Where’s your shot? / Oxymorons in the news / Tuned out

Where’s your shot? Although supplies remain short, those eligible for the COVID-19 vaccine can now try their luck signing up at Jewel-Osco, Walgreens, Walmart and through sites serving most of suburban Cook County and all of Illinois.

Things are looking up: Pfizer says it’s gaining on vaccine delivery goals.
Tinley Park’s convention center is the county’s first mass vaccination site.
Chicago’s vaccination program has a race-gap problem.

Ball in the Senate’s court. The House has kicked Donald Trump’s unprecedented second impeachment to the other side of the Capitol.
Note from The Conversation to those who consider impeaching an ex-president a waste of time: “In 9th-century Rome they put a pope’s corpse on trial.”
The Democrats’ new Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, says the party may address Republicans’ recent packing of the federal court system by adding judges to some courts.

Power play. In a move The Washington Post says would deliver on one of his “boldest climate campaign pledges,” President Biden was set to ban new oil and gas leasing on federal property.
A Sun-Times editorial calls on Biden to do “a thorough housecleaning, starting at the top” of Trump’s Postal Service hierarchy. (Cartoon: Keith J. Taylor.)

Oxymorons in the news. One of Trump’s former administrators is launching a pro-Trump think tank.
A former chairman of the Better Government Association: Leave the sign on Trump’s Chicago building, “so that when kids in the future ask who or what is a Trump, their parents may recount one of the strangest, most contentious and tumultuous presidential administrations in our national history.”
Trump’s established an unofficial “Office of the Former President.”

‘They’re saying you’re a piece of shit and I’m a piece of shit mother. But it’s just fucking words.’ The Tribune reports that video recorded at the Antioch police station shows white supremacist fanboy Kyle Rittenhouse and his mom fixated on social media in the hours after his arrest for the murder of two men during Kenosha protests in August.
Little noticed over the weekend, dozens of Texas-based racists held a rally in the heart of Chicago.

More snow. Another four inches could blanket Chicago by Wednesday morning.
A Trib map shows how much fell near you. (Another Keith J. Taylor cartoon.)
It could be worse—and is, in other parts of the Midwest.
Wanted: Shoveling volunteers to clear Chicago seniors’ sidewalks.

Renters refuge. The Cook County Board is moving toward landmark new protections for tenants (“The Buzz” in today’s Politico Illinois Playbook).
As jobs have dissolved in the pandemic, the percentage of union members among the still-employed has risen.
Illinois says it’s blocked nearly a million fake unemployment claims since the pandemic dawned.

Tuned out. Two execs overseeing CBS’ local TV stations (which include Chicago’s Ch. 2) are on leave during an investigation of charges surfaced by a Los Angeles Times report—which was one of the most-clicked items in yesterday’s Chicago Public Square—that they “cultivated a hostile work environment … bullying female managers and blocking efforts to hire and retain Black journalists.”
The National Association of Black Journalists is demanding those guys’ “immediate termination.”

Politico rebellion. Staffers are protesting the decision to publish work by a reactionary jagoff.

Now you can sleep better. Twitter’s banning the MyPillow guy for his lies about the election.
In a twist that wouldn’t have been out of place on 30 Rock, he’s suing the Daily Mail for reporting he was fooling around with one of that show’s stars.

‘The greatest podcast that ever was.’ The Trib’s Christopher Borrelli sings the praises of—and celebrates Chicago’s ties to—99% Invisible.
A Chicago lawyer who made fun of host Ken Jennings is on a Jeopardy! win streak that included a rare tiebreaker round.

Things You Knew Dept. Axios on Twitter’s acquision of Revue: The newsletter biz is booming “as users flock to email to help sort through the massive scale and clutter on the web.”
Twitter pledges “a better home for writers.”

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Thanks to Chris Koenig for making this edition better.

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