Hi again. Great to be back. If you haven’t taken a minute to nominate Square for best newsletter and best blog (links corrected) in the Reader’s Best of Chicago poll, now’s a great time. And now the news:
Better late than never. Add ex-Vice President Mike Pence to the list of Republicans condemning Donald Trump for his dinner with Ye (the former Kanye West) and racist, sexist, dictator-loving hatemonger Nick Fuentes …
■ … who, like Ye, is a product of the Chicago area—Lyons Township High School …
■ … and who identifies himself as a “proud incel,” who believes “having sex [with anyone] … is gay.” (Cartoon: An excerpt from Brian McFadden’s 2022 Winter Gift Guide.)
■ Stephen Colbert: “I can’t imagine having dinner with someone so disgusting. And you have no idea which of those three guys I’m talking about.”
■ A white gunman who in May killed 10 Black shoppers at a Buffalo supermarket has pleaded guilty and faces the rest of his life in prison.
To spend more time with his defense lawyers. Ed Burke, Chicago’s longest-serving alderman—for three years now facing federal racketeering, bribery and corruption charges—is calling it quits.
■ Politico recalls: “Burke once said there are only three ways to exit the Chicago City Council: ‘The ballot box. The jury box. Or the pine box.’ He chose to avoid all three.”
■ One of his former colleagues tells the Sun-Times: “You will never see the likes of him again.”
■ The end of the filing season leaves a total of 11 candidates for mayor—including Lori Lightfoot.
■ A Tribune editorial hails ’em all as “brave folks actually following through for their city.”
Chicago’s most dangerous bike lane. Block Club Chicago and the Illinois Answers Project roll out an investigation of a Milwaukee Avenue stretch that since 2020 has been the scene of 50 crashes, three of them fatal.
■ Chicago’s winter parking ban returns Thursday—snow or not.
So now it’s the Illinois (and other places where families have $54,000 to spare) Math and Science Academy. Aurora’s celebrated state high school is opening admission to out-of-state kids whose families can cover a massive annual tuition.
■ A year after its passage, Illinois’ first-in-the-nation Inclusive Athletic Attire Act—which guarantees student athletes the right to modify uniforms to accommodate cultural, religious and personal preferences—is still the subject of confusion.
A ‘sleazy practice.’ Ex-Tribune columnist Eric Zorn encourages Tribune subscribers to call the Tribune to demand release from charges for the Tribune’s often useless “premium issues.”
■ This afternoon at 2 Central time: Consumer Reports updates “The Fight for Fair Internet.”
More than ever, don’t trust Twitter for COVID info. Under new owner Elon Musk, the company is abandoning rules to block “harmful misinformation” about the virus and vaccines.
■ Ars Technica: Twitter’s having trouble paying employees on time.
■ Remember that scheme for Musk’s Boring Company to tunnel between downtown Chicago and O’Hare (2018 link)? The Wall Street Journal reports the company’s been ghosting cities across the country.
DJs, good and bad. Returning to the airwaves for the first time since a four-month leave to contend with cancer, WXRT-FM’s Lin Brehmer delivered a “Lin’s Bin” commentary that brought listeners to tears.
■ The audio had yet to be posted to the web at Square’s deadline, but was to appear now can be heard here soon.
■ Google and iHeartMedia have settled with the Federal Trade Commission and several states—including Illinois—over complaints that iHeart’s DJs, on its Chicago radio stations among others, endorsed and claimed to have used Google’s Pixel 4 phone when the thing wasn’t available and many of the DJs hadn’t used it.
■ Chicago’s KISS-FM was Exhibit A (page 7).
A Square public service announcement.*
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‘That is not who I want to be.’ In his first late-night interview since slapping Chris Rock at the Oscars, Will Smith—promoting a new movie—told Trevor Noah, “I was going through something that night.”
■ The Cleveland home that stood in for a Hammond home in A Christmas Story is up for sale.
■ Its 10th anniversary is occasion for the re-release of Scrooge & Marley, a Chicago-filmed queer variation on A Christmas Carol …
■ … a movie on which your Square columnist came so close to netting an IMDB listing.
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■ Thanks to new supporter Alan Hofstadter, who last week pitched in all of what he thinks Square’s worth.
■ Tim Colburn made this edition better.
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