Chris Kennedy - Prometheus on the Carpathian Rock

Zeus Preckwinkle is out of town, but might have made the call on Chris Kennedy. 

Chris Kennedy is a good guy and as I said yesterday, a good guy has no business hanging around a Progressive Democrat (Prog Dem).

Prog Dems are not liberals; they are Stalinists with East Bank Club memberships and Brooks Brothers Gold Cards.

Chris Kennedy, the scion of Robert Kennedy and nephew of JFK - the American Gracchi,  grew up in the shadows of history and myth making;   he became a solid, honest and sincere man who is willing to quietly fight poverty and lift people up.

Prog Dems never do that.

I have witnessed Chris Kennedy lend a pair of hands to Catholic Charities (1120 W 79th St, Chicago, IL 60620) humping boxes of food and warm clothing that he bought for distribution - without ever saying, " Do you know who I am?"  He never had a squad of Sun Times ink-slingers at his beck and call like the Nordic Jesus who Popes-up the neighborhood.

Chris Kennedy is among the oligarchs of Chicago but he is not with them.  He Kennedy is a great name to appoint to a Blue Ribbon panel or a directorship, but he is too honest to drawn into the circle of Prog favor.  Chris Kennedy kept terrorist comic-strip academic Bil Ayers from getting Emeritus status with University of Illinois.  Ayers remains a player in the cook County oligarchy.  Ayers helped make Venezuela what it is today and hopes to see Metro Chicago do the same.

The Kennedys are welcome to the Prog Dem banquet, but assigned a table near the men's room exit.

Note this observation from Joel Kotkin fro 2008, when Bloomberg and Schumer checked Caroline Kennedy from folowing Hillary Clinton into the Senate:

. . . the current gentry liberals increasingly reflect the biases of their own social class. The upper echelons of Wall Street, academe and the media have been moving toward what passes for the "left" for over a generation. Ironically, this movement became most evident in the early 1960s in the elite support that gathered around Caroline's father, John, who brought with him into office "the best and brightest."
As historian Fred Siegel has noted, the Kennedy phenomena differed greatly – in both style and substance – from the "lunch pail" liberalism epitomized by President Harry Truman and, to an extent, that of both Lyndon Johnson and his vice president, Hubert Humphrey. Their Democratic party was sustained by appealing to the economic interests of working and middle-class Americans.
As opposed to gentry politics, whose bastions lay in fashionable urban districts and college towns, Truman-style democracy reached into the vast suburban dreamscape – even into small towns and rural areas.
Over recent years this version of the party, with its more geographically diverse middle-class base, has lost influence. It's been a process of both addition and subtraction.
A series of strong Republican politicians since Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan lured many middle-income voters out of the Democratic Party by appealing to their patriotism, economic self-interest and, in some cases, prejudices.
At the same time, the core of the elite liberal constituency – academics, high-tech businesspeople and media figures – has been growing steadily in wealth and influence. By marrying this constituency to poor minority voters, gentry liberals have turned our core urban areas into a collection of electoral "ditto heads," with so-called "progressives" winning as much as 70 or 80% of the vote in presidential elections.
This year's thrilling primary battle between Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama represented a clash of these two tendencies. Although Clinton herself enjoyed strong ties to some gentry liberals, she campaigned, particularly toward the end of the marathon, as Harry Truman in a bright pantsuit. Obama, for his part, sallied forth from a solid base of academics and well-educated professionals, as well as African Americans.  (emphases my own)

Caroline Kennedy became Ambasador to Japan as a participant trophy and America got another harpy in place of Hillary - Kirsten Gillbrand 
The Prog Dems have rewired the Democratic Party so that it is set to blow -up rather than divert the charted course.

Chris Kennedy found this out last week when he called out the conspiracy to kick people out of the city - his only mistake was in pointing only to the black people.  The Prog Dems want all middle class helots gone - White, Black, Brown and Rainbow.  If you refer to your Zipcode as a neighborhood, you gotta go.   If have a wife and kids - out you go.  You have the wrong attitude for a Smart-sized, secular, bike friendly urban paradise with plenty of green open space free of kids for community members with oodles of disposable cash, income and especially inherited wealth.

Chris Kennedy brought a torch into the cave created by the Sun Times, Chicago Tribune, WGN, WTTW, WBEZ, The Reader and the good folks at Disney where news is displayed with a pen-light. For that transgression he will have his liver eaten by Eric Zorn, Neil Steinberg, Mary Mitchell, Carol Marin and Mark Brown for weeks to come.

JB Pritzker is the Prog Dem's porkier Kirsten Gillibrand.  Chris Kennedy is a nice guy, but no Caroline Kennedy and Rahm and  Fred Eychaner are not about to appoint Mr. Kennedy Ambassador to Japan.

A great man wrote Nothings on the Square.

Chris Kennedy should take copy of it with him to read while the vultures gnaw on his liver.

Want to Get Illinois Out of Stupid? Pay Attention and Vote Erika Harold for Illinois Attorney General.

Erika Harold for Illinois Attorney General *- ASAP!

If are happy with your tax burden and the endless parade incompetent, larcenous and creepy elected officials in this City, County and State, vote the way you are told by the Chicago Tribune, Chicago Sun Times, WTTW, WBEZ, Crain's  NBC, WBBM, FOX 32, WGN, Chicago Business, The Reader and all of Fred Eychaner's Free Newsstand. 

Vote like Eric Zorn, Steve Chapman, Andy Shaw, Mike Flannery, Dane Placko, Chuck Goudie, Phil Ponce, Carol Marin, Mark Brown, Bruce Dold and Neil Steinberg.

That will ensure that, Sneedless to say, the buckshot, the upshot and the bullshot for Illinois will be JB Pritzker, Rahm Emanuel, Toni Preckwinkle and Kwame Rauol  in control City Hall, the County, the Governor's Mansion and, most importantly - Illinois Attorney General.

With 13 weeks till the primary election and Attorney General Lisa Madigan’s surprise decision not to seek re-election, Illinois voters have a crowded field of eight Democratic and two Republican candidates to choose from.

Though the Cook County Democratic Party last month crowned State Sen. Kwame Raoul, D-Chicago, as their choice, former Gov. Pat Quinn has secured the top ballot spot via a state lottery, which might help get him some votes. Raoul and Quinn are perhaps the most familiar names on the Democratic primary ballot.
In the Republican primary, Erika Harold — a Harvard-educated attorney and former Miss America who has the backing of the state’s Republican Party — faces Gary Grasso, a DuPage County Board member.  Sun Times

I don't know a thing about Mr. Grasso - probably a very nice gent. But, I know a little about Erika Harold.

This might be the only time you read about Erika Harold, Sneedless to say. Lisa Madigan was an access ticket for our lazy Illinois media and she had fourteen years of unexamined performance protecting Illinois politics from scrutiny.


Lisa Madigan has done nothing in her fourteen years as Attorney General but become the first woman to hold that office. 

Ms. Madigan argued successfully before the United States Supreme Court in Illinois v. Caballes," where the court reaffirmed the ability of police officers to use specially trained dogs without a search warrant or probable cause to detect the presence of illegal drugs during traffic stops."  Not exactly groundbreaking.

Ms. Madigan raised her profile by speaking out on many issues and accepted awards.

Illinois cork-screwed deeper into the rich soil of this State.

Kwame Rauol and Pat Quinn are equally challenged human beings, in fact the Lake Zurich Patch called them 'an unbeatbale ticket 2014.'  They lost, huge.

Now they face each other in duel of the challenged for Attorney General.   Pat Quinn secured the top spot on the ballot, but Kwame nailed imprimatur of the State Democratic Party.

The Illinois Attorney Generalshould not be a security blanket for crooks, cons, conniving creeps and cretins. Instead the States Attorney General's homepage reads like programming from NPR

• Advocating for Women
• Protecting the Environment
• Safeguarding children
• Advocating for the Older Citizens

Name one crook sent to the Illinois Corrections System by Lisa Madigan. Name one investigation of corporate collusion in the explosion of Pay Day/Car Title Loan industry in Illinois during Madigan's tenure.  

These Usury Utilities prey on the poor, but the Attorney General's Consumer Affairs site offers this advise to the desperate: 

Consider Other OptionsWith their extremely high interest rates and many charges and fees, small consumer loans, payday installment loans, and payday loans can quickly transform a short-term financial crisis into a long-term debt problem. You should exhaust all possible resources – family, church, friends – before you even consider taking out one of these high-cost loans.

Should you exhaust all possible resources -family, church, friends - turn to gun violence on yourself after you have been taken to court by the good folks at PLC Illinois.

Thanks Lisa!

Like President Obama, Erika Harold is Harvard Law Alumna and, unlike POTUS 44, a practicing attorney in Illinois with a list of legal achievements.

• When she was blessed with the opportunity to attend Harvard Law School, she was thrown a curveball. She couldn’t afford the tuition.
• But Erika didn’t give up. Lacking the funds to pay for school, she got creative. She decided to compete in the Miss America Organization to attempt to earn the scholarship money necessary to pay for law school.She won. And she used her platform to not only pay for school, but also to give back.

• As Miss America 2003, Erika became a national leader in the fight to end youth violence and bullying, sharing with more than 100,000 students her own experience of overcoming bullying. Erika was named one of Fight Crime, Invest in Kids’ “Champions for Children” and received a leadership award from the National Center for Victims of Crime.

• Upon graduating from Harvard Law School, Erika worked as an attorney in the litigation groups of Sidley Austin LLP and Burke, Warren, MacKay & Serritella, P.C.

• Erika represented businesses in commercial disputes and advised religious institutions in matters involving First Amendment protections. She also was active in the law firms’ respective legal education efforts, teaching students about the U.S. legal system as part of the Lawyers in the Classroom program and coaching a team of high school students in the City-Wide Mock Trial Competition. She was also part of the teaching faculty for Harvard Law School’s 2017 Trial Advocacy Workshop.

• In 2015, the Illinois Supreme Court appointed Erika to serve on the Illinois Supreme Court Committee on Equality.

• Erika is also a member of Trinity International University’s Board of Regents, and serves as a Commissioner on the Illinois Supreme Court Commission on Professionalism.

• Erika currently serves on the national board of directors of Prison Fellowship, the world’s largest outreach to prisoners and their families. In that capacity, she advocates for criminal justice reform.  She was also recently selected to the 2017 Emerging Lawyers list and was recognized in the categories of commercial litigation, civil rights/constitutional law.Erika Harold works as an attorney at Meyer Capel, one of Champaign County’s largest law firms.  

I doubt if Erika Harold will receive the Caroline Kennedy New Frontier Award, like Lisa Madigan, because Ms. Harold is not a child of nepotism, but she is willing open the books on Lisa's Dad and his minions, because, " Erika Harold knows that home is worth fighting for. That’s why she’s stepping up to take on Mike Madigan’s political machine."

Jeanne Ives should be linked arms with Erika Harold, ASAP.  Jeanne could point out all of the bones in Springfield graveyard of deals. 

That is something worth bucking the trend. 

Let's see if Illinois is ready to grow a pair. 

* My apologies - I had earlier confused States Attorney with the office of Attorney General.  My error was pointed out by a kind soul.  I am nothing, if not flawed.

Forrest Claypool is Never Down, Much Less Out. Watchdog that Head-Scratcher.

“I have fully acknowledged my mistakes in judgment and apologized,” Claypool said. “But I did not regret the passion for justice that led to that mistake.”

Claypool mistakes lying as the defense of justice for poor kids and that is why he will always have a job and another six figure pension in Illinois.

You see Forrest was doing a solid for  CPS General Counsel Ronald L. Marmer at the CPS Board , a pal.
   
This pal would throw your salary and my salary away - combined.  Pals like Ron always need more gelt.  That is why they can and do waste tax dollars in the public trough, while kids at Harper High and Oglesby Elementary learn . . .nothing.

Illinois is a stupid State.

• We elected Pat Quinn, after he proved what a ninny he was when Blago went to the joint.
• We elected GOP Bruce Rauner to hold a place for Prog-Dem Michigan Avenue Fats -aka JB Pritzker
• We worry about Mike Madigan and vote handsomely for his daughter
• We think a wedding dress is proof of residency
• We loved Toni Preckwinkle until the Pop Tax
• We elected Durbin and Duckworth to the Senate
• We elected Marque Kirque to the Senate
• We believe the idiotic media.
• We think Paul Simon Polls are not rigged
• We tolerate Forrest Claypool and his all too numerous ilk

I hate to kick a man when he is down.  I don't.  Forrest Claypool, the poster child for Illinois Grift and Illinois Attention Deficit Disorder,  is anything but down.

Forrest Claypool will never be down, unlike some Streets and Sanitation truckman, who might nod off on break in the cab of a big blue city truck and catch the camera eye of Chuck Goudie's I-Team, or Andy Shaw's BGA snitch patrol.  That guy will never work again in Cook County and his kids will be pulled out of St. Joseph the Worker Grammar School, or the Lou Rawls Charter School, because the tuition nut is too high. Forrest Claypool has amassed a fistful of pensions as well as all of the change that fell between the cushions on the 5th Floor, Chicago Parks, County Board, CTA and CPS.

I might even suggest that a little something must have landed in the side pockets of Claypool's Joseph A. Banks slacks from Ventra and Bombardier, were I a mean-spirited scandal monger.

Shucks, I don't work for the media.

Any way.  The Chicago media is more than reluctantly kicking grease and mud on Forrest's nicely tailored duds about fibbing to the General Inspector.

He will survive. He will survive.  Claypool will survive because he is such an unctuous weasel, practiced grifter,  a preening soul-less Progressive and habitual sneak.  In short, he is the perfect model of the WTTW, WBEZ approved Reformer.

He is passionate about justice and will lie his lath-like ass off to get justice.

Forrest resigned as CPS CEO.

Give him a solid twenty minutes and he will be appointed to another monster salary on our dimes.

I never kick a man when he is down.

Never. 

Life is Not a Seamless Garment -Book of Maccabees e.g.

 

 First Maccabees 1:10-15; 41-4310 From these there grew a wicked offshoot, Antiochus Epiphanes son of King Antiochus; once a hostage in Rome, he became king in the 107th year of the kingdom of the Greeks.11 It was then that there emerged from Israel a set of renegades who led many people astray. 'Come,' they said, 'let us ally ourselves with the gentiles surrounding us, for since we separated ourselves from them many misfortunes have overtaken us.'12 This proposal proved acceptable,13 and a number of the people eagerly approached the king, who authorised them to practise the gentiles' observances.14 So they built a gymnasium in Jerusalem, such as the gentiles have,15 disguised their circumcision, and abandoned the holy covenant, submitting to gentile rule as willing slaves of impiety.  . . .41 The king then issued a proclamation to his whole kingdom that all were to become a single people, each nation renouncing its particular customs.42 All the gentiles conformed to the king's decree,43 and many Israelites chose to accept his religion, sacrificing to idols and profaning the Sabbath.

 “We should be no less appalled by the indifference toward the thousands of people who die daily for lack of decent medical care; who are denied rights by a broken immigration system and by racism; who suffer in hunger, joblessness and want; who pay the price of violence in gun-saturated neighbourhoods; or who are executed by the state in the name of justice.” - Blase Cardinal Cupich, Archbishop of Chicago

Cardinal Cupich is very much like most Progressive Cook County Democrats ( Claypool, Preckwinkle, Quigley & etc), because he nails appointed positions, but just can't seem to get enough votes.  Recently Chicago's Archbishop, elevated by Pope Francis I and destined to be long associated with his pontificate, suffered a loss in an election of the National Conference of Bishops, to Archbishop Joseph Naumann:

Archbishop Joseph Naumann, by contrast, has argued that “issues that involve intrinsic evils – direct attacks on human life, abortion, euthanasia, embryonic stem cell research, or direct attacks on the institution of the family (for example, a redefinition of marriage to equate with same-sex unions or cohabitation) – must assume a moral priority. While all issues are important, all are not equally important from a moral analysis.”
Some observers, such as Christopher white(sic) of Crux, had framed the Cupich-Naumann vote in advance as a “referendum on both the conference’s approach to pro-life policies and Pope Francis”.
However, the editor of the Catholic News Agency, JD Flynn, tweeted after the vote: “CNA has talked with bishops who emphasis this is not a referendum on Francis. Bishops voting for both candidates told me it was only about trying to discern the best fit.” Catholic Herald

Today, at St. John  Fisher, Ray the Lector read the wonderful passage from the Book of Maccabees posted above and it got me to thinking about this vote and the state of goofy culture.

Going along to get along has won far too many elections for people who have no business crafting laws, let alone setting the table for human actions - especially with regard to moral and social justice issues. Seamless garments - one size fits all - have their  purposes, I suppose, but they do not  the necessarily present like a tightly tailored suit of ethical cloth.

Like this one from Deuteronomy

Learn Then that, I , I alone am God,
and there is no god besides me.
It is I who bring both death and life

Got it.

That will not play well on Chicago Tonight and WTTW, in general, but it just might get more cars in the parking lots of St. Cajetan, St. John Fisher and other parishes on a Sunday.

St. Odilo's 9:30 AM Mass was parked yesterday.  Just saying. 

Cardinal Blase Cupich - Exorcise Guns, Not Evil.

Guns kill people in the same way that pencils flunk exams.

The news media's most beloved Catholic leader, is Chicago Archbishop Cardinal Cupich.  Blase Cardinal Cupich is no Francis Cardinal George in that the media love Cupich's every utterance, teaching moment and close association with Cook County's political class, their operatives and their doctrines. The news media treated Cardinal George to an endless bed of nails.

Yesterday, Cardinal Cupich decried gun violence - not evil, but guns: assault rifles in particular.  Cardinal Cupich planted his crosier next to the banner of the Democratic Party in solidarity.

It’s not the first time that Cupich, a keen hunter and supporter of hunters’ rights, has called for tougher gun laws. But he was as pointed as he has been in his criticism of Republican politicians who toe the National Rifle Association’s line on gun control (President Donald Trump, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Paul Ryan have offered their prayers after Sunday’s atrocity, but none has supported an assault weapons ban).
“When the hunting sport has human prey, we have to take action,” Cupich said.

I would venture to guess that more human prey have been 'taken down' in human history by the long bow, spears and swords than all of the quadruped beings shot by hunters combined. From the Battle of Muye in 1046 BC, through Marathon in 490 BC and beyond Agincourt, scores of thousands of human beings perished by the sword, lance and arrow. Deer, ducks and  pheasant are shot seasonally for the table. Human beings kill one another, because of human evil.

There was and continues to be some serious evil going on with our species.

Time was, churchmen would encourage prayer and changes of heart.  Francis of Assisi was soldier before he turned from Satan. St. Ignatius Loyola, a wounded veteran, did the same.

Evil in men's hearts compels them to take up sword, lance, bow and the monster in Texas's a Ruger AR-556 rifle.

Devin Kelley slaughtered 26 worshippers in a Texas church - A Ruger AR-556 rifle did not.  In fact a brave man with a Ruger AR-556 rifle returned fire on the monster and chased him away from his desire to kill more people.

I venture to say that Devin Kelley was one very evil son of a bitch:

• Kelley was convicted of fracturing his baby stepson's skull and assaulting his first wife, Tessa, in the incident at Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico.

• He was confined for a year, given a bad conduct discharge and reduced in rank to E-1, or airman basic,  . . .  The military failed to enter the domestic violence case into a database that would have made it illegal for him to buy a gun, officials said.

• Records show his first wife divorced him in 2012 in New Mexico. . . .adding that she did not want to speak about him until she was interviewed by law enforcement.

• Kelley remarried in Texas in 2014. The status of that marriage was not clear, but authorities said there was a "domestic situation" with his in-laws.

This atheist preacher, Kelley, was going to kill worshipers  - and he did - with fire, flood, famine, or an AR-15. 

My Cardinal sees no evil at work here?  Cardinal Cupich sees an opportunity to 'get on the right side ' of the media and the elites who govern what is printed, presented and portrayed.  What troubles me, as a wildly flawed Catholic, is the oddness of the Cardinal's words on this evil event, “The time, however, for expressing sorrow and leaving it at that is over. It’s time to act. Let’s start with these high-powered weapons. Both state and federal law need to change to make these guns not available. We don’t need military weapons in our society. We’re not supposed to be at war with one another.” (emphases my own)

No, we are not. Guns do not go to war on us.  People do.

Things should never take on the qualities of a human being, created by God with a soul.  Human beings are blessed with free will, but an AR-556 is not.  A Ruger A-556, though banned in every Catholic parish in this Archdiocese along with every other ballistic discharging metal/composite tube, will never load its own magazine and make its own way into a Mosque, Synagogue, Basilica, Church, or Meeting House to do slaughter.  An evil human being will use a Ruger AR-556, a can a gasoline, ammonia and bleach, a machete, golf clubs, or a 24" tire iron to do what he wills.

Anthropomorphism is a mental exercise that gives human qualities to inanimate objects ( Demon Rum/Drug Abuse/Gun Violence & etc.) .  It can also help us understand God who is three Persons. It can also allow people to practice anthropomorphism in reverse and say, "It's not a human being/person, it's just a blob of tissue."  Pretend that there is such a thing as 'gun violence' and not criminal violence and we will watch the body count rise even higher. 

I was disappointed that my Cardinal did not demand a war on evil. That is something that my beloved Francis Cardinal George would have done.  He taught all of us that Satan was active in our world and that evil happens when we allow Satan to dictate our actions. No, Cardinal Blase Cupich knows that such a response would be scorned by the likes of Rahm Emanuel, E.J. Dionne, Michael Sneed, Michael Pfleger, Jim Acosta and Toni Preckwinkle.   

Rather, our society is free to continue to pretend that things control our lives.

Lynn Sweet Sweet on Bloomberg? Big Beverage and Little Voters Bad.

The Cook County pop tax: Conceived Nov. 10, 2016, when Cook County Board members approved the one-cent-per-ounce Sweetened Beverage Tax. Born on Aug. 2, 2017, its effective date. Date of death was decreed by a 15-2 repeal vote on Wednesday. The tax dies at the end of the county fiscal year, midnight on Nov. 30.
Bloomberg is crusading for higher taxes on sugary drinks as a way to reduce the obesity epidemic in this nation, with allies including the American Heart Association, active in the Cook County fight. Lynn Sweet Chicago Sun Times Cheerleader

Lynn Sweet really has a sweet gig.  Hang with the mighty and do their bidding.  Many of us out here in the fly-over land of helots are not so fortunate.

Lynn Sweet lists every government that took Mike Bloomberg's coin to kill Pop USA, as if any of these bought agencies matter to any of us.

Referendums in Oakland and Albany in 2016 approved the beverage tax, aligning these California East Bay cities with Berkeley, with a tax in effect since 2015.
Boulder and Seattle also have sweetened beverage taxes.
In 2017, however, Bloomberg’s team is hitting a rough patch when it comes to beverage taxes. Will the Cook County repeal give the beverage industry anti-tax drive momentum?

It do seem to be the case!

• Michigan state lawmakers took notice of the uproar in Cook County and last week, in a pre-emptive move, sent a bill to the governor to ban local governments from imposing soda taxes.
• On Oct. 4, the St. Helen, Oregon, city council voted down a sugar-sweetened beverage tax.
• On May 2, voters in Santa Fe, New Mexico, defeated a proposed 2-cents-per-ounce tax on sodas.
• Last spring, West Virginia state lawmakers dropped a beverage tax proposal.

Yeah, that Oakland CA is one head's up burg, Lynn, and Berkeley sends me too.

Not a bit. Not a sugary bit.

Try running a family owned gas station in Morgan Park, like Kean, and then have something like the Glorious Sugar Tax imposed upon your filling station, that also depends upon a steady flow of customers who not only gas up, but purchase pop, sweetened tea, Slurpees and sports drinks, as well.

A small fortune in revenue was lost over the past months thanks to a social engineering scam dressed up as a health issue to shore up political budgetary screw-ups.

Fat kids were not responsible for Cook County spending sprees:

. . . Preckwinkle sweetened the deal by giving each commissioner control over $500,000 in gas tax revenue to spend on transportation projects in their districts. She also rallied public health advocates to point out that downing fewer Mountain Dews could lead to a drop in obesity and diabetes.
Commissioners deadlocked, and Preckwinkle cast a rare, tie-breaking vote to impose the tax. If it hadn't gone as smoothly as Preckwinkle hoped, at least the new tax had passed, the budget was balanced and the heat was mostly on her.
Then it all started to unravel.
While the vote was taken in November 2016, providing plenty of distance from the March 2018 primary election, the tax wasn't scheduled to take effect until July 1.
The vagaries of federal law, the Illinois Constitution and state statutes meant it took months to come up with the rules of how the tax would be put in place, and changes were still being made late in the game.
For example, county officials at one point planned to tax low-income folks receiving Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits, but the state later told them that could not be done.

Not mention a sugary carrot to union County employees"

 However, it's worth noting that Teamsters Local 700 endorsed passage of the penny-an-ounce tax on sweetened beverages, saying at the time that it would "guarantee job security for hundreds of people that work for Cook County." The levy passed with Preckwinkle casting a tie-breaking vote.
It's also pertinent that Local 700 has been one of Preckwinkle's main campaign donors in recent years, with the Local and an affiliated Teamsters group using the same Park Ridge address giving her campaign fund at least $68,000 since 2014.
In the memo, Robinson is trying to build support for ratification and perhaps exaggerates a bit if only to look good.
The proposed pact includes some things taxpayers may like, with wages frozen the first year and then rising 2 percent across-the-the-board in each in the second and third years. "Step," or experience-based raises, also would be frozen for two years, but then be fully implemented.

Like the Proco Joe Chick Fil A Purge, Chicago and Cook County Values are not spun from Marilyn Katz's MK Communications, but born in the neighborhood values forge by faith and family.

Lynn Sweet of the Sun Times,  a very dependable Cook County, City of Chicago and Democratic Party cheerleader makes the argument that the Beverage Tax was merely a victory of Big Soda over Big Nanny Bloomberg. Not so.

People have had enough of this nonsense coming from political and media hacks.

People beefed loudly, because the steady streams of kids from St. Cajetan's, Clissold, Morgan Park and Chicago Ag School, as well as Mount Carmel, St. Rita, Mother McAuley, Brother Rice, Morgan Park Academy, Leo, Marist and legions of tradesmen, teachers, cops, firemen, retirees ad even an Alderman could not buy a bottle of pop, a Slurpee, or an Arizona Iced Tea without hitting a Pay Day Loan Center.

It is nice that some Cook County Commissioners were not totally tone deaf.

What would be nicer is a repeal of Cook County Ofiice Holders universal.

Sweet.

Dogmatic Dicky Durbin Does Doctrine Duty - Abortion Doctrine

• Dogma - “a doctrine or body of doctrines concerning faith or morals formally stated and authoritatively proclaimed by a church.” 
• U.S. Constitution - “no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Officer or public Trust under the United States.” Article VI
• Dick Durbin - “Do you consider yourself an orthodox Catholic?”
• Cecile Richards - Planned Parenthood Harpy - “In times like these, you can’t underestimate the importance of leadership.  Planned Parenthood thanks Senator Durbin for fighting for a woman’s access to essential health care no matter where she lives,”

Senator Dick Durbin is nothing if not a clown; an oafish clown at that.

Even the Chicago Tribune Editorial Board of Bruce Dold has been forced to offer a very grudging and tepid criticism of Senator Dick Durbin's oafish treatment of a candidate for the Federal Bench.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., told Barrett that “the dogma lives loudly within you” and worried that it might take priority over the impartial administration of justice. Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois asked, “Do you consider yourself an orthodox Catholic?”

It may seem out of bounds for senators to raise the matter of how a judge’s Catholic faith would affect her decisions. But the senators didn’t raise it; Barrett did, in a 1998 law review article examining the obligations of Catholic judges in death penalty cases. It concluded that judges faithful to church teachings “are morally precluded from enforcing the death penalty.. . . Given that Barrett said judges shouldn’t let religious faith dictate their decisions, the exact content of her Catholicism, which Durbin wondered about, is irrelevant. He and Feinstein also erred by putting the issue in terms that could easily be interpreted to mean they distrust devout Catholics. That gave Barrett’s supporters room to accuse them of indulging bigotry and imposing a religious test for office.
It’s an implausible charge on its face. Both voted to confirm John Roberts and Sonia Sotomayor, who are Catholics. So, by the way, is Durbin, and Feinstein graduated from a Catholic high school.”

Without offering the slightest suggestion of Progressive Secularist Orthodoxy within the twin Senators' Inquisition, the Chicago Tribune  failed to call-out real bigotry. Feinstein and Durbin 'tested's.Barrett's faith in order to block her appointment to the Federal Bench.

The official religion of the Democratic Party and a very husky hunk of the GOP is Progressive Secularism and worship at the altars of Diversity, Mother Earth, Abortion, Globalism and Oligarchy is all but legislated.

Chicago Tribune columnist and political Latitudinarian John Kass, honestly reported and commented on the oafish and obvious dogmatism of politicians in the pay of Planned Parenthood. This writing savaged the bumptious Durbin.

Bruce Dold seemed compelled to toss out some dish water prose to wash away the blood on Durbin's face.

Durbin went all witch-hunt on Ms. Barrett, in order to show fealty to Planned Parenthood's blood money.

Arthur Miller would have shivered the timbers of the Commonwealth were he alive to pen a new Crucible.

You see, Durbin, is a renegade.  He took the coin of the industry most out of orbit of the Roman Catholic Church - the Abortion Industry.  He not only took the coin but used the office of United States Senator to further its power and influence.

The Catholic Ordinary of the Diocese of Springfield, Bishop Thomas Paprocki noted this in 2014 -

“Senator Durbin was informed several years ago by his pastor at Blessed Sacrament Parish here in Springfield that he was not permitted to receive Holy Communion per canon 915 of the Code of Canon Law,” Bishop Paprocki reportedly wrote in response to a pro-life activist's query, the Illinois Review reported. “My predecessor upheld that decision and it remains in effect. It is my understanding that the senator is complying with that decision here in the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois.”
Canon 915 states that those who have been "obstinately persevering in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to holy communion."

No taking of the Eucharist for Durbin in his home diocese, but I am certain he will be admitted to the rail at Holy Name Cathedral, where Pastor Pfleger-approved Cardinal Cupich welcomes political powerhouses.  Take that like  doctrine, brothers and sisters, because Cardinal Blase Cupich will offer no criticism of Durbin, Emmanuel, Preckwinkle, Pfleger or Duckworth.  He will offer no reminders to his media friends, Michael Sneed, Carol Marin, Mary Schmich, or Rex Hupke that the media must afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted.

Cardinal Cupich wants to be loved, by the powerful and their stooges - he is. He banned guns from Catholic Churches.  This Sunday I will leave my 9mm on the kitchen counter where it belongs, Priase Jesus!

The Rev. Michael Pfleger, pastor of St. Sabina Catholic Church and a prominent activist against gun rights, said after surveying clergy, the late Cardinal Francis George chose to leave it up to priests to ban firearms from individual parishes. On Tuesday, Pfleger praised Cupich's decree.
"There has been this kind of madness, in my mind, a growing obsession that guns are needed to be safe," he said, adding, "With that reality growing day by day, it is a tremendous statement for the cardinal to say for the church, we are not buying into this madness. In our buildings and our properties, we are not going to allow guns."  

Guns kill people, like pencils flunk tests.

Cupich sought and received the imprimatur of Pastor Pfleger and wears it like his pallium.

Even Mary Schmich, aswell as The Seeker Manya Brachear,  says nice things about Cardinal Blase.

Cardinal George afflicted the powerful and comforted the powerless.  Cardinal George acted more than he proclaimed.

Cardinal George did that and the stooge media detested the man.

Durbin is living Progressive Secularist Dogma.

He only turns to the faith of his fathers when he needs a photo op with some Knights of Columbus.

Dogma Dicky Durbin does doctrine.  He is clown, but a very dangerous and powerful clown

POP! . . . goes to Will County

"The beverage tax is not the cause nor the solution to Cook County's financial challenges," said Brian Jordan, president of the Illinois Food Retailers Association.

Didn't sound like much back in July, but now this could be slogan of a Cook County counter-revolution.  Store counter, that is.  The irony of the photo above is just magical.

The Signs of a Cook County tax are everywhere! Bi-lingual of course, but printed in non-union shops to save costs.

A Radical Idea from Your Betters!  -Idea radical de tus superiores!

Way to Tax! Viva!  -Larga vida a los impuestos!

Fight Fat Asses!  No más culos gordos!

Think of the Children, Bitches!- ¡Piensa en los niños, putas!

Let's Give Toni Some Sugar! -Vamos a darle a Toni un poco de azúcar!


Well, Supersize my cynicism!  Toni Preckwinkle, the most humorless and gormless of all government goons, shopped for an found a judge to jam this Sweetened Beverage Tax up, down  or into any orifice considered by individual Cook County residents the most . . .uncomfortable.

CHICAGO — Diet Coke heads, take note: just because the sugar in your pop is fake, you'll still be paying more for it starting Wednesday as Cook County's sweetened beverage tax finally goes into effect, adding a penny per ounce to the cost of bottled drinks.
The tax will hike the price of a 2-liter bottle by 68 cents and a six-pack by 72 cents.
Though often dubbed the "pop tax," the fee, narrowly approved in November 2016 by the Cook County Board, actually applies to hundreds of beverages beyond soft drinks.
The tax is expected to raise $200 million a year for Cook County, which the county needs to keep its books out of the red, according to Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle.

Every ounce of sugary liquid sends a penny to the Cook Coffers.  Gee, what could go wrong?

Pennies from heaven?  Nah, more like corpses stacked high in Toni' crypt until carted off to some subterranean cold storage.  I imagine the 40 oz slurpees purchased  at Kean Gas Station by County, City and State workers added to the larder until . . .Friday.

Then, like so many Chicago residents did with the idiotic plastic bag tax, residents will hop in the Prius and hybrid over to County Line road south, west and north to pick up cases of Mountain Dew, Fanta, Wildwood, Dr. Pepper and his collegaues Dr.s Bold, Skippy and Becker, Sweetened teas and all manner of Gatorades.

At the 7-11 on 111th & Kedzi,  a 28 ounce frozen drink (Slurpee, Slushie, or Whatever) bounces up from blue collar $ 1.75 to the Majestic price of $ 2.03.

Do the math. 12 ounces = 12 more cents and on and on.

Buy a Cook County Case of Coke and that is 288 pennies to Toni! $2.88 on top of City and County taxes already stamped to your receipt.

I expect Slushee sales to sink.

Will, DuPage and Lake Counties can expect a spike in sales of sugary drinks and the State of Indiana will be selling pop like fireworks.

Cook County residents voted all too happily for the obtuse Xanthipe, who ran poor old Zeus off to the Zamboanga, knowing that Todd Stroger could not do worse, will spend more gas buying pop in Peotone and Palatine, in the dim hope that they might come out a bit ahead.

Can't happen, Neighbor. 

We screwed our beds and must lay in them.

Pop goes the weasels like clockwork.

Sweet PR for Wee Mike Quigley - Collusion of the Media with American Oligarchs

"A byproduct of Quigley’s membership on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence — and its investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 election — has been to raise the national profile of the North Side lawmaker, who has become a frequent guest on cable shows discussing the probe. "-  Lynn "Sweetheart of the Clown Rodeo" Sweet: Chicago Sun Times

When was the last time Lynn Sweet did a puff PR piece, wrapped as news, for any Illinois member of Congress, other than spotted cows and incestuous cousins of the Progressive Cook County Democrats?

Dan Lipinski? Only when he was a super-delegate for the Democratic Convention and threatened to cast his vote for Bernie Sanders.

“As a Democratic member of Congress, I have a vote at the Democratic National Convention as a superdelegate. Before the Illinois primary I told Democrats in the 3rd District that I decided that I would pledge my vote to whichever candidate won the district,” Lipinski told the Sun-Times in an email.

Bernie whupped Hillary here in the 3rd District , during the Illinois primary.  Sweet tried to toss sand in Illinois Speaker Mike Madigan's eyes, for not coming through for HRC - the choice of the Cook County Banana Republic.

Pete Roskam?  Only to to shill for the laboriously obnoxious Cheri Bustos and toxic Illinois Personal PAC- aka Abortions R Us.

WASHINGTON — Seeing cracks in once solid GOP suburban Chicago turf, Democrats are promising to give Rep. Peter Roskam, R-Ill., his biggest race since he was first elected in 2006.
“There are at last count 22 different people looking to take him on,” said Rep. Cheri Bustos, D-Ill., on the recruitment team for the national Dem House political shop, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

Nope.  Only the lumps and loonies of the IVI-IPO Mikva Challenged Young Pioneer Progressives machine get kindness - Daley, Durbin, Obama, Quinn, Preckwinkle, Dart (formerly 19th Ward - currently?  Not so much), Schawosky, Deb Mell, Bobby Rush, Danny Davis and Dave Orr are all Lynn Sweetie Pies.

Today, the man who helped Buck Toothed Dave Orr, Cook County Clerk,  make voting easy to hack in 2006, Congressman Mike Quigley (D-himself), who found Borscht  on the Russian Tea Time menu and announced the Ivans in the electoral woodpile!  Quigley was appointed to the House Select Committee on Intelligence by no less a mental giant than Nancy Pelosi.  Wee Mike, who had been Alderman Bernie Hansen's rat-catcher, bag-man, stooge and minion back in the 1980's shaking down real estate and gay bars, has bounded his stumpy legs up and onto greater seats of power -Cook County Commissioner and U.S.  Congressman on such powerful committees as  Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government (FSGG) and the Subcommittee on Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies (THUD).

THUD - total boondoggle!

Lynn Sweet is not concerned that piggy little Mike Quigley has his practiced chubby fingers very deep in the Federal cookie jar, because she knows that Progressive only steal ( make clever investments) out of love for children, elderly Black folks and Dreamers.

You see, Mike Quigley is using his Congressional high stool to unhorse Jared Kushner and quicken the exit of President Trump, before he drains the lucrative swamp that waters Lynn Sweet's NPR, CNN, MSNBC and newtwork face time, as well as the Federal funds siphoned from the streams of plenty to the Cook County Banana Republic.

Instead, Lynn Sweet cheer leads for Team Banana Republic.

The 11-page statement Kushner released through his attorney before he headed to Capitol Hill filled in blanks and put a lot more on the table — such as a meeting now-former Russia Ambassador to the U.S. Sergey Kislyak brokered between Kushner with Sergey Gorkov, the head of a Kremlin-linked Russian bank.
Quigley told me his questions would dive into more than what Kushner offered up in his statement, such as the basic, “Why did you meet with the Russian banker?

”Quigley said there is more to be learned about why Kushner even entertained the notion that he go to the Russian embassy to get a secure line for a conversation. Said Quigley, “You would assume that the Russian ambassador was laughing inside.”

You would assume that Mike Quigley would be worried about some smart, honest and courageous investigative journalist combing through the minutes of the Cook County Board in 2006 and grubby little Mike's paws all over collusion with the Venzuelan Voting Machines along with CPS Czar Forrest Claypool and Dave Orr in collusion with real Russian hacking and vote tampering.

You would assume that, but this is Cook County - The Banana Republic that shakes the federal Trees.
Thud!

Sweet.

Payback Really is a Bitch! Cook County Purge of Teamsters, Guards and Anyone Toni Preckwinkle Don't Like.

Hyde Park 2006 Independence Day parade (left to right starting at center in light green): Preckwinkle as the Statue of Liberty, Illinois State Representative Barbara Flynn Currie as Uncle Sam, and Chicago City Council Alderman Leslie Hairston as Betsy Ross

I did a buddy of mine a solid. He asked me to help get Pat Quinn elected Governor for real in 2009 and Pat would do my buddy a solid.  I was dubious.  No Progressive ever does any one a solid.   I am old school; I supported and voted for Pat Quinn for Governor. I still need a shower on that one.

That sin of mine is the real reason why Chicago, Cook County and the State of Illinois are so screwed up.

We all do 'nice people,' a solid.

Jeremy Bentham, the great 19th Century economist argued for the greatest good for the greatest number of people.  Can't argue with that.

However, for a Progressive, the greatest number is # 1.  That truth was argued to young President Teddy Roosevelt by glaciologist John Muir and still holds true today.

I did a buddy a solid and did not vote my own conscience.  I detested Pat Quinn's politics going all of the way back to the days when he carried water for a crook and a Progressive - Governor Dan Walker.
Quinn opposed all regular Democrats, because he wanted to be viewed as a Reformer ( aka - unskilled policy bully).

The Late Illinois Senate Leader Phil Rock was a Democrat of the old school - anti-abortion, anti-Marxist and true to the values that created the greatest standard of living in world history. Phil Rock kept goofs like Quinn at arm's length.  That was long ago, when being middle class was a good thing.

Pat Quinn and Dan Walker and Abner Mikva and Dawn Clark Netsch and Bill Singer and Jesse Jackson and Michael Shakman and Larry Bloom and Toni Preckwinkle and the late Red guru Dr. Quentin Young were dead set against  this middle class hegemony.

Toni Preckwinkle was a Catholic high school ( Visitation), when Pat Quinn was honing his Hyde Park Mafia ( Abner Mikva) chops.  Preckwinkle had a reputation as a humorless, racist ( hates whitey) and not very well read history instructor and those qualities made her an ideal candidate for IVI-IPO Democrats.

It took Toni three swings  with the IVI bat to unseat Tim Evans for Alderman of the 4th Ward, but the rest is the typical Progressive history - suck up to Regular Democrats, gain their trust, knife them in the kidneys and repeat, repeat, repeat and repeat while keeping the media with you.

Sometimes, the Feds get in the way of Progressive Independent and Reform minded Democrats -Larry Bloom (neighboring 5th Ward Alderman), IVI-IPO operative Bob Creamer and Illinois Governors Dan Walker and Rod Blagojevich come to mind.

When Reformer Larry Bloom went to school in 1999, Mikva Challenged Federal Judge was wont to complain about Federal prosecutors for  "prosecutorial zeal does not, as I perceive it, justify overstatements of the nature I find in some respects in this case."  Convict Larry Bloom whined, "I was mugged--not by any petty thief or street tough, but by agents of my government, our government."

Translated - "Larry Stole and cheated on his taxes but criminy . . .he's a Goo-Goo!"

Thus far, Toni Preckwinkle has escaped the eyes of the Feds.  Therefore, Toni Preckwinkle does what she wants and to whom she wants. It is now the Teamsters, who work for Progressive rival Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart.

Tit for tat?

Or a case of unintended consequences?

Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart’s office just got a letter from Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle listing 925 positions designated for layoffs — if a judge doesn’t allow a countywide sweet beverage tax to take effect by August.
• The kicker: Sneed is told 377 of those jobs, many of them held by Cook County Jail correctional officers, are held by members of the Chicago Teamsters Union.
So here’s the kick in the butt.
Recently, the Teamsters Union took out a full-page newspaper ad opposing the tax, which Preckwinkle vigorously backed.
“This sure looked like a shot across the bow,” a top Sneed source said.
“Or interesting timing that many of the designated layoffs were members of the Teamsters Union, which took out the ad opposing the tax,” the source said.

You see, Teamsters not only work as Correctional personnel, but also deliver Pop. Pop is a Progressive target, because fat kids love it and it rots teeth, creates obesity and goes great with salty snacks.

Teamsters deliver salty snacks.

Teamsters also deliver votes.

Let's get back to my sins.

I agreed to do a pal a solid.  I helped support Pat Quinn for Governor.  Running with daffy Pat filling the void left by reformer Rod Blagojevich, for trying to sell  a Senate seat to IVI-IPO Alumnus Barack Obama, was Toni Preckwinkle for President of Cook County Board to unseat Todd Stroger, created by Progressive patron Tom Hynes, to replace the late John Stroger, a Regular Democrat and gentleman to the backbone.

My pal was immediately stabbed in the back by Pat Quinn upon his election, because Quinn has the loyalty of a gnat.

Toni Preckwinkle rode Quinn's coat-tails, because of people like me.  I did a pal a solid and created the person taking jobs away from 925 families in Cook County.

That's Progressive.  Get people to do you a solid and then give it to them good and hard.

As Progressive Federal Judge Milton Shadur lamented when he was forced to sentence Reformer Larry Bloom, "It is true of law-enforcement agencies in addition to anyone else that if you lie down with dogs, you are likely to get up with fleas."

As the great Fats Waller once reasoned, " One never knows, Do One?"

Ain't that a Bitch, Judge?