Signs of a spine. The fourth try proved a charm as the U.S. House—with four Republicans joining Democrats—for the first time OK’d a war powers resolution that would kill President Trump’s war on Iran.
■ The Lever calls it the first real legal challenge to the war.
■ Predictably, Trump took to social media this morning to label those Republicans “bad” and “unpatriotic.”
■ But columnist and former Labor Secretary Robert Reich sees a sign that Trump’s clout “is whooshing away. … Something important has changed.”
■ Heads Up News proprietor Dan Froomkin takes cues from Hungary in outlining how to “put Trumpism fully behind us.”
Watch your mailbox. Postcards going out offer longtime Comcast and Xfinity customers a piece of a $117.5 million settlement over a major data breach.
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Not dead yet. Popular Information: Contrary to claims from acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, Donald Trump’s “anti-weaponization fund” isn’t off the table.
■ Trump says he’ll nominate Blanche to keep the job.
■ Lawyer/columnist Robert Hubbell calls that “a sign that Trump no longer cares about Republican prospects for the midterms or 2028.”
■ USA Today’s Chicago-based columnist Rex Huppke: The president’s choice of “soul-sold Trump toady” Bill Pulte to head the national intelligence operation “is a bad, bad choice that could put Americans in danger.”
■ Unearthed video shows Pulte getting a lewd award.
■ The Bulwark: “A ‘degenerate’ buffoon” now heads U.S. intelligence.
Trump health questions. Add ex-Vice President Dick Cheney’s old doctor to those calling for the president’s doctor to face reporters and address the president’s long disappearances from the public eye …
■ … although columnist Jeff Tiedrich notes that the president’s handlers yesterday “finally let him out of his spider hole so he could hold an Oval Bordello dog-and-pony show.”
California cliffhangers. The vote-counting continued today from Tuesday’s primary, with declarations of winners likely days—or weeks away.
■ A congressman unseen for three months won renomination in New Jersey’s Republican primary …
■ … prompting The Daily Show’s Ronnie Chieng to pronounce him maybe “the greatest politician of all time.”
‘The optics are horrible.’ Poynter’s Tom Jones writes: “Just when you thought the CBS News soap opera couldn’t get any more dramatic …”
■ The AP recaps “A dizzying week of public airing of dirty laundry”—including remarks to staff from news chief Bari Weiss and fired 60 Minutes’ anchor Scott Pelley’s response.
■ Jimmy Kimmel last night branded Weiss and company “Trump suck-ups” …
■ … but Weiss’ handpicked CBS Evening News anchor, Tony Dokoupil, last night saluted Pelley as “a journalist who valued truth at all costs.”
■ Columnist Neil Steinberg’s not all that sympathetic: “What was he expecting? His new boss to blink, smack his forehead and say, ‘My God Scott, you’re absolutely right! We are being vile corporate asshats.’”
■ Columnist Eric Zorn offers the memo CBS execs should have written instead of firing Pelley.
■ WGN Radio (briefly, an employer of your Chicago Public Square columnist) has yanked veteran Tribune columnist Rick Kogan’s weekly show—replacing it in part with a show led by a Free Press colleague of CBS News chief Weiss.
■ The Onion: “FCC To Investigate TV Shows Where The Mom Has Job.”
■ The deadline for filing is Sept. 14.
■ Tech watchdog Kim Komando: Using your phone to pay is safer than tapping or swiping.
■ Still relying on Microsoft Office 2019? Not for long.
■ TidBITS advises iPhone owners to jump on a new software update: “A bug that blocks charging precisely when you need it most is worth squashing with alacrity.”
‘401 North Obama.’ The campaign to rename Wabash Avenue—home to Trump Tower in Chicago—in honor of Barack Obama has a new website …
■ … and, as of early this morning, more than 13,000 signatures.
■ Columnist Susan Berger toured the Obama Presidential Center in Hyde Park: “The contrast to today is so drastic, I cried.”
■ The New York Times’ critic (gift link) sees the center as having two sides: “A lovely park and a forbidding tower.”
■ The Tribune’s A.D. Quig breaks down what to expect when you visit.
Pellet putdown. Among the many bills Illinois lawmakers passed in a hectic last few hours of this legislative session: One making the state the first in the Great Lakes region to classify plastic pellets as pollutants …
■ … and another creating a state-run investment fund for grants to nonprofit organizations.
Clarification. Yesterday’s Square erroneously suggested that thousands of local home listings vanished overnight this week—when in fact that happened last month.
■ Mike Braden made this edition better.
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