, about half aren’t.
When I told Jim he’d be the subject of this article, his response was classic: “You could put my name as a footnote,” he said. “This is really about a group effort.” He wanted to make sure we acknowledged Canning (“my co-chair for 15 years who personally sponsors scholarships for more than 100 students”), Monsignor Ken Velo (the popular and deeply respected president of the fund) and Josh Hale (the fund’s executive director of seven years “who is as good as any non-profit executive I’ve ever worked with”).
Everything Jim has done for the city of Chicago’s children is incredible, but I would be remiss if I didn’t mention how he has also inspired all of his own children — Fred, Jim and Elizabeth Cole — to participate and give their time and money to this cause in a large fashion.
He’s an inspiration to his family, an inspiration to the community and an inspiration to me.
Michael Ferro has made a donation in Jim O’Connor Sr.’s name to the Sun-Times Foundation at the Chicago Community Trust.

---

Copyright © 2012 — Sun-Times Media, LLC

The Bronzeville/Canaryville Express: Leo Transportation: A Daily Giggle Mission

"I love the young dogs of this age, they have more wit and humour and knowledge of life than we had; but then the dogs are not so good scholars." Samuel Johnson from Boswell's Life of Samuel Johnson

I leap out of the sack every morning, hit my knees to the floor and pray the Memorare and the Novena to St. Teresa, in anticipation of my tasks and the fun the day brings to this old high school teacher.

I get to transport the lads from Bronzeville and Canaryville neighborhoods to Leo High School. The Ford van gets stuffed like a Christmas goose with teenage lads. At 35th & Dr. Martin Luther king Drive's BP station, I pick up the giant Daylon -14 years of 300 + lbs. of muscle, bone and more than few layers of baby fat; the lean and athletic Joe who racks up football field yardage like Willie Moscani on a nine ball felt.  Then the two stops in Canaryville at Pizza Nova for AJ, Nick, Brian, Ryan and Sean and Graham Elementary at 44th & Emerald for Jeff, Mitch, Tommy, Sal and Bryan.

The patter is wild, the consumption of Dunkin Donut holes (glazed only) furious past human understanding, and the teasing of this Methuzalah behind the wheel a thing of beauty - Hip-Hop, Novice Blasphemies, pleas, male malodorousness and beefy good fellowship.

Now, I must $#$%, shower and shave and get about  to my morning's obligations and delights.  

Terry Sullivan Sings the American Songbook at 12 West Elm -Sunday, Oct. 14th at 3P.M.

CHICAGO JAZZ CARAVAN

with vocalist Terry Sullivan

Sunday, October 14, 2012

3:00 pm

TWELVEWEST nightclub

12 West Elm, Chicago

Admission $10

Limited seating; reservations recommended

at 312/337-3200 or www.12westelm.com

Dress: business casual or better

The CHICAGO JAZZ CARAVAN

is a roving ensemble of some of

Chicago’s most seasoned jazz musicians,

performing music reminiscent of

New York jazz supper clubs of the ‘fifties.

Personnel:

Tom Muellner, piano        

Larry Kohut, bass     Terry Sullivan, vocals

TWELVEWEST is Chicago ’s

sophisticated new gold coast nightclub.

12 West Elm St. Chicago, IL
312-337-3200

3:00pm to 5:00pm

Terry Sullivan Trio  (Category 1) $10 cover      copy this event into your personal desktop calendar

    

This Cat Drifts With Passion - Chet Coppock: A Conundrum Wrapped in Bacon

Your soul is oftentimes a battlefield, upon which your reason and your judgment wage war against your passion and your appetite. Kahil Gibran

"Watch the run, watch the screen, watch everything!" - Abe Gibron

 On AM radio in Chicago, one is more than likely to hear an ad delivered by Sports Journalist, wit, boulevardier, gourmand and authority Chet Coppock.

Chet Coppock and the words 'succulent' are synonymous is this our palatable swine and kine town, when the man is pointing hungry bellies in the direction of a fine dining establishment; however, I recently needed to pull the old Malibu onto the shoulder of the Dan Ryan in order to control my giggles upon hearing Chet shill for a plastic surgeon.




I nearly went east and west*on the Ryan when I heard this one! Mr. Coppock's salutation " This cat drifts (or is it drips?) with passion" caused me no end of giggles.

The DNA of language is safe in the hands of Chet Coppock!

* an homage to Mike Houlihan

President Obama's Debate Performance Mirrors His Presidency - Dennis Byrne Explains

Obama's presidency was based purely on hope, change and hot air. Never did he demonstrate executive ability or leadership. He was called brilliant and awarded the Nobel Peace Prize purely on expectation. The debate showed how he has failed to grow into the office.Obama's presidency was based purely on hope, change and hot air. Never did he demonstrate executive ability or leadership. He was called brilliant and awarded the Nobel Peace Prize purely on expectation. The debate showed how he has failed to grow into the office. Dennis Byrne, Chicago Tribune

Barack Obama spent his entire adult life being told that he was the bees-knees for so long that he has become Capt. Yossarian who explains with Biblical certainty at every waking moment  “I am miracle ingredient Z-247. I'm immense. I'm a real, slam-bang, honest-to-goodness, three-fisted humdinger. I'm a bona fide supraman.” ( Catch 22, Heller) 

Barack Obama has become what flattery made of him.

He did not wish to govern Illinois; wanted to govern America.

The debate last week made the vanity of human wishes pretty obvious to all but those who flattered the man to this permanent  human condition.

In today's Chicago Tribune column, Dennis Byrne presents the Barack Obama as the man in the debate in full.

Samuel Johnson remarked on what we saw in Barack Obama a two centuries and change before the match-up in Denver 2012:

Remark each anxious Toil, each eager Strife,And watch the busy scenes of crouded Life;Then say how Hope and Fear, Desire and Hate,O'erspread with Snares the clouded Maze of Fate,Where Wav'ring Man, betray'd by vent'rous Pride,To tread the dreary Paths without a Guide;As treach'rous Phantoms in the Mist delude,Shuns fancied Ills, or chases airy Good. (Vanity of Human Wishes line 3-10)

Tribune Editorial Board - Repeats the Obama Senate Gambit for Tammy Duckworth

In 2004,the Editorial Board and its Care Kid Columnists of the Chicago Tribune did more* to give Barack Obama Senator Peter Fitzgerald's seat than an army of 11th, 14th, 17th, 18th, 19th & 47th Ward City workers could do with millions of walking around dollars, Michael Shakman and all of his works consigned to the back of UPS 40' trailer bound for Nome and limitless air time on WTTW.

2004. . . Dave Axelrod, one-time kid reporter for the Chicago Tribune, went full smear with help of Northwestern disc Jockey-editor Bruce Dold had four years of practice in the editorial driver's seat.  Sealed divorce records of public people became the thermonuclear detterant to one's decision to remain in a race. Millionaire, Army vet, school teacher, philanthropist and venture capitalist ( yes, he built that life, Barry) was the road-block to Barack Obama. Tammy Duckworth Bruce Dold's editorial page and his rag-rangers went all over Blair Hull like a cheap suit, until he opened his own divorce records.

Danny Hynes ran second to Barack in the Democratic Primary because he did so with the very same enthusiasm and grit that I ran yesterday's Chicago Marathon.

Now, for the Republican Primary.  Jack Ryan, a school teacher, venture capitalist, and Chick Magnet, needed to be eliminated Bruce Dold, sent the Trib lawyers to California to have a compliant judge forcibly 'unseal' the divorce file - because the public needed to know the private life of a would be public man.

The Chicago Tribune made Barack Obama and aside from scrutiny by John Kass and Dennis Byrne and a very few others, this organ played Obama's waltz into the White House.

Today, its shameless folly is played out in its endoresemnt of Tammy Duckworth, the moveable feast for Dem-Progressives. who moves more than an old man's bowels.

2006 article: Illinois's 6th congressional district election, 2006In the 2006 election, Duckworth was the Democratic nominee for the U.S. House of Representatives seat for the 6th congressional district of Illinois which was vacated by long-time incumbent Henry Hyde. Duckworth lost to her opponent, Representative Peter Roskam, by 4,810 votes.^[8][34][35]2012Main article: United States House of Representatives elections in Illinois, 2012#District 8In July 2011, Duckworth launched her campaign to run in 2012 for the re-drawn 8th congressional district of Illinois.^[1] She defeated her opponent Raja Krishnamoorthi to win the Democratic nomination on March 20, 2012, and will face incumbent Republican incumbent Joe Walsh in the general election on November 6, 2012. Wikipedia

Once an election boundary  pre-drawn, Dawn Clark Netsch and Abner Mikva begin scouting real estate for Tammy Duckworth's entry into the lists.

Tammy Duckworth gave her blood and limbs in the service of America and for that deserves the honor and respect of all.

Since, her heroic recovery Tammy Duckworth has been a government appointee and frequent candidate.  No less a political reformer than Governor Rod Blagojevich appointed Duckworth to the post of Illinois Veterans Affairs Director, where she was duly criticized for using state time and vehicles to make political appearances for frequent election victim Dan Seals, another Progressive card-board cut-out.  Following some bad press, Tammy Duckworth got hereself a Federal appointment and new opportunities to run against Joe Walsh.

Tammy Duckworth's service deserves respect, but certainly not a place at the Progressive trough that is paid for by tax-payers. God bless her, but don't vote for her,

Bruce Dold's endorsement is a re-play of the Obama ascent to power and a term ending November 6th.  The editorial praises Tammy Duckworth because she is not Joe Walsh! Bruce even leads with his patented Axelroding of Tribune enemies -

Then there were the tax liens, the building foreclosure, the suspended drivers license, the court fight over child support …
It's too bad, because the Joe Walsh who showed up for our endorsement interview had a lot more to offer than the Joe Walsh whose antics are splashed all over YouTube. In a face-to-face meeting with Duckworth, he was direct, specific, and even charming.
Walsh pulled no punches about his views. He embraced the plan offered by Rep. Paul Ryan to restructure Medicare. He said he would not raise taxes, period. He said the long-term fix for Social Security is to "put younger Americans in charge of their retirement income." To achieve lower tax rates overall, he would support eliminating deductions for mortgage interest and charitable donations.
Duckworth, by contrast, was noncommittal on some key issues, and largely drew from the Democratic playbook. She said she was not ready to make major changes to either Medicare or Social Security. She would increase taxes for those earning more than $1 million a year. She'd be OK with ending the deduction for second homes and yachts.
Duckworth also said she'd cut oil, gas and agribusiness subsidies, and that better supervision of wasteful defense contracts could save $9 million a day. But Walsh is correct when he says those cuts wouldn't dent the deficit. "We have to reform entitlements, period."
Where he offered solutions, Duckworth too often offered only a promise to search for one.
That all might sound like it's leading up to an endorsement of Walsh but ... it's not.
Walsh has been a congressman made for cable television, but not for his constituents. He has fueled the political vitriol that has paralyzed Washington, that nearly shut down the federal government, that has failed to produce meaningful fiscal reform and economic recovery. We saw something in that endorsement interview — what a congressman Joe Walsh might have been.
Our endorsement in the 8th Congressional District goes to Duckworth.

Here is the tepid, shuck's she's a wounded vet endorsement -

When we supported Duckworth in a 2006 run for Congress, we said she wasn't politically polished. Unfortunately, she has since become a more-practiced politician. Practiced, that is, in not offering her opposition targets by getting too specific on solutions. We have, though, always admired her character and moxie. She risked her life for her country, and lost both legs when an Iraqi grenade struck her Blackhawk helicopter in 2004. So yes, she's a war hero, though she says that label belongs to the comrades who saved her life. She served as director of the Illinois Department of Veterans Affairs for three years and assistant secretary of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs for two. We believe she will draw on all that experience to represent the district well. We hope she will challenge her own party leaders. Duckworth has the capacity to inspire, Walsh tends to antagonize. Duckworth is endorsed.

The Chicago Tribune placed a young inexperienced egoist in the U.S. Senate in 2004 and sky-rocketed that man who America fully saw in contrast to a man of ability for the first time in Denver last week.  That performance  was a Obama's A -Game, folks.  Illinois can not afford another "aint'she great" light-weight in government - We are topped off!

Pat Quinn, Sheila Simon, Jan Schakowsky, Deb Mell, Deb Shore, Mike Quigley, Forrest Claypool, Toni Preckwinkle . . .how they working out for us?

*  But Obama wouldn't have been elected to the U.S. Senate, much less president, without a few more sex scandals yet. In the 2004 Illinois Democratic Senate primary, Obama badly trailed multimillionaire Blair Hull for months. He and Michelle agreed that if he lost that race, he was out of politics. Then divorce papers revealed that Hull's wife had accused him of physically assaulting her. (Hull said he didn't want to "relitigate" his divorce.) Obama was already moving in the polls, and he had to fend off other candidates, but after the scandal he surged into the lead and won the primary.At first the general election pitted Obama against GOP Senate nominee Jack Ryan, a popular banker expected by many to win handily. Until, that is, Ryan's wife, TV actress Jeri Ryan, said her husband pressured her to accompany him to sex clubs and have sex in front of strangers. Ryan withdrew from the race and Obama cruised to victory against fringe candidate Alan Keyes. Daily Beast 2009