If Trump fired Bannon / Pilots 'infuriated' / Beaches closed

IF TRUMP FIRED BANNON… Amid speculation President Trump’s chief strategist, Steve Bannon, could soon be ousted, Politico’s Ben Schreckinger asks backers and critics of the Trump administration about prospects Bannon would seek revenge. And how he might do it.

Trump partisan Jeffrey Lord gets shut down on CNN.
The Anti-Defamation League offers presidential press secretary Sean Spicer a Holocaust education class.
Five questions for the Washington Post writer whose raised eyebrows became a meme and inspired a mashup with the closing credits for Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ TV show Veep. (Photo: Gage Skidmore.)

‘TRUMP MAY ALREADY BE THE MOST ERRATIC PRESIDENT.’ The Washington Post’s Eugene Robinson says “We have no idea where he really stands because, well, neither does he.”
The decision for the first time to deploy a MOAB (take your choice: “massive ordnance air blast” or “mother of all bombs”) in Afghanistan was “baffling in military terms.” The Pentagon’s explanation? “It’s the type of weapon for the type of target.”

PILOTS ‘INFURIATED.’ The union representing United Airlines pilots blames brutal removal of a passenger from a jet on “the grossly inappropriate response by the Chicago Department of Aviation.”
An alderman grills an O’Hare bureaucrat: “So, you’re the deputy commissioner and you’re in charge of safety and security for Chicago’s airports. . . . And you’re not aware of whether or not there is a use of force order . . . that is distributed to your officers.”

SUED, FOUND UNFIT—AND A FRIEND MYSTERIOUSLY SHOT. A Tribune investigation explores a Chicago cop’s rocky record.
The Chicago police union’s new leader called a news conference and then ended it after just a minute.

SHOULD CHICAGO ANNEX SOME SUBURBS? Columnist Edward McClelland lists reasons Chicago should absorb some of its neighboring communities—including lower taxes for those residents.
One of the factors behind the Great Retail Meltdown of 2017? Too many malls.
Illinois election fallout: All those relatively small local votes last week fit “a broader pattern that should have Republicans on edge.”

THE GIRLFRIEND WAS THE TARGET. That’s what prosecutors say a man charged in the shooting death of Cook County Judge Raymond Myles tells police.
Tribune editorial: Chicago should ban guns from party buses.

YOU KNOW, LIKE CHICAGO BUT WITHOUT GUNS. A new report in Science concludes Saturn’s moon Enceladus has nearly all the ingredients for life.
Comedian W. Kamau Bell has created a Chicago episode of his CNN series, United Shades of America.

BEACHES CLOSED. Indiana shoreline spots are likely to stay closed for days after a chemical spill near Lake Michigan.
Mayor Emanuel says Chicago water is safe despite the spill.
The Tribune’s Kim Janssen demands of the mayor who passed on a Joffrey Ballet scholarship: “Dance, Rahm, dance!

‘OF THE 1,700 OR 1,800 DAILY NEWSPAPERS, A LOT OF THAT WAS CRAP.’
As he approaches retirement, visionary tech writer Walt Mossberg celebrates the internet’s impact on journalism: “Thousands of … people, who are just as smart as the staff of The New York Times and the Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal, got a chance … to start their own site, their own blog, their own whatever, and I think that was a great thing.”

A GOOD FRIDAY, NOT A GREAT FRIDAY.
Jimmy Kimmel asked kids to explain Easter: Jesus “was in heaven working on his project, then he came down to see the bunny.”
How bunnies and eggs came to be associated with Jesus.
A line of Easter toys is being recalled by Target.
University of Michigan students have built a 1,500-pound Rubik’s Cube.

CORRECTIONS. Eagle-eyed readers spotted typos in yesterday’s Chicago Public Square: Art Belanger and Mark Mueller caught an errant character string, and Mike Braden identified a redundancy. Square regrets there’s not more time in those final minutes before 10 a.m.

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