May 2003

It’s All Fun and Games Until Someone is Hit with An Audit

Carl Officer has opened his administration calling for two investigations. The first was one to look into the circumstances of a city officials recent death which seems a bit strange. The second is to investigate East Saint Louis’ grant making offices including Tax Increment Financing and Community Development Block Grant funds for potential improprieties.

(nervous tic)

Good for Carl.

(Did I just say that?)

(Why yes I did)

Good for Carl. I don’t know of any specific problems with these departments and it could be Officer being Officer, but a good lookover by Federal and State officials would do the town well.

It Took Prison to Make Her Look Decent

For many years Betty Loren-Maltese was the crooked circus clown of Cicero politics with the huge red hair and painted face. It has taken prison to make her look like a normal human being:

The Sun-Times covers her time in prison and she has made the requisite efforts to claim a jail house conversion.

Of course, the real story is told in this line:

Loren-Maltese told Fox News her family is financially supported by her friends.

Movement on Burge Torture Case

The Tribune reports that the special prosecutors investigating torture under former Chicago Police Commander John Burge.

Moreover, they have gathered 130,000 documents–a total of more than 1 million sheets of paper, they said–that chronicle the controversial legacy of one of Chicago’s most enduring police scandals.

A grand jury in the case has issued subpoenas, Egan and Boyle said, although in some instances, those subpoenaed have agreed to cooperate and have met with the special prosecutors outside the grand jury.

"Is there a reluctance to talk?" said Boyle. "For some of them, of course there is." Others, he said, have helped to move the inquiry forward.

"They’re not all saying, `I’m not going to talk to you,’" said Egan.

Egan and Boyle said that with help from attorneys and through their investigation, they have uncovered nearly two dozen new cases–bringing to 86 the total number they are investigating. They initially began work on 12 Death Row cases.

One hopes they are successful. After torturing suspects for years, Burge is now retired and living a nice life in Florida. That is wrong.

Ryan Name Confusion Much Adieu about Nothing

Eric Zorn points out that near the end of the Jim Ryan for Governor campaign, Ryan name confusion was at 3 % and dropping meaning the name wasn’t the problem. The problem was the worst campaign in a long time and that Jim Ryan did nothing to make himself a strong choice for voters. The remarkable thing is how well he did despite this.

The rest of the column is a positive profile of Jack Ryan, one that he hasn’t earned. And I’ll say the same thing about Blair Hull. Being rich and the such doesn’t make one a good candidate. It makes one rich. Buying into these guys spiels is hogwash. They have never put themselves on the line in elected office. They may do well, but without a public record no one has any business building them up.

John Kass Suggests Perle wouldn’t be tolerated in Chicago

Really and he goes on to wonder why a subpeona hasn’t been served.

Perle is a leading intellectual, and one of the main architects of the war to oust Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq. And for the record, I agreed with him on that, and still do, and the only regret I have about it–aside from the American and Iraqi deaths–is that it wasn’t done sooner.

Perle also serves on the Defense Policy Board, a group that advises Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. The members of the board receive top-secret information, they’re insiders and they’re in business, many of them, representing billions of dollars in defense-related industries, including homeland security.

In Chicago, if an alderman played those games he could get a subpoena. In Washington, though, the insiders write chin-stroking op-ed pieces and have fashionable brunches in horse country on weekends.

There are hundreds of thousands of American families that have sent loved ones to Iraq or Afghanistan, or to other dangerous places, where they risk their lives carrying out government policy. That anyone advising the president should be involved in an apparent conflict of interest, which is a polite way of saying war profiteering, is revolting.

I told you profiteering would be an election issue–Kass is a strong supporter of the President.

If the Clintons had played it this way, Republicans would shriek their outrage. Now, though, the Republicans are silent.

I saw Bush speak in Philadelphia three years ago. It looked as if he actually believed the words coming out of his mouth. And I could hear him plainly.

I didn’t even have to read his lips.