Unspeakable? The Daily Beast reports that new House Speaker Mike Johnson’s never listed a bank account on his financial disclosures—and, on his newest form, doesn’t list a single asset at all.
■ The AP: Johnson was the dean of a small Baptist law school that didn’t exist.
■ Stephen Colbert called out Johnson’s regressive website and podcast with his wife—newly not available: “You just see ‘Error 404: This seemed OK before I knew we’d be famous.’”
■ Salon: Johnson “made a remark about his wife that was … so gross that it immediately went viral.”
‘Anyone can make a video with world leaders saying anything.’ The Daily Show illustrates with a perversion of President Biden’s remarks on an executive order putting fences around artificial intelligence development.
■ Platformer’s Casey Newton: The technology’s potential to do good “appears roughly equal to its potential to do harm.”
‘I tend to blame Israeli incompetence more than I fault Hamas for doing what terrorists do. Because I expect more of Israel.’ And yet, Sun-Times columnist Neil Steinberg writes of the ongoing war, “I wish Hamas would understand that trying to kill their way out of this fix keeps blowing back on them in a bad way.”
■ An eyewitness to an Israeli strike targeting a Hamas commander at a refugee camp in northern Gaza: “Children were carrying other injured children.”
■ CNN’s Wolf Blitzer pressed an Israel Defense Forces spokesman: “You knew there were civilians there. You knew there were refugees … but you decided to still drop a bomb?”
■ One suburban man is mourning 30 relatives dead in Gaza.
■ AP’s tally as of this morning: 1,400 dead in Israel, almost 8,700 dead in Gaza and the West Bank.
■ An international media freedom group cites 34 journalists killed in the war—and accuses both sides of war crimes.
■ Prosecutors have charged a Cornell University junior in connection with threats to the school’s Jewish students.
■ The Conversation: The latest bombings add to generations of displaced Palestinians.
■ A longtime Chicagoan living in Israel with her husband and two children: “I’m angry. Angry that the people acting in my name don’t share my dream of a just and sensible outcome. Angry that the people acting in the name of Palestinian rights have been hijacked by murderers.”
■ The Onion mocks: “Politicians Explain Why They Will Not Endorse A Ceasefire.”
‘How are we going to survive winter here?’ The Tribune reports that Chicago’s first bout of sub-freezing temperatures poses an existential crisis for the city’s migrants.
■ A Trib editorial: “Migrants are here. Many have children. All of them feel the cold,” but “tents are inadequate.”
■ Mayor Johnson can notch a victory: A Chicago City Council committee’s OK’d a March referendum on the so-called “mansion tax” to fund expanded services for the city’s homeless.
■ Is your home or office cold? WBEZ rounds up your rights under Chicago’s heat ordinance.
■ The season’s first bout of icy weather contributed to several Chicago-area car crashes.
‘Stop playing coy.’ A Sun-Times editorial demands transparency from Illinois government over key resignations amid suspicious spending at the Illinois Emergency Management Agency.
■ Gov. Pritzker’s waiving penalties and interest for Cook County taxpayers hit by flooding and other severe weather in September.
‘A Category 5 hurricane in Mexico revealed the dangers of climate change. Nobody noticed.’ Columnist Will Bunch asks why the world is ignoring the devastation in Acapulco.
■ Former Hoy editorial page editor Antonio Rosas-Landa: “Acapulco needs help, which will come from somewhere … other than the Mexican government.”
■ PolitiFact blows away lies that wind turbine generators typically fail after three or four years.
■ Cipher: The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is offering a first-of-its-kind course training students to mediate conflicts over clean energy projects.
Pumpkin purge. Don’t trash ’em. Smash ’em—Saturday at a number of locations across Chicago …
■ … and the suburbs.
■ In case you missed it: The most-tapped item in yesterday’s Chicago Public Square—by far—was the history of what many consider Halloween’s creepiest song.
One week left. Nominate Square for Best Email Newsletter and Best Independent Website in the Reader’s Best of Chicago awards …
■ … then email a screenshot of your vote to Bestof@ChicagoPublicSquare.com and see your name published in a future edition.
■ You know, like Brent Brotine.
