* “Naively, perhaps, I’ve always thought of our cultural institutions as the custodians of Chicago’s better nature,” Lynn Becker writes upon discovering even more deceit in the museum’s PR campaign. “I would never have imagined that such an institution - and for the moment let’s be kind and include the CCM among them - would conduct a public campaign built out of deliberate deception, withholding of information, race-baiting, gutter politics, and an almost pathological proclivity for telling lie after lie.”
* “Now that the ever-compliant Chicago City Council has voted 33-16 to approve the Chicago Children’s Museum Grant Park land grab, the real battle can begin: In the courts, where there are no aldermen who cower in fear of crossing Mayor Richard M. Daley, the plan’s most powerful supporter,” writes Blair Kamin at The Skyline.
* “This is a rehab project for an existing building,” Pete Scales, a spokesman for the Department of Planning and Development, tells Bloomberg. “That’s something that gets lost in the debate.”
I’m about to take the stage in St. Paul and announce that we have won the Democratic nomination for President of the United States.
It’s been a long journey, and we should all pause to thank Hillary Clinton, who made history in this campaign. Our party and our country are better off because of her.
I want to make sure you understand what’s ahead of us. Earlier tonight, John McCain outlined a vision of America that’s very different from ours - a vision that continues the disastrous policies of George W. Bush.
But this is our moment. This is our time. Our time to turn the page on the policies of the past and bring new energy and new ideas to the challenges we face. Our time to offer a new direction for the country we love.
It’s going to take hard work, but thanks to you and millions of other donors and volunteers, no one has ever been more prepared for such a challenge.
Thank you for everything you’ve done to get us here. Let’s keep making history.
State Rep. Monique Davis (D-Chicago) has apologized to atheist Rob Sherman for her embarrasing tirade during a House committee hearing that landed her on Keith Olbermann’s “Worst Person In The World” list, Rich Miller of Capitol Faxreports.
Davis, you might recall, is the same legislator who said, while promoting a school prayer bill disguised as a moment of silence bill, that students might use that moment to “listen to the rustling of leaves, to listen to the chirping of a bird.”
(To which I replied on the Beachwood: Is school funding so dire that classes are now meeting in the woods?)
I’ve got the latest on Todd Stroger’s Friends & Family Plan in my Beachwood column this morning.
And there appears to be no recourse for citizens - short of marrying into the Stroger family and getting on the gravy train.
But let’s not forget who the county takes its cues from. Last week, a federal judge awarded $3.6 million in fees to lawyers who fought for years to keep politics out of City Hall hiring.
It’s easy to decry the Todd Stroger Tax, but there is a Richard M. Daley Tax far more onerous.
Division Street is NBC5’s blog about Chicago news and politics from the perspective of Steve Rhodes, a 20-year veteran of the newspaper and magazine world and more recently, the proprietor of the Chicago news and culture review, The Beachwood Reporter.
* “Naively, perhaps, I’ve always thought of our cultural institutions as the custodians of Chicago’s better nature,” Lynn Becker writes upon discovering even more deceit in the museum’s PR campaign. “I would never have imagined that such an institution - and for the moment let’s be kind and include the CCM among them - would conduct a public campaign built out of deliberate deception, withholding of information, race-baiting, gutter politics, and an almost pathological proclivity for telling lie after lie.”
E-mail sent to supporters late last night:
