An early edition of Chicago Public Square today. Back to normal tomorrow. As ever, check the Square Facebook page for breaking news and perspective updates through the day.
[Update] 6 twisters. At least that many tornadoes blitzed the Chicago region last night—at least one near each airport …
■ Yeah, that was an earthquake west of Chicago early yesterday.
Ear here. Sporting a bandage over the wound he sustained Saturday in Pennsylvania, convicted felon and official presidential nominee Donald Trump made his first public appearance since the shooting—to cheers from the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee …
■ … alongside his choice for vice president, Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance.
■ You might conclude, as Politico does, that Trump upstaged his chosen veep.
■ The Lever: “Vance wants police to track people who have abortions” …
■ … and, the Sun-Times notes, he’s the reason Chicago has no top federal prosecutor.
■ Columnist Jordan Zakarin: Vance exemplifies Republicans’ “fake embrace of workers.”
■ Former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich: “Vance is not qualified to hold any office.”
■ Pod Save America co-host Dan Pfeiffer: “Trump picked Vance to make Project 2025 a reality.”
■ Trump antagonist and Ex-Illinois Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger, live with Stephen Colbert last night: “They are celebrating that choice both in Milwaukee … and in Moscow.”
■ Wonkette columnist Evan Hurst is even less charitable, calling Vance an “unlikeable pile of human butthair.”
■ Political poll analyst Nate Silver: Trump’s pick of Vance gives Democrats an opening.
■ USA Today’s Rex Huppke: “For Trump, unity means complete submission. … I, for one, decline to submit.”
’Prompter problems. Last night’s Republican festivities suffered a few glitches—including a teleprompter that Minnesota Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson blames for making him say something he says he didn’t want to say …
■ … and that HuffPost credits with a “super awkward” moment for House Speaker Mike Johnson.
■ MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow’s not buying it.
Sorry about the ‘bull’s-eye’ thing. President Biden tells NBC News he made a mistake in using that term last week—before the apparent assassination attempt on Trump—in saying his campaign was done talking about his poor debate performance and instead would target the Trump campaign.
■ In light of top Trumpsters’ condemnation of violent and extreme political rhetoric, Popular Information samples the convention’s featured speakers who’ve used violent and extreme rhetoric.
■ Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: “In or out of office, Trump has encouraged violence as his go-to solution.”
■ Platformer columnist Casey Newton calls it “an assassination attempt for the social media age.”
‘A lot of weird dots.’ Acknowledging that “nobody knows a f**king thing right now” about the motive behind the shooting, columnist Jeff Tiedrich asks, “Did the extreme right want this to happen?”
■ The AP says we know a few things.
■ The Washington Post: Video shows police were warned about the Trump rally shooter at least 86 seconds before gunfire rang out.
■ Columnist Neil Steinberg calls the shooting “another stroke of good fortune for a man born with a horseshoe up his ass … an excuse to eventually become the dictator he already intends to be.”
■ Eric Zorn at The Picayune Sentinel is stunned by Trump’s assertion that God alone spared his life: “What? God failed to protect the victims at … so many other venues of mass slaughter?”
■ Cartoonist Tom Tomorrow: “Has a country where people wonder every day if their children will get caught in a school shooting finally lost its innocence?”
■ LateNighter: The shooting put nighttime comedians in a box.
‘Special counsels are unconstitutional if they make Trump sad.’ That’s Lisa Needham at Public Notice, assessing what law professor Joyce Vance considers “a bad decision” …
■ … by a woman who Trump niece Mary L. Trump calls “Donald’s personal pocket judge.”
Chicago’s best. Chicago magazine’s out with its listing of the Best of Chicago for shopping, eating, drinking and more …
■ … including “the best place to blow your kid’s mind.”
■ Hey, maybe Mayor Johnson has some tips for the best joints for personal grooming?
Charged up about recycling. Wired: A new federally funded program aims to make it easier to trash your phones, computers and other battery-powered electronics responsibly.
■ Wired flags what it considers “the 209 best Prime Day deals.”
■ Other lists at Wirecutter and ZDNET.
■ The Onion: “The Amazon Prime holiday, which falls on July 16 and 17, is observed 13 days later by members of Eastern Orthodox churches as a result of religious differences dating back to the Great Schism of 1054.”
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■ Stephan Benzkofer, among many others, made this edition better.