As a recent New America Foundation report makes clear, precious little has gone to the productive side of the economy that determines the country’s competitiveness and creates many high-paying blue-collar jobs. Infrastructure, a critical component of any productivity-enhancing strategy, has accounted for barely 10 percent of the package.
The results have not been pretty for the productive sectors of the economy. Construction workers now have higher than 19 percent unemployment; jobs in this sector have fallen during the past year in 333 out of 352 metropolitan areas, with more than 200 plunging by double digits. Meanwhile, the hard-pressed manufacturing sector suffers more than 12 percent unemployment.
Why this disinclination to fund the tangible parts of the economy? One reason may be that those working in construction and manufacturing — both blue-collar workers and white-collar professionals — do not wield the same influence in this law review administration as college professors, Service Employees International Union-organized workers or unionized teachers.
One also senses that some militant environmentalists in the administration may be less than enthusiastic about anything associated with the entire carbon-creating part of the economy. Certainly, new factories, natural gas facilities, roads, ports and waterways don’t fit the professed passion of the president’s own science adviser, John Holdren, for the gradual “de-development” of the U.S. and other advanced economies.
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On November 19, 1904 in Lemont, Illinois, Chicago chauffeur Billy Bate was found slumped behind the wheel of his Toledo touring car. He'd been shot in the head execution-style, making him the first recorded victim of the now-infamous one-way ride. Although the authorities launched a nationwide manhunt for 'Mr. Dove', his last known passenger and probable killer, their efforts were unsuccessful and the Bate Auto Murder remains unsolved. This 12-page ebook includes photos of the victim and the death car. It's a story of big city violence in rural surroundings, and marks a trend that continues to this day.
Published Books:
Guns and Roses: The Untold Story of Dean O'Banion, Chicago's Big Shot Before Al Capone. Cumberland House Publishing (Nashville, TN) 2004
The Man Who Got Away: the Bugs Moran Story. Cumberland House Publishing (Nashville, TN) 2004
The Starker: Big Jack Zelig, the Becker-Rosenthal Case of 1912, and the Advent of the Jewish Gangster. Cumberland House Publishing (Nashville, TN) 2008
Professional Affiliations:
Member, the Writer's Union of Canada
Radio, Television, and Film Appearances:
"Talkline with Zev Brenner", WSNR 620 AM(NY) (November 2008)
"Dave Gordon Radio Show Show", ThatRadio.com (October 2008)
"Our Gotham",www.monk1903.com (June 2008)
"Bulldog and The Rude Awakening Show", WOCM-FM 98.1 (June 2008)
"Mobs In America", Abu Media Ireland (August 2007)
"Man, Moment, and Machine" History Channel televised special (November 2006)
"Young Indiana Jones" DVD Series- consulting expert (July 2006)
"Paddy Whacked": the Irish Mob History Channel televised special (March 2006)
Dave Strauss Radio Show, KTRS St. Louis (February 2006)
The Radio Detective, with Jerry Pearce (March 2004)
WBIG AM with William Kelly (March 2004)
Web and Magazine Articles (author) :
"Max 'Kid Twist' Zweifach - Leader of Monk Eastman Gang ." J*Grit- the Internet Index of Tough Jews, January 2009
"Big Jack Zelig - Lower East Side Gang Leader." J*Grit- the Internet Index of Tough Jews, January 2009
"Rose Rossi- First Victim of the One-Way Ride?" On The Spot Journal, Fall 2008
"The Fighting Parson: Remembering the Reverend Leslie Spracklin, Canada's Elliot Ness." On The Spot Journal, Volume 1, Issue 5, Winter 2007
"A Buck A Fist: Dopey Benny Fein and New York's Labor Wars". On the Spot Journal, Volume 1, Issue 3, Spring 2007
"Labor Pain: Mossy Enright and Chicago's Labor Wars". On the Spot Journal, Volume 1, Issue 1, Fall 2006
"Mary Ward: The First Fatal Automobile Accident". History Magazine, Volume 8, Number 2, December / January 2007
Personal Appearances:
Golden Age of Gangsters Convention, Itasca, Illinois, September 2004
Contributing Author / Expert:
The Most Evil Mobsters in History, by Lauren Carter. Michael O'Mara Books Ltd, London, England, UK 2004
Public Enemies: America's Criminal Past 1919-1940, by Rick Mattix and William J. Helmer. Cumberland House Publishing, (Nashville, TN), 2007
Bad Seeds In The Big Apple, by Pat Downey
President Obama will drink Bud Light at the Thursday meeting with the African-American professor and white police officer who got in a dust-up earlier this month. Press secretary Robert Gibbs just made the announcement to the press pool on Air Force One
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg defended a city program to send homeless families out of New York on planes, trains and buses on Wednesday, saying it “saves the taxpayers of New York City an enormous amount of money.”
Speaking in the Blue Room in City Hall to announce a new finance commissioner, Mr. Bloomberg was asked if the program simply shifts the homelessness program to a different place, as some critics of the program have suggested.
“I don’t know, when they get to the other places, whether they find jobs,” Mr. Bloomberg said. “It may be an easier place for them. If we don’t — we either have two choices. We can do this program or pay an enormous amount of money daily to provide housing.”
It costs the city about $36,000 a year to provide shelter for a homeless family. The average stay in shelter is about nine months.
Chicago’s first openly gay alderman today re-opened the volatile debate about whether City Hall should establish contract set-asides for businesses owned by lesbian, gay, bi-sexual and transgendered residents.
Six years after raising the issue only to drop it like a hot potato, Ald. Tom Tunney (44th) brought it up again during a Budget Committee hearing called to extend until 2015 a construction set-aside ordinance for minorities and women. Today, Tunney was hardpressed to explain how someone would prove they’re gay to qualify for a city set-aside — especially after the seemingly endless string of stories about minority business fraud.
“Qualified domestic partners. That could be one factor,” the alderman said.
He added, “That’s why there’s nothing passed yet in any municipality. We still need to work on the definition.”
When the Judge says, in speaking on this subject, that I make speeches of one sort for the people of the northern end of the State, and of a different sort for the southern people, he assumes that I do not understand that my speeches will be put in print and read North and South. I knew all the while that the speech that I made at Chicago, and the one I made at Jonesboro and the one at Charleston, would all be put in print, and all the reading and intelligent men in the community would see them and know all about my opinions. And I have not supposed, and do not now suppose, that there is any conflict whatever between them. But the Judge will have it that if we do not confess that there is a sort of inequality between the white and black races, which justifies us in making them slaves, we must then insist that there is a degree of equality that requires us to make them our wives. Now, I have all the while taken a broad distinction in regard to that matter; and that is all there is in these different speeches which he arrays here; and the entire reading of either of the speeches will show that that distinction was made. Perhaps by taking two parts of the same speech he could have got up as much of a conflict as the one he has found. I have all the while maintained that in so far as it should be insisted that there was an equality between the white and black races that should produce a perfect social and political equality, it was an impossibility. This you have seen in my printed speeches, and with it I have said, that in their right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” as proclaimed in that old Declaration, the inferior races are our equals. And these declarations I have constantly made in reference to the abstract moral question, to contemplate and consider when we are legislating about any new country which is not already cursed with the actual presence of the evil,—slavery. I have never manifested any impatience with the necessities that spring from the actual presence of black people amongst us, and the actual existence of slavery amongst us where it does already exist; but I have insisted that, in legislating for new countries where it does not exist, there is no just rule other than that of moral and abstract right! With reference to those new countries, those maxims as to the right of a people to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” were the just rules to be constantly referred to. There is no misunderstanding this, except by men interested to misunderstand it. I take it that I have to address an intelligent and reading community, who will peruse what I say, weigh it, and then judge whether I advance improper or unsound views, or whether I advance hypocritical and deceptive, and contrary views in different portions of the country.
Gov. Pat Quinn and Comptroller Dan Hynes traded the first shots Friday in next year's Democratic primary battle for governor over who's more culpable for the state's financial woes.
The governor called Hynes a "no show" on tough budget choices, while Hynes' campaign accused Quinn of keeping quiet while disgraced former Gov. Rod Blagojevich "drove our state into a ditch.". . . "When you get in the arena, you've got to make decisions," Quinn said. "You can't stand on the side of the road and not take part in tough battles. You can't be a no show. You can't just show up and say, 'Hey, I want to be elected to something.' I think you have to show you have the courage of your convictions to stand in the arena, take tough positions, do hard things because that's what the public demands."
But Hynes campaign spokesman Michael Rendina disputed Quinn's characterization, noting Hynes has proposed $1.2 billion in cuts to the state budget along with $1.8 billion in new money by legalizing more casinos, closing business tax breaks and expanding the sales tax to luxury items. Hynes had been critical of inconsistencies behind Quinn's failed push for an income-tax increase and questioned why the governor hadn't made cuts to try to win public support.
"Gov. Quinn is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts. After Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn spent six years in silence watching Rod Blagojevich drive our state into a ditch, it is puzzling that he describes a 50 percent income tax increase on Illinois families as leadership," Rendina said
Born in 1948 in Hinsdale, Illinois, Quinn attended the local Catholic grade school, St. Isaac Jogues. He graduated in 1967 from Fenwick High School, a Catholic school in Oak Park, Illinois run by the Dominican Order of Priests[1]. While a student at Fenwick, Quinn was the cross-country team captain and the sports editor of the school newspaper. Quinn went on to graduate Phi Beta Kappa from Georgetown University in 1971 with a bachelor's degree from the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service. After taking a few years off from education, he received a Juris Doctor degree from Northwestern University School of Law in 1980.[2]
Quinn is divorced and has two sons, Patrick IV and David, born on April 12, 1983, and December 16, 1984, respectively. Both sons, like their father, competed in scholastic sports, specializing in track and field events.[3]
Quinn was briefly a practicing tax attorney before his career in public office.
Overall, 49% of voters say they at least somewhat approve of the President's performance. Today marks the first time his overall approval rating has ever fallen below 50% among Likely Voters nationwide. Fifty-one percent (51%) disapprove.
"I mean, if I was trying to jigger into -- well, I guess this is my house now, so -- it probably wouldn't happen.President Barack Obama June 22, 2009
"But let's say my old house in Chicago -- here I'd get shot."
WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama said Wednesday that police acted "stupidly" in the arrest of prominent black scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. and that despite racial progress blacks and Hispanics are still singled out unfairly for arrest.http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009...est=latestnews
"This still haunts us," Obama said.
Obama called Gates a friend, and said he doesn't know all the facts of the case. Nonetheless, Obama said, anyone would have been angry if treated the way Gates claims police in Cambridge, Mass., treated him. Gates, a Harvard University professor, claims he was arrested in his home after showing ID to police who responded to a report of a possible burglary.
"Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof he was in own home," Obama said during a prime-time news conference that otherwise focused on the health care debate.
Gates' arrest followed a report of a possible burglary. A woman apparently saw Gates force the front door and called police. Police came and demanded that Gates show identification. Gates was arrested shortly afterward for alleged disorderly conduct, a charge that was dropped Tuesday.
"What I think we know separate and apart from this incident is that there's a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately," Obama said. "That's just a fact."
That disparity is a reminder that "race remains a factor in the society," Obama said.
The nation's first black president held himself up as testament to what he called the "incredible progress" minorities have achieved.
The police sergeant accused of racism after he arrested Gates insisted Wednesday that he won't apologize.
Police say Gates at first refused to display ID and then accused the officer of racism.
Sgt. James Crowley said he followed proper procedures in arresting Gates.
Standing in the stately East Room of the White House where he now lives, Obama allowed some humor into the discussion.
Obama ticked off the reported facts of the Gates case -- starting with Gates apparently forgetting his keys and jimmying the door. Police responded appropriately at first, Obama said.
"I mean, if I was trying to jigger into ...," Obama began, and then trailed off as reporters laughed. Obama laughed, too. "Well, I guess this is my house, now so it probably wouldn't happen."
Obama said he could understand police responding in good faith if he was forcing his way into his old house in Chicago.
"Here I'd get shot," he joked.
Cambridge police Sergeant James Crowley declined today to criticize President Obama for saying Wednesday night that police "acted stupidly" in the arrest last week of Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr., but he did say it was "regrettable" that anyone would speak without knowing the "whole story" of the confrontation a week ago at Gates's home near Harvard Square
Gates said he does not think that anything he did justified the officer's actions. He walks with a cane and said he did not pose a threat.
"I weigh 150 pounds and I'm 5-7. I'm going to give flak to a big white guy with a gun. I might wolf later, but I won't wolf then."
Like Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr., I am interracially married, currently live in a predominantly white neighborhood, have a healthy respect for armed men wearing uniforms, and have had the police come to my house in a confrontational manner, doing the job they're paid to do.
It happened when our house alarm went off at 2 a.m. a few months ago, on a night the electricity was off and the neighborhood was dark as pitch. WANH!! WANH!! WANH!! It sent my wife and me leaping out of bed. I sprinted downstairs with a baseball bat, our Rottweiler and a flashlight to confront any possible intruder. I checked all the windows and doors, the dog yawned, and it quickly became apparent that there was a short circuit from a rear door.
My wife called the alarm company and gave them the code for a false alert.
Then two cops showed up.
The first thing they did was ask me to step outside. The second thing they did was to ask me for my identification, to prove that I lived there. They were demanding and they were not friendly. They kept their flashlights in my face. They did not take my word for it that it was my house, though I was as white as they were.
Once I showed them my driver's license with the address, they asked if anyone else was inside, and then they asked if they could look around the place.
I was irritable in that middle-of-the-night kind of way, but it did not occur to me that they might be picking on us, the salt-and-pepper couple on the block. What occurred to me was that they got a call about a home alarm going off and they had to secure the premises before they could leave. And I was thrilled to have them search the entire house, because my wife's 9-year-old daughter was murdered in a home invasion in Silver Spring six years ago. The police came running then, too, but it was too late.
At 4 P.M. Nancy's father went to the town house and discovered their bodies lying faceup in the basement. Richard had been handcuffed and shot in the back of the head. Nancy had been shot in the elbow, side and stomach. With her finger, she had tried to scrawl a message in blood. At first, rumors circulated that the letters spelled IRA. Later, police concluded that the message was a heart next to the letter U.
CORRUPT NEWS MEDIA personified by TV anchorwoman Carol Marin in my case, abetted the MI5/FBI criminals the same way they abetted the Omagh perpetrators - by blaming it on the RIRA and, by extension, McKevitt. Within days of the Langert massacre Buckley got Marin to announce on prime-time network TV that “the IRA are linked to Langert murders.” When I phoned her the next day to learn the basis for her “scoop,’ she told me that her source was “an FBI agent.” When I asked her how she had met her responsibility to verify it she said she had not done so but had accepted the uncorroborated word of the FBI. She never issued a correction; and the rest of the news media parroted her lies.
The one place lawmen apparently did not pay enough attention to was the town of Winnetka itself. But at the community's highly regarded New Trier Township High School, senior David Biro, 17, a lanky honor student known for his biting sarcasm and perverse humor, mockingly bragged to classmates that he had shot the Langerts. Accustomed to Biro's frequent claims that he was a hired assassin, drug dealer and street-gang member, most of his fellow students did not take him seriously. Finally, however, one of Biro's schoolmates decided that there was more to the boy's claims than mere braggadocio. Early last month he told Winnetka police what Biro had been saying. Investigators listened closely, since Biro had mentioned details of the murders that had never been publicly released.
It wasn't the first time Biro had caught the eye of police. According to friends—all of Biro's acquaintances cited in this article have insisted on anonymity since they are potential court witnesses—he was admitted to Charter Barclay, a psychiatric hospital in Chicago, three years ago after reportedly trying to poison his parents, brother and sister with tainted milk. Since then he had been stopped by police for a series of minor infractions. When the high school informant told police of Biro's claims of involvement in the Langert killings, investigators recalled that Biro had been spotted, wearing black clothing, near the murder scene on the night of the slayings.
On Oct. 5, the day after police learned of his boasting, Biro was taken into custody for questioning as he left his parents' three-story stucco home. After police searches of his bedroom uncovered items, including a glass cutter, handcuffs and a .357 Magnum revolver, that had been stolen from the office of Biro's former lawyer, the teenager was charged with first-degree murder of Richard Langert and his pregnant wife, Nancy, and the intentional homicide of their unborn child. A .357 Magnum can fire the type of .38-caliber bullets used in the murders, and while law enforcement officials have revealed few details of their investigation, they say they are confident that the .357 Magnum and other items taken from Biro will link him to the murders. Biro is being held at the Cook County jail without bail, awaiting his Nov. 21 arraignment.
Biro's arrest has bewildered the community and left everyone, including the police, wondering why a child of privilege might have committed such a crime. Drawings and writings recovered from his room have led police to consult with ritual-crime experts to determine whether Biro may have dabbled in destructive occult beliefs. His closest friends wonder if Biro may have been "pushed or dared" into committing a crime as a street-gang initiation—or whether he might have killed the Langerts at the behest of someone else.
Some classmates say Biro was driven, as one acquaintance put it, "to test his limits." A red notebook, found in his room by police, contained underlined news articles about the murders, including a magazine story in which an attorney for Nancy Langert's sister observed, "I bet if they ever do catch the culprit it will turn out to be some local teenager." Says one girl: "If [Biro] did do it, it's because he wanted to commit the perfect crime. Dave viewed everything as an intellectual challenge, and he may have been too smart for his own good."
One question remains: Why the Langerts? Though Biro's parents were casually acquainted with Nancy Langert's parents, police admit they are puzzled about the nature of the relationship—if any—between Biro and his alleged victims. Although the teenager accompanied his mother to the Langerts' funeral, police say there is no evidence he knew them before the night that their paths may have fatally crossed.
Celebrate 25 years of inexpensive used books at the Newberry's annual Book Fair. We have a record number of books to sell this year! More than 110,000 donated books will be sorted into 70 categories for your browsing convenience. With many books priced under $2, it's easy to replenish your home library's holdings on subjects ranging from antiques to zoology.
Admission is free.
Happy shopping!
Parking: The Newberry Library does not have a visitor parking lot. Limited metered parking is available on area streets. Daytime and evening parking restrictions do apply, so be sure to read the posted signs carefully. Garage parking is also available in the neighborhood. No Hummers; No Buicks; No Lincolns; No Fords and No Chevies.
The following garages offer discounted parking to Newberry patrons ($7 for 0-8 hours; $9 for 8-10 hours). Remember to bring your parking ticket with you so it can be validated by the Newberry security guard. The Sheehan Family at 10857 will let you use their drive way but then you need to take Metra downtown and transfer to the CTA
100 West Chestnut Street (enter on Clark Street)
100 East Walton Street (valet service)
Festivities on Saturday, July 25
9 am – Complimentary yoga presented in Washington Square Park by lululemon athletica - Pass. Where's the beer ticket booth?
10 am – Book Fair opens
10:30 am – Complimentary kids’ yoga presented in Washington Square Park by Get Healthy Chicago
12 pm – Meet the Author: Alex Kotlowitz (book signing) Author of Never a City So Real a wonderful, short study of Chicago. I will leave him alone.
Bughouse Square Debates (1 pm to 4 pm)
1 pm – Rick Kogan Welcome! - " Hey, Kogan, You Bastard! It's Hickey!! Yeah, that's right! You were 'spozed to have me back on your show and talk about my novel! Yeah, I'm heckling! What's the matter? Not so tough when don't have Steve Bertrand to back you up! . . . Terry, in a minute, I . . . no I have not had enough beer. My Mom is in Orland; Okay? Kogan! I'm here allllll Daaaayyyy!!!!!!"
1:15 pm – Presentation of the Altgeld award to High School Teacher Barb Thill - Clap politely.
1:35 pm – Main debate (Abraham Lincoln vs. Stephen Douglas) "Go Douglas! Little Giant Rocks! No Lincoln; No War!"
2:15 pm – Memorial tributes to Studs Terkel, Leon Despres, Franklin Rosemont and Judith Krug - " Hey, . . . why you call the cops on me??????" A wide-eyed Terry Sullivan watches in disgust and mild disbelief. Ms. Sullivan calls Hickey's kids, " I am afriad your father is at Chicago Ave. Police Station. I will post bail, but I am going home. Please, have your Father call me . . . when Hell Freezes!"
2:30 pm – Soapbox Debates ( still in custody)
3:45 pm – Dil Pickle award presented ( still in custody)
6 pm – Book Fair closes for the day
9:45 P.M - Hickey gets released into the custody of his kids. The elegant,polite and beautiful Ms. Terry Sullivan awaits the forth coming apology "Oh, No" Phone call.
The 2009 Book Fair is generously supported by Whole Foods Market, Hallett Movers, and by our media partner, Flavorpill.
Many thanks to the following restaurants for donating lunches to our many wonderful Book Fair volunteers:
Bistro Zinc
Caffe Baci
D'Absolute Caterers
Edwardos
Fox and Obel Food Market
Goddess and Grocer
Go RomaJewell Events Catering
Occasions Chicago Catering
Tri-Star Catering
