Shots in the light. Chicago’s first post-approval COVID-19 vaccination was administered this morning on the city’s West Side (updated link).
■ Suburban Cook County’s allocation of vaccines will go first to workers at 15 hospitals.
■ A batch aimed for Naperville was delayed.
■ A second COVID-19 vaccine—from Moderna—could get a final OK as soon as Thursday.
■ The Tribune: Can your boss require you to get a vaccine? Yes.
‘Unconscionable.’ Now confirmed by the Electoral College, President-elect Biden took off the gloves last night, condemning Donald Trump and his allies for the “threats and abuse” they delivered during the campaign and its aftermath.
■ Even intransigent Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is now congratulating Biden.
■ Biden was headed to Georgia today to support Democrats in two runoffs that could determine control of the U.S. Senate …
■ … one of which may be decided in part by ads featuring a candidate’s dog.
■ Pro-Democrat Broadway stars—including Lin-Manuel Miranda, Josh Gad, Idina Menzel, Billy Porter, Vanessa Williams, Rosie Perez and Bernadette Peters—have released a music video of Georgia on My Mind.
For Barr, the door. Trump’s attorney general is leaving the administration Dec. 23.
■ Legal headline of the day: “Clock Ticks Toward Mootness in Trump Emolument Cases at SCOTUS” (National Law Journal).
At this point, it will be bigger news if a federal agency hasn’t been hacked. Add the Department of Homeland Security to those victimized by what The Washington Post calls “a months-long, highly sophisticated digital spying operation by Russia.”
■ And it’s not just the government.
■ Over the course of months, the AP reports, hackers had “ample time to extract information from a lot of different targets.”
‘It’s a joke. And that joke ends today.’ The Democratic state representative who chairs a committee investigating Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan brought yesterday’s hearing to a thudding halt.
■ But, WBEZ reports, Madigan still looks short of the votes he needs to hang on to his leadership role.
‘It was the utter disdain for education and educators, expertise and experts.’ The Trib’s Heidi Stevens lays into that Wall Street Journal column condemning Jill Biden for using the honorific “Dr.” even though she’s not a medical doc.
■ Her fellow columnist Eric Zorn: “Medical doctors shouldn’t routinely use the title either.”
■ New jobs at Chicago Public Schools: 2,000 new workers, no residency required—many to oversee students whose teachers are working remotely.
First woman to report live from the Super Bowl. Pioneering Chicago journalist, author and adventurer Jeannie Morris is dead at 85.
■ “No women in my dugout,” she recalled being told by manager Ted Williams.
Say Hello to Chicago. That’s one of a bucketful of music videos rock legend Neil Young dropped overnight on Facebook.
■ Young’s made his digital music archives free for the holidays.
Why Google rules. The New York Times dissects the company’s edge: “Google has performed so many more searches than any other search engine that it has established a huge advantage over rivals in understanding what consumers are looking for.”
■ A Boston University computer science prof warns that the energy demanded by artificial intelligence technology poses an environmental threat.
■ The FTC’s demanding Google, Amazon and seven other big social media companies cough up details on how they collect and use their customers’ personal info.
■ The Onion: “Amazon Worker Emerges From Holiday Overtime Shift To Find 3,000 Years Have Passed In Outside World.”
Small things, enormous impact. A glaciologist tells CNN “a frozen rainforest” of microscopic life is melting Greenland’s ice sheet, threatening a global rise in sea levels beyond what science has predicted.
■ The Conversation: Venus was more like Earth—until climate change made it uninhabitable.
■ The Quad-City Times: “Climate change is making Iowa and Illinois hotter, wetter and more humid.”
■ Purdue University researchers: Plastic pipes damaged in fires are polluting drinking water.
■ Thanks to Chris Koenig for making this edition better.