Same story, 2 headlines / Storms’ toll / Apple security fixes

Same Story, Two Headlines Dept.

■ Chicago Tribune online edition (gift link): “Trump defends his tariffs during Michigan visit even as businesses say they’ve hurt the state.”

■ Trib print edition front page:

■ Press Watch proprietor Dan Froomkin: “What a disservice to the people of Chicago. It was all lies.”

■ Columnist Heather Delaney Reese: Trump told autoworkers that “he has been better to them than the people who raised them.”

■ Former Trib editor and now Stop the Presses columnist Mark Jacob offers alternative headlines.

■ Also from Jacob, on the decline of CBS News: “When news execs help fascists whitewash murder.”

■ Columnist and former Chicago TV executive Jennifer Schulze: “Trump’s fascist power play threatens Chicago’s favorite local TV station.”

■ CNN’s Brian Stelter: “Surprise: PBS and NPR are still alive and kicking.”

‘Great late-night television.’ Veteran TV critic Bill Carter praises Jon Stewart’s Daily Show dissection of Trump’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner speech from a veteran comic’s perspective.

■ And then Stewart hosted—and praised—one of the targets of Trump’s animus that night, CNN reporter Kaitlan Collins.

■ Seth Meyers: “People ask me all the time if I think Trump is good for comedy. I’ll say this: He’s better for it than he is at it.” (Cartoon: Jack Ohman.)

Storms’ toll. A wrenching round of bad weather ravaged the Chicago region yesterday, pelting some areas with golf-ball-sized hail …

■ … and maybe tornadoes …

■ … leaving hundreds of thousands powerless …

■ … maybe for days.

■ At least one person was missing and presumed dead after flooding overwhelmed workers in a suburban storm sewer.

■ A tornado blitzed northeastern Wisconsin.

■ Block Club: What to do if your basement flooded.

Speaking of power outages … The Trib reports (gift link) a Texas-based startup is offering Chicagoans an outdoor battery system that can lower electric bills and provide up to two days’ backup electricity.

■ Columnist Matthew Yglesias: “The simplest way to bring down utility bills is to charge what the electricity actually costs.”

■ Shared electric scooters are now a no-no along a stretch of Sheridan Road.

■ The American Prospect: “The strongest El Niño in history is coming. … Climate change is not going to wait for America or any other country to sort out its political dysfunctions.”

‘86 the 86 47 prosecution.’ Law professor and former federal prosecutor Joyce Vance shreds the indictment of former FBI Director Jim Comey over his Instagram post of seashells spelling out a political slogan.

■ Comey’s lawyers: “No reasonable observer would understand the phrase ‘86 47’ to connote … violence against the President.”

Follow the money. An Illinois Answers Project investigation tracks funding for this year’s Chicago Public Schools board elections to billionaires, the Chicago Teachers Union and secretive political organizations …

■ … and it’s created an online tool to give you real-time notifications any time a campaign committee reports a major contribution.

‘Much like his candidate, Moraff has a credible sexual assault allegation against him, too.’ Reporter Marisa Kabas says the political operative behind disgraced and replaced Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner faces similar troubles.

■ Satirist Andy Borowitz: “Hegseth Freaks Out After Testing Positive for Estrogen.”

Apple security fixes. TidBITS tracks a “massive number” of updates in a new free operating system for iPhones, iPads, Macintoshes and other devices.

■ Tech columnist Kim Komando: Apple may owe you $95 … eventually.

Fauci’s diary. COVID-era personal notes from the National Institutes of Health’s pandemic leader, Anthony Fauci, show he reveled in “the public adulation of me.”

■ They were published to the web by Republican Sen. Rand Paul.

‘I read Public Square immediately after receiving the daily email. I am deeply appreciative of the work you do.’ — Kind words yesterday from a supporter of this publication.

■ Join him in the ranks of Chicago Public Squarians today and see your name atop tomorrow’s roll-call—like this: Audrey Sostak, Tom Macek, Bill Utter, Jeff Baker, David Hammond (again!), Jerry D. Mason, Marianne Griebler, David Walsh, Jim Maguire, Garry, Martin Berg, Kermit Carlson, Steve Carlson, Nina Ovryn, Susanne Riedell, Theresa Rattenbury, Anne Costello, Norm Winer, Paul Crossey, Paul Herrick, Susan Gregoire, Marc Sims, Jim Polaski, Jack Bizot, Darryl Roberts, Rosalind Rouse and Michael Phillips.

A Square public service announcement

‘An embarrassment’ / Mitch hitch / A ‘summer sh*t show’

‘An embarrassment.’ Poynter media writer Tom Jones says “Donald Trump’s hour of rambling, insults and ridicule” left the White House Correspondents’ Association with little to celebrate after Friday night’s rescheduled dinner.

■ Andrew Egger at The Bulwark: “Punchline after punchline landed with a thud.”

■ Columbia University journalism ethics professor and former New York Times public editor Margaret Sullivan rates the evening a “predictable disgrace” and rejects “every specious argument that encourages the media to keep normalizing Trump.”

■ As the reliably unrestrained Jeff Tiedrich puts it: “The colicky piss-baby didn’t just end up shitting the bed at the Correspondents’ Dinner, he rolled around in the mess for almost an hour.”

‘The president of the United States has lost his mind.’ Reviewing Trump’s weekend on social media, columnist Heather Delaney Reese notes that “over the course of five hours, he posted dozens of times,” including “image after image of a third Trump presidency in 2028” …

■ … which makes this six-year-old illustration by the late Keith J. Taylor as timely as ever:

■ Historian Heather Cox Richardson: The Trump administration’s actions in his second term “align with the strategy of Nazi political theorist Carl Schmitt.”

■ Reviewing a book he considers “mandatory reading for anyone who wants to understand the state—and stakes—of American politics today,” Pro-Israel Political Update columnist Steve Sheffey warns that “Christian nationalism might be the most dangerous force in American politics.”

■ Columnist and former Illinois U.S. Rep. Marie Newman: “Trump and election deniers are endangering election workers, deliberately” …

■ … and political analyst Brian Beutler says Democrats look poised to fund Trump’s election-subversion schemes.

‘Crypto sketchiness for maximum profit.’ HBO’s John Oliver—whose contract is up at the end of the year as his parent company faces possible acquisition by Trump-friendly Paramount Skydance—devoted almost his whole show last night to the president’s embrace of financial technology he once denounced as “a disaster waiting to happen” …

■ … but Oliver left a little time at the end to invite the Texas-based gas station giant Buc-ee’s to come at him.

Mitch hitch. The Louisville Courier Journal reviews key Senate votes stalled by is-he-dead-or-not Sen. Mitch McConnell’s absence.

■ Satirist Andy Borowitz: “Unconscious Mitch McConnell Scores Higher Approval Rating Than Conscious Version.”

‘An America numb to violence.’ Pulitzer-winning Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Will Bunch (gift link) mourns a lack of public outrage over the police killing of a Black man on a Madison, Wisconsin, street corner.

■ As Chicago and Illinois State Police officers early Sunday pursued a car in connection with reports someone inside had pointed a gun at a person, the car drove off a Bedford Park bridge—killing three [update: four] occupants.

■ Separately, three people were killed and six were wounded in South Side violence early Sunday.

You’re welcome, Amazon and Walmart. Popular Information’s analysis finds U.S. taxpayers spending billions of dollars a year providing Medicaid benefits for hundreds of thousands of workers whose take-home pay from those companies hovers at or below the poverty line.

■ Gizmodo: “Apple is reportedly worried about its non-creepy reputation as it prepares to enter a creepy product category.”

A ‘summer sh*t show.’ Columnist and former Chicago TV news executive Jennifer Schulze says the nation deserves “straight answers about the cyclosporiasis outbreak but the nation’s top health official is too busy talking about orange juice and TikTok.”

■ The Onion: “Man Eating Salad Takes Moment To Appreciate What A Good Boy He’s Being.”

‘The pain ebbed after the second day and I’m getting by on Advil.’ Recovering from surgery, columnist Neil Steinberg tapped your Chicago Public Square columnist to fill in today.

■ “Dear Abby” Jeanne Phillips, who almost 40 years ago took on the advice column created by her late mother, is retiring.

Chicago Public Squarewear prices are about to rise. But you can still get $5 off a T-shirt or hoodie by pitching in any amount—as little as $1, just once—to keep this service coming …

■ … and that will get your name atop tomorrow’s roll call of Square supporters. You know, like Kathy O’Brien (again!), Susann Slinic (again!), Dave Connell, Cecelia Kafer, Gordon Meyer, Daniel Honigman, Ellen Siciliano, Graham Greer, Denise Joyce, Anne White, Alison Price, Eric Zorn, Suzy Carlson, R Carney, Jill Chukerman, Cathy Sullivan, Judy Sherr, Chris Ruys, Gary Strokosch, Donna Rigsbee, Matthew Hunnicutt, Suzanne Ross, Jen Purrenhage, Brian Gunderson, Collin Canright, Emily Gage, Paul Buchbinder, Chris Mcintosh, Tim Brandhorst, Sandra Slater, Ron Castan, Eric Townsend, Sabrina Deitch, Vidas Germanas, Irene Rundblom, Mark Zegan, Jim Stafford, Maria Peterson, Valerie Morrow, Jill Brickman, Peter Chien, Ed McDevitt, Rachael Georges, Monica Eng, Mark Nystuen, Jan Menaker Brock, Deborah Spector, Kevin Lampe, Paul M. Moretta and Robert S. Gold.

■ And because those small recurring donations are the heart of Square: If over the course of the last decade you’ve contributed a total of at least $100 and you haven’t gotten any free swag, drop your size, style preference and shipping address to shirts@ChicagoPublicSquare.com and we’ll get right on that.

■ Mike Braden made this edition better.