Chicago: The World Class City - All Net and No Smelt

Romantics will delight in dining lakeside, with a view so close they can toss a coin into the ageless waters and wish for a love to match.
Economists will adore the prices. Shrimp, fish, oysters and other seafood are not only tasty but also a bargain for the pricey Near North Side.Both types of lovers quickly join the regulars at Rocky`s: anglers with their tackle boxes and police officers who dock department boats at the bait shop near Navy Pier.Among the more popular items are the large, french-fried shrimp ($4.50 a half order) and Rocky`s fish sandwich ($1.50), a treat for those familiar with fast-food versions. While both are prepared in a crunchy batter, the shrimp and fish themselves are moist and tender. -Manuel Galvan, Chicago Tribune 1987

Oh, My God! I'm so excited I could moisten my chinos!  Rahm Emanuel has bullied Jimmy Fallon NO Less into yet another vist to Chicago, A World Class City!

Jimmy Fallon came to Chicago when Skinny Sheahan invited Fallon to take the Polar Plunge for the Special Olympics and Rahm was given the full credit.

That's how it goes in Chicago. Anne McGlone Burke working for the Chicago Park District in 1968 runs the firrst Special Olympics in Soldier Field and the the Kennedy Clan takes credit.

That's how you get World Class, change historical facts, erase landmarks and stick to the narrative.

Chicago 2014 is a city with a silver bean, Pritsker Pavillions, Lois Wesiberg Dancing Dervish diversions, cows on parade, Marilyn Monroe softy-core-porn statuary and no where to grab a bag of fried smelts for under $12.   World Class baby.

Chicago was a town - My Kind of Town, Frank's Kind of Town a town that Billy Sunday could not shut down and one could park without taking out a second mortgage.

I guess I am just a grumpy old man who thinks that Toni Preckwinkle, Pat Quinn, Forrest Claypool and Rahm Emanuel could not carry  Wilson Frost's jockstrap. Shucks, I thought that thirty years ago.

When the Fire Department Gym and Rocky's Shrimp and Smelts were demolished to make room for Navy Pier parking, Chicago went from a Sears Roebuck catalog town to the edgy Abercrombie & Fitch world class city inhabited only by members of Smashing Pumpkins, BillyDec, Chief Keef and Richard Roeper and former Mayor Daley perched on a bench in the Viagra Triangle where he can smoke a stogie, as far as we know. -World Class, baby!

Me, I like smelts.  I like them pan fried, deep fried and when I'm Fully Kreuzened - live.  The absolute best was Rocky's.  Rocky's was the stuff of legend - as architecture and as cuisine.  The Italian family owned fried fish palace operated as a bait-shop, as well as eatery, "It`s named for Joe ``Rocky`` Panzo, who was born in Italy before the turn of the century and came to Chicago during the Roaring `20s. "

Rocky's was open from April Fools Day to Thanksgiving.

In 1981, I took my pal Mark Manning, who was in residency at Grant Hospital to Rocky's. Manning, now a semi-retired surgeon in Del Rio Texas, is a Southie from Boston and no stranger to fine fried fish, as in Kelly's on Revere Beach and the No Name over by 151/2 FishPier in Boston, waxed rhapsodic on Rocky's fare.  He had the clams, (" These OUR CrowHawgs, Hick, not clams!"), the shrimp ("These ain't shrimp they're midget prawns or something.") and then had his first ever smelts. Manning was hooked. . .or netted, by these fresh water sardines. Smelts were his caviar. "Hick, Pal-ey, lets stroll ovah to Rocky's" became his mantra throughout his stay here in Chicago, through his career as an Air Force Surgeon and to his recent call from Texas.  " Rocky's . . .I still get all weepy on that place."

Me too.

I miss alot of the great things that made this town - neighborhood saloons with one choice of draft beer and that great cork smell from the beer soaked and reuseable cork or wood pulp coasters; mom and pop stores, dime stores. butcher markets, pop in bottles, Ward bosses who not only tool a few envelopes, but the time to listen to complaints of anyone in their fiefdom and five very different newspapers who hired good writers.

I love Chicago.  I liked it better when it was a town.

Doing Austins Part II - Leo High School in Gresham of Chicago and Catholic Schools in Israel

Leo High School is not too far from Israel.



“the loss of Catholic schools would mean that a fundamental part of the Church’s mission of evangelization would disappear completely in the very land where Jesus walked.”  - See more at: 

N.B. - My Augustinian examiner blew an O-ring and thus I must examine what passes for my conscience.

Catholic schools are in danger of disappearing in . . .Israel.

Catholic schools have vanished in Englewood, Auburn, Gresham, Roseland, Grand Crossing . . .in Chicago.

Lemme see, Little Flower High School is now Scott Joplin Middle School, Academy of Our Lady ( Longwood) is International Charter School, Little Flower Grammar School is now Ellison Charter School, Mendel High School is now Gwendolyn Brooks Magnet School  ; Mercy High School, St.Thomas Aquinas High School, Visitation High School, Maria High School, St. Wilibrord High School closed an all but forgotten, and elementary schools of the Archdiocese of Chicago closed, closed, closed.

In a very recent study of Catholic schools in Israel conducted by  Father Jeffrey Burwell, the director of Catholic studies at the University of Manitoba in Canada, and reported in The Cardinal Newman Society, Kimberly Scharfenberger, clear signs of change, or die leaped out at me.

“Catholic schools in both Israel and in the Palestinian Territories, especially in East Jerusalem and the West Bank, are in a precarious predicament,” Fr. Burwell said. “The State of Israel has as its primary concern a deep commitment to care for its Jewish residents. As a result of this understandable perspective, the Israeli government is not altogether concerned with non-Jewish schools.” 

Fr. Burwell added that “the Israeli government can do what it pleases when it comes to Catholic schools.” Catholic schools are in the power of the government, because anything they have “is theirs completely and totally because of Israeli generosity,” he said. ( unlike here in Blaine Amendment Illinois) 

Meanwhile, according to Fr. Burwell, Catholic schools in the Palestinian Territories “are in much more dire financial situations” because Palestine is in the midst of political upheaval and tremendous poverty. “Many Christians are leaving the region, which means that the vast majority of Catholic school teachers are in fact Islamic,” Fr. Burwell explained. “It is self-evident that a poor Catholic school that is largely staffed by Muslims can do very little to embrace the notion of evangelization, particularly as the region itself teeters on social and political unrest.” 

 American society is hostile to Catholic schools.  The bogeyman "Separation of Church & State"  is and has been a Nativist dodge. In fact,  thirty eight States continue to clutch the Blaine Amendment to its collective bosom and prominent among them Illinois. School Choice means Popery!  Catholic schools are supported by Catholic individuals, foundations, friends and the ever rising costs of tuition.

No Catholics; no Catholic schools.  Well, maybe a few, like St. Ignatius and Loyola Academy.   That is the ultimate victory of the Progressive!  Catholics tend to think for themselves and people who think for themselves tend to be . . . not pliable.

Some Catholics would argue that Catholic schools should be for Catholics only or for the conversion of the non-Catholic.Some would opine, " Well, how many of your students at Leo are Catholic?"

I'd say. " Fewer than 10%

Then, Mr. Catholic might ask, "Why should a Catholic support a school of non-Catholics?"

I'd argue, or attempt to point to the fact that, where there are no Catholic schools available, there also is an up-tick in urban killings. More Catholic schools, fewer savage killings.

Catholic schools offer more and cost more than Charter, Magnet and generic public schools - they can say God.   You don't have to believe it, but you will see the God stuff put into action.

Gresham is not too far from Israel, Father Burwell replies, “A Catholic school is, by its very being, a tool for evangelization,”

Leo High School opererates because of its generous allies: Alumni, Big Shoulders Fund, and foundations. However, the game is stacked against Leo High School.

There will never be vouchers in this state, because the very catholic politicians who should champion school choice take the coin of the very Anti-Catholic forces who besmear the faith and foundations they trot-out at corned beef and cabbage lunches: Illinois PAC, Planned Parenthood, Fred Eychnaer, public service unions and the teachers unions.

As an inner city, gender specific Catholic high school there is greater competition for students to begin with - St. Rita, Brother Rice and Mount Carmel are within easy reach and those schools boast diverse student populations.    However, the real competition  comes from the increased number of Charter schools - there are six such Charter high schools in  Leo High School's Zipcode.   Charter schools are public schools dressed up like Catholic schools and cost 80% less.

Time to get serious.











                                              

Wake up, America! The Way This Cat Do!

Post by Marcos e Claudio Oficial.

Hat Tip tro Miky In

'Doing Austins' With Myself Part I

An Augustinian Examiner ( Austin Friars in UK)

" . . .However, there does not seem to have been any 'proper' exams at Oxford for a degree during Medieval times. A student would be presented before his college chancellor and would then have to swear on oath that he had read certain books on his subject and then nine tutors had to testify on each student's ability within his subject. The student would then have to argue on an academic subject before a Master of Arts - usually an Augustinian monk, thus giving the process its nickname 'doing Austins'. " Medieval Studies

Austin examiner -What is your idea of a Catholic school?  Specifically, What is your vision for a gender specific Catholic college preparatory high school?

Me - Well, to your initial and more general question, a Catholic school tends to be one of the following -

• a parish school dedicated to the immediate member congregation and operated with revenue from tuition - usually but not always an elementary school
• a central high school ( co-ed or single gender)operated with subsidies from the Archdiocese*, tuition and substantial fund-raising through institutional advancement activities
• a religious congregation endowed school/academy supplemented by significant tuition costs and an extraordinary and sophisticated institutional advancement operation
• An Independent Catholic school/academy endowed by individual Catholics of great wealth and open to largely affluent families with some scholarship opportunities for the financially challenged, but again operated via tuition and substantial fund raising activities
• Innovative and imaginative religious congregation and corporate sponsored work/study schooling, the San Miguel and Cristo Rey models of the De LaSalle and Jesuit orders

To your second question, I would like to see the development of an endowed Independent Catholic high school open to students from struggling and financially challenged families - a school where the revenue pie chart indicates a larger donations wedge than the tuition slice indicates on Catholic school financial graphs. I believe that young people from the inner city's working classes of all races and creeds deserve a Catholic school opportunity.

Austin Examiner - Please explain what you mean.

Me - Sure, This summer I wrote a wonderful column for the Irish American News.

Austin Examiner - A 'wonderful article,' you say?

Me - Delightful, really.  Do go to my link and enjoy the whole piece, but, in essence, let me summarize the salient point with this passage, When Catholics departed the ( inner City and plagued by violence) neighborhoods, so did the Protestants and Jews. White flight became the all too simplistic neologism that helped further polarize races. Black folks attended smaller, non-institutional churches that did not have the economic infrastructure to provide social outreach for poor people. The big churches were deconsecrated and became real estate blight.
For example, when the Irish Christian brothers parted ways with Leo High School, the monastery on the south west corner of 79th & Sangamon Street was abandoned and became a danger to the community. Leo High School’s President Robert W. Foster ordered the demolition of that building, when it had been broken into, looted of brass, copper and other marketable metals, wiring, wood and stained glass to avoid injury or assault upon our neighbors. It cost Leo High School a great deal of money to do the demolition.
Leo High School also raised money from the Alumni and a few foundations and acquired one whole block of neighboring buildings that had been abandoned as well and developed a recreational field open to the community and used by the school’s athletic teams.

Leo High School remains open, a Catholic institution, because of the grace of God and our Alumni and friends. It is costly, but Leo High School educates wonderful young men who turned the brass door knobs embossed with Christ’s cross. Leo President Dan McGrath raised more support revenue in the last two years than at any time in the school’s history. Most of that revenue went to tuition support and capital improvements. Leo’s revenue pie-chart is upside down – fund raising revenue far exceeds tuition revenue. ( parenthetical my own)

Austin Examiner - Delightful . . .somewhat

Me - In our times, a Catholic central high school  for boys, can serve the families of a thriving neighborhood according to the old financial  template, but with greater difficulty. Catholic schools must constantly raise tuition costs on families in order to stay competitive with elite Magnet and Charter public schools. Taxes allow those two challengers to traditional Catholic schools to offer more 'bells and whistles' in curriculum and activity choices.  While tax revenue to public education bleeds everyone, Catholic and private school families lose an extra quart.

Austin Examiner- Must you be so sanguine? Sorry, just trying to lighten the moment.

Me- (with generous wave of my generous palm) Not at all Frater, as Magne Pater Augustine chanted, 'Qui cantat, bis orat.'

Austin Examiner - That will about do -now, continue, please.

Me - Hey, look Hard Collar and Hood, you started the waltz with your quip about my metaphorical conceit.

Austin Examiner - Yes, yes,  "I started a joke / Which started the whole world crying / But I didn't see / That the ...

Me- Hey, cincture belly!  Level off!  Hey,  . . .well, take this up later. Calm down, Man.  Here, drink this. It's Canfields . . .Seltzer . . lime.   Sorry about the Bee Gees number everybody. . .no really.  Can't stand them Brothers Gibbs. . . .




 * Subsidies ended during the episcopate of Cardinal Bernardin

This is How An Emerged Nation Governs - 85% of the Vote and No Beheadings, Massacres, or Explosions! Scotland the Brave

I listened to NPR for the results of the Scots Vote on staying in the United Kingdom.  Yesterday. NPR was all Scotland and a Blue and White ' Yes!'

Today, I needed to drive from 108th & Rockwell to 83rd & Wood Street ( Zipcode 60655-60620 mind you) , or 4.2 Miles in 11 minutes.  In that time, NPR droned out three stories 'from emerging nations.'

They were yarns of UN Aid workers in West Africa slaughtered while educating folks on the dangers of ebola, Siera Leon went on Ebola lock-down and Iran's lashing of happy dancers.

I turned to News Radio 780 AM and finally learned that Scotland Vote "Nae" by at least 10%.

Scotland was passionate about the vote and witnessed an 85% turnout of the vote.  That is Democracy unencumered by parsing of ninnies.  People hold strong opinions and vote on it in a Democracy.  In 'Emerging Nations' they slaughter the closest carbob foot-print, take to the hills, jungles and deserts and wait for a BBC World service crew to record the leadership of the slaughterers to offer a Foucaultian Derrida Lah Dee Dah presis on ravages of 19th Century Euro-colonialism to the African Continent that sparked the massacre,

The BBC and NPR drown us in scab-yanking yarns of suffering from Emerging Nations.  I have a cauliflowed set of ears as a result.

When these Nations finally " Emerge" -then lets celebrate diversity.  Until then, people from Emerging Nations will want to live in a Demcracy like Scotland and the United States. . .for a few years anyway.
After which, the BBC and NPR will 'explan' the ravages of Democracy.

Well Done Scotland!  You are no where near as Balkanized as us Yanks.

I'm No Thomas Friedman and Obama is No TR - Not Even a Wilson

 

Marines and sailors showing the flag in Vera Cruz 1914.

Using military force against an enemy to punish, avenge a wrong, as retribution is a timeless cause of armed conflict. There are many examples throughout history of successful punitiveoperations. Analyzing historical punitive expeditions for the elements that made them successful or unsuccessful can aid future military and government leaders in framing strategic and operational conflicts, and serve as a backplane for attempting to understand the nature of punitive expeditions and strikes. - Punishment, Revenge, and Retribution: A Historical Analysis of Punitive Operations MAJ Brandon D Newton U.S.Army

Thomas Friedman of the New York Times coined the term 'The Arab Spring" which followed in the wake of President Barack H. Obama's  nicely ironic Cairo Speech and his now wildly ironic Apology Tours.  The Arab Spring was intended to signal the triumph of the Obama Doctrine over two hundred years of American Foreign Policy.  The Arab Spring was the mythical dance between Islam and Democracy - it was no walz.  Rather, the Arab Spring became conga line lead by Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, Al Queda and the Wahabbist mullahs - a wholly owned subsidiary of the Saudi Royal Family.  Egypt was only saved from anarchy and Shariah theocracy by the military.  Elsewhere, the Arab and Levantine worlds gushed blood, while America went all Dunkirk in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The Obama Sesame Street Diplomacy mouthed by then Secretary of State Hilary Clinton and now John Kerry holds that while it might be necessary to whack a few Taliban/Al Queda and now Isis(l) moles with drone dropped ordnance, diversity and inclusive hugs will make a better world.  Following the beheadings of two American and one British citizen by ISIS(L) knifemen, President Obama  bleated the CAIR meme, " The Islamist State is not Islamic"  Such noggin numbing logic would also lead one to believe that the Nazis were not National Socialists and Caliphate don't need no Caliph.

When 9/11 took place the Bush family helped spirit the bin Laden clan out of the states so as not to harm the family noted for their piety and concrete pouring artistry, because of crazy uncle Osama.  Shortly we learned that the 9/11 monsters were almost universally Saudi, like Osama and that one of many Saudi Princes offered Rudy Giuliani some dough which he tossed back in that worthy's soul-patched mug.

The Saudi Royals have underwritten the Wahhabi blood- flavored doctrines by barely literate mullahs and exported the strict constructionist Qu'ranic verses worldwide.

I really rather foolishly believed at the time that President Bush would Delta Force the hell out of Saudi agents of change.  Instead, we feinted to Kabul and returned to Baghdad with Senator Barack Obama and MSNBC the only victors.

So here we are today - American fighting persons are returning to Iraq and Syria while levitating above the rocks and sands like St. Joseph of Cupertino: Numbers to be determined on a Case-to Case Basis. Three thousand military folks will be going to West Africa to war on Ebola.

So, early this morning I read Thomas Friedman and it seems he and I are in complete agreement . . .well kinda.  Thomas Friedman wants no Imperialistic Ventures Part III - no how and no way.  He believes that Arab Existentialists  will sort things out for themselves.

LONDON — An existential struggle is taking place in the Arab world today. But is it ours or is it theirs? Before we step up military action in Iraq and Syria, that’s the question that needs answering.
What concerns me most about President Obama’s decision to re-engage in Iraq is that it feels as if it’s being done in response to some deliberately exaggerated fears — fear engendered by YouTube videos of the beheadings of two U.S. journalists — and fear that ISIS, a.k.a., the Islamic State, is coming to a mall near you. How did we start getting so afraid again so fast? Didn’t we build a Department of Homeland Security?
I am not dismissing ISIS. Obama is right that ISIS needs to be degraded and destroyed. But when you act out of fear, you don’t think strategically and you glide over essential questions, like why is it that Shiite Iran, which helped trigger this whole Sunni rebellion in Iraq, is scoffing at even coordinating with us, and Turkey and some Arab states are setting limits on their involvement?

I agree wholly, Brother Friedman.  The Saudis, Turks and Emirs du jour will again sit this one out, because  - -  

“This is a war over the soul of Islam — that is what differentiates this moment from all others,” argues Ahmad Khalidi, a Palestinian scholar associated with St. Antony’s College, Oxford. Here is why: For decades, Saudi Arabia has been the top funder of the mosques and schools throughout the Muslim world that promote the most puritanical version of Islam, known as Salafism, which is hostile to modernity, women and religious pluralism, or even Islamic pluralism.audi financing for these groups is a byproduct of the ruling bargain there between the al-Saud family and its Salafist religious establishment, known as the Wahhabis. The al-Sauds get to rule and live how they like behind walls, and the Wahhabis get to propagate Salafist Islam both inside Saudi Arabia and across the Muslim world, using Saudi oil wealth. Saudi Arabia is, in effect, helping to fund both the war against ISIS and the Islamist ideology that creates ISIS members (some 1,000 Saudis are believed to be fighting with jihadist groups in Syria), through Salafist mosques in Europe, Pakistan, Central Asia and the Arab world.

Yep and then some.

I am no Thomas Friedman.  I could never have come up with the notion of an Arab Spring brought to you by the nephews of the Grand Mufti who escaped the Nuremberg Trials.  No sir.  I am no sophisticate.

I could never bring myself to call a adjunct lecturer filling a U of C Law School slot as a solid to real estate slum lord Allison Davis and slum lady Valerie Jarret, a Professor - President and Nobel Laureate or not.
Woodrow Wilson was a professor.

Woodrow Wilson was the grandpa of Obama's political coating - a Progressive. Woodrow could reform the hell out of stuff and still enjoy The Birth of a Nation. Wilson was one complex Orangeman.  He would defend democracy at the drop of his silk hat.  Sent the battleship USS Florida sailing into Vera Cruz when dictator Presidente Huerta kidnapped  a score of Americans and then sent Black Jack Pershing after Pancho Villa when he shot up Columbus, NM.

These were punitive expeditions*.  Even a milquetoast like Prof. Woodrow Wilson worked up some gunboat diplomacy and maintained American power in Latin America.  Huerta was no Assad and Pancho Villa, my favorite Mexican patriot, was far from the likes of the Islamist savages; yet, they needed a good bruising.

I wish GW Bush had done so instead of Nation building where there are only desert tribes and self-interest sheiks.

President Obama is no Jefferson, no Monroe, No Teddy Roosevelt and no Wilson.  He is an over-reaching narcissist and a resume inflating empty suit deathly afraid of Valerie Jarrett.

ISIS(L) could use a brief and very thorough punitive expedition.  Once every ISIS(L) caliph in waiting was sent home to the Prophet, every chastising  military person would come home to a heroes welcome, a nice rest, a little something extra in the pay envelop and wait for the next punitive expedition** against directed against anyone foolish enough to kidnap, or kill Americans.

*  Notable punitive expeditions[edit]

The French Navy raids San Juan de Ulua (Mexico) during the Pastry War (1838).
In the 13th century Kublai Khan, the founder of the Yuan Dynasty, sent emissaries demanding tribute from the Singhasari kingdom of Java. The ruler of the Singhasari kingdom, Kertanagara, refused to pay tribute and tattooed a Chinese messenger, Meng Qi, on his face. A punitive expedition sent by Kublai Khan arrived off the coast of Java in 1293. Jayakatwang, a rebel from Kediri, had killed Kertanagara by that time. The Mongols allied with Raden Wijaya of Majapahit against Jayakatwang and, once the Singhasari kingdom was destroyed, Wijaya turned against the Mongols and forced them to withdraw in confusion.
In 1599 the Spanish conquistador Juan de Oñate ordered his nephew Vincente de Zaldivar to engage in a punitive expedition against the Keres natives of Acoma Pueblo. When the Spanish arrived, they fought a three-day battle with the Keres leaving about 800 men, women and children dead.
During the First Anglo-Powhatan War (1610–14), Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr (1577–1618), an English nobleman was appointed Virginia's first royal governor and ordered to defend the colony against the Powhatan. Lord de la Warr waged a punitive campaign to subdue the Powhatan after they had killed the colony’s council president, John Ratcliffe. His tactics against the Indians proved effective and included raiding their villages, burning their homes, torching their cornfields and crops, and plundering their provisions.
From 1838 to 1842 ships of the United States Exploring Expedition engaged in three punitive expeditions against Pacific islanders.
The First Opium War (1839-42), in retaliation of the burning of opiate products by Commissioner Lin Zexu, which resulted in the opening of a number of ports, the cession of Hong Kong to Great Britain, and the Treaty of Nanjing.
The 1842 Ivory Coast Expedition was led by Matthew C. Perry against the Bereby people of West Africa after two attacks on American merchant ships.
The French Campaign against Korea in 1866, a response to the earlier execution by Korea of French priests proselytizing in Korea.
The 1867 Formosa Expedition, a failed punitive operation of the United States.
The United States expedition to Korea in 1871, in retaliation to the General Sherman incident, where a U.S. merchant ship was burned as it entered Pyongyang.
The 1874 Japanese expedition against Formosa.
Benin Expedition of 1897 British punitive action that led to the annexation of the Kingdom of Benin. The New York Times reported on January 13, 1897 that a "punitive expedition" would be formed to "punish the murderers of the Benin City expedition."
The Pancho Villa Expedition from 1916 to 1917, led by General John J. Pershing, was an operation in retaliation against Pancho Villa's incursion into United States.
Suppression of the 1920 Iraqi Revolt against the British Mandate of Mesopotamia,
The 1979 invasion of Vietnam by China was characterised by Deng Xiaoping as an act of punishment necessitated by Vietnam's invasion of Cambodia, saying that "Children who don't listen have to be spanked."

 ** 

The killing or wounding or capture of those opposed to us and the destruction of their property. The destruction of the property of those who aid and abet those hostile to us. The laying waste of entire sections inhabited by people generally supporting those hostile to us. The removal and dispersion of all of the inhabitants of an area of unrest

Major Harold H. Utley, “An Introduction to the Tactics and Techniques of Small Wars.” Marine 

Corps Gazette 16, no. 1 (May 1931): 51. 

Rauner, The Illinois GOP and Me

 

Rauner said if elected, he would partner with Michael Shakman to work out a settlement that includes a federal hiring monitor. His remarks came after Quinn on Friday released the names of more than 100 clouted state transportation employees who were part of what the state’s top ethics watchdog dubbed an improper hiring scheme. Quinn also said he would keep the 103 IDOT employees on the payroll.  Sun Times

Here on the south side, we have an odd custom.  Let's say, I am walking up to County Fair and my neighbor Mike Regan is driving by me on the way from that great grocery and without looking at me fires his arm out of the driver's side window and at the end of that limb is The FINGER!

Do I get upset and worrying that I might have offended Mike?  Not at all.

Or, let's say I am walking to Kean Gas at 111th & Talman and I hear familiar voice 'Hickey, You ugly old A$$hole!'  Do I recoil in horror at this attempt to define me. Not in the least.  It is a kinsmen voicing this ave.  Cousin Bub coming from Cardinal Fitness over by Maplewood.  We are odd ducks who salute one another with jocular offense and the towel snapping familiarity of friends who know every wart on our fannies.  This is a closed circle.

I am an UnEvolved Democrat*.  That means that I continue to think that life begins at conception, Communism is still a huge threat to the American worker, government should protect people and not enrich sycophants and reward the  demographic du jour and that Republicans are the political party that blows off its own toes.

Abortion was once only acceptable to people like Chuck Percy.  Communists were only electable in Hyde Park. Sycophants were only kept around by Ward bosses for laughs and never boosted to seats on the County Board, or made President of the Chicago Transit Authority every political job holder whether white, blue, or scoop collar beefed about every other race, creed and color's prestige in the Cook County hierarchy. The Irish Catholic is was and shall always be universally loathed and largely shrugged off.

Michael Shakman, a Hyde Park Democrat, changed utterly the Democratic Celtic Twilight of the Daleys et al. and continues to defraud Cook County and the State of Illinois of millions of dollars. Shakman begot every goof in government from Dick Simpson to Pat Quinn.  The Ward organizations no longer exist, but talentless grifters have amasssed numerous pensions for jobs not done from death of Old Man Daley up to the cuurent Carpetbagger on the Fifth Floor. When Cook County residents bolt rigid with shock at each despoiling of their way of life and stutter,'It Can't Get Any Worse'  a Martin Oberman, or a Forrest Claypool lands new Six Figure sinecure with all of perks.

Then there are the Republicans.  The once free-booting back-slappers of Du Page County who ruled
suburbia and downstate from Governors Len Small to Jim Edgar have devolved to a race of bloodless toadies who allow anyone (Eric Zorn, Carol Marin, Pat Quinn, or Sheila Simon for God's sake) to define them.

In his race to lose against the historically hapless Gov. Pat Quinn 2010, Rep. Pat Brady allowed Roe Conn and Richard Roeper to define him as a tax suspect as well as the monstrous master of Pat Quinn Boss Terry Cosgrove of Planned Parenthood to define him as a Lady Hater.

If you are going to succeed in Illinois as GOP office holder, one must be defined and like it.

Only Judy Baar Topinka is a bullet proof because she will dance the polka with any definer. 'Want babies dead? You got it.'

Billionaire Bruce Rauner is in the race to lose against the historically hapless Governor Pat Quinn and he is not only allowing himself to be defined, but he is going full Topinka.  Trying to belittle Pat Quinn is like trying to define the vastness of the Pacific Ocean. God handled both.

Then Bruce Rauner, the Cathcart festooned, beater driving plutocrat wine-guzzler, goes even goofier than Quinn by pledging more tax-dollars to the four-eyed bandit Michael Shakman

Why am I not a Republican?

I will not be defined by people who don't know me, don't like me, or don't get me.


* AKA Reagan Democrat, Close-Knit Ethnic Democrat, 19th Ward Democrat

Obama Getting the Help of the Saudis is like Taking Dust Buster to the Desert.

Caller- Do You Have Prince Abdullah in the Can?

Respondant - No! Diplomatic Immunity!

NYT - BEIRUT, Lebanon — Many Arab governments grumbled quietly in 2011 as the United States left Iraq, fearful it might fall deeper into chaos or Iranian influence. Now, the United States is back and getting a less than enthusiastic welcome, with leading allies like Egypt, Jordan and Turkey all finding ways on Thursday to avoid specific commitments to President Obama’s expanded military campaign against Sunni extremists.

ISIS(L) is the nasty spawn of the Wahabbist Mullahs paid for by the Saudi Royal Family.  Booze and Oil don't mix as any State Policeman can tell you.  The more booze carburetted through an oil pipeline the greater the danger.

For years, I have considered the Saudi Royals to be the world's turd in the punchbowl.  In the early 1990's, while teaching at La Lumiere School in Indiana, young teachers who were unhappy with their low pay and long hours would scan the help wanted adds in the Independent Schools Magazine, published by NAIS and plunk inviting adds featuring "Great Pay and Adventure Teaching English in Saudi Royal Schools - Apply Now!" under my nose in the Main House during the three squares a day meals included in our contract agreement, as well as housing, insurance, great retirement benefits and a magnificent rural lakeside setting.

Hoary old Hickey ( late 30's and early '40's at the time) would offer, " Are you out of your @#$%ing Mind?"

Let's see one - This place is gorgeous and you'd want to go . . .to . . .this?"

There would follow litany of  stuff I knew. Here's a few capital gems:

A range of offenses can doom a subject to execution, including murder, drug dealing, repeated drug use, armed robbery, rape and sexual misconduct like sodomy and adultery. Religious offenses, including sorcery, false prophecy, apostasy and blasphemy can and sometimes do bring death sentences, but are more often dealt with by lengthy or lifetime prison terms.

My brother, a master carpenter, had been offered tax-sheltered work in Saudi Arabia and had done his due diligence.  My Bro is a tee-totaller and devout Mass going Catholic. He gave the offer the back of his hand.

I explained this to the young academic bounders who repaired to what passed for dens of exotic adventure in Rolling Prairie, Hudson Lake, La Porte, Michigan City in Indiana and New Buffalo Michigan the nano second they were 'off duty.' at the school. They too drew sober wind at the thought of a year and change under Shariah Law.

You see, the Arabs loved too booze as much as the Amish, but they do did it on sneak after 1952.  Here's why.

In recent years, Saudi-funded Islamicisation has had some notable triumphs – particularly when it comes to alcohol, which has always been near the top of the Wahhabi hit list, in spite of the fact that Saudis themselves often succumb to drunkenness, alcoholism, and, more recently, massive and widespread drug abuse. Alcohol was actually permitted in Saudi Arabia up until 1952. Two things happened that stopped the party. Firstly, one of King Abdullaziz's sons - Nasir - made an extended trip to America, and learnt to appreciate wine, women and song. Upon his return, the carousing continued with a series of orgies, famously involving men and women. The partying stopped abruptly one night, when the spirits consumed in vast amounts ended up killing seven, including women.
For this Nasir was beaten and imprisoned, but alcohol remained legal - the reveling Saudi elite really didn't want a dry state. The last straw was placed in the camel's back in 1952 when Nasir's brother Mishari – also a dissolute libertine – got himself so drunk that he went out and shot the British consul dead, also wounding his wife. The long-suffering King had had enough, and alcohol was banned. From that date onwards, the Saudi authorities made a virtue out of necessity and preached the evils of alcohol, gaining renewed support from the Wahhabi mullahs, whom the Saudi royal family used thenceforth as a highly effective thought police. Just as the later Talibans found, Desert Islam is not only a highly effective method of social and political control, but it legitimates exploitative and despotic administrative practices. Of course, the ruling elite carried on just as before with their ongoing alcohol-fueled orgies, rapes and paedophilia, but the official line was that alcohol was an evil. Saudi was on the wagon.
One of the first countries to be hit by Saudi double standards was Kuwait, which was severely strapped for cash in the 1960s. Their Saudi cousins offered to help, on condition that this small country – once a drinker's paradise – banned alcohol outright. The Kuwaitis accepted the money, shut down the bars and watched as mosque after mosque popped up, spouting jihad. This development was ironic considering that, barring the Saudis, the Kuwaitis were the most notorious drunks in the Arab world. Time magazine vividly captured the chaotic aftermath of the introduction of the ban:
A month ago the oil-rich sheikdom of Kuwait banned all liquor within its borders, and since then many of its thirsty citizens have been drinking everything in sight from perfume and eau de cologne to rubbing alcohol and Sterno — with predictably disastrous results. By last week, an estimated 150 Kuwaiti had died from alcohol poisoning, several hundred more had been blinded, and Kuwait's hospitals were filled to overflowing. Bathtub gin is flourishing, and bootlegging the real thing has become Kuwait's fastest growing business.
Moving on to the United Arab Emirates, the Emir of one of the Emirates was allegedly an alcoholic who eventually died of cirrhosis of the liver. Being quite the playboy, as most Arab leaders are, he gambled – a lot. So much, in fact, that he bankrupted the whole of his Emirate. Sheik Zayed, the founder and president of the United Arab Emirates, was a just and religious man who had paid off his neighbour's gambling debts one too many times. So, the incoming Emir of this particular Emirate, the son of the alcoholic, had one last resort – the Saudis. In 1985, Saudi money was handed over, again with strings. The Emirate became dry overnight and, again, the ferocious Imams turned up the heat from new, stark, mosques. The long-suffering inhabitants of the statelet now had to watch as their neighbour, Dubai, developed as a magnet for beer swilling, whoring tourists - particularly those from Saudi Arabia.
Women are also high up on the Desert Islam hit list, and the region has seen an increase in restrictive dress codes for women, and in segregation as a whole. If one looks at films during the Golden Age of Arab film making from the 1950s through to the mid 1970s, one sees women dressing flamboyantly in Western dress. They are also invariably uncovered – and not just their hair. Some were beautiful. Some were sexy and even lewd. Strangely, perhaps, drunk women were often used as a comic foil in these movies. They giggled. They flirted. They fell over. All very Carry On...

Booze and Babes are ag'in Shariah Law.  In order to protect Royal Share, the Saudi Royals closed the bars and opened Mosques run by Wahabbi mullahs - the Jihadi Lads who will lop off a noggin, blow up an Israeli kindergarten and slaughter a whole mess of Kurds with a smile.

ISIL is merely bastard kids of the Saudi Royals it seems to me; therefore, why would Soul-patched Pops go all jihad on the bar-sinister spawn?

Not gonna happen.  The only strike force the Saudi Royals will throw together will be a Nile Delta Hot-Tub Full of Jack Daniels Commandos and Royal Saudi Scotch Guzzlin Guard - Praise be the Prophet.

197 Reasons to Doubt Obama's Speech Last Night -

There is a story about Mr. Obama relevant to the war, battle or whatever he declared Wednesday evening against the Islamic State, aka ISIS. It is found in his former campaign manager David Plouffe's account of the 2008 election, "The Audacity to Win."
Mr. Plouffe writes that during an earlier election race, Mr. Obama had a "hard time allowing his campaign staff to take more responsibility." To which Barack Obama answered: "I think I could probably do every job on the campaign better than the people I'll hire to do it." Audacity indeed. WSJ - Dan Henninger

The Commander in Chief has made no secret of his contempt for the Constitution, Congress, Cupcakes, Corpsmen and Combat Veterans of WWII and especially unborn Children. .  Obama holds so many people in contempt - me and more than likely you -that would take an entire wing of his looming Presidential Library to include the encyclopedic nature of Obama's Universal Contempt(s).  Contempt for the military is an easy one.  Obama has purged as many generals as Joe Stalin. 

 

The Five Year Purge of the United States Military by the Current Commander in Chief

 

Year: 2013 (9, so far). Bold Type are Top Theatre Commanders

1. Marine Col. Daren Margolin – Quantico – Oct. 18, 2013. Was in charge of Quantico’s Security Battalion.
2. Marine Major General C.M.M. Gurganus – Oct. 12, 2013. Commander Regional Command Southwest and I Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward) in Afghanistan.
3. AF Major Gen. Michael Carey – Oct. 8, 2013. 2-star commander of 20th Air Force. 3 wings of ICBMs. 450 nukes. Covered 3 AF bases across nation.
4. Navy Vice-Admiral Tim Guardina – Oct. 9, 2013. 3-star vice-commander all US nuclear forces (land/air/sea). Relieved of command. Demoted in rank to 2-stars.
5. Marine Major General Gregg A. Sturdevant – September 2013. Director of strategic planning and policy for U.S. Pacific Command and commander of the Aviation Wing At Camp Bastion, Afghanistan.
6. Marine Col. James Christmas – July 18, 2013. Commanded 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit. Also, commanded the new Special-Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force Crisis Response Unit.
7. Army Brigadier General Bryan Roberts – May 2013. Commander, Ft. Jackson, SC.
8. Marine Gen. James Mattis – May 2013. Chief of CentCom.
9. Army Major General Ralph Baker – April 2013. Commander of Joint Task Force Horn of Africa at Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti, Africa

Year: 2012 (Overall total – 4 +24 = 28 Final total).

1. Marine General John R. Allen – Nov. 13, 2012. Commander, ISAF – International Security Assistance Force.
2. Army General David Petraeus – Nov. 9, 2012. Commander, International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and Commander, U.S. Forces Afghanistan (USFOR-A). Director of CIA from September 2011 to November 2012.
3. Navy Rear Admiral Charles M. Gaouette – Oct. 27, 2102. Commander, USS John C. Stennis strike group. Relieved within a day or so of Benghazi.
4. Army General Carter F. Ham – Oct. 18, 2012. Commander, AFRICOM. Relieved during Benghazi from direct command of AFRICOM.

Naval Officers (all in 2012): Total – 24

1. Cmdr. Derick Armstrong, Commander, guided missile destroyer USS The Sullivans.
2. Cmdr. Martin Arriola, Commander, USS Porter.
3. Capt. Antonio Cardoso, Commander, of Training Support Center San Diego.
4. Capt. James CoBell, Commander, Oceana Naval Air Station’s Fleet Readiness Ctr. Mid-Atl.
5. Cmdr. Joseph E. Darlak, Commander, USS Vandegrift.
6. Cmdr. Franklin Fernandez, Commander, Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 24.
7. Cmdr. Ray Hartman, Commander, amphibious dock-landing ship Fort McHenry.
8. Cmdr. Jon Haydel, Commander, USS San Diego.
9. Cmdr. Diego Hernandez, Commander, ballistic-missile submarine USS Wyoming.
10. Cmdr. Lee Hoey, Commander, Navy Drug Screening Laboratory, San Diego.
11. Cmdr. Dennis Klein, Commander, submarine USS Columbia.
12. Capt. Marcia “Kim” Lyons, Commander, Naval Health Clinic New England.
13. Capt. Chuck Litchfield, Commander, USS Essex.
14. Capt. Robert Marin, Commander, USS Cowpens.
15. Capt. Sean McDonell, Commander, Seabee reserve unit Naval Mobile Const. Battalion 14.
16. Cmdr. Corrine Parker, Commander, Fleet Logistics Support Squadron 1.
17. Capt. Lisa Raimondo, Commander, Naval Health Clinic Patuxent River, Md.
18. Capt. Jeffrey Riedel, Program manager, Littoral Combat Ship program.
19. Cmdr. Sara Santoski, Commander, Helicopter Mine Countermeasures Squadron 15.
20. Cmdr. Sheryl Tannahill, Commander, Navy Operational Support Center Nashville.
21. Cmdr. Michael Ward, Commander, USS Pittsburgh.
22. Capt. Michael Wiegand, Commander, Southwest Regional Maintenance Center.
23. Capt. Ted Williams, Commander, Mount Whitney.
24. Cmdr. Jeffrey Wissel, Commander, of Fleet Air Reconnaissance Squadron 1.

Year: 2011 Total – 1 + 157 = 158 overall - especially Capt. Owen Honors Commander USS Enterprise

Army Major Gen. Peter Fuller – May 2011. A top U.S. commander in Afghanistan.

157 Air Force majors. Military advocates decry ‘illegal’ early terminations of 157 Air Force majors

Year: 2010 Total – 1 ( total)

1. Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal – June 2010. Overall commander Afghanistan. Replaced by Gen. Petraeus.

Year: 2009 Total – 1 (total)
Army Gen. David D. McKiernan – 2009. First 4-star relieved since Truman relieved MacArthur. Commanded in Afghanistan.~ 

President Obama holds so many other vocations in contempt, but they will not be asked to sternly admonish ISIS(L)

Geometry - The Catholic Soul

That's why Geometry, Clyde.

I pick up twelve to thirteen Leo students every morning.  Sophomore Clyde "The Glide" Butler is a veteran passenger and my first stop in Englewood of Chicago.  Clyde is a school leader, by dint of his character developed from his family, and an excellent student with 3.8 GPA.  That freshman year cumulative average is currently being battered by Euclid and Archimedes: Geometry.

                                                             Clyde the Glide Leo 2018
The sophomores are having a genuine struggle, as did I in  the Fall of1967, getting a grip on Geometry the second step of the classical quadrivium ( Arithmetic, Geometry, Astrology and Music).  The 19th Century Germans and 20th Century American sociologist-philosophes murdered education by systematically undoing  1800 years of Classical Education in name of Kaiser and then John Dewey.  Now, there is Arne Duncan armed with Common Core and Video lessons from Howard Zinn and his comic book quality videomaster Kenneth Burns - just wait until you learn how FDR saved his career by making Henry Wallace his Veep.

Geometry survives in the curriculum, as does Counting and Ciphering wages amounting up to and including $ 15.00 per hour. Geometry, because we all need to learn the angles and Math because Mickey D's needs cashiers.

Geometry, if taught correctly, is murder in the early goings.  Dead Tan Guys invented Geometry. The same folks who gave us Democracy and the best cuisine of God's Blue Planet made sense of universe -geometry handled the shapes and Arithmetic the majesty and types of numbers. Geometry and Math were cult classics, because they were mysteries more than disciplines (like our Prussian John Dewey demands).

The Greeks realized that mathematics offered the young mind its first immediate encounter with Truth.  Early education taught basic reading and calculating skills, and developed a taste for beautiful and noble actions and ideas.  Through these efforts, the youth were made receptive to their culture.  But geometry, the study of shapes through measurement, and arithmetic, the study of fascinating kinds of numbers, contained truths that transcended any human society.  Right triangles and ellipses belong to no man; they are instances of a beautiful, ordered reality that is eternal and divine.  Students learned that such truth exists, and that their minds could see it. from Beyond the Test: Educating in The Truth

Geometry and Arithmetic built cathedrals, aqueducts, roads that all led to Rome, mosaics, sculpture, painting, military dicta and screwed fresh water up to a thirsty folks from the Nile.  That screwer of Lake Michigan Straight was none other than Archimedes who studied his Euclid and gave the Romans all kinds of hell during the eight years of siege on his town of Syracuse. Like I said, Old Dead Tan Guys mastered the shapes and numbers and allowed us to put them to practical purposes.

" Why do we gotta study Geometry? Its boring.  What do you do with it?" saith Clyde the Glide.

Euclid heard the same damn thing.  Euclid understood that we live in a 3-D world and only need the glasses to see it that way.  The glasses are reverence.  Geometry ( and I received a Gentleman's D) is awesome - in the proper definition.  It does, or should strike awe in all of us - more so than Mark Zuckerberg's PT Barnum nonsense.  Euclid stole no one Else's ideas - far as I know.

Numbers and shapes lead us to The Truth - we Catholics call that God.  That is Catholic soul, Clyde.

The Tyranny of My Home Cooked Meals

 

"The women interviewed faced not just children but grown adults who are whiny, picky, and ungrateful for their efforts. “We rarely observed a meal in which at least one family member didn’t complain about the food they were served,” the researchers write. Mothers who could afford to do so often wanted to try new recipes and diverse ingredients, but they knew that it would cause their families to reject the meals. “Instead, they continued to make what was tried and true, even if they didn’t like the food themselves.” The saddest part is that picky husbands and boyfriends were just as much, if not more, of a problem than fussy children." from Slate by some whiny Skirt.

Pre-school Dinner Quid Nunc at Casa Hickey ( 1999-2010)

"Why can't we have fried chicken like Mom used to make?" asked my oldest.

"Mom's dead." was my cold hard fact of a rejoinder and I had taken the Hamilton Beach slow cooker out of the box in the basement to signal the start of a new school year.

"You're horrible! How . . .how could you say that?"

" I employed the stative subject complement."

" Well, what are you making for dinner?"

" Find out at meal time. Now, scat!"

The dinner table is not a Democracy.  This is gustatory Spain; not England. One cook, one meal is good enough for one dinner table with three children ( two girls and boy), while the chef and waiter stands, serves, clears and cleans the kitchen serving board.

In the summer months the grill does the trick, but fall, winter and early spring belong to the cast-iron skillet or the Slow Cooker.  I don't follow the rules.  I make them.  I am Pater Familas, The Widow Dad.

Voila~!

 


Sic Semper Tyrannis!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Governor Pandering Pat Quinn Rolls Out His Push Mower Again

 1994 Ryan v. Quinn - "King George, prince of perks." -cries Pandering Pat

Ryan retorts, "He's as insider as anyone.  He was back working for the Dan Walker administration [in the 1970s]. He's made a career out of push- ing referenda. I don't think he's held any job out- side the public eye."

Governor Pat Quinn requires no sarcasm from anyone, because he provides the obvious ironies.

Gov. Pat Quinn has always been a  Goo-goo Gadfly, a Democratic Diva, a Progressive Pest  "of a most praisèd water. " 

In 1994, Pandering Pat Quinn took issue with then Secretary of State George Ryan holding that office and enjoying the perquisites of Illinois Elected Official goodies - State coppers mowing the lawn and bragging the groceries at the A & P.  

In fact, I recall a goofy Pat Quinn for Secretary of State TV spot in 1994 - he showed how honest he was by pushing a green-happy mover, just like his current ad employs.  Sadly, my You Tube Search skills failed me.  Maybe it is the same one. After all, Gov. Thrifty Pat never spends a dime unless it is squeezed of a tax-payers chinos.

Pat Quinn had his ass handed to him by George Ryan in 1995.  

It is kind of  tough being a fatuous dolt, ninny, lightweight, sap and mooncalf 24/7, 365 per annum without trotting out what did not work in 1994, but as Pat Quinn likes to tell people dumber than himself - he likes things tough. 

Flipping Mickey Ds For Ever! SEIU's Commie Gimmickry and Wage Slavery

 

I worked in the fast food industry from September 1969 - November 1969.  Gene Mahoney hired me along with Pat Murphy and Timmy Atkins, as well as about six young ladies to work at Chicken Unlimited on north east corner of 79th & Wood Street for $1.30 per hour.

Gene Mahoney had a gold mine due to his foresight and a loan from Standard State Bank at 79th & Ashland. The corner of 79th & Wood was a people magnet.  Around the corner on Wood was a saloon ( very busy)and across the street the 18th Ward Republican Headquarters ( rarely visited) on the south east side of the corner was Kiley and Kalina's Drug Store two more busy saloons, a fore-runner to 7/11 Hites' - which sold candy and pop to hundreds of Little Flower Grammar School & High School students and the bread and cheese that Dads forgot while visiting the three saloons - ' Here's a buck, run up to Hites' and get a loaf of that Butternut and a hunk a Baloney, or your Old Lady will crucify me.'

 Across the street was Fields one of many Greek restaurants that served Mass go-ers, mourners from Sheehys/Walter Quinlan & Sons, or high school teachers and  coaches from Little Flower High School on break.  Fields, with manager/cook/ owners named Chris, Jim and Gust,  served consistently wonderful food and coffee that was better than any brewed by a Barista extant.

Gene Mahoney niche-marketed , shift changers, teen-agers with pocket change, guys who needed nourishment to go along with the Great Taste of Drewrys/Hamms/Meister Brau and Schlitz, and families requiring a quick meal of fried chicken , hamburgers, fries, shrimp and creamy cole slaw with very generous helping of buns and honey.  Gene Mahoney was an electrician by trade and managed a hardware store, as well as operated this Chicken Unlimited station. He later opened two more.

Gene Mahoney tasked me, Pat Murphy and Tim Atkins with deep frying chicken, shrimp and spuds and also grilling the beef patties for low-end hamburgers and the signature Wham-Burger ( so-named for its size and secret Wham Sauce) according to franchise standards.  I was an adept with a spatula, but miserable a deep-fryer failure.  Chicken, shrimp and spuds were to be cooked to a golden brown  Mine came out of the bubbling oils with all of the  texture and appearance of a Rawlings,  a Spaulding, or a Wilson . . . football.

I took home eight pay checks.  On Halloween, Gene Mahoney informed me that I should seek employment where I needed to deep-fry "nothing."  I went to work at Gee Lumber two miles west on 79th Street - it was longer walk to work, but found my skills and attention level to detail work more suited to cutting 2X4s, mixing cement or stacking lumber.  I continued to take my high school lunches at Chicken Unlimited on Wood Street all through my senior year and was delighted to see that my replacement, Kevin Glynn, was superb fryer of foods.  I was paid $ 1.30 at Chicken Unlimited and at Gee Lumber and banked that cash at Standard State Bank for my looming tuition at Loyola University.  I did not aspire to be a chicken fryer, nor a cutter of lumber.

Would I have been happier making $ 15 an hour soaking a hamburger with Wham sauce?  I rather doubt that, unless my aspirations matched the prevailing minimum wage.

1954 - Full Universal Health Care for all Local 25 Members and their Families - not now.  SEIU spend dues on the likes of Gov.Pat Quinn, Sen. Dick Durbin and Marxist 501(c) 3s and entertaining the Chicago media..  

SEIU, is the son of Local 25 Chicago Office, Theatre, and Amusement Building Janitors' Union. In 1969, that Local was run by old timey union tough guys, like its President Tom Burke,  who had their heads busted by management goons hired by the Building Managers Association of Chicago while walking picket lines.  I worked out of this local during my summer vacations between my junior and senior year.  I made $ 1.85 ($.55) more than the Chicken Unlimited and Gee Lumber scale. Nickels added up back then. When my summer work ended in August 1969, I settled for the lower wage in order maintain a less than full-time weekly set of hours.  I was still in high school. Gene Mahoney, and Mr. Jim Gee, Jr. helped me pay the $80 in tuition at Little Flower High School and save for the $1,400 annual tuition at Loyola. SEIU was born when Local 25 was seized and turned over to the Toronto Local run by Marxists in 1973 and they controlled the union Cook County Democrats, the Chicago news media and murdered the aspirations of its membership - in my opinion.

The Reds ran Local 25 and adopted the color purple under the now invisible direction of Marxist Andy Stern.

Today, labor remains very confused.Labor  History has been forgotten, or erased by SEIU. Skilled and Industrial trades have cooperated with SEIU for decades and allowed the "producers" to go-along to get along.

A producer was laborer who had something to show at the end of his labors - a carpenter, a butcher, dress-maker, a canner, a boilermaker, a steam-fitter, a pipe-fitter could join the Knights of Labor - the people who actually won the eight hour day and forty hour week.  A priest, a parson, a clerk, or an academic could not be a member of the working class. 

The Knights of Labor was a rather inclusive group. It sought to unite together all "producers." Producers included anyone that constructed a physical product in the course of their workday. The Knights of Labor welcomed factory workers and business owners into its ranks. The group rejected "nonproducers"—people who did not engage in physical labor, such as bankers, lawyers, and academics. The Knights of Labor sought to create a united front of producers versus the nonproducers. The organization even allowed women and African Americans to join its ranks. Together, the producers sought an eight-hour workday, an end to child labor, better wages, and improved working conditions in general. Under (Terence) Powderly's leadership, the organization also sought to instill morality in its members, including providing support for the temperance movement.(emphases my own)

 Terence Powderly and the Knights of Labor, like Mother Jones and Booker T. Washington have all but disappeared from the labor conscious vocabulary.

All labor is noble; by that I mean any job accepted by woman or man and carried out with care and conviction.  Some Labor remains noble; by that I mean, organizations of working men and women who bargain in good faith with wage providers.  SEIU, in my considered opinion, is and has been dangerous.

The Minimum Wage Dodge is no more than another Cadillac Commie gimmick to destroy the American Middle Class and the American Standard of living.  Leadership of SEIU comes out academia and  not the work force.  Schools of Social Work produce Andy Stern, Anna Burger, or discredited scams like ACORN which gave Illinois Keith Kelleher. I doubt any SEIU Clipboard, or Bullhorn Artiste ever swung a mop, stripped a floor, or cleaned brass.  

The skilled and industrial trades are led by producers - workers actually know how to pack a pump, thread pipe, and the difference between red, green, white and black wires. 

Skilled trades people aspired to wages they earned.  SEIU enslaves its membership to a wage it manages squeeze out of taxpayers via legislation.  

$ 15 an hour are slave wages.  

Faith -Belief in God - Makes Heroes: Sotloff and Foley

"I began to pray the rosary. It was what my mother and grandmother would have prayed. 
I said 10 Hail Marys between each Our Father. It took a long time, almost an hour to count 100 Hail Marys off on my knuckles. And it helped to keep my mind focused."  - James Foley on his Islmaist captivity in Libya.


The first young man murdered by Islamist savages of ISIS(L) was James Foley a Catholic.

The second young man murdered by Islamist savages of ISIS(L) was Steven Sotloff a Jew

Both men exhibited magnificent grace and faith in meeting the similar fate at the hands of a twisted maniac.

You will not hear much to nothing about the religious faith of either man from our American media.  Belief in God and commitment to one's religion sends chills up the spines of John Dewey zealots in academia, print and elected office, because it diminishes the need to worship at the altar of the State.

James Foley prayed the rosary - a spiritual exercise that strengthened the sinews of  Austria's Don John at Lepanto and twelve years later, Poland's John Sobieski swept the Caliph's 200,000 man Ottoman Army from the walls of Vienna.

The Rosary is not a Steven Spielberg talisman that shoots fire and lightening from the crucifix attached to the beads.  Rather, is a meditative escape from the self and that is its power.  My Dad carried a metal disc rosary and prayed with it at Bougainville, Guam and Iwo Jima.  He came home with that metal disc rosary and tiny fragments of Japanese ordnance in arms, legs and back, but whole of limb and sound of faith.

The faces of James Foley and Steven Sotloff reflect deeply centered faith formed in each man.


Their calm in face of eternity and their gaze upon Heaven's Gates are the message that back-fored on Jihad John and the Islamist monsters who took their lives but not their immortal souls.

These men of Faith should give all of us the resolve we need.

I am awed by Steve Sotloff and Jim Foley.  I am awed by Faith.