John Kass on Chicago’s Troubles
[Guest post by Jack Dunphy]
John Kass of the Chicago Tribune has become the indispensable Chicago columnist. He is unflinching in his reporting on the many manifestations of corruption for which the city is so widely known, and his columns are a refuge from the simpering Obama worship found elsewhere in the paper. His latest piece is on the murder of Thomas Wortham, an off-duty Chicago police officer who was shot and killed during a robbery. Wortham survived two tours in Iraq with the National Guard only to come home and be killed on his own block.
Kass has a particular loathing for Mayor Richard Daley, under whose stewardship the city has suffered, and who made an ass of himself at a recent press event. “In anti-handgun Chicago,” Kass writes, “criminals aren’t bothered by Mayor Richard Daley’s handgun ban. They haven’t been bothered for years.”
Read the whole thing.
–Jack Dunphy
Chicago is a great example of what can happen when you have the same stupid political dynasties with the same dysfunctional ideologies running things year after year. At least Los Angeles and New York occasionally manage to elect someone from outside the sewer of urban Democrat politics. Such a magnificent city being served by such a collection of crooks and bums.
JVW (36eb17) — 5/22/2010 @ 9:15 pmLost Angels is heading that way at a great rate of knots…. along with a good portion of the rest of the state.
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 5/22/2010 @ 10:53 pmFor every politician (and celebrity) who doesn’t believe in 2nd amendment rights for all law abiding citizens, I would strip of their bodyguards and security details. If they think gun control works, then why do they need armed bodyguards?
I would start with Daley.
wherestherum (d413fd) — 5/22/2010 @ 10:53 pmHoplophobia is a disease.
Mayor Daley is a very good administrator and an even better family man. Chicago is a beautiful, clean and most of all, solvent city.
Daley’s attitude about guns might go back to when his pride and joy bashed in another kid’s head with a baseball bat. Twice. Two different colored kids. That we know about.
He is not naturally a good thinker or good learner. He is proof that the Illinois bar exam is honest because he failed it twice. (Unlike the insurance broker exam that his brother failed and his father fixed.)
We’ll see how he reacts to McDonald. He learns slow, but he learns.
nk (db4a41) — 5/22/2010 @ 11:22 pmChicago is solvent?
highpockets (f6be95) — 5/22/2010 @ 11:32 pmTwo out of three sets of books say so.
AD - RtR/OS! (3c862f) — 5/22/2010 @ 11:50 pmYes, Chicago is solvent. The thing is, we have like 16 taxing bodies so it’s hard to get a picture because you have Chicago Public Schools with one rating and University of Chicago (joking) with another. But for tax-free investment bonds, Chicago is blue chip.
THIS IS NOT INVESTEMENT ADVICE. I AM NOT NOT AN INVESTMENT COUNSELOR AND I DO NOT GIVE A S___T HOW YOU THROW AWAY YOUR MONEY. 😉
nk (db4a41) — 5/22/2010 @ 11:58 pmYes, but why would you settle for that paltry interest that AAA muni’s pay when you can score some big bucks with muni’s from the Golden State?
AD - RtR/OS! (3c862f) — 5/23/2010 @ 12:06 amWould Arnold cheat you?
I grew up in Chicago and it is unrecognizable. My family have all moved to the suburbs except my sister whose husband, a policeman (now retired) had to live within city limits. They live in Beverly, which when I was a kid, was the richest neighborhood on the south side. There are shootings every week in that neighborhood, now. People have been mugged on the next block.
Daley gets elected by the whites who fear that anything else would be worse. The consensus is that, after he goes, Chicago goes the way of Detroit.
Mike K (82f374) — 5/23/2010 @ 6:39 amThat’s true, Mike K. I’m from Chicago too, and there is great fear of the power vacuum created by a non-machine government.
Kass is a treasure.
Patricia (160852) — 5/23/2010 @ 8:01 amIf you think things are bad with Daley, just wait until Rahm Emanuel is mayor.
BT (74cbec) — 5/23/2010 @ 9:08 amI think Reverend Wright could be called out of retirement to run.
Mike K (82f374) — 5/23/2010 @ 9:10 amAs a friend of the family, my boss was at the hospital until 5 a.m. regarding this shooting. Kass captures the personal tragedy well, as well as the degree to which anarchy is spreading to new areas of the city.
Karl (db6904) — 5/23/2010 @ 9:51 amI was born and raised in Chicago on the Great South Side (Roseland) during the reign of King Richard I. I was a police officer for close to 25 years during the administrations of Bilandic, Byrne, Washington, Sawyer and Richard II. Dick Daley embodies the worst form of nannyism and elitism. It might not be so galling except for the fact that he has the IQ of a basket of rocks. I can not express in polite terms my disgust at this walking, talking representation of ignorance.
SaintGeorgeGentile (aa85b2) — 5/23/2010 @ 10:25 amAny relation to the Riverside Gentiles?
nk (db4a41) — 5/23/2010 @ 11:28 am?
SaintGeorgeGentile (aa85b2) — 5/23/2010 @ 12:18 pmNo problem, I guess Gentile is a pretty common Italian name. Sorry.
nk (db4a41) — 5/23/2010 @ 1:45 pmGentile refers to my being a non-mormon. Though some now consider it a possible slur or insult I don’t mind. I used to work with some Italian Gentiles long ago in Chicago, good people.
SaintGeorgeGentile (aa85b2) — 5/23/2010 @ 8:44 pm