Chicago Public Square will take a few days off. Back Wednesday. Meanwhile, won’t you take a few seconds over the Labor Day weekend to cast a vote for Square as “Best Blog”* in the Reader’s Best of Chicago poll? And now, the news:
‘Curious.’ That’s a word Sun-Times columnist Mark Brown applies to Mayor Lightfoot’s much-hyped “State of the City” address last night: “Lightfoot says that if she needs to sacrifice herself politically to solve Chicago’s entrenched financial problems ‘so be it.’ If so, she doesn’t seem to be ready to make that sacrifice quite yet.”
■ Lightfoot elaborated today in a meeting with the Tribune streamed live on the web.
■ South Side reaction: “She can’t follow the same playbook that’s been laid out for the last 25 years because it’s made our community suffer … and that playbook should be burned.”
■ Lightfoot is promising to attend four town hall meetings to get people’s opinions on what to do, and they too will be livestreamed.
■ She is also putting the squeeze for help on Gov. Pritzker …
■ … who will be partly sidelined for up to six weeks by a thigh fracture.
Thumbs up. Illinois has given Green Thumb Industries medical dispensaries—three in Chicago suburbs—the first five state licenses for the sale of recreational marijuana.
■ John Kass to the governor: Don’t sell the Thompson Center. “The state should … grow marijuana in that fat Combine greenhouse.”
‘Cone of uncertainty.’ That phrase is almost always applicable to Florida, but no more so than now—as meteorologists grapple with the likelihood of its extended pummeling by slow-moving Hurricane Dorian.
■ Updating coverage: The forecast for what could be the most powerful storm to hit the state’s east coast in a generation has been growing increasingly dire.
‘Democrats were aghast, but I was delighted.’ The Sun-Times’ Neil Steinberg assesses President Trump’s reported promise to pardon aides who commit crimes in the process of getting a border wall built.
■ Fox News—repeating: Fox News—host Neil Cavuto spent almost four minutes ripping Trump for falsehoods, closing with a warning to the president: “Just because you’re the leader of the free world doesn’t entitle you to a free pass.”
Say what? Trump’s longtime personal assistant is out at the White House after reportedly “sharing intimate details about the president’s family with reporters.”
■ CNN: “From her desk directly outside the Oval Office, she observed almost every coming and going over more than two and a half years.”
■ The Root’s Stephen A. Crockett Jr.: “A white woman with arguably the whitest name ever is no longer working in the Whitest House.”
Biden’s blunders. CNN’s Brian Stelter surveys fallout from Joe Biden’s complete botching of a war story.
■ Biden will share center stage with Elizabeth Warren at ABC’s Democratic presidential debate Sept. 12.
Protect yourself. Consumer Reports offers five simple—30-second—privacy fixes for your digital life.
■ Is your iPhone screen cracked? Apple’s making repairs more accessible.
■ Illinois lawmakers are gathering information on the health threats—or not—posed by emerging 5G cellphone radiation.
Feeling festive?
■ A guide to the Chicago Jazz Festival.
■ Or maybe the North Coast Music Festival is more your thing.
■ The schedule for Riot Fest in a couple of weeks has been released on the back of a beer can label.
‘When we talk about trying times for the media, this is what we talk about.’ The Big Lead’s Kyle Koster bemoans an AP style change deprecating hyphens in compound modifiers (so, AP contends, it’s now first quarter touchdown).
■ Remember: It’s one space after a period, not two (2015 link).
■ A timeless Onion bit from 2013: “4 Copy Editors Killed In Ongoing AP Style, Chicago Manual Gang Violence.”
* Chicago Public Square’s secret name is … chicagopublicsquare.blogspot.com. (Try it.) So, you know, Square really does have the right stuff to qualify for “Best Blog” in the Reader’s Best of Chicago poll. If you didn’t click the link at the top of this issue, you can in good faith do so now.
■ The kids are all right: Teen Vogue reports young people are creating their own news outlets.