SKINBACK . . . I would say scratch that reference to Daleys related to Duff-Greens on mother's side, as in today's posting and mailing. Wiser people than I have tried to verify it, to no avail. Sorry.
9/26/2003
CHI TRIB LIVES! . . . 9/26/03, feast of N. Amer Martyrs, Sts. Isaac Jogues, John de Brebeuf & Companions, all S.J., Chi Trib's day to shine, in that its people exposed the Duff Family Pseudo-black some time back for posing as minority contractors and the Dist. Atty. announced indictments. Columnist Jn Kass crows on Don & Roma, and his enemies have no grounds to gainsay him. I take back at least 5% of what I have said about Chi Trib.
Seriously, folks, it's a Day to Remember for the once world's greatest newspaper, which is doing more than shooting loafing street crews, an important element of municipal investigation in the Colonel's day, a long time ago. Kass has been on the case, and now he can write in his sleep the column that zeroes in on Mayordaley II as Foney Baloney. Let us hear it for him and his ilk on the other side of Michigan Avenue.
THIS PLOT BE THICK . . . And let us hear it for Republicans and Sen. Peter Fitzgerald, without whom we would not have a D.A. who would go where his duty pointed him in re: Daley and Friends. Glory be to God for not necessarily intended consequences.
This is why Daley et al. plump constantly for Dem victories, including Bill as Gore campaign mgr. going to court in Florida. Bill was standing up for the Family as much as anything else.
In more ways that one: A caller to Don & Roma (WLS-AM, a.m. drive-time) said Mme. Duff is related to Rich on his mother's side. She would be Patricia Green Duff, 75, indicted with her son, a figurehead black man, and others. She is listed as president and sole owner of Windy City Maintenance, the allegedly fraudulently minority-owned company that "sprang from nowhere to garner approximately $100 million in city-related work since Mayor Richard Daley took office," per Chi Trib.
Her husband, John Duff Jr., 78, is former director of Windy City Maintenance and former executive in a liquor union known as Local 3. "He has been tied to organized crime, and in 1982 pleaded guilty to federal charges of embezzling union funds," again per Chi Trib.
Did we think the Duffs sprang from nowhere on the political scene? Blood tells. Tribalism will out. The saga of politics Daley-style goes on and on and on.
CLOSER . . . And by the way, this trenchant critic sharply distinguishes between hard-news-oriented city-side reporting by Chi Trib and the me-too liberalism that shows in national political and cultural coverage, where former elite-college students of tenured radicals hold sway.
There. Got that off the old chest.
Seriously, folks, it's a Day to Remember for the once world's greatest newspaper, which is doing more than shooting loafing street crews, an important element of municipal investigation in the Colonel's day, a long time ago. Kass has been on the case, and now he can write in his sleep the column that zeroes in on Mayordaley II as Foney Baloney. Let us hear it for him and his ilk on the other side of Michigan Avenue.
THIS PLOT BE THICK . . . And let us hear it for Republicans and Sen. Peter Fitzgerald, without whom we would not have a D.A. who would go where his duty pointed him in re: Daley and Friends. Glory be to God for not necessarily intended consequences.
This is why Daley et al. plump constantly for Dem victories, including Bill as Gore campaign mgr. going to court in Florida. Bill was standing up for the Family as much as anything else.
In more ways that one: A caller to Don & Roma (WLS-AM, a.m. drive-time) said Mme. Duff is related to Rich on his mother's side. She would be Patricia Green Duff, 75, indicted with her son, a figurehead black man, and others. She is listed as president and sole owner of Windy City Maintenance, the allegedly fraudulently minority-owned company that "sprang from nowhere to garner approximately $100 million in city-related work since Mayor Richard Daley took office," per Chi Trib.
Her husband, John Duff Jr., 78, is former director of Windy City Maintenance and former executive in a liquor union known as Local 3. "He has been tied to organized crime, and in 1982 pleaded guilty to federal charges of embezzling union funds," again per Chi Trib.
Did we think the Duffs sprang from nowhere on the political scene? Blood tells. Tribalism will out. The saga of politics Daley-style goes on and on and on.
CLOSER . . . And by the way, this trenchant critic sharply distinguishes between hard-news-oriented city-side reporting by Chi Trib and the me-too liberalism that shows in national political and cultural coverage, where former elite-college students of tenured radicals hold sway.
There. Got that off the old chest.
9/19/2003
HIS BRITCHES GOT TOO SMALL?
"The Tribune's not much for promoting its people; it doesn't want to treat anybody as bigger than the paper. But [demoted-to-page-two columnist David] Greising was the best evidence of the stylish, provocative, savvy section that Business editor Rob Karwath presumably wants Business to become," said Chi Reader's Michael Miner last July -- http://www.chireader.com/hottype/2003/030725_1.html
Better late than never (from me) with this percipient observation by M. Miner. Greising, who followed weeks later by declining, like Melville's Bartleby the scrivener, to write for page two and got a reporting assignment instead, got too good at annoying rich and powerful CEOs, is my bet. He was too good, is the point. Mother Tribune likes you good but not too good. It makes her nervous.
"The Tribune's not much for promoting its people; it doesn't want to treat anybody as bigger than the paper. But [demoted-to-page-two columnist David] Greising was the best evidence of the stylish, provocative, savvy section that Business editor Rob Karwath presumably wants Business to become," said Chi Reader's Michael Miner last July -- http://www.chireader.com/hottype/2003/030725_1.html
Better late than never (from me) with this percipient observation by M. Miner. Greising, who followed weeks later by declining, like Melville's Bartleby the scrivener, to write for page two and got a reporting assignment instead, got too good at annoying rich and powerful CEOs, is my bet. He was too good, is the point. Mother Tribune likes you good but not too good. It makes her nervous.
HIS BRITCHES GOT TOO SMALL?
"The Tribune's not much for promoting its people; it doesn't want to treat anybody as bigger than the paper. But [demoted-to-page-two columnist David] Greising was the best evidence of the stylish, provocative, savvy section that Business editor Rob Karwath presumably wants Business to become," said Chi Reader's Michael Miner last July -- http://www.chireader.com/hottype/2003/030725_1.html
Better late than never (from me) with this percipient observation by M. Miner. Greising, who followed weeks later by declining, like Melville's Bartleby the scrivener, to write for page two and got a reporting assignment instead, got too good at annoying rich and powerful CEOs, is my bet. He was too good, is the point. Mother Tribune likes you good but not too good. It makes her nervous.
"The Tribune's not much for promoting its people; it doesn't want to treat anybody as bigger than the paper. But [demoted-to-page-two columnist David] Greising was the best evidence of the stylish, provocative, savvy section that Business editor Rob Karwath presumably wants Business to become," said Chi Reader's Michael Miner last July -- http://www.chireader.com/hottype/2003/030725_1.html
Better late than never (from me) with this percipient observation by M. Miner. Greising, who followed weeks later by declining, like Melville's Bartleby the scrivener, to write for page two and got a reporting assignment instead, got too good at annoying rich and powerful CEOs, is my bet. He was too good, is the point. Mother Tribune likes you good but not too good. It makes her nervous.
9/18/2003
9/18/03 SUN-TIMES . . .
DISEASE CONTROL . . . Page 3: "Heartier" germs develop from overuse of anti-biotics, says headline. No. Hardier, i.e. more hardy = more likely to withstand nullification by medication. Heads are done by copy desk, I assume; copy deskers are supposed to know better. Tsk, tsk.
CORRUPTION CONTROL . . . Page 9:
1. Connected city employe holds two city jobs, Chicago-style. He is brother-in-law of late Ald. Fred Roti, who did federal time.
2. Cicero ex-cop sues ex-mayor, now doing Fed time, and ex-police supt. for trashing his reputation for cooperating with FBI re: attempt to frame opposition mayoral candidate. Ex-Chi Ald. Ed Vrdolyak, acting as lawyer for ex-mayor et al., who years ago with current Chi Ald. Ed Burke led war vs. Mayor Harold Washington, played key role in ex-cop's troubles, getting very angry with him about helping FBI, says suit.
3. Gov. Blago may close troubled-minor home Maryville off to wards of state, this the day after a Fed. investigation into Maryville is reported. Investig. has to do with falsifying records of lead-up to a ward's suicide.
Fran Spielman in on the first story, of course. She monitors Daley and his people very well. John Kass of Chi Trib also does this, and Chi Trib columnist Denny Byrne too. Should this sort of coverage not be a preoccupation of city desks?
REST OF STORY? . . . Meanwhile, the boyish and irrepressible Richard Roeper discusses the disappearing dog whose loss well nigh broke the heart of the owner couple. This is Roeper's contribution to covering corruption in the city and suburbs.
Left unexplained is how this apparently yuppie couple (white, at that?) has come to live in East Garfield Park. Nothing about how that happens. What's going on there?
DETAILS OF THE CASE . . . Page 13 has Chi cop testifying in wrongful-death suit, admitting he was out of line when he smashed rear driver's side window with a tire iron after he and other cops finally curbed the car after a chase on the Dan Ryan some time back. (He also poked inside with his gun, shooting the driver dead, without meaning to do it, he says.)
But the windows were tinted, which meant he could not see inside; so smashing them makes sense. Also: the driver had arrogantly sped away from a traffic stop. He was NU BMOC footballer and decided he did not have to obey the law. He did not deserve death but deserved something, it would seem.
MORE DETAILS: CITY IS FULL OF SAME . . . Page 18 has 18-year-old found guilty in 2001 cop killing in alley in Pilsen. Defense said he misstook the cop for a rival gangster. But other gangsters said a white (non-Hispanic) man in their neighborhood wearing a bullet-proof vest and a badge on his belt was obviously not one of them, Plus, the kid, then 16, kept plugging him as he lay there.
This Ambrose vs. La Raza. Defendant faces life in prison, having proven himself as a gangster. But in prison he will be one less threat to life on the street.
GET 'EM, ED, DOROTHY, DICK . . . 9/2, Sun-Times, Ald. Burke, Ald. Tillman, Mayor Daley hit reparations trail, another case of good govt. being good politics. See justice-seekers, govt. types ready to sock it to businesses for sake of votes.
DISEASE CONTROL . . . Page 3: "Heartier" germs develop from overuse of anti-biotics, says headline. No. Hardier, i.e. more hardy = more likely to withstand nullification by medication. Heads are done by copy desk, I assume; copy deskers are supposed to know better. Tsk, tsk.
CORRUPTION CONTROL . . . Page 9:
1. Connected city employe holds two city jobs, Chicago-style. He is brother-in-law of late Ald. Fred Roti, who did federal time.
2. Cicero ex-cop sues ex-mayor, now doing Fed time, and ex-police supt. for trashing his reputation for cooperating with FBI re: attempt to frame opposition mayoral candidate. Ex-Chi Ald. Ed Vrdolyak, acting as lawyer for ex-mayor et al., who years ago with current Chi Ald. Ed Burke led war vs. Mayor Harold Washington, played key role in ex-cop's troubles, getting very angry with him about helping FBI, says suit.
3. Gov. Blago may close troubled-minor home Maryville off to wards of state, this the day after a Fed. investigation into Maryville is reported. Investig. has to do with falsifying records of lead-up to a ward's suicide.
Fran Spielman in on the first story, of course. She monitors Daley and his people very well. John Kass of Chi Trib also does this, and Chi Trib columnist Denny Byrne too. Should this sort of coverage not be a preoccupation of city desks?
REST OF STORY? . . . Meanwhile, the boyish and irrepressible Richard Roeper discusses the disappearing dog whose loss well nigh broke the heart of the owner couple. This is Roeper's contribution to covering corruption in the city and suburbs.
Left unexplained is how this apparently yuppie couple (white, at that?) has come to live in East Garfield Park. Nothing about how that happens. What's going on there?
DETAILS OF THE CASE . . . Page 13 has Chi cop testifying in wrongful-death suit, admitting he was out of line when he smashed rear driver's side window with a tire iron after he and other cops finally curbed the car after a chase on the Dan Ryan some time back. (He also poked inside with his gun, shooting the driver dead, without meaning to do it, he says.)
But the windows were tinted, which meant he could not see inside; so smashing them makes sense. Also: the driver had arrogantly sped away from a traffic stop. He was NU BMOC footballer and decided he did not have to obey the law. He did not deserve death but deserved something, it would seem.
MORE DETAILS: CITY IS FULL OF SAME . . . Page 18 has 18-year-old found guilty in 2001 cop killing in alley in Pilsen. Defense said he misstook the cop for a rival gangster. But other gangsters said a white (non-Hispanic) man in their neighborhood wearing a bullet-proof vest and a badge on his belt was obviously not one of them, Plus, the kid, then 16, kept plugging him as he lay there.
This Ambrose vs. La Raza. Defendant faces life in prison, having proven himself as a gangster. But in prison he will be one less threat to life on the street.
GET 'EM, ED, DOROTHY, DICK . . . 9/2, Sun-Times, Ald. Burke, Ald. Tillman, Mayor Daley hit reparations trail, another case of good govt. being good politics. See justice-seekers, govt. types ready to sock it to businesses for sake of votes.
3. CHICAGO NEWSPAPERS, http://chicagonewspapers.blogspot.com/
9/18/03 SUN-TIMES . . .
DISEASE CONTROL . . . Page 3: "Heartier" germs develop from overuse of anti-biotics, says headline. No. Hardier, i.e. more hardy = more likely to withstand nullification by medication. Heads are done by copy desk, I assume; copy deskers are supposed to know better. Tsk, tsk.
CORRUPTION CONTROL . . . Page 9:
1. Connected city employe holds two city jobs, Chicago-style. He is brother-in-law of late Ald. Fred Roti, who did federal time.
2. Cicero ex-cop sues ex-mayor, now doing Fed time, and ex-police supt. for trashing his reputation for cooperating with FBI re: attempt to frame opposition mayoral candidate. Ex-Chi Ald. Ed Vrdolyak, acting as lawyer for ex-mayor et al., who years ago with current Chi Ald. Ed Burke led war vs. Mayor Harold Washington, played key role in ex-cop's troubles, getting very angry with him about helping FBI, says suit.
3. Gov. Blago may close troubled-minor home Maryville off to wards of state, this the day after a Fed. investigation into Maryville is reported. Investig. has to do with falsifying records of lead-up to a ward's suicide.
Fran Spielman in on the first story, of course. She monitors Daley and his people very well. John Kass of Chi Trib also does this, and Chi Trib columnist Denny Byrne too. Should this sort of coverage not be a preoccupation of city desks?
REST OF STORY? . . . Meanwhile, the boyish and irrepressible Richard Roeper discusses the disappearing dog whose loss well nigh broke the heart of the owner couple. This is Roeper's contribution to covering corruption in the city and suburbs.
Left unexplained is how this apparently yuppie couple (white, at that?) has come to live in East Garfield Park. Nothing about how that happens. What's going on there?
DETAILS OF THE CASE . . . Page 13 has Chi cop testifying in wrongful-death suit, admitting he was out of line when he smashed rear driver's side window with a tire iron after he and other cops finally curbed the car after a chase on the Dan Ryan some time back. (He also poked inside with his gun, shooting the driver dead, without meaning to do it, he says.)
But the windows were tinted, which meant he could not see inside; so smashing them makes sense. Also: the driver had arrogantly sped away from a traffic stop. He was NU BMOC footballer and decided he did not have to obey the law. He did not deserve death but deserved something, it would seem.
MORE DETAILS: CITY IS FULL OF SAME . . . Page 18 has 18-year-old found guilty in 2001 cop killing in alley in Pilsen. Defense said he misstook the cop for a rival gangster. But other gangsters said a white (non-Hispanic) man in their neighborhood wearing a bullet-proof vest and a badge on his belt was obviously not one of them, Plus, the kid, then 16, kept plugging him as he lay there.
This Ambrose vs. La Raza. Defendant faces life in prison, having proven himself as a gangster. But in prison he will be one less threat to life on the street.
GET 'EM, ED, DOROTHY, DICK . . . 9/2, Sun-Times, Ald. Burke, Ald. Tillman, Mayor Daley hit reparations trail, another case of good govt. being good politics. See justice-seekers, govt. types ready to sock it to businesses for sake of votes.
Copyright Jim Bowman, 2003
9/18/03 SUN-TIMES . . .
DISEASE CONTROL . . . Page 3: "Heartier" germs develop from overuse of anti-biotics, says headline. No. Hardier, i.e. more hardy = more likely to withstand nullification by medication. Heads are done by copy desk, I assume; copy deskers are supposed to know better. Tsk, tsk.
CORRUPTION CONTROL . . . Page 9:
1. Connected city employe holds two city jobs, Chicago-style. He is brother-in-law of late Ald. Fred Roti, who did federal time.
2. Cicero ex-cop sues ex-mayor, now doing Fed time, and ex-police supt. for trashing his reputation for cooperating with FBI re: attempt to frame opposition mayoral candidate. Ex-Chi Ald. Ed Vrdolyak, acting as lawyer for ex-mayor et al., who years ago with current Chi Ald. Ed Burke led war vs. Mayor Harold Washington, played key role in ex-cop's troubles, getting very angry with him about helping FBI, says suit.
3. Gov. Blago may close troubled-minor home Maryville off to wards of state, this the day after a Fed. investigation into Maryville is reported. Investig. has to do with falsifying records of lead-up to a ward's suicide.
Fran Spielman in on the first story, of course. She monitors Daley and his people very well. John Kass of Chi Trib also does this, and Chi Trib columnist Denny Byrne too. Should this sort of coverage not be a preoccupation of city desks?
REST OF STORY? . . . Meanwhile, the boyish and irrepressible Richard Roeper discusses the disappearing dog whose loss well nigh broke the heart of the owner couple. This is Roeper's contribution to covering corruption in the city and suburbs.
Left unexplained is how this apparently yuppie couple (white, at that?) has come to live in East Garfield Park. Nothing about how that happens. What's going on there?
DETAILS OF THE CASE . . . Page 13 has Chi cop testifying in wrongful-death suit, admitting he was out of line when he smashed rear driver's side window with a tire iron after he and other cops finally curbed the car after a chase on the Dan Ryan some time back. (He also poked inside with his gun, shooting the driver dead, without meaning to do it, he says.)
But the windows were tinted, which meant he could not see inside; so smashing them makes sense. Also: the driver had arrogantly sped away from a traffic stop. He was NU BMOC footballer and decided he did not have to obey the law. He did not deserve death but deserved something, it would seem.
MORE DETAILS: CITY IS FULL OF SAME . . . Page 18 has 18-year-old found guilty in 2001 cop killing in alley in Pilsen. Defense said he misstook the cop for a rival gangster. But other gangsters said a white (non-Hispanic) man in their neighborhood wearing a bullet-proof vest and a badge on his belt was obviously not one of them, Plus, the kid, then 16, kept plugging him as he lay there.
This Ambrose vs. La Raza. Defendant faces life in prison, having proven himself as a gangster. But in prison he will be one less threat to life on the street.
GET 'EM, ED, DOROTHY, DICK . . . 9/2, Sun-Times, Ald. Burke, Ald. Tillman, Mayor Daley hit reparations trail, another case of good govt. being good politics. See justice-seekers, govt. types ready to sock it to businesses for sake of votes.
Copyright Jim Bowman, 2003
9/02/2003
PRAISE INDEED . . . "Washington, like Chicago, is a great news town," said Vickie Burns, a news show producer on her way to a Washington job. As opposed to what? Boston, where clergy abuse has been exposed in spades? Omaha, where the Boys Town financial scandal was exposed decades ago? Los Angeles? Cincinnati? Where is this city that is not a great news town and what is the meaning of such a statement except to butter people up?
COUNTING THE WAYS . . . Sun-Times item-purveyor Michael Sneed 8/28 has "I'm going to leave him in . . .able hands . . . " said Judy Baar-Topinka. But "I'll be taking one of the final voyages [on QEII]," chirped Judy. And "quoth [Warner] Saunders: "He kept saying . . . " Said, chirped, quoth? What's going on here? To keep up with that, a thesaurus is required.
DISSEMBLING . . . Robert McClory tore into the RC church in Chi Trib Perspective page one Sunday 8/17, contrasting its peremptory officialdom with that of the Episcopal Church U.S.A., where things are discussed and voted up or down. Perspective gave the other side, of course. [Just kidding.] But it also failed to identify McClory in a way to distinguish him from the dozens of academics/book authors to whom it gives space: he's professor emeritus of Medill journalism school, Northwestern, yes. He wrote the book Faithful Dissenters, etc., yes.
But he's also a founder and board member of Call to Action, the Chicago-based dissenting Catholic's national organization par excellence and long-time if not still a reporter for National Catholic Reporter, the liberal Catholic's vade mecum. Would not this be worth telling Chi Trib readers, even if McClory makes an iron-clad case vs. RC Church, including a history-oriented shot at the Galileo debacle?
CORRECTION . . . The further trouble is, McClory, also a long-time contributor to Chicago Reader, got in over his head with the Galileo business, specifically by claiming that some RC churchmen declined to look through Galileo's telescope, saying it was not necessary. McClory used the Galileo business to buttress his contention that the church's condemnation of homosexual activity is subject to change, no matter what today's churchmen say.
Not so fast, said Robert Bireley, Loyola U. history prof (and for truth in packaging here, a Jesuit and Renaissance historian, author most recently of The Jesuits and the Thirty Years War:
Kings, Courts, and Confessors (Cambridge U. Press, 2003) but also of The Refashioning of Catholicism, 1450-1700 (Catholic U. Press, 1999), which is required reading at the U. of Missouri and maybe other places in Religious Studies 204: The Reformation to the Present, and of three other books, in a letter which Trib ran eight days later, 8/25.
That was no churchman who wouldn't look through the telescope, said Bireley; it was an atheist philosopher (whom he named), if it was anyone, and that's in doubt, there being no record of it. The Galileo case was bad enough, he said, but "let's not oversimplify."
McClory also aimed his peashooter at the church over slavery, in a short list of familiar grievances. But the church "had a lot to do with" ending slavery, medievalists agree, said Bireley. Indeed, a 1537 papal statement provided backup for anti-slavery work by churchmen in Latin America.
History, he said, in a closing rapping of McClory knuckles, is "messy and complicated," as any freshman knows. But McClory "ignores . . . circumstances" surrounding events and so "raises questions" about his trustworthiness in judging "contemporary matters."
And there you had a Medill professor emeritus not only inadequately identified by the once world's greatest newspaper, but also rebutted by a Loyola historian, in broad daylight.
COUNTING THE WAYS . . . Sun-Times item-purveyor Michael Sneed 8/28 has "I'm going to leave him in . . .able hands . . . " said Judy Baar-Topinka. But "I'll be taking one of the final voyages [on QEII]," chirped Judy. And "quoth [Warner] Saunders: "He kept saying . . . " Said, chirped, quoth? What's going on here? To keep up with that, a thesaurus is required.
DISSEMBLING . . . Robert McClory tore into the RC church in Chi Trib Perspective page one Sunday 8/17, contrasting its peremptory officialdom with that of the Episcopal Church U.S.A., where things are discussed and voted up or down. Perspective gave the other side, of course. [Just kidding.] But it also failed to identify McClory in a way to distinguish him from the dozens of academics/book authors to whom it gives space: he's professor emeritus of Medill journalism school, Northwestern, yes. He wrote the book Faithful Dissenters, etc., yes.
But he's also a founder and board member of Call to Action, the Chicago-based dissenting Catholic's national organization par excellence and long-time if not still a reporter for National Catholic Reporter, the liberal Catholic's vade mecum. Would not this be worth telling Chi Trib readers, even if McClory makes an iron-clad case vs. RC Church, including a history-oriented shot at the Galileo debacle?
CORRECTION . . . The further trouble is, McClory, also a long-time contributor to Chicago Reader, got in over his head with the Galileo business, specifically by claiming that some RC churchmen declined to look through Galileo's telescope, saying it was not necessary. McClory used the Galileo business to buttress his contention that the church's condemnation of homosexual activity is subject to change, no matter what today's churchmen say.
Not so fast, said Robert Bireley, Loyola U. history prof (and for truth in packaging here, a Jesuit and Renaissance historian, author most recently of The Jesuits and the Thirty Years War:
Kings, Courts, and Confessors (Cambridge U. Press, 2003) but also of The Refashioning of Catholicism, 1450-1700 (Catholic U. Press, 1999), which is required reading at the U. of Missouri and maybe other places in Religious Studies 204: The Reformation to the Present, and of three other books, in a letter which Trib ran eight days later, 8/25.
That was no churchman who wouldn't look through the telescope, said Bireley; it was an atheist philosopher (whom he named), if it was anyone, and that's in doubt, there being no record of it. The Galileo case was bad enough, he said, but "let's not oversimplify."
McClory also aimed his peashooter at the church over slavery, in a short list of familiar grievances. But the church "had a lot to do with" ending slavery, medievalists agree, said Bireley. Indeed, a 1537 papal statement provided backup for anti-slavery work by churchmen in Latin America.
History, he said, in a closing rapping of McClory knuckles, is "messy and complicated," as any freshman knows. But McClory "ignores . . . circumstances" surrounding events and so "raises questions" about his trustworthiness in judging "contemporary matters."
And there you had a Medill professor emeritus not only inadequately identified by the once world's greatest newspaper, but also rebutted by a Loyola historian, in broad daylight.
8/25/2003
TO HELL IN HANDBASKET . . . Bad news day, a la HV Kaltenborn on radio in 30s & 40s, in Chi Trib for Sunday 8/17. On Page1:
* "Power grid primed to fail: Nips, tucks won't fix it anymore [sic], experts say"
* "As Iraqis die, hate for U.S. spreads: Families left bitter by relatives' death" (by the inimitable Gary Marx, late of Havana)
* "Job losses hit blacks hard: Many 'feel frozen out of work world'" (always a good angle here: how hard blacks have it)
MARXMAN STRIKES AGAIN . . . "As Iraqis die" highlights the day's gloom-and-doom coverage. It features gut-wrenching (colorful) accounts by "witnesses" of noncombatants' death by American gunfire: "Bullets ripped . . . She slumped . . . eyes frozen . . . baby slipped from her arms. . . . hit in the stomach."
"The tragedy" in question got only five paragraphs in an official American statement. It was "one of [unspecified] dozens" of such incidents, which "can turn" Iraqi friends into "bitter enemies." The "mounting casualty toll" creates "a new circle" of Iraqis who learn "to revile [American] soldiers who came to liberate them."
Notice "came to liberate" and its implication of failure. Can the writer not say "liberated"? [No, it would be very gauche at the press club.] Notice also that my "American" is in brackets, because it's not used -- he writes "U.S.," never American, lest we confuse our government or military with ourselves.
Note also the delicious quotes, with APPEALING picture of good-looking father with two lovely kids left without their mother, one of two shooting victims of misdirected American fire.
An American officer is quoted in matter-of-fact terms that in no way compete with the vivid, even purpled, prose of this man Marx, of which there is more more more, here not included for reasons of time.
(He "strikes again" is in reference to his 9/18/02 utterly tendentious, not to say misleading story-attack on Ken Paterson as horseman riding the length of Cuba, here discussed in November.)
ANOTHER DAY, OTHER BAD NEWS . . . Meanwhile, on Sunday 8/24/03, we have Chi Trib's Perspective section demonstrating the striking ecumenism of the editors, who have decided that one side to a story is enough for one Sunday.
SIDE ONE: RIGHTS VIOLATED . . . We have "DON'T TREAD ON ME: Is the war on terror really a war on rights?" by DePaul U.'s M. Cherif Bassiouni, whom The Trib trundles out regularly to supply the Arab and Palestinian position. His lead is a stunner: "The Declaration of Independence heralded the values of freedom, justice and equality in a country whose government was accountable to the people." There are a lot of people who didn't know or never thought about that, are there not?
Memorable quote, for flavor: "The nation has never before seen a more systematic erosion of civil rights than after 9/11. This has taken the form of undermining the legal system, coupled with egregious governmental abuses of power, all in the name of combating terrorism."
SIDE ONE AGAIN: THIS WAR BAD, BAD . . . We have "PRE-EMPTIVE WAR: A STATUS REPORT: After striking first...... the questions multiply in Iraq: When you cut off one head, do two sprout in its place?" by the inimitable, rabidly leftist R.C. Longworth. The questions do not multiply. There are no questions. R.C.L. has all the answers.
He quotes Madeleine Albright respectfully about how Clinton never did this sort of thing: "Every president 'has quietly held in reserve' this possibility of 'anticipatory self-defense.' But never before has it been brought front and center and turned into the basis of policy."
He writes: "The result [of the Iraq war] is a murderous chaos. The war destroyed not just a regime but also a society, however repressive. In its place, it created a quagmire without water, electricity or the other basics of life, an utterly lawless land, populated by increasingly terrified and humiliated Iraqis, and policed by frightened [sic] American troops, tragically untrained for their task and comprehending neither the language nor the culture of the country they now rule."
He's a "senior correspondent," you know, not a columnist. Egad, a pamphleteer in reporter's clothes!
SIDE ONE YET AGAIN: BUZZ, BUZZ . . . We have "KARMA AND OTHER CONSEQUENCES: Has America stirred up a hornet's nest of hate?" by Kenneth R. Crossman, an essayist and a fellow in infant mental health [sic] at The University of Chicago," which opens with: "The Bush administration's policy of preemption is not just bad karma, it isn't wise."
This is quite a naturalist's meditative piece, about hornets! It is pure creative writing from the Izaak Walton School of Thought, except that Izaak did not extrapolate from fish to nations. Give me Darwin and the voyage of the Beagle any day. But in arguing "preventive war," any stick should do it.
YET AGAIN: DAMN THE BARRIERS, FULL SPEED . . . We have "THE STATE OF CIVILIZATION: Does Chicago's architecture betray a fortress mentality?" by a DePaul U. ESL teacher who does not like the post-9/11 barricades (they "were supposed to provide safety even if they were an eyesore"), vs. the rest of us who adore them, and apparently thinks we overreact to terrorist possilities. These barricades remind her "of war and the terrorists of Sept. 11 and suicide bombers." Fancy that!
What's more, her freshman history teacher's words "ring in [her] ears" -- you are what you build or something close to that -- several times in this incredibly vapid, turgid essay. Once such barriers were called moats and walls. "Today we call [them] security measures [damn our eyes!]. Security to protect our freedom [half sentence, but whatthehell]. Yet I don't feel free." Yet you don't know how to write either. We all wish it was your freshman writing teacher whose words ring in your ears.
ONE-NOTE ABANDONED: RANSOMING CAPTIVES . . . There is also a piece by an Atlanta writer who talks sense about not paying ransom to Islamic (or other) hostage-takers.
ABANDONED AGAIN: JOBS GOING, GOING . . . Finally, there is a pretty long page 3 column -- I am tempted to call it filler -- arguing cogently and concisely against free trade, "U.S. future needs blue-collar might: So, who cares if manufacturing falters or moves abroad? Americans should, because it is imperative for innovation, national defense and jobs," by the president and CEO of Manufacturers Alliance/MAPI Inc [owned by Tribune Company?] or more likely by HIS senior writer.
In fact Chicago's own Bill Daley, now in the telephone business, might have thought twice about armtwisting and cajoling for NAFTA (for Cliton, remember? when Ross Perot heard that sucking sound of jobs going south) if he had read it. On the other hand, can we imagine Bill changing tack because of a good argument?
============================
Jim Bowman
Oak Park, IL
www.blithe-spirit.com
Fax: 708 575-5321
* "Power grid primed to fail: Nips, tucks won't fix it anymore [sic], experts say"
* "As Iraqis die, hate for U.S. spreads: Families left bitter by relatives' death" (by the inimitable Gary Marx, late of Havana)
* "Job losses hit blacks hard: Many 'feel frozen out of work world'" (always a good angle here: how hard blacks have it)
MARXMAN STRIKES AGAIN . . . "As Iraqis die" highlights the day's gloom-and-doom coverage. It features gut-wrenching (colorful) accounts by "witnesses" of noncombatants' death by American gunfire: "Bullets ripped . . . She slumped . . . eyes frozen . . . baby slipped from her arms. . . . hit in the stomach."
"The tragedy" in question got only five paragraphs in an official American statement. It was "one of [unspecified] dozens" of such incidents, which "can turn" Iraqi friends into "bitter enemies." The "mounting casualty toll" creates "a new circle" of Iraqis who learn "to revile [American] soldiers who came to liberate them."
Notice "came to liberate" and its implication of failure. Can the writer not say "liberated"? [No, it would be very gauche at the press club.] Notice also that my "American" is in brackets, because it's not used -- he writes "U.S.," never American, lest we confuse our government or military with ourselves.
Note also the delicious quotes, with APPEALING picture of good-looking father with two lovely kids left without their mother, one of two shooting victims of misdirected American fire.
An American officer is quoted in matter-of-fact terms that in no way compete with the vivid, even purpled, prose of this man Marx, of which there is more more more, here not included for reasons of time.
(He "strikes again" is in reference to his 9/18/02 utterly tendentious, not to say misleading story-attack on Ken Paterson as horseman riding the length of Cuba, here discussed in November.)
ANOTHER DAY, OTHER BAD NEWS . . . Meanwhile, on Sunday 8/24/03, we have Chi Trib's Perspective section demonstrating the striking ecumenism of the editors, who have decided that one side to a story is enough for one Sunday.
SIDE ONE: RIGHTS VIOLATED . . . We have "DON'T TREAD ON ME: Is the war on terror really a war on rights?" by DePaul U.'s M. Cherif Bassiouni, whom The Trib trundles out regularly to supply the Arab and Palestinian position. His lead is a stunner: "The Declaration of Independence heralded the values of freedom, justice and equality in a country whose government was accountable to the people." There are a lot of people who didn't know or never thought about that, are there not?
Memorable quote, for flavor: "The nation has never before seen a more systematic erosion of civil rights than after 9/11. This has taken the form of undermining the legal system, coupled with egregious governmental abuses of power, all in the name of combating terrorism."
SIDE ONE AGAIN: THIS WAR BAD, BAD . . . We have "PRE-EMPTIVE WAR: A STATUS REPORT: After striking first...... the questions multiply in Iraq: When you cut off one head, do two sprout in its place?" by the inimitable, rabidly leftist R.C. Longworth. The questions do not multiply. There are no questions. R.C.L. has all the answers.
He quotes Madeleine Albright respectfully about how Clinton never did this sort of thing: "Every president 'has quietly held in reserve' this possibility of 'anticipatory self-defense.' But never before has it been brought front and center and turned into the basis of policy."
He writes: "The result [of the Iraq war] is a murderous chaos. The war destroyed not just a regime but also a society, however repressive. In its place, it created a quagmire without water, electricity or the other basics of life, an utterly lawless land, populated by increasingly terrified and humiliated Iraqis, and policed by frightened [sic] American troops, tragically untrained for their task and comprehending neither the language nor the culture of the country they now rule."
He's a "senior correspondent," you know, not a columnist. Egad, a pamphleteer in reporter's clothes!
SIDE ONE YET AGAIN: BUZZ, BUZZ . . . We have "KARMA AND OTHER CONSEQUENCES: Has America stirred up a hornet's nest of hate?" by Kenneth R. Crossman, an essayist and a fellow in infant mental health [sic] at The University of Chicago," which opens with: "The Bush administration's policy of preemption is not just bad karma, it isn't wise."
This is quite a naturalist's meditative piece, about hornets! It is pure creative writing from the Izaak Walton School of Thought, except that Izaak did not extrapolate from fish to nations. Give me Darwin and the voyage of the Beagle any day. But in arguing "preventive war," any stick should do it.
YET AGAIN: DAMN THE BARRIERS, FULL SPEED . . . We have "THE STATE OF CIVILIZATION: Does Chicago's architecture betray a fortress mentality?" by a DePaul U. ESL teacher who does not like the post-9/11 barricades (they "were supposed to provide safety even if they were an eyesore"), vs. the rest of us who adore them, and apparently thinks we overreact to terrorist possilities. These barricades remind her "of war and the terrorists of Sept. 11 and suicide bombers." Fancy that!
What's more, her freshman history teacher's words "ring in [her] ears" -- you are what you build or something close to that -- several times in this incredibly vapid, turgid essay. Once such barriers were called moats and walls. "Today we call [them] security measures [damn our eyes!]. Security to protect our freedom [half sentence, but whatthehell]. Yet I don't feel free." Yet you don't know how to write either. We all wish it was your freshman writing teacher whose words ring in your ears.
ONE-NOTE ABANDONED: RANSOMING CAPTIVES . . . There is also a piece by an Atlanta writer who talks sense about not paying ransom to Islamic (or other) hostage-takers.
ABANDONED AGAIN: JOBS GOING, GOING . . . Finally, there is a pretty long page 3 column -- I am tempted to call it filler -- arguing cogently and concisely against free trade, "U.S. future needs blue-collar might: So, who cares if manufacturing falters or moves abroad? Americans should, because it is imperative for innovation, national defense and jobs," by the president and CEO of Manufacturers Alliance/MAPI Inc [owned by Tribune Company?] or more likely by HIS senior writer.
In fact Chicago's own Bill Daley, now in the telephone business, might have thought twice about armtwisting and cajoling for NAFTA (for Cliton, remember? when Ross Perot heard that sucking sound of jobs going south) if he had read it. On the other hand, can we imagine Bill changing tack because of a good argument?
============================
Jim Bowman
Oak Park, IL
www.blithe-spirit.com
Fax: 708 575-5321
8/09/2003
SUN-TIMES' SPIELMAN ON NO-BID INSIDER
See here -- http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-clout08.html -- for the ever-reliable Fran Spielman's (Sun-Times, 8/8) account of City Hall insider with "fat" no-bid consulting contract. He is Steve Schlickman "a former CTA and RTA official who ran the now-defunct downtown circulator project that spent $59 million of taxpayers funds, but never laid a rail or turned a single shovel of dirt."
What's noteworthy about this story, besides its political significance, is how it supplies pertinent background details, telling us why the story is important without editorializing. It helps, of course, to be familiar with Spielman's reporting and writing, which is never ironic or cute and thus does not trivialize its subject matter. She does, therefore, trade on her (good) reputation, which is true of any writer.
See here -- http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-clout08.html -- for the ever-reliable Fran Spielman's (Sun-Times, 8/8) account of City Hall insider with "fat" no-bid consulting contract. He is Steve Schlickman "a former CTA and RTA official who ran the now-defunct downtown circulator project that spent $59 million of taxpayers funds, but never laid a rail or turned a single shovel of dirt."
What's noteworthy about this story, besides its political significance, is how it supplies pertinent background details, telling us why the story is important without editorializing. It helps, of course, to be familiar with Spielman's reporting and writing, which is never ironic or cute and thus does not trivialize its subject matter. She does, therefore, trade on her (good) reputation, which is true of any writer.
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