Zorn: Trump's former four-star generals are using the f-word — fascist — to describe him
Zorn: Trump's former four-star generals are using the f-word — fascist — to describe him
This is not a drill, voters.
10-24-2024 (issue No. 164)
This week:
It’s break the glass and pull the alarm time — America might just be on the verge of electing a fascist would-be dictator
Fewer newspapers are endorsing presidential candidates, and I’m fine with that
Land of Linkin’ — Where I tell readers where to go
Squaring up the news — Where Charlie Meyerson tells readers where to go
Highlights from Ezra Klein’s New York Times essay, “What’s Wrong With Donald Trump?”
Feeling listless? — Here are some good ones about Donald Trump
Hizzoner: Homina-homina — Mayor Brandon Johnson doesn’t not seem to know how to give a straight answer
Mary Schmich & Cheer Chat — An update on preparations for “Songs of Good Cheer” by my former colleague and fellow cast member
Quotables — A collection of compelling, sometimes appalling passages I’ve encountered lately
Quips — The winning visual jokes and this week’s contest finalists
Good Sports — No, the Fighting Illini are not for real
Tune of the Week — “Fallen” by Sarah McLachlan, via Neil Steinberg
Eric Zorn is a former opinion columnist for the Chicago Tribune. Find a longer bio and contact information here. This issue exceeds in size the maximum length for a standard email. To read the entire issue in your browser, click on the headline link above. Paid subscribers receive each Picayune Plus in their email inbox each Tuesday, are part of our civil and productive commenting community and enjoy the sublime satisfaction of supporting this enterprise.
Last week’s winning quip
It's the order of mankind's accomplishments that fascinate me. In 1969, we put men on the moon. In 1970, we put wheels on luggage. — @WilliamAder
This is more or less true. From Travelpro’s page on “The History of Rolling Luggage”:
In 1970, Bernard D. Sadow innovated a traditional suitcase on wheels attached to a long strap.
In 1972, Sadow patented his invention as the Rolling Luggage.
In 1987, Robert Plath updated Sadow’s design by placing the suitcase vertically, attaching two wheels and building a retractable handle.
To my mind, the 1987 update really revolutionized suitcases. Thus there are a number of other developments/inventions that somehow predated the rolling bags nearly all of us now use, including personal computers and cell phones.
Here are this week’s nominees and the winner of the Tuesday visual-jokes poll. Here is the direct link to the new poll.
It’s break the glass and pull the alarm time
The New York Times report"John Kelly, the Trump White House’s longest-serving chief of staff, said that he believed that Donald Trump met the definition of a fascist" (gift link) broke Tuesday evening and I certainly hope this alarming news is on the front page and at the top of the website of every American newspaper Thursday.
Kelly, the retired four-star Marine general who became Trump’s homeland security secretary and White House chief of staff confirmed in a recorded interview “that Trump had made admiring statements about Hitler, had expressed contempt for disabled veterans and had characterized those who died on the battlefield for the United States as ‘losers’ and ‘suckers.’”
In response to a question about whether he thought Trump was a fascist, Kelly first read aloud a definition of fascism that he had found online.
“Well, looking at the definition of fascism: It’s a far-right authoritarian, ultranationalist political ideology and movement characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy,” he said.
Kelly said that definition accurately described Trump.
“Certainly the former president is in the far-right area, he’s certainly an authoritarian, admires people who are dictators — he has said that. So he certainly falls into the general definition of fascist, for sure.” …
He said he believed Trump stood alone in his lack of understanding of history and the Constitution.
Kelly said Trump lacked a fundamental understanding of basic American values and what being president is about. …
Kelly was asked whether Trump had any empathy.
“No,” Kelly said.
This is not some MSNBC lefty or some pointy-headed Substacker bleating about Trump. It’s someone who worked with him closely and identified with quite a few of his conservative goals. And he’s not alone, as CNN reported in “24 former Trump allies and aides who turned against him.” The list includes:
His first secretary of defense, James Mattis: “Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people – does not even pretend to try. Instead he tries to divide us.”
His second secretary of defense, Mark Esper: “I think he’s unfit for office. … He puts himself before country. His actions are all about him and not about the country. And then, of course, I believe he has integrity and character issues as well.”
His first secretary of state, Rex Tillerson: “(Trump’s) understanding of global events, his understanding of global history, his understanding of U.S. history was really limited. It’s really hard to have a conversation with someone who doesn’t even understand the concept for why we’re talking about this.”
His first secretary of the Navy, Richard Spencer: “The president has very little understanding of what it means to be in the military, to fight ethically or to be governed by a uniform set of rules and practices.”
Tuesday night on CNN Trump's former National Security Adviser John Bolton said, “You can take what John (Kelly) says to the bank … don’t give your vote to Donald Trump. … He cares only about himself. … Trump in the White House again — for a second term — will harm American national interests, domestically and internationally.”
In addition, retired four-star Army Gen. Mark Milley, Trump’s chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told author Bob Woodward that Trump “is the most dangerous person ever. I had suspicions when I talked to you about his mental decline and so forth, but now I realize he’s a total fascist. He is now the most dangerous person to this country. … Do you realize, do you see what this man is?”
In “Trump: ‘I Need the Kind of Generals That Hitler Had’: The Republican nominee’s preoccupation with dictators, and his disdain for the American military, is deepening,” The Atlantic editor Jeffrey Goldberg writes:
Trump … publicly floated the idea of “termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution,” as part of the effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election and keep himself in power.
On separate occasions in 2020, Trump held private conversations in the White House with national-security officials about the George Floyd protests. “The Chinese generals would know what to do,” he said, according to former officials who described the conversations to me, referring to the leaders of the People’s Liberation Army, which carried out the Tiananmen Square massacre in 1989. (Pfeiffer denied that Trump said this.)
Trump’s desire to deploy U.S. troops against American citizens is well documented. During the nerve-racking period of social unrest following Floyd’s death, Trump asked Milley and Esper, a West Point graduate and former infantry officer, if the Army could shoot protesters. “Trump seemed unable to think straight and calmly,” Esper wrote in his memoir. “The protests and violence had him so enraged that he was willing to send in active-duty forces to put down the protesters. Worse yet, he suggested we shoot them. I wondered about his sense of history, of propriety, and of his oath to the Constitution.”
Esper told National Public Radio in 2022, “We reached that point in the conversation where he looked frankly at General Milley, and said, ‘Can’t you just shoot them, just shoot them in the legs or something?’”
When defense officials argued against Trump’s desire, the president screamed, according to witnesses, “You are all fucking losers!”
Trump supporters always try to brush off concerns based on such statements and declarations as “Trump Derangement Syndrome,” a dismissal which, to my mind, amounts to Trump Oblivion Syndrome — a blinkered naiveté about the man’s dangerous inclinations and glaring weaknesses.
Yes, he showed similar signs in 2016, and democracy and rule of law more or less survived during his four years as president. But that was only because he had sane, patriotic, knowledgeable people surrounding him — see the above list and many more — who checked his authoritarian impulses. He will make no such “mistake” again if he’s elected next month.
Derangement is the idea that the high price of groceries, an ineffective border control policy and growing acceptance of transgender people are a good reason to turn the country over to an ignorant, splenetic, narcissistic, senescent aspiring autocrat — a person recognized as an existential threat to democracy by those who have worked very closely with him.
Granted, a Kamala Harris Democratic administration won’t pursue some of the policies that Trump and his followers favor — mass deportations, trade wars, tax cuts for the wealthy, drastic limits on abortion rights, an end to Obamacare, marginalization of the LGBTQ community, contempt for the rule of law and so on — but Congress is likely to check many of their initiatives, and in four years, voters will again have their say.
However, a Congress strong enough to disable authoritarianism and guarantee free and fair elections in 2028 is not something you can be sure of should Trump again occupy the White House.
Too many mainstream journalists and media outlets are covering polls, stupid stunts and Arnold Palmer’s penis instead of laying out the stakes of the current election every single day on their front pages and the tops of their newscasts. Thursday’s Tribune has the right idea;
What can you do? Vote, of course. But consider volunteering to motivate like-minded voters to the polls. Here are a few options.
Mobilize — “Events, Petitions, and Volunteer Opportunities”
An impassioned Jordan Harris, a Pennsylvania state representative from Philadelphia, said it well in a viral video:
This ain't the time to play. This ain't the time to second guess. This ain't the time to sit on the fence. You get the democracy that you work for. … From now to Election Day, I need each and every one of you to pick up your phone … and tell people that they need to vote. … Today, tomorrow and until Election Day, if you knock one door, knock another, if you make one call, make another. If you send one text, send another. Because what we cannot do is look up on Nov. 6 and think of what we could have done. The time is now. We must work for the democracy that we want.
I endorse this idea: Tribune readers are just going to have to make up their own minds in the presidential election
The Chicago Tribune is among the growing number of newspapers that will not endorse a presidential candidate this year.
The reason for this sucks. In 2022, the mysterious overlords at Alden Global Capital, which owns the Tribune and many other papers, announced that publications in their chain would no longer be endorsing candidates for president, governor and the U.S. Senate. I disapprove of the mandate, since owners, publishers and other nonjournalists should stay out of the endorsement process if it’s to have any integrity whatsoever.
But I’m OK with the result. It’s high time newspapers abandon the hoary tradition of making endorsements for high office. They’re a vestige of the days of the partisan press and have little to no effect on voters. As The Associated Press pointed out, in 2016, “57 of the biggest newspapers endorsed Hillary Clinton and two picked Donald Trump,” who won the election. (The Tribune was one of nine newspapers that endorsed libertarian Gary Johnson instead of a viable presidential candidate, an abdication for which the paper is still ridiculed.)
Of the country’s 100 biggest newspapers by circulation, 92 endorsed a presidential candidate in 2008. By 2020, only 54 made a choice.
We won’t have a final count this year for a few weeks, but it’s sure to be even smaller. We already know that the Sun-Times won’t be endorsing a president due the paper’s not-for-profit status, and that the Los Angeles Times won’t endorse this cycle.
The LA paper’s editorial board was prepared to endorse Harris when owner Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong nixed the endorsement, prompting the editorial page editor, Mariel Garza, to resign Wednesday:
“I am resigning because I want to make it clear that I am not okay with us being silent,” Garza told (Columbia Journalism review executive editor Sewell Chan) in a phone conversation. “In dangerous times, honest people need to stand up. This is how I’m standing up.” …
“I didn’t think we were going to change our readers’ minds—our readers, for the most part, are Harris supporters,” Garza told (Chan). “We’re a very liberal paper. I didn’t think we were going to change the outcome of the election in California.
“But two things concern me: This is a point in time where you speak your conscience no matter what. And an endorsement was the logical next step after a series of editorials we’ve been writing about how dangerous Trump is to democracy, about his unfitness to be president, about his threats to jail his enemies. We have made the case in editorial after editorial that he shouldn’t be reelected.”
(Her resignation notice read) “It makes us look craven and hypocritical, maybe even a bit sexist and racist. How could we spend eight years railing against Trump and the danger his leadership poses to the country and then fail to endorse the perfectly decent Democrat challenger—who we previously endorsed for the US Senate?
”The non-endorsement undermines the integrity of the editorial board and every single endorsement we make, down to school board races. People will justifiably wonder if each endorsement was a decision made by a group of journalists after extensive research and discussion, or through decree by the owner.”
Well, they already quite justifiably wonder that, as deliberations are secret and decisions are not made democratically on editorial boards.
But the lack of a formal endorsement is unlikely to leave readers confused about any editorial page’s general view of the presidential choices. As Tribune Editorial Page Editor Chris Jones told me, “We have discussed those candidates in very vivid ways many time before and will do so again to help our readers decide what to do. “
The recusal announcement two years ago from Alden said in part:
Unfortunately, as the public discourse has become increasingly acrimonious, common ground has become a no man’s land between the clashing forces of the culture wars. At the same time, with misinformation and disinformation on the rise, readers are often confused, especially online, about the differences between news stories, opinion pieces and editorials. … Endorsing candidates for elected offices inherently means picking one party over another. At this stage of our nation’s history, that partisan selection is counterproductive to achieving the essential goal of facilitating healthy public debate and building trust in our journalistic enterprise. … We recognize that picking a candidate may alienate more readers than it persuades.
There are always readers who are under the impression that endorsements reflect the consensus view of the journalists in the newsroom — the reporters and editors and photographers and designers who follow current events closely and who could lay a plausible claim on having an opinion with more weight, more importance, more insight behind it than, say, a similarly sized group of employees at Sears or Baxter or Boeing.
Endorsements, like the opinions expressed in the unsigned editorials, are the work of a discrete and ever smaller group of experienced journalists who work on the editorial board. These boards are so small at many newspapers that they’re little more than vessels for opinionated publishers or owners, rendering absurd the idea — the conceit — that “the institution” of the newspaper is the voice of editorials.
So why the Oz-like voice from behind the curtain? Aside from tradition, why should a general audience newspaper have a set of beliefs and principles that goes beyond the core journalistic mission of finding the facts, telling the truth, exposing misdeeds and corruption, and putting the news of the day into context, in part through the publication of responsible opinion essays?
After all, that’s a fair summation of exactly what respected newsrooms do. Why add an agenda on top of the basics of good journalism? Nonpartisan TV and radio stations don’t do it. Magazines don’t do it. Universities don’t do it. Other “institutions” filled with smart, well-informed people don’t do it.
In 2016, John McCormick, then deputy editor of the Tribune’s Editorial Board, told the Columbia Journalism Review, “Swaying votes is only one reason for endorsing, and arguably not the most important. Every few years, endorsements bring a publication to full stop. They explain to the world what that publication is, what it advocates, how it thinks, what principles it holds dear.”
But a newspaper’s journalism — its news reports, its coverage decisions, its mix of opinions in staff and guest columns — should suffice to reflect the values that the entire paper holds dear, the paper that exists today, not one rooted in a founding dogma or, at some papers, the whims of an owner or publisher.
Alden Global Capital expressed willingness to continue to publish editorial endorsements in smaller races — “city councils, school boards, local initiatives, referendums and other such matters” — and since I tend to find those pieces useful, I’m no more or less dubious of them than I am of the concept that a newspaper ought to have an unsigned editorial “voice” that attempts to leverage the credibility of its journalists to put a thumb on the scale not just of elections, but of public policy debates in general.
Adding …
Mark Jacob offers a slightly different view on social media:
In the past, I haven’t supported newspaper endorsements for president. Endorsements may help in lightly covered local races, but people can get info about presidential hopefuls. …
But now I think news outlets must loudly warn people about Trump, whether it’s through an endorsement of Harris or a Page 1 editorial about his fascism or whatever. Just as news outlets warn people about dangerous weather, they need to warn them about dangerous politics. … There are just a few days left for news orgs to defend the public they serve — to confront fascism. They need to do it now.
Land of Linkin’
The Tribune’s Alice Yin penned an extraordinarily good story for Monday’s paper, “Mayor Brandon Johnson faces political headwinds from his progressive base.” Rich Miller, proprietor of the Capitol Fax blog, wrote of the article, “It’s much needed. Too many stories simply use the easy quotes from the mayor’s usual critics. This one hits different.”
Hyde Park Herald: “Ken Dunn, Hyde Park’s 'zero waste man,' dies at 82.” — This is a comprehensive obituary about an environmental steward who walked the walk: “Dunn formed the not-for-profit Resource Center in 1975, which boasts the tagline ‘we were recycling before it was a thing.’ Indeed, the city’s first attempt at recycling didn’t come not until almost two decades later, with Mayor Richard Daley’s ‘blue bag’ program. And the blue bins that line Chicago alleyways weren’t introduced until 2007.”
Rich Miller: “In which I try to defend an expansion of a wildly unpopular policy” — to wit, the use of cameras to enforce speeding laws.
The Picayune Plus: “I cannot prove to you that I worked at The Jolly Tiger. You’re just going to have to trust me.”
I’ve just recently learned about “poll chaplains,” clergy deputized to “provide spiritual care, a peaceful presence, a sense of security and a calming influence at the polling place. Faith leaders employ their pastoral and interpersonal skills with those present at the polls while monitoring the polls for any signs of voter intimidation or suppression.”
CBS News: “Trump's Social Security plan would hasten insolvency, lead to bigger benefits cuts, analysis finds.” Trump’s plan would “lead to a 33% across-the-board cut to all benefits, according to a new analysis from the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (CRFB).”
The Illinois State Board of Education report card site keeps track of teacher attendance in public schools, measuring the percentage of teachers with 10 or more absences during the school year. The state average is 35.6% (and Chicago’s is 43%) if you’d like to compare your district.
As a palate cleanser, here is a heavy metal song about dogs’ fondness for chewing on socks:
(Hat tip to reader David Wolff)
Squaring up the news
This is a bonus supplement to the Land of Linkin’ from veteran radio, internet and newspaper journalist Charlie Meyerson. Each week, he offers a selection of intriguing links from his daily email news briefing Chicago Public Square:
■ In using the first-person “we” to defend the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, Trump linked himself to the insurrectionists more closely than ever.
■ Late-night monologues went hard on Trump’s remarks about Arnold Palmer.
■ Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Will Bunch, who was there: “Trump voters … have something in common with you: They are also incredibly anxious about Nov. 5.”
■ Actual McDonald’s workers say Trump flunked his tryout as a fast-food worker.
■ MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow: Trump’s again been offering financial incentives to keep adult film star Stormy Daniels from talking about him.
■ Injustice Watch says its reporting has prompted Illinois bar groups to revise their ratings of a Cook County judge seeking retention.
■ Ready to vote early? The Chicago Public Square Voter Guide Guide is at your service.
■ An Illinois pilot program has installed kiosks in more than a dozen supermarkets where Illinoisans can renew their drivers’ licenses and other state IDs and get vehicle stickers.
■ “Lawsuits, online complaints and 1-star reviews”: The Sun-Times has crunched the numbers to identify Illinois’ most complained-about car insurance companies, and reporter Stephanie Zimmermann wants you to email her about your bad experiences.
■ The Illinois state treasurer’s office has sent close to 140,000 people checks for unclaimed property—including things like abandoned savings accounts, uncashed payroll and refund checks, insurance payments and utility deposits. Check here to see if there’s anything waiting for you.
You can (and should) subscribe to Chicago Public Square free here.
Neologism of the week
Near as I can tell, “Roevember” was coined in 2022 as shorthand for the forecast that those of us who believe in abortion rights would vote in great numbers in the November midterm elections in response to the U.S. Supreme Court overturning the protections of Roe v. Wade that June.
Highlights from Ezra Klein’s New York Times essay ‘What’s Wrong With Donald Trump?’
Here are a few intriguing paragraphs from Ezra Klein’s frightening but spot-on 6,400-word essay (gift link) that posted Tuesday:
Something I have learned as I’ve gotten older is that every person’s strengths are also their weaknesses. Disinhibition is the engine of Trump’s success. It is a strength. It is what makes him magnetic and compelling on a stage. It is what allows him to say things others would not say, to make arguments they would not make, to try strategies they would not try. …
One of Trump’s verbal tics is to say, “Many people are saying.” But it’s the opposite. He’s saying what many people want somebody to be saying. He’s saying what people are saying in private but often are not saying in public. …
There is something undeniably electric to watch someone unchained from the bundle of inhibitions the rest of us carry around. Watching someone just say it. There is something aspirational about it. What if I was without fear, without doubt? And if I can’t be without fear, if I can’t be without doubt, what if I could at least be led by somebody who was? Protected by somebody who was? Fought for by somebody who was? …
What makes Trump Trump isn’t his views on immigration, though they are part of it. It’s the manic charisma born of his disinhibition. It is his great strength. It is also his terrible flaw. …
Trump’s disinhibition is yoked to a malignancy at his core. … The man cannot help himself. He is missing the part of his mind that tells him what not to say, what not to do. He may be cunning and intuitive. He may know how to work a room and command a crowd. He may know how to spy the weakness in another person and dominate them. But he cannot control himself.
Tasty listicles
I’ve distilled Will Saletan’s Bulwark essay, “Let’s Be Honest, Trump’s Running As a Fascist” into the 18 bullet points he expands on to argue that Donald Trump “is running the most openly fascist campaign ever undertaken by a major-party nominee for president of the United States.”
1. He says he’s legally immune to all current charges against him.
2. He claims the right to do whatever he wants as president.
3. He advocates “one really violent day” of police action.
4. He vows to indemnify police against “any prosecutions” for doing what he wants.
5. He threatens to use the military against “the enemy within.”
6. He says some of his political opponents shouldn’t be allowed to run for office.
7. He says he could have jailed Hillary Clinton.
8. He has called for jailing Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer.
9. He has accused Harris of murder.
10. He vows to prosecute anyone who, in his view, has “cheated” in an election.
11. He threatens to strip TV networks of their broadcast licenses for offending him.
12. He said Fox News “shouldn’t be allowed” to broadcast a speech by Harris.
13. He advocates mandatory imprisonment for flag burning, and he rejects court rulings that such a law would be unconstitutional.
14. He advocates one-day trials and executions of people who are charged with selling drugs.
15. He advocates the death penalty for persistent illegal immigration.
16. He openly abuses antiquated draconian laws.
17. He speaks approvingly of violence against his detractors.
18. He calls the January 6th insurrectionists “hostages” and says he’ll pardon many of them.
I’ve also digested Mark Jacob’s expanded list of 10 ways in which “the rise of Hitler and the rise of MAGA smell similar.”
1. A big lie about treachery is used to foment resentment.
2. There’s an obsession with purity of the culture.
3. Chaos is something to be exploited, not addressed.
4. The super-rich bankroll the right-wing seizure of power.
5. Some people think the fascist threat is overblown.
6. There’s a cult of personality.
7. Christianity is used to legitimize the movement.
8. Books are the enemy.
9. An independent news media is the enemy.
10. Educators are pressured to be politically compliant.
Along these same lines is Jacob’s list of “200 reasons to vote against Trump.”
Jacob, a former editor at the Tribune and Sun-Times, now writes Stop the Presses, a valuable Substack “about how right-wing extremism has exploited the weaknesses in American journalism and what we can do about it.”
Also check out Vanity Fair’s list: “ Donald Trump, a Retrospective: A Look Back at the 1,462 Worst Days in Presidential History: Let us never forget all the ways, big and small, that Trump was the worst president ever.”
Mayor Brandon Johnson simply cannot give straight answers
From a transcript of Tuesday’s news conference:
Q: The school board's agenda review committee is meeting this week. On the agenda (are) two closed session items: One to discuss personnel matters. One to discuss potential litigation. Have you asked the new board to fire (CEO) Pedro Martinez, and are you worried that if they do so, they might face potential litigation?
A: Well, you know, look, here's what these board members are prepared to do, is to carry out the vision of the people of Chicago. The people of Chicago voted for a parent. They voted for a public school educator. They voted for someone who recognizes that there's actually value in having well-rounded curriculum as well as activities that broaden and enrich the experience of children. All of you all know that my children are public schools students. The first mayor in the history of Chicago to do that. And we're going to fight to ensure that every single family has an opportunity to experience the fullness of their child's potential. That's what this moment is all about. I have never moved in a surreptitious way as relates to my vision for public schools. Too many of our children wake up every single day, and they have to guess whether or not they're going to have real resources in their schools. We want to take the guess— the guessing —out of our public school system. This idea of choice, of this idea of privatization, has been an absolute failure for the people of Chicago. And so, to your question, their task is to carry out the vision that I have for public education in this city. And my vision for public education is, in this city, that once and for all, parent voice matters. No matter where you live. You deserve libraries, librarians, AP courses, honors courses. Just this week we invested $2.5 million into a West Side school that we visited last year over at Collins. These students asked very specifically about the renovation of their building and access to better resources. Delivering on those promises is what I was elected to do, and delivering those promises is exactly what I'm doing.
So … yes? No?
Mary Schmich & Cheer Chat
An update on preparations for the 26th annual “Songs of Good Cheer” winter holiday sing-along programs at the Old Town School of Folk Music written by my former colleague Mary Schmich
We're making a Songs of Good Cheer album, pegged to the holiday singalong .Eric Zorn and I and a band of great musicians have been doing for a, gulp, quarter of a century at the Old Town School of Folk Music.
Monday, a subset of the band gathered at Jim Tullio's recording studio in Evanston to record singalong vocals to tracks we've previously laid down. (I have no idea whether I'm using "tracks" and "laid down" correctly. But I like tossing the words around.)
This is the gang singing on a song I wrote, "Gonna Sing." The first video shows them warming up to the recording of Chris Walz and Anna Jacobson singing while I play the piano. Tullio is lurking behind that soundboard (is that the term?) working his tech magic.
In the second video, below, from left to right, that's Eric Zorn, Jim Cunningham, Anna Jacobson (with Mara and Milo), Fred Campeau, Barbie Silverman, Paul Tyler, Gail Tyler and Steve Rosen.
Shows are Dec. 12-15, and tickets are now on sale online and at the Old Town School of Folk Music. Sunday is almost sold out. Saturday's two shows are selling fast. Opening night--Thursday!--still has space to come with a group of friends. We hope you'll join us.
Minced Words
Lots of talk on this week’s episode of “The Mincing Rascals” podcast about the ongoing presidential election that culminates on Nov. 5. Is the law treating Rudy Giuliani too harshly? Is the proposal to lower the speed limit in Chicago to 25 mph. a good idea? And now that Chicago Teachers Union foe Austin Berg is back from his travels, he offers his views on the upcoming school board election.
Subscribe to us wherever you get your podcasts. Or bookmark this page. If you’re not a podcast listener, you can hear an edited version of the show at 8 p.m. most Saturday evenings on WGN-AM 720.
Read the background bios of some regular panelists here.
Quotables
A collection of compelling, sometimes appalling passages I’ve encountered lately
I don’t know about you, but I’d really like to get the government out of my fucking snatch. — Julia Louis-Dreyfus
Now some might think waxing poetic over a deceased sports legend’s junk is not presidential. But may we never forget Reagan’s immortal words at the Berlin Wall: “Mister Gorbachev, Jack Nicklaus has a ballsack the size of a baby head!” — Stephen Colbert
I was going to vote for Kamala Harris because Trump is an existential threat to the nation, but then he closed down a McDonald’s and pretended to make French fries, so now I'm not sure. — @7Smite4
You have to tell Kamala Harris that you’ve had enough, that you just can’t take it anymore. We can’t stand you. You’re a shit vice president. The worst. You’re the worst vice president. Kamala, you’re fired. Get the hell out of here. You’re fired. Get out of here. — Donald Trump, mispronouncing “Kamala”
If you think 500% tariffs and a ban on all food imports will lower your grocery bill, you might be a dumbass. — @DirtRoadPickup
I'm not really sure what's more alarming: What John Kelly heard Trump say or the fact that nobody on the right will give a shit what John Kelly heard Trump say. — Christian Schneider
I support Harris because the rule of law matters. Trump tried to overthrow the transfer of power and would do it again. I’m more conservative than most Harris voters, but policy and ideology don’t matter for long when you elect a corrupt autocrat. Been there, done that. — Garry Kasparov
I’m mad about the price of food. That’s why I have no choice but to vote for the guy who plans on deporting 14% of agricultural workers. — @SkylerforNY
Quips
In Tuesday’s paid-subscriber editions, I present my favorite tweets that rely on visual humor. Subscribers vote for their favorite, and I post the winner here every Thursday:
The new nominees for Quip of the Week:
When do elections stop being the most important ones of our lifetime? Because I've been through like five of those. — @Bob_Janke
You're either part of the problem, or you are the entire problem. — @LucifersTweetz
I got your "Arnold Palmer" right here. — @WilliamAder
I used to think popcorn poppers were only good for making popcorn. How right I was! — @kipconlon
Hockey would be better if the players had to write a short essay about what they did wrong before they could leave the penalty box. — @PonchoRebound
If I was God, I would give humanity a vague, ambiguous guide to how to live their lives, then sit back and enjoy the drama. — @wildethingy
Life as a liberal for me is so nice. 6:30 a.m.: Wake up; land acknowledgment. 8 a.m.: Vegan breakfast. 10 a.m. – 6 p.m.: Welfare leeching. 7 p.m.: Voter fraud. 9 p.m. - 11p.m.: Job at weather machine. 12 a.m. - 6:30 a.m.: Nesting with poly clan. — @excesstential
"The best laid plans of mice and men oft go awry." Sure. But I bet mice are bringing down the average. —@sympatheticopp
Always answer the door wearing a coat. If you’re pleased to see them, tell them you’ve just got home. If you don’t want them in, say you were just on your way out. — unknown
Never make a promise you can’t keep rescheduling. — @topaz_kell
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Why the new name for this feature? See “I’m rebranding ‘Tweet of the Week’ in a gesture of contempt for Elon Musk.”
Good Sports
Are the Fighting Illini for real?
I don’t think so. My friends who are backers of the University of Illinois football team are exulting in their team’s 21-7 victory Saturday over my Michigan Wolverines in a one-way rivalry game (Michigan does not consider Illinois a football rival) and the team’s 6-1 record.
But they don’t have a single impressive win on their resume. Michigan stinks this year — mediocre coaching and inept quarterbacking behind a porous offensive line have them at 4-3 and headed, I predict, for a 5-7 season.
Here’s a look at the other five teams Illinois has beaten: Eastern Illinois and Purdue are now 1-6; Kansas is 2-5, and Central Michigan is 3-4. Nebraska is 5-2 but got pantsed 56-7 last Saturday by Indiana University (which is for real).
Rooting interest in the World Series
It’s the New York Yankees vs. the Los Angeles Dodgers starting Friday, and because I have no strong interest in either team and because they are both from blue states, I’m throwing in with my sister-in-law and her husband. They live in Los Angeles and are huge Dodger fans, so I’ll root for the Dodgers on their behalf. (My eldest son has lived in New York City for the last six years but I have yet to hear him say a word either way about the Yankees.)
Plus the Dodgers have Shohei Ohtani, the best all-around player in the history of the game.
The people have spoken!
Reader Steve T. weighed in with this:
If you take away the “calendar month” part of your question, the best 30 days of sports runs from mid-March to mid-April: NCAA basketball tournaments, National Basketball Association and National Hockey League games that truly matter as the playoffs approach, opening day for Major League Baseball and the Masters golf tournament. Plus the pro football draft speculation is in high gear.
Tune of the Week
I’ve been opening up Tune of the Week nominations in an effort to bring some newer sounds to the mix. I’m asking readers to use the comments area for paid subscribers or to email me to leave nominations (post-2000 releases, please!) along with YouTube links and at least a few sentences explaining why the nominated song is meaningful or delightful to you. The following is a song I cribbed from a recent blog entry by Sun-Times columnist Neil Steinberg.
Steinberg wrote, “When I was in rehab, music was key. Someday when I take a week off I plan to write a weeklong series, ‘Songs about Sobriety’ highlighting some essential tunes.” Among those he mentioned for inclusion was Sarah McLachlan’s 2003 song “Fallen.”
Truth be told I've tried my best But somewhere along the way I got caught up in all there was to offer And the cost was so much more than I could bear Though I've tried, I've fallen... I have sunk so low I messed up Better I should know So don't come round here And tell me I told you so...
“‘Better I should know’ is a very useful concept,” Steinberg texted me.
The regrets McLachlan sings of are unspecified. In her Songs of Lent Substack, Melissa Johnson wrote about “Fallen”:
We try to do what we think is best and create our pathway in life, knowing there will be ups and downs along the way. However, at some point we realize that we made a wrong turn and that one wrong turn turned into ten.
The weight of our regrets can feel like too much to bear and we feel ashamed or embarrassed for the things we’ve done. It can feel like all eyes are on our mistakes, judging every wrong turn we made. No matter who you turn to — family member, friend, mentor — someone is going to point it out and think of us as “less than,” “messed up,” or even a “sinner.”
The words “I told you so” can slap us across the face so hard that we either want to fight back or go hide from everyone who might hold any kind of judgement against us. Of course we know we’ve done wrong and were told this could happen. Regardless of all that has happened, we just desperately want to be forgiven for our actions and move on.
McLachlan uses this intense song to empower people to admit their mistakes, recognize what they have lost, and not let people bring them down any further by continually reinforcing what they have done wrong.
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Contact
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The decision not to endorse a candidate for president this year could conceivably be the last time such a decision is left up to the newspapers to make.
I understand the impulse to only focus on the threat Trump poses, but some people simply aren’t convinced that he’s dangerous. Of course plenty of those same people won’t be persuaded by signs he’s mentally unbalanced, either. But on the off-chance some would, shouldn’t we be making every argument we can that he’s the wrong choice?