Firefighter/ Writer Matt Drew's " Shadows of Chicago" is a Read as Tall as Its Subject

Matt Drew Firefighter and author. (DNAinfo.com)


The Devil in White City the Chicago history we usually get in WTTW specials was made sexy and marketable by posting the core narrative with a sex criminal.  The historical packaging was pretty much standard Studs Terkel approved history.   That best-selling book is being made into a film.

Chicago Fireman and writer Matthew Drew writes a Chicago saga worthy of Cinerama at the Old Michael Theatre on Dearborn. Within the acute angles of his three subjects, Charlie Comiskey, Big Jim Horan and Mayor Fred Busse,  swirl events and personalities with real Chicago spark. No agenda stuffed frauds - Shoeless Joe Jackson was a working-class hero who only stuffed his bibs  with Hundos, because the Old Roman was a cheapskate - the Studs Terkel meme.

A few years back serious Chicago scholars like former Fire Commissioner Jim Joyce and former DEA agent Rick Barrett snapped knuckles on the noggins of dozing Chicago's smart set with events, books and press opportunities focused on the valor of Chicago first respond-ers with interest in horrific Stockyard Fire of  1910 and the murder of Police Constable Jeremiah Sullivan.   Scholarship on Chicago's actual history seems to be best found in the hands of working men, like Barrett and Joyce. Pretend history is handled very nicely by  politicians political columnists and academics - Jane Addams invented the eight hour day, the Baby Ruth candy bar and the can-can.

This summer another working class scholar, Matt Drew published Shadows of Chicago: The True Story of Three Men and the Crimes That Shocked America. Matthew Drew is a Chicago firefighter who teaches firefighting tactics at University of Illinois.  The book looks at the lives of three men, a baseball player-mogul.a fireman and a mayor.

The sweep and force of the book comes from the cast of personalities who weave through the lives of these interesting men - Dever, Powers, Powderly, Swift, Capone, Rothstein, Cobb, Harrison, Armour, Dunne, and Buck Weaver.  One character that sparks a fire in my little brain-pan was fireman Albert Moriarty ( pp.131-32) the brother of professional baseball players George and William. George, Matt Drew tells his reader, played for Ty Cobb's Detroit Tigers.

George Moriarty is the grandfather of my pal the famed actor, composer, musician and writer Michael Moriarty. 

Every Chicago reader, unencumbered by historical miasma that fogs our fabricated Chicago history, will find a connection like the one that I mentioned and breath in fresh ideas.  Real history, from Herodatus to Drew, manages to do just that.

Here is fine review of Matthew Drew's fine book.
http://www.forestparkreview.com/News/Articles/9-10-2013/1910-Stockyard-fire-tale-told-in-firefighter's-new-book/

The Pimpslapeur Approach to Shocking Language Works!

Language, even shocking language, requires a bit of commitment.  There are all manner of approaches to language via linguistics.  Linguistics is the study of tongues . . .not literal tongues; rather, the sounds made by tongue clacking slurping and clucking from the old pie hole. You know, speech . . .talk . . .stuff w

I have read and heard advertisements for such language approaches as Rosetta Stone, Pimsleur, and Esperanto Espresso, or Grunt.   I remember taking speed-reading lessons in eighth grammar school based upon Gestalt peripheral reading exercises.  We watched a TV show.  In pre-PC times we would talk ethnic Jewish and Italian until  'Hey!it's became too cold talk!'

I learned Latin and English and used to have a pretty fair command of conversational Spanish.  I can read French and some German thanks to English and Latin lessons.  The language that has really influenced me in my three score years here is Shocking Language.

Shocking Language was learned de la famille, at school, the workplace and most especially the playground. Shocking language happens because shock is easily apprehended even by the tiniest of tots.  A recent University of Maine study attests to the signal advantage shocking language affords lonely, hurt, vulnerable and frustrated children.

I am by nature and inclination a standing eight count.  My earliest childhood memories are honeyed with uncles' knuckles to back of the noggin, sharp words and threats of violence only majesty Cinerama in Technicolor could capture the moment.  Nothing like a whack with a 2X4 on the bridge of nose to one's attention - ' Did you HEAR me, Patrick?'

My name is shocking trochaic dimeter - stress/unstress: PAT rick/ HICKey.  I hear one, or two feet of that and I cover up in the fetal position, awaiting almost certain to arrive buffets and bootings.  No one ever good news'd me with PAT rick, let lone PAT rick/HICK,ey. Shocking.

We can say shocking things as children.  Our infant musings are taken cum grano salis by most adults, except elected officials.  " My Dad, says you got crabs, Mr. DiCola!!"

We were all at one time pygmy Joe Bidens.

My son Conor,at age three,  followed a morbidly obese man around the Amtrak train platform in Niles Michigan explaining to all and sundry -"He likes Cake!  That man likes his Cake!  You like Cake Mister?  That guy likes cake!"  followed by a very maternal muzzling from his wide-eyed Mammy!  I was of absolutely no help, whatsoever.

Scatologically graphic words, phrases and imagery can shock, as much as sexually graphic offenses verbal universal.  However those are much too common, churlish and MTV for our tastes. Such language is only appropriate for persons behind the wheel of an automobile being challenged by Hipsters on bicycles.

Rather, let's consider the application of Shocking Language borne by iconoclastic view masters of the world's sense of propriety.

I was introduced to the parents of prospective students by our marginally educated principal as " Mr. Hickey, Our BeKnighted English Teacher!"

I assured the parents that their two boys would be instructed with more than a few moments of lucidity in my care and assured the shocked Mom and Dad that my grasp of vocabulary exceed the command of my superior Ms. Sheepshanks, a State certified job holder.

The parents were charmed and enrolled their children ASAP.  The educator remains benighted. Shocking language helps, once apprehended as homophone failure sounding  from a Peter Principled Principal..

My Old buddy DooDah Ma#$% of LaPorte County, Indiana was charged with assault following an imbroglio at the Prairie Tavern (PT) in Rolling Prairie. Doodah looked like Randall 'Tex' Cobb on a windy day and was a superior bartender and judge of human worth.

A serial lawsuit perpetrator had staked out PT as his latest victim and pretended to be hurt.  Doodah ushered the man out with some brio and the man's false teeth fell to the floor.  Doodah was asked by the judge about the events.  Doodah explained, " Your Honor, the gentleman in question made a general threat to one and all upon entering.  I detected . . . .smelled you Honor . . . the pungent aroma of marijuana upon his person and asked him to leave.  He refused and gently escorted the man making this accusation to the door. At the door, this man returned my courtesies and patience with hocker spat in my direction which I dodged."

The robed County magistrate was spell bound, " What then Mr. Mag#$%?"

" I bitch-slapped him, " replied well-spoken tap-tun.

"Please, explain Mr. Mag#$%," encouraged the jurists." I whacked him in the chops with back of my hand Your Honor . . .you know . . .a bitch slap?"

"Continue, MR. Ma#$%, ordered the Hoosier Black Robe.

" I picked up the man's bridge work washed it off in the sink and returned the undamaged choppers to the larcenous dope smoker. . ." and with a majestic sweep of his arm announced, " in full view of twenty sober and industrious Christians, now Present, Your Honor!"

Case dismissed.

Shocking language?  Shocking testimony and shockingly sound judgment.

The Real Skinny - Jim Sheahan a Marathon of a Man.

Skinny and his consigliere William Tang ( two-guys center) at a recent Bocce Ball Tournament.  

We have giants among us, but we never really notice them because we are too busy viewing all the pygmies grabbing the attention - celebrities, bust-out millionaires, lawyers with cowboy hats, thugs and elected officials..

Those of us lucky enough to live in a neighbor meet giants every day.  People who actually devote their time, talent and treasure to other people.

James "Skinny" Sheahan is a giant.

This video says it all.

God graced us with great people.

The Can't Miss 'Tribune New Plan of Chicago' - The Escher Template

This can't miss!



Macro Escherian* Plan of Chicago

Busy Chicagoans scurry about their particular . . . what's another word for business . . .walk of life . . .yeah that's good . . .walk of life.  Very secular PC and NPR monotone  Yeah, Walk of Life.

Chicagoans, under the Old Plan, walked with great speed and purpose.   “New York for a moment does not compare with Chicago in the roar and bustle and bewilderment of its street life, ”  wrote the Scottish writer William Archer. The winner of the 1st Pulitzer for fiction was Chicago investment house scion turned Marxist Ernest Poole, wrote in 1940 of the wild Mack Sennett quality of Chicago pedestrians fighting time and the bridges over the Chicago River to meet appointments.

I remember reading accounts of the break-neck pace of Chicagoans in the Daniel Burnham days of the Columbian Exhibition, which produced the first moving sidewalk - now, a feature of most airports.  Also, notable the Parliament of World Religions, absent Roman Catholics and Jews it seems, kick-started the one world-ism  Godless secular spiritualism template for Progressives that is so evident in 2013.

Chicagoans needed to slow-down and reconsider un-born children as a root cause for misery, only equaled by Woman's Suffrage, Prohibition and Theosophical Governance of the many, by the few and for the few

The post-Burnham Chicago saw the American Middle Class.  The post-1972 Democratic Convention Chicago worked for forty years to erase the American Middle Class.  Chicagoans are told what to think and do by people born in Southern Illinois or Highland Park, Illinois.  Real 2013 Chicagoans came from elsewhere with scads of disposable income thickened by shrewd political investments with government sinecures.

Imagine if each individual Chicagoan had the earnest, forthright, vapid and compelling resume of a Forrest Claypool (Parks, Salaried boards, County Board, CTA), moving with unchecked ease up onto another level of sweet-paying  unaccountable walk of life.   Now, that would be something.  Big Plans!

Breeders will be  and should be encouraged to take their walk of life outside of the City proper and enter only when needed to build, clean, serve and protect Chicago - the smaller, smarter safer Chicago.



Micro Escherian Plan of Chicago Small Communities -formerly known as neighborhoods.

Neighborhood is code for homophobic, close-knit ethnic breeders - non minorities; equally Un Evolved Minorities live in Communities: The Un-Evolved whose children get killed on Safe Passages, clamor for better schools for those children, go to church, work at jobs, pay taxes, fees and fines, but get upset about Ventra Cards, Divvy bike terminals taking up parking spaces and cameras. They can take their private schools with them, unless they can turned into Charters or Magnets out of the Smart Sized Esherian Chicago.

In the grand scheme of things, an individual will reside in some geographic garbage grid, unencumbered by a biologically workable spouse and the subsequent spawn . . .with his/her large dog taken out to open air and enclosed cafes on his/her walk of life.

Think big - think Escher; think like Medill.

* M.C. Escher: Maurits Cornelis -Call me "Mauk!" Escher -Dutch Graphic Artist 1998-1972.
aka -Macro Chicago Escher
aka -Micro Chicago Escher

Tales of the South Side: Breakfast at Tiffany's Reviewed by Kondike " Moose" Cholak

Man, I took a beating in April of 1965. That was not my best year by far.  The Nun I had for the tail-end of Sixth Grade at Little Flower told my folks that I was 'retarded, obstinate, disorganized and destined for bad end.' To say that I was a miscreant little jerk is not a stretch and I remain less than anal retentive in my assault upon tasks. However, bad end?  I think not.  I have been saved by great folks.

Immediately following one of my numerous extra curricular Pre-May Crowning beat-downs by Sister Beautificus, RSM, I accompanied two pals Tom Scanlon and Bernie Weber eastward in  the alley between 80th & &79th Street.. In their company,  I took my first cigarette, actually my second, my first I got from Uncle Mike.  This was my first outside of the tribal circle.  My companions were considered a bad lot in the common-room of the school's convent,  whose families lived in the apartments along Ashland Avenue on the Little Flower side.  One guy, Tom, is now a retired school psychologist and the other, Bernie, became a much decorated Chicago fireman, also retired.  We all three had written satirical essays on the upcoming May Crowning, which offended Sister Beautificus, who asked me, 'What would your Father say if he saw this?'  I waited a second, timing is everything, " Who you think wrote most of its, S'ter?"  Flesh and bone was now open for business. Messy desks, slipshod arithmetic no SRA work done in weeks built the hooded Black and White into a Torrent of Spring Fury!  I took it on the cheeks, the ears, the snot-locker and even the gums, as did my boon chums.  We celebrated this blood-bond with a pack of Chesterfields snitched from Tom's Mom's purse. 

Upon the celebratory light-up, Bernie's Dad's car came bouncing through the then unpaved alley at a great clip.  Old Man Weber had seen us in the act,

 " Bernie, get your rump home now!  Immediately, if not sooner.  Hickey - I'll see your old man, when he gets off work and stops at Billy Ellis's.  Hi Tom!  How's your Mom?"

Mrs. Scanlon was a widow who worked for the Phone Company over on Stewart and was considered by every pater familias to be easy on the eyes. .

"Fine, Mr. Weber, "  Scanlon, obviously off the hook, spirited the rumpled pack of Chesterfield's in my jacket pocket and tore ass south at the intersection of Marshfield and the alley.  Mr. Weber glared at me, " You're as big a smart-ass as your Uncle Bart.  I told Bernie to stay the Hell away from you. Bernie, beat it!  You, Mr. Hickey, make yourself scarce."

Swell. A brace of great communications concerning the fruit of his loins to candy Dad's ears, prior to his twenty minutes at home before he had to go his other job at the Beverly Theatre.  Nun Battery followed by the manly art of snitching a nail.  "I am well and truly screwed," I determined with no prodding from the audience, whatsoever. Smart Lad!  I fired up another smoke and walked across Ashland Ave. to the Highland Theater - home of the Hercules versus Viet Cong and other B Movies.. There was always sexy and salacious movie posters to heighten a lad's trip to the Saturday Confessional.  Always, a grand idea to tempt oneself.

 I stood in the ticket bay of Highland Theatre on Ashland and smoked another Chesterfield with the existential fatalism of Sartre, jilted by some swell French Dame in tight sweater and tighter black slit skirt..  I looked at ads of upcoming movies that I would never see.  A gruff but familiar voice assaulted my pornographic musings, " Spit out that butt, Kid." Jesus!!!!!!!

Cop? Uncle?  No. Ignatius the school janitor?  Nope. I turned to see furrowed brows and dashing side burns, bushy eye brows and Goliath-like terror of none other than Klondike Moose Cholak - The Wrestling Foe of Man and Beast!.

The man eclipsed the waning western sun beaming on the tar roof of Billy Ellis' Wooden House, where the Old Man stopped for a Hamms and a Vinegar and Oil ( Seagrams VO Canadian).  The Star of Saturday afternoon pre-Confessional Wrestling, brought to me by Ben's Auto Sales on South Western Ave., snapped,  " Weed's for sissies, book-worms and sob-sisters, kid."

Uh,uh stammered I ,  " I just tried 'cuz the guys and me . . ."

Moose Cholak glared at me, " Hey, save it for Aunt Gertie!  You wanna end up being be some pencil neck, no good for anybody, salad eater, Boy?"

Given my proclivities of the tongue, I was more than familiar with the rhetorical question at this tender age and checked my natural tendency go all Noel Coward with Klondike Moose Cholak.

Rather, I penitently answered properly, "No sir."

With folded arms and a broad smile of avuncular approval, Klodike Moose Cholak ordered me to pick up the cast away cylinder of sin and put it in the cement ashtray near the curb like a good boy and then waxed poetic, " Breakfast at Tiffany's,  kid. That's what smoking'll do for you and our whole county. You know, that they made it a movie a couple years back with that skinny broad from My Fair Lady.? Now, pay attention! The guy who wrote the story about that  skirt what liked to shop and hang around with fairies and rich creeps, started smoking at your age.  I saw him on Suskind's TV show, when I couldn't go back to sleep last week and it stuck with me.  This tiny little bald  guy with a pixie voice said his mom was some hillbilly hooker and that he started smoking as a little guy and it stunted his growth, made his hair fall out and talk like a girl. That's no way, Kid. Now,  where's that saloon what's called The Wooden House?"

I pointed to the northwest corner of 79th & Ashland and corrected the wrestler, " We call it Billy Ellis's around here."

With a smile, Moose offered this valediction, " You got some lip on you kid. A  lip on you that' would trip a pig."

How could one come to bad end in this urban Arcadia?

I have not had a cigarette, since breakfast.

Billy Thurber? Jimmy Ayres? It's a Whimsical Terrorist Reading His Own Whimiscal Thoughts

The Whimsical Weathermen Bill and his Odious Old Lady.


I love DNA.com Chicago.  DNA.com features Pulitzer Prize winning Mark Konkol  one of the very few authentic Chicago writers in the local media.  Along with John Kass, Steve Rhodes, Natasha Korecki, Dan Mihalopoulos, Steve Metsch, and Kate Grossman, Konkol respects the people who live in this city and not just the tonier denizens of  metro power-communities like Winnetka, Evanston, Hyde Park, Oak Park and Lakeview. The balance of the crew aboard this Chicago neighborhood news aggregater is pretty much solid - I especially like  Wendell Hudson ( Gresham etal) Casey Cora ( Canaryville and Erica Demerest ( Pilsen).  A very few ink-slingers give me the vapors and miseries, Lawd, Lawd!

One howler is the chap who covers Hyde Park - home of humorless Humanists and the prickly Progressive.  Hyde Park is a cool neighborhood with great dining and dancing, as well as intellectual jungle jims where coffee or beer can lubricate quality talk between persons who actually know something besides their place in the front of the line.

The neighborhood is not generally plagued with crime despite the disposable income available to ne'er-do - wells in the corduroy, or denim britches of both gender afoot. Rather the neighborhood is blemished with blow-hards who tend to be radical Progressives. Convicted Alderman Larry Bloom'd here and abouts until his two big-hearted meat hooks snagged some swag in between Larry's Rage Against the Machine landed Larry in Oxford Federal Pen. Toni Preckwinkle, Barbara Flynn-Currie, and,of course, Dr. Quentin Young the Guru of the Marxist Progressive Democrat sway enormous clout over the city, county, state and nation from this 'hood.

A tad north of Hyde Park is Kenwood kind of like Morgan Park is to Beverly in the real world.  In Kenwood resides President Obama's clout and chinaman - Bill Ayers, SDS/Weatherman Veteran/ Educational Ghost Payroller (Ret.)/ Commie Snake-Oil Shill and Cubana de Aviación frequent flier - he is even believed to have penned both of Barack H. Obama's autobiographies.  Bill Ayers - the Barney Google of Terror.This fatuous dope gets far too much attention and I only wish to point out the rather flawed work of a small cognomen in the DNA.com Chicago wheel - Ted Cox - accent grave on the Ted.

Bill Ayers is the product of a powerful home chock full of money - cash, bonds, dividends, investments, trusts and I'll bet more gold coins than William Devane.  Ayers Pappy - Old Tom - was a Commonwealth Edison CEO and Chicago's utility, charity, civic and political, boards-man.  I know some revolutionaries and even a couple of devout Communists and they are sweet generous and self effacing people from whom one could expect the loan of a generator when Com Ed goes out.  Old Tom and his kid strike me as the types who call the cops on Trick 'R Treaters at the stroke of 6PM.  The real revolutionaries worked in Northern Ireland and Nicaragua and one never hears much about their guerrilla days.  Ayers never shuts up.  Covering this clown is Ted Cox.

International House at University of Chicago - has a seating capacity for 300-400 persons.  Bill is reported to have attracted 100, which in crowd reporting gets a bemused nod of 'Sure. . .sure.'  Ayers Zippo'd Kerry, Obama, Clinton and Henry Kissinger and dys-informed the gathering on Syria, Libya and Dylan.  Ted listened and filtered Chicago's Own Billy Ayers through . . .now, get this . . .James Thurber

The reading part of the evening, from "Public Enemy: Confessions of an American Dissident," a sequel to his earlier "Fugitive Days" about his time underground with antiwar radicals the Weathermen, tended to be humorous, ironic and self-deprecating, as Ayers' writing also displays an air of whimsical imagination reminiscent of James Thurber.
Ayers writes of being in a seminar with his students in 2008 when they began watching the debate in which he was dragged into the campaign as a "domestic terrorist" who had supported Barack Obama in his early political ventures. One student turned to him and said, "Oh my God, that guy has the same name as yours."

Pokkatah, Pokkatah, pokka . . .What???  Whimsical Billy?  Whimsy is Ogden Nash.  Bill Ayers is a political sideshow and rhetorical chicken choker.  Ayers is a hillbilly grifter, so obvious in his dress, speech, deportment and pretensions ( Rilke?  Really?),  that he resembles the old cartoon-snake-oiler Barney Google. Even Slate hates Ayers books.

Beacon Press will publish Public Enemy: Confessions of an American Dissident. It’s billed as a sequel to Fugitive Days, Ayers’ 2001 Weather Underground memoir, which at the time was the most “self-indulgent and morally clueless” memoir Slate’s Tim Noah had ever read. (This was several years before Eat Pray Love.) I liked Fugitive Days a little more than that, and Ayers was kind enough to sign a copy for me after some of my college friends and I annoyed him at one of the 2001 readings.

Fugitive Days and Ayers’ post-9/11 book tour were streaked with humility. Ayers had done something wrong, and he admitted it, but he did it for the right cause. Public Enemy, by contrast, is a memoir of score-settling, against a cast of extremely stupid (according to Ayers) critics. To hear Ayers tell it, since 2001 he’s been victimized and pilloried and misunderstood by a succession of idiots.

Guerrillas don't cry!  There's no crying in Bolivarista World Revolution!

Ted Cox finds the dope whimsical!   How about CCCP's own Thurber, Beria, Ted? What a scamp.   Now, that lad could kick up a swell Beriozka.  Ted is probably a pretty good guy, who just wants a neighbor to feel good.

Ted, Bill Ayers is a talentless, wealthy, but talentless dope hooked up for life to an odious hag of a cheerleader.  Now, she is dangerous.

Ted, Bernardine Dohrn is not whimsical. This is 

For Leo Lion Linebacker Terron " Mr. Touchdown" Bell - Here's the Song I Mentioned

The Soul Bowl Champions - In the Maroon Shirt and Tie is Scholar Athlete Terron 'Mr. Touchdown' Bell.  Old # 59 snagged a pass intended for a Hales Franciscan Spartan receiver and carried the ball into the end zone!

Terron Bell -5-7, 252 | 40: 5.48 | Class of 2014

They always call him Mr. Touchdown;
They always call him Mr. T.
He can run and he can throw;
Just give him the ball and look at him go!
Hip hip hooray for Mr. Touchdown;
He's gonna beat em today;
So, lets give a great big cheer
for the hero of the year;
It's Mr. Touchdown, USA**. 

This song was originally posted at:
http://bussongs.com/songs/mr-touchdown.php

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*This song was written for Chandos "Pete" Young. He was named Mr. Touchdown USA in 1933 when he scored 128 touchdowns playing for Bluefield College in WVA.

Chicago Tribune Editorial - " Hey, Folks! We Had a Huge Part in Lousing Up Chicago; Now, Let's All Help Planning the Funeral!"

For more than forty years, The Chicago Tribune Editorial Board has been in the vanguard of the coalition of advocates, academics and activists who have helped turn Chicago away from The Machine and towards the Mistake on the Lake! Now, that Chicago has become everything that the Tribune has demanded it become, like a Gold Coast Dowager with a fat divorce settlement and thirty years of Rush Street Cosmo -promiscuity and concomitant liposuction, the Kids on Board want an urban intervention.

The Tribune has poured oceans of ink on Chicago's — forgive the euphemism — urban problems. Treating them as individual diseases is convenient for us, convenient for readers, just convenient: Write another series, then preserve it in a digital folder marked Crime, or Schools, or Jobs, or Family Breakdown, or City Finances.
What we haven't done as rigorously is examine the whole patient: the still-sturdy skeleton of Chicago on which holistic remedies might be built.

Yep, about as appealing as smooching the old Cougar's cold sores, that is.

With decades of patient and gutless group thought,  the Chicago Tribune Editorial Board has achieved everything Abner Mikva learned from Saul Alinsky.   Chief Keef gets more publicity than the Special Olympics and deceased gang-bangers more respect than Francis Cardinal George.

For better than forty years the Chicago Tribune Editorial Board worked to make sure that everyone takes this person very seriously, and questions the values, aspirations and intentions of these people


For forty plus years the Chicago Tribune Editorial Board worked 24/7 to

• Undermine any and all confidence in the Justice System - see Peoples Law Office, Loevy & Loevy, Bernardine Dohrn, Medill School of Journalism and the Centers for Wrongful Anything
• Call for every idiotic tax necessary - see  Ralph Martire
• Back protected political grifters and lightweights - see Forrest Claypool et al
• Assault the Catholic Church particularly and religion generally - See John Kass' great column*
• Demand larcenous policies for education - See the Tribune Editorials c. 1968-2013
• Equate sexual behavior with race - ibid.
• Denigrate Skilled Tradesmen - Promote SEIU Marxism with Labor -ibid.
• Censor and obliterate the past -ibid.
• Promote the Selfish -ibid.
• Denigrate the Competent - ibid.
• Examine only the approved point of view -ibid.
• Ignore Consequences - See Detroit

Now, Hyde Park Mafia's paper of record wants Stella & Stosh, Marty & Maeve, Curtis & Clara, Dash & Dot to come up with master plan that would make Danny Burnham fill his britches!

Here's my plan .. . .Go . . .try to show some respect for people who actually make a difference in lives of people.

Seriously, cite every suggestion proposed by this band of lemmings at Joe Medill's rag and walk things back.

* Best reason to read the Tribune, other than High School Sports

The Soul Bowl is Leo's! Varsity 28-21 Over the Very Tough Spartans of Hales Franciscan

I guess # 3 Theo Hopkins and #5 Riley McClendan are somewhat pleased by the Leo Varsity victory Saturday - # 11 Daniel Scott*& is too overcome with joy and manly pride to join this dance of victory - Daniel has his mind on Gordon Tech. Great Coverage by CUBE, Chicago;s prep sports go-to guys.



A lackluster 1st half for the Lions was sparked bright-eyed and bushy tailed by # 22 Mike Conley just before the half.

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Then, Coach Mike Holmes and staff rallied the Lion's roar for a defensive seminar on team - witness Mr. Terron Bell # 59

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And another inception by multi- IHSA track & field Champion Theodore Hopkins, Jr. # 3.

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This was a fine day - weather not withstanding.

The Soul Bowl is in the main office of Leo High School - all Alumni share in this honor.

Leo Varsity Football stands at 6-0 with Gordon Tech coming up.

*


Leo High School Football
Mascot Lions Team Varsity 13-14 Colors Orange, Black
Coach Michael Holmes Address 7901 S Sangamon St, Chicago, IL 60620
Overall 6-0 Conference 3-0 National Rank 3008State (IL) Rank 103
League Chicago Catholic - Red
(C) = Captain
Click column headers to sort the data
# Name Pos. Gr. Ht Wt
2 James Davis III WR, DB Sr. 5-9 175
3 Theodore Hopkins Jr. (C) RB, DB Sr. 5-10 185
4 Saheed Adewole WR, OLB Jr. 6-1 205
5 Riley McClendon-Gray (C) DB, WR, KR Sr. 5-11 185
7 Latrell Giles QB Jr. 6-1 175
9 Nnequez Bennett DB, WR Sr. 6-1 180
11 Daniel Scott LB, WR Sr. 6-3 190
16 Mallik Prince RB, QB, DB Sr. 5-9 175
22 Michael Conley RB, ILB Sr. 6-0 215
23 Marquis Williams RB, ILB Jr. 5-7 200
25 Zuriel Cook S, WR Jr. 5-7 165
28 Darius Williams DB, WR Jr. 5-10 165
40 Joe Shorter RB, DB Jr. 5-10 180
44 Caleb Carter LB, DE Sr. 5-10 210
50 Anthony Anderson OL, DL, K Sr. 6-1 245
54 Juvan Lewis OL, DL Sr. 6-2 270
58 Jabari Jackson OL, DL Jr. 6-0 230
59 Terron Bell OL, DL Jr. 5-7 260
64 Clifton Thurman OL, DL Jr. 6-0 260
69 Durman Jackson III DL, OL Sr. 5-11 295
70 Christopher Livingston OL, DL Jr. 6-0 260
72 Les Wiggins OL, DL Sr. 6-3 265
75 Raheem Williams OL, DL Jr. 6-4 380
82 Solomon Jones WR, K, DB Sr. 6-2 195
83 Sydney Dorsey WR, DB Sr. 6-0 175
88 James Britton Jr. DE, TE Jr. 6-3 240

I Am in a Wonderful Frame of Mind . . . For What It's Worth!

God is a good guy, to me anyway.

My son is taking his trade exam after a two year apprenticeship. My older daughter and her fiance closed on a house nearby. My youngest daughter is studying and working at Western Michigan.  Leo High School is gearing up at the school for today's Soul Bowl with Hales Franciscan and a continuation of a perfect season at both varsity and JV levels.



 I have Chet Baker playing and singing in the background.  My only worry concerns my lovely lady friend who is visiting family in New Orleans as a tropical storm is twisting near Big Easy.  God's a good guy.

This week at Leo High School I watched two young women really make an impact upon the tough but eminently fragile young men they teach.  Both women, a science and a math teacher, are at ease with their disciplines and the young bundle of hormones in front of them.  Our science teacher, a veteran of Maria High School, gives a vocabulary word of the day unrelated to biology, or chemistry.  You should hear 15, 16 and 17 year old African American,Mexican and Irish tough guys employ the new found words and their proper meanings in the hallowed halls long ago patrolled by quick belting Irish Christian Brothers - ' Mr. Hickey's evanescent hair reminds me of Fall!'  Friday's word flibbertigibbet dominated both lunch hours.

The young teacher, who bears my last name, teaches geometry like she has been in the trade for years and she is Mike Joyce's assistant boxing coach armed with ND Bengal Bouts seasoning the young lady handles her mitts well after school. In the classroom, the boys are learning because their teacher treats them like men.

Our guys come to school early and stay late.  We are making a difference and that makes me very proud.

Yep, God is a good guy who helps us work incrementally.  I can not wait to get over to Hales Franciscan for the Soul Bowl.  I know my great frame of mind is only going to improve. God gave us Chet Baker, after all.

The Integrity Desert at 1600 Pensylvannia Ave. and the Resident Desert Fox

Normandy 1944 -" Don't fight a battle if you don't gain anything by winning." Erwin Rommel, The Desert Fox

Omaha Beach 1944 -“I had no friends beside me,” Conwell said. “If a guy fell beside me, I let him. The English had told me don’t stop to help. I know that might not have been the Christian thing to do, but it kept you alive. I just went with it. The object was to stay alive and it worked for me.” Creed Conwell D-Day Omaha Beach survivor



WWII Memorial  2013 -  National Park Service Spokesman Carol Johnson told reporters today that the orders to close the the World War II memorial in Washington, DC during the government shutdown came from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), which answers directly to the Obama Administration.

"O.M.B (Office of Budget Management) sends everything down to the other agencies," said Johnson.

"Why can't I just eat my waffle?" President Barack H. Obama 44th Commander-in-Chief of the United States of America and waffle aficionado

ObamAbortion is No Fluke: Who Will Have the First ObamaCare Opportunity to Butcher Her Child?

Secretary Sebelius asks unaborted young 'uns about the pictures in this Golden Book and wonders ' What Kind of Mothers Allowed Them to Not Be Aborted?  What a World. Well, We will soon change that!'

Former Dr. Kermit Baron Gosnell, now serving time for butchering full term and unborn children, must be shickled . . .tickled . . .aplenty on this First Tuesday of ObamaCare, formerly known as October.  Boy howdy, Old Orange Jumpsuit and crowds of Lord & Taylor suited dowagers and Planned Parenthood hags have abortion, not only on demand, but on the Citizens' dime.

The Office of Personnel Management ruled Monday that members of Congress and their staffs will be able to buy health care plans that pay for abortions, even though the premiums are funded largely by taxpayer money — a move that conservatives say breaks federal law on abortion funding.
Under the terms of Obamacare, lawmakers and their aides are required to ditch their government-sponsored plans and buy insurance on state-based health care exchanges, though unlike most people on the exchanges, the staffers and members will have most of the costs of their premiums paid by their employer — in this case, taxpayers.

Abortion just jumped up a step!  More shame on us all.

Abortion the Original Hate Crime - Now, available through the United States Government, absolutely shameless, since 1973!

So, It's Monday - Polka!

The Bears?  Had to happen.   Sox and Cubs?  Please.  Mortgage due tomorrow?  As always.

Hey,The weather was fabulous all weekend; the kids are all healthy and happy; Leo High School football is 5-0 at the JV and Varsity levels; I got two and half  pounds of Greek (Kasseri and Graviera) cheese in the icebox and polka music in my blood!

Pobierz w Paddy Wagon was Irish drań!






White Boy, grać, że funky music!

Totalitarian Tinkerbell's Top Tomes

Academics can barely determine the proper amount to tip a barista; yet, they can tell cops how to fight crime and President's what trigger not  to pull . . . and when.  Academics comprise Blue Ribbon State panels of tweedy totalitarians who empty prisons of felons and ignore the families of victims.

Academics used to be the sad rumpled dopes that they are in real life.  Only Camille Paglia among the literary lions stands up for real people.  Professor Paglia called the most fatuous fraud in literary studies, Stanley Fish -America's Totalitarian Tinkerbell.  Spot on, Doc.

I was lucky enough to be taught by teachers and only ran into an academic well past the time of being awed by the man's condescension and poor personal hygiene.  I had about tens years of teaching under my pelt, before returning to post-graduate studies.  This one poser taught some PC lit course on gender and colonialism.  He was a faculty pain-in-the-ass and popular with the kids - easy A.

How sad that some people only read what academics find - vital, searing, game-changing and really stupid.
I imagine that the book reviews never get past the covers.
e.g..




“Throughout, Dimock contends that American
literature is answerable not to the nation-state, but
to the human species as a whole, and that it looks
dramatically different when removed from a strictly
national or English-language context.”
I applaud this goal, yet all of the texts drawn
from global contexts “across deep time” are presented in English translations.
Henry James’s novels and
The Epic of Gilgamesh, to give one comic example,
get read together. I know—in this case, who cares?
But this is true throughout. Knowing a text in its
original language and cultural contexts is crucial.
If such knowledge is removed, due to the scholar’s
inadequacies or the assumed reader’s, the result is
readings lacking resonance, depth, weight. Reading
then is like looking at a child’s shaken snow globe,
with the texts-snowflakes gradually settling down to
one common level. All are globally equal now but
equally bland and banal."  Daniel T. O’Hara
Temple University



"Cheesy, laughable, and
iterative: the writer who brought you a fudge recipe
in Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang (1964) introduces the
bondsman of global capital." -Eyal Amiran University of California, Irvine

"How cleverly condescending can one get? A tear falling in a field of snow!" -Marjorie Perloff
Stanford University


"The character of Clyde had been pulled out of Dreiser’s own murky
inner life. Dreiser has never been accused of being
a stylist, so a difference in language is not the question; it is more a matter of Dreiser letting the public
record interfere with his re-imagining ."William A. O’Rourke
University of Notre Dame


"This formulaic knock-off
of fantastic conspiracy theories is a trite study for a
film script—and no wonder the movie was also bad.
I love the chapters that are only a couple of lines
long." Bonnie Wheeler
Southern Methodist University


In a world that depends up Public Televison to determine what restaurant serves really important cuisine, it is always nice to go out and eat some good chow in the Heart of Italy.

Do so likewise with what you read.