■ Evan Hurst in Wonkette: “Dear Pissed-Off High School Kids: If Adults Threaten To Punish You For Protesting, F__KING DO IT ANYWAY.” (Photo: Brian Crawford outside Oak Park and River Forest High School.)
■ A Sun-Times editorial: “Stick with this one, kids. The world of your fathers and mothers has failed you.”
■ Tribune columnist Rex Huppke’s open letter to the kids of Parkland, Fla.: “When the haters crash down on you … stare them down. … They’ll blink, because they’re cowards at heart.”
■ At Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, some students are journalists and survivors.
■ After rejecting students’ appeal for gun-control measures, Florida lawmakers declared pornography a public health risk— something at least one Republican lawmaker couldn’t explain.
■ Trevor Noah’s protest on The Daily Show: “There’s no NRA for porn going, ‘You can take my porn when you pry it from my warm, lotion-filled hands!’”
■ Illinois lawmakers are advancing a plan to require gun stores get state licenses.
Bonus points for keeping Wolf Blitzer away. CNN’S town hall last night—when Parkland students, parents and teachers blasted tough questions at politicians and a representative from the National Rifle Association—is winning praise as “extraordinary” television.
■ Sen. Marco Rubio said six things that may change the national conversation on guns.
■ Jennifer Van Laar in RedState: “Throughout the event blame was continually [mis]placed on both guns and the NRA.”
■ … and it ended with a song that almost certainly will make you cry.
■ The Washington Post: What it would cost to arm the nation’s teachers, as the president proposed.
■ On Twitter this morning, the president moved to clarify.
Trump-Russia, explained. Give the Tribune’s Mark Jacob and Charles J. Johnson 5 minutes to sort things out for you.
■ PolitiFact: When the president said he never denied Russian meddling, he was wrong.
‘What the hell is wrong with this governor?’ Republican gubernatorial candidate Jeanne Ives condemns Gov. Rauner for bragging his administration did “exceptionally well” managing the continuing outbreak of Legionnaire’s disease at a state home for veterans.
■ Abortion rights were a key point of contention in last night’s debate between two Chicago-area Democrats seeking the nomination to run for Congress against a Nazi in the general election.
■ The name of a Cook County assessor candidate kicked out of the primary will nevertheless appear on the ballot.
■ … but, in “a revolt,” the more prominent challenger to incumbent Joe Berrios, Fritz Kaegi, has picked up key endorsements from four South Side aldermen.
■ WBEZ: Why the assessor race is so important to your wallet.
Democrats’ Madigan problem. The question of whether Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan should step down following sexual harassment scandals in his political house took center stage in yesterday’s gubernatorial debate.
■ The Tribune’s John Kass on another problem for Madigan: An allied state representative accused of beating a girlfriend.
■ A Chicago alderman accused of protecting his brother from harassment charges under Madigan is dodging questions.
■ … but as media watchdog Robert Feder notes, Sinclair still expects to operate the stations.
■ The Chicago Reader’s posted an opening for its new top editor to replace its last top editor, who fired the previous top editor as he returned from a honeymoon and who then was fired himself after one controversial issue.
Wauconda, meet Wakanda. The Black Panther movie is making things interesting in Chicago’s homophonically-named suburb.
■ 15 things people get wrong about the character.
Yesterday’s most-clicked Chicago Public Square link. Who knew Newsweek was still a thing people cared about?
