Sharpie-dressed map.* Digging an even deeper hole to justify his lies about Hurricane Dorian’s path, President Trump trotted out a National Hurricane Center map altered with an apparently hand-drawn half-circle to suggest the storm at one point threatened Alabama …
■ … which means whoever doctored the map may have broken federal law …
■ … signaling the dawn of a scandal that Stephen Colbert has dubbed … “Water-gate.” (Cartoon: Keith J. Taylor.)
■ Updating: Dorian is menacing the Carolinas …
■ … and it’s left thousands of Bahamians in dire straits.
Democrats’ green ‘fault lines.’ CNN’s marathon town hall on the climate crisis exposed significant differences among the party’s presidential candidates …
■ … and turned a spotlight on Joe Biden’s fundraiser tied to a fossil fuel company.
■ An economist tells The New York Times that one of the Democratic also-rans is “the most important person on the planet.”
■ The Trump administration is flipping off a plan that would have phased out old-style incandescent light bulbs.
Plastic, plastic everywhere. Southern Lake Michigan is a hotspot for 22 million pounds of plastic entering the Great Lakes every year.
■ Consumer Reports sadly has found it necessary to explain how to eat less plastic.
Todd’s troubles. The Cook County state’s attorney is getting custody of the investigation into reports Cubs co-owner Todd Ricketts made “misrepresentations” that lowered his tax bills by tens of thousands of dollars.
■ Downton Abbey fanboy and ex-Congressman Aaron Schock is off the hook on corruption charges …
■ … under an extraordinary deal that leaves him free to run for office again.
■ Chicago’s departing FBI boss on political corruption scandals: “The city of Chicago should expect more to come.”
Button up. Tired of waiting for the CTA to deliver on a promise of distributing identifying buttons to pregnant women—as a signal that clueless riders should offer them seats—a Chicago organization is making its own for a giveaway next week.■ On Facebook last night, columnist Mary Schmich shared her own series of unfortunate—but ultimately uplifting—transportation events.
Marijuana ‘will burn your brain out.’ Politico’s Shia Kapos says that’s the only citizen comment that agitated the small group of citizens who turned out for the first of Mayor Lightfoot’s town hall meetings on Chicago’s beleaguered budget.
■ Groundbreaking reform at the Chicago City Council: A committee meeting was livestreamed on the web.
■ New from Chicago’s inspector general: The city takes months and months to act upon sanitation code violations.
Changing Chicago. Reflecting Hispanic population growth, Modelo Especial has passed Miller Lite to become the city’s top-selling beer.
■ A former Logan Square synagogue is turning into an apartment building.
If you had $50,000 to spare, would you give it to Fox News contributor Donna Brazile and ex-White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer? That’s what Chicago’s struggling Northeastern Illinois University is planning …
■ … even though NEIU took a drubbing two years ago for doing much the same thing.
■ The Obama Presidential Center isn’t a done deal, but a new study concludes that just the prospect has already pushed up Woodlawn area housing prices to levels current residents can’t afford.
Apple’s unfair edge. The Washington Post lays bare the company’s power to steal the best ideas from players in its App Store.
■ Sears is laying off 250 people at its suburban HQ.
Don’t forget … to vote for Chicago Public Square in the Reader’s Best of Chicago poll.
* Although Chicago Public Square independently dreamed up that play on ZZ Top’s song, of course Twitter was first.