Welcome to Illinois. President Biden was to arrive at O’Hare today, and then off to a Kankakee farm and, later, an electrical workers’ convention.
■ Politico’s Shia Kapos: Biden planned to blame the “Putin price hike” for high food and gas costs.
■ New numbers from the Labor Department show inflation backed off in April after seven punishing months.
■ Reminder: Adjusted for inflation, gas prices are still below 2008’s record—which would be the equivalent of more than $5 today.
■ Meanwhile, Mayor Lightfoot will be in … Texas.
‘I hope no one in Chicago actually believes it.’ Reader columnist Ben Joravsky casts a wary eye on the Lightfoot administration’s suggestion that a new casino “won’t cost the public a dime.”
■ An ordinance that would have ended the shutoff of water to Chicagoans behind in their bills flopped in the City Council yesterday.
Scoot along. Chicago’s Divvy network is evolving—becoming the first in the nation with docking stations that can handle bikes, electric bikes and scooters …
■ … which are now a permanent part of the city’s transportation milieu …
■ … but not everyone’s happy about the changes, which include a per-minute charge to use those e-bikes.
‘No sign that the court is changing course.’ Politico, which broke Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s draft opinion overturning the right to abortion, reports that that opinion is so far the only one circulating in the court.
■ The Illinois Supreme Court is getting its first Black female justice—a Republican.
Trump redux? Twitter’s would-be owner, Elon Musk, says he’d let Donald Trump back if he gains control of the company …
■ … and the American Civil Liberties Union says that’s the right call …
■ … but University of San Francisco law prof Lara Bazelon says the ACLU’s role in Johnny Depp’s defamation lawsuit against his ex-wife shows the organization has lost its way.
‘The republic cannot stand unless the sanctity of the sidewalk in front of Susan Collins’ house is maintained.’ Esquire’s Charlie Pierce says there’s “Nothing like a disturbance of the routine … to get the Democrats of the capital city acting like half-bright invertebrates.”
■ A new batch of pro-abortion-rights chalk messages appeared outside Sen. Collins’ home, but her husband says that this time they didn’t call the cops.
■ The Onion’s pros and cons of protesting at politicians’ homes include this con: “Unfair to public officials to have to see or hear people they serve.”
R.I.P., iPod. After almost 21 years, Apple’s sounding the death knell for the device that transformed the music biz …
■ … and gave us the word podcast. (Photo: Cherished family collection.)
■ Gizmodo: “It was groundbreaking at a time when people were carrying around CD players, changing out discs.”
■ Wall Street Journal columnist Joanna Stern says the iPod deserves to live.
■ Tedium revisits “the many, many competitors … that Apple’s legacy device vanquished.”
■ In 2015, Wired declared the iPod Touch “the most secure communications device available to anyone, anywhere.”
■ You can still buy one here.
■ CNET ZDNet offers a step-by-step guide to reducing your digital footprint, whether you want to lock down your personal data or vanish entirely.
Sorry about that ‘widespread voter fraud’ business. The duplicitous One America News Network has aired a segment acknowledging it spread crap about Georgia’s 2020 election.
■ A veteran TV writer who’s now an Emerson University professor of comedic arts urges late-night TV shows to “get over their Trump obsession,” representing “a bygone era of television.”
■ Columbia College journalism graduate Danny Fenster—who was imprisoned in Myanmar for almost six months last year—is one of 24 journalists named to Harvard’s new class of Nieman Fellows.
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■ Congrats to Square supporter and news quiz winner Ron Schwartz, who sends along this photo of himself wearing his prize—a Square cap.
