Buh-bye, Elon!
Musk's humiliating defeat in Wisconsin is likely the beginning of his end as a political power player
4-3-2025 (issue No. 187)
This week:
The Final Fours — Vote on the finalists in both our bracket tournaments for funniest quips/visual jokes
News and Views — Hot takes, fully baked on the White House
Land of Linkin’ — Where I tell readers where to go
Squaring up the news — Where Charlie Meyerson tells readers where to go
Mary Schmich — Another TrumPoem
Quotables — A collection of compelling, sometimes appalling passages I’ve encountered lately
Good Sports — The end of chain measurements of first downs in the NFL and results of my polls on proposed changes to the rules of basketball
Tune of the Week — “Mouth of a Flower” by Haley Heynderickx, nominated by Chris Wills
Wisconsin will be Elon’s Waterloo
Voters in Jefferson County, Wisconsin — home of Waterloo, a town of about 3,600 residents about 30 miles east of Madison — did not vote for liberal state Supreme Court candidate Susan Crawford on Tuesday. They gave conservative candidate Brad Schimel a 6-percentage-point victory. But last November, that same county went to President Donald Trump by 16 percentage points.
Similarly, in the other Waterloo, Wisconsin — a town of about 600 residents in the deep red southwest corner of the state — voters gave Schimel a 30-percentage-point victory Tuesday, but that was down from a 46-percentage-point victory for Trump in November.
Overall, as I’m sure PS readers all know by now, voters in the Badger State gave Crawford a resounding 10-percentage-point victory in what was clearly a rebuke to billionaire oddball Elon Musk and his effort to buy the pivotal court seat for Schimel.
Musk and his affiliated PACs poured some $20 million into boosting Schimel’s campaign (costing Musk the equivalent of a morning’s work).
The Associated Press gleaned that this effort seems to have backfired:
Jim Hazelton, a 68-year-old disabled veteran, said he had planned to abstain but voted for Crawford after Musk — whom he called a “pushy billionaire” — and Trump got involved.
“He’s cutting everything,” Hazelton said of Musk. “People need these things he’s cutting.”
Trump doesn’t like losers, and Musk lost big Tuesday, just as Napoleon Bonaparte lost big at the battle of Waterloo in what is now Belgium on June 18, 1815. His defeat “concluded a war that had raged for 23 years, ended French attempts to dominate Europe, and destroyed Napoleon’s imperial power forever,” as the British National Army Museum website has it. “It also ended France’s attempts, whether under Louis XIV or Napoleon, to dominate the continent. Waterloo inaugurated a general European peace that, apart from the brief interruption of the Crimean War (1854-56), lasted until 1914.”
Musk — who had had an anemic 35% public approval rating in a CNN poll taken last month — was a political liability Tuesday and will remain an albatross as long as Trump allows/encourages him to caper about, injecting himself and his money into political fights. Surely. if slowly, MAGA will edge him out of the national spotlight.
Politico underscored this view in “Trump Tells Inner Circle That Musk Will Leave Soon.”
President Donald Trump has told his inner circle, including members of his Cabinet, that Elon Musk will be stepping back in the coming weeks from his current role as governing partner, ubiquitous cheerleader and Washington hatchet man. … Musk’s looming exit comes as some Trump administration insiders and many outside allies have become frustrated with his unpredictability and increasingly view the billionaire as a political liability.
(Yes, it’s odd that Wisconsin has two Waterloos, but Virginia has three, one in New Kent County, one in Fauquier County and one in Clarke County)
The Final Fours
Here are the survivors in the click-poll bracket tournaments to choose the best written quip and the funniest visual joke of the last 12 months:
Written
Vote below for one of the following:
I’m sorry, but you can’t always be experiencing a higher volume of calls than average. That’s not how averages work. — @Kit_Yates_Maths
In the UK we celebrate Thanksgiving as the day we managed to ship all our paranoid religious fundamentalists off to another continent. — @wildethingy
If you enjoy interacting with people who have strong opinions and minimal life experiences, may I recommend parenthood? — @MedusaOusa
I told my dad I ran out of alcohol and didn't have any money to buy any for the weekend. So he gave me the huge bottle of vodka from the cupboard that I’d replaced with water when I was 16. Life really does come back to bite you in the ass. — @Lizbeth_Ellen
Visual
Thanks to all who voted.
An update on the court fight between UIC law and the prof who used a redacted racial slur on an exam
Among the more ludicrous stories that surfaced in the aftermath of the racial unrest that followed the police murder of George Floyd in May 2020, was the persecution of University of Illinois at Chicago Law School professor Jason Kilborn. School officials suspended him and put him into a reeducation program after he used a redacted form of a racial slur on the final exam he gave his students in his Civil Procedure II class in December 2020.
Here’s the controversial portion of the hypothetical situation he posed on the exam:
Employer’s lawyer traveled to meet the manager, who stated that she quit her job at Employer after she attended a meeting in which other managers expressed their anger at Plaintiff, calling her a “n____” and “b____” (profane expressions for African Americans and women) and vowed to get rid of her.
To underscore, these redactions aren’t mine, but are exactly how the exam read.
Well! The umbrage and accusations of racism that followed were beyond absurd. The university suspended Kilborn after concluding that he’d created a racially hostile environment, then compelled him to enroll in diversity training where, I kid you not, one of the mandatory readings included this:
Kilborn has since been reinstated, but he sued the school in early 2022, alleging that administrators had violated his free speech and due process rights in retaliating against him. The most important claim in his suit has just survived UIC’s efforts to get the case thrown out: Last month, in a 25-page ruling, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit reversed a lower court ruling and reinstated Kilborn’s retaliation claim.
UIC had been arguing that the Supreme Court’s 2006 ruling in Garcetti v. Ceballos applied. In that case, a 5-4 majority held that public employees don’t enjoy First Amendment free speech rights when they are speaking in an official capacity.
But the appellate panel smacked that idea down:
Garcetti does not apply. The Supreme Court made clear that its decision did not extend to cases “involving speech related to scholarship or teaching.” Instead, it reserved the question in response to Justice Souter’s concern that the decision would otherwise “imperil First Amendment protection of academic freedom in public colleges and universities.” As the Court itself recognized, “expression related to academic scholarship or classroom instruction implicates additional constitutional interests” that could have “important ramifications for academic freedom.”
We decline the University officials’ invitation to extend Garcetti to speech involving university teaching and scholarship when the Supreme Court was unwilling to do so. …
Kilborn’s exam question, out-of-class statements, and in-class remarks are all academic speech that address matters of public concern, notwithstanding the limited size of Kilborn’s audience. The exam question was designed to give students experience confronting a highly charged situation that they may encounter in real-life practice and to be a continuation of the learning that occurred in the classroom. … It is reasonable to infer from the well-pleaded facts in Kilborn’s complaint that University officials punished him for the controversial exam question and used the investigation to establish a pretext for their actions.
Though the ruling dismissed some of Kilborn’s other claims, it “was a 100% victory in terms of what I reasonably hoped and thought I would achieve,” Kilborn wrote to me. “Now we head back to the district court for formal discovery of the sham UIC investigation and a revelation of the details of how UIC officials violated the constitution.”
Kilborn forwarded documents his legal team received using Freedom of Information Act requests showing UIC has spent nearly $1.3 million in outside legal fees fighting him so far. He wrote:
They now face a choice: pay me a similar amount (most of which would go to my lawyers, who are heroes and saints and deserve to be well compensated for their marvelous work) or get ready for the discovery process that will reveal the many ways in which their nonsense “investigation” was a complete sham and their punishments of me were totally unnecessary, unwarranted and violative of my First Amendment rights, not to mention defamatory. When I win (as I clearly will, and I have no incentive to back down), the civil rights law under which I’m suing will impose my lawyers’ fees on UIC in addition to my money damages, not to mention the outrageous amount that UIC’s lawyers will charge them for the next several years of more wasted work. The whole thing is just disgusting.
My efforts to get a comment from UIC Law Wednesday were not successful.
The Picayune Sentinel will continue following this story as developments warrant. I direct you to my previous coverage for more background:
UIC employs ‘N-word’ to teach a professor a lesson about redacted slurs (1-27-22)
Update on the Jason Kilborn story (2/23/23)
News & Views
News: The White House Correspondents’ Association disinvited comedian Amber Ruffin from its April 26 gala in the interest of avoiding “the politics of division.”
View: Not now, WHCA! Stop trying to appease Donald Trump! When are reporters and news organizations going to realize that you can’t make nice with a bully?
The tradition of having a comedian make jokes at the expense of politicians and journalists at this weird but high-profile gathering goes back decades and includes the appearance of such biting satirists as Trevor Noah, Larry Wilmore, Wanda Sykes, Hasan Minhaj, Jimmy Kimmel, Seth Meyers, Jon Stewart, Paula Poundstone and Al Franken.
When announcing Ruffin’s appearance on Feb. 4, Eugene Daniels of Politico, president of the association, said:
When I began to think about what entertainer would be a perfect fit for the dinner this year, Amber was immediately at the top of my list. She has the ability to walk the line between blistering commentary and humor all while provoking her audience to think about the important issues of the day. I’m thrilled and honored she said yes.
Amber’s unique talents are the ideal fit for this current political and cultural climate. Her perspective will fit right in with the dinner’s tradition of honoring the freedom of the press while roasting the most powerful people on all sides of the aisle and the journalists who cover them.
But relations between the media and the White House have since gotten very sour over such issues as The Associated Press’ refusal to use “Gulf of America” for the Gulf of Mexico and the desire of Trump’s team to control the seating chart at press briefings.
And after the president’s team complained about Ruffin’s stated determination to focus jokes on members of the Trump administration — whom she described as “kind of a bunch of murderers” on a podcast — Daniels disinvited Ruffin last weekend and sang a wholly different tune. Suddenly her provocative “blistering commentary and humor” no longer fit the “current political and cultural climate.”
At this consequential moment for journalism, I want to ensure the focus is not on the politics of division, but entirely on awarding our colleagues for their outstanding work and providing scholarship and mentorship to the next generation of journalists.
We are always in times of political division, and a big reason this is a “consequential moment for journalism” is that journalists and owners are not standing shoulder to shoulder in defying Trump’s effort to control them.
Former White House correspondent Ron Fournier has described the media’s overall response to Trump as “pathetic,” and in a Substack post headlined “Dear White House Reporters: WTF?” he wrote:
Trump seems determined to turn the White House press corps into his personal propaganda machine, and the precedents he sets today will be exploited by all future presidents. I repeat my February warning:
The next step on the slippery slope could be to control who has access to video and audio feeds of presidential events. The communications wing of the U.S. military both records and distributes audio/video feeds at the White House now. Trump could break precedent and limit distribution to MAGA-friendly outlets or individuals.
Another step on the slippery slope could be to dictate the content of official transcripts of presidential events. No White House has dared to seize full control of those historical documents for regular Orwellian scrubbings. This White House could; they control the livelihoods of the stenographers whose work is traditionally nonpartisan.
Your bosses need to stop capitulating, band together, and take a stand. A few options:
Boycott the briefings, an unpopular idea defended here.
Cancel the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Use the time to catch up on your rest or FOIAs.
Join The AP lawsuit (on the Gulf of Mexico issue), or at least frame it properly: A strong-arming government vs. every American’s First Amendment rights.
When the White House pulls a reporter from the pool or the briefing room, don’t take their place (you know who you are, and you ought to be ashamed).
When Trump or his people duck one of your competitor’s questions, repeat the question and demand an answer.
Devote more resources to investigative journalism that highlights the human cost of policies in Washington. No fear or favor. But especially no fear.
News: “An autographed Chicago Bulls jersey that Michael Jordan wore in a preseason game during his rookie year sold for $4.215 million at an auction that closed Wednesday.”
View: Though I understand the pleasures of collecting items, sports memorabilia fetishists go too far. Sure, it’s kinda cool to own a jersey that the GOAT wore for a preseason game, but maybe $400 cool, not more than 10,000 times $400 cool.
News: Election results vindicate the Oak Park Library Board’s decision last March to fire its executive director.
View: I’ve referred to the controversy over the firing of Joslyn Bowling Dixon, a highly qualified African American, over her alleged failure to be sufficiently earnest and deferential regarding the village’s diversity, equity and inclusion agenda as “the most Oak Park Story ever.” And Tuesday — in which voters elected the pro-firing slate of Annie Wilkinson, Mika Yamamoto and Colin Bird-Martinez and rejected two of the three candidates who objected to how Dixon was canned —gave us the most Oak Park election result ever.
News: "After raising $3 million in the quarter, (Illinois Democratic U.S. Rep. Raja) Krishnamoorthi says he has $19 million on hand.”
View: Obscene but impressive. Krishnamoorthi has been re-elected by 14 percentage points in each of the last two cycles so is not in need of a bulging campaign warchest if he wants to keep the suburban seat he’s held since 2017. So, as Rich Miller said so succinctly, “Get ready for that U.S. Senate announcement.”
Should Illinois’ incumbent veteran Democratic U.S. Sen Dick Durbin decide not to run in 2026, we can expect a crowded primary field of hopefuls (though it will not include Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul, who took his name out of consideration Tuesday).
News: ICE admits it screwed up in deporting an innocent man to a foreign prison, but claims to be unable to bring him home.
View: The incompetence of the Trump administration is staggering. From ABC News:
A Maryland man with protected legal status was sent to the notorious prison in El Salvador following an "administrative error," a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) official admitted in a sworn declaration on Monday. … The government has acknowledged the error but said in a filing that because (Kilmar Armando) Abrego Garcia is no longer in U.S. custody, the court cannot order him to be returned to the U.S. nor can the court order El Salvador to return him.
Whoopsie?
Land of Linkin’
Shane O’Neill of The Washington Post has an in-depth feature (gift link) on Kat Abughazaleh, the 26-year-old “content creator” who is challenging veteran Illinois U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky in next year’s Democratic primary: “Abughazaleh’s candidacy is exceptionally well-timed. She’s taking on an 80-year-old incumbent after Joe Biden’s aborted presidential campaign raised questions about age and governorship. She’s a loose-lipped digital native campaigning in the shadow of Kamala Harris’s much-publicized aversion to media access. She’s challenging party norms on the heels of a public rift caused by Sen. Charles E. Schumer’s last-minute accession to the GOP’s Trump-friendly budget. And she’s aggressive in her condemnation of Trump and his party, differentiating herself from the Democratic establishment’s polite paddles and pink protest tactics.” O’Neill quotes me throwing a bit of shade on her effort, words I may end up having to eat. But I have dined on my own verbiage before.
Chip Mitchell at WBEZ: “Chicago’s murder drop ‘mirrors a lot of big cities,’” He writes, “The year’s first quarter ended this week with 96, down more than 15 percent from the first three months of last year. It’s the fewest Chicago murders of any quarter since early 2019.
In Slate: “For years, many people have harbored a secret question: What actually is cryptocurrency? Maybe they understood it in some sense — money that existed via some unhackable code? — but they didn’t really get it. Some of us at Slate didn’t get it, frankly! Perhaps you didn’t really get it either. The thing was, for a long time, you could get by in society without really understanding crypto. Now, in America, that’s no longer true. … Here, you’ll find a glossary breaking down what all the ridiculous terms that get batted around when talking about crypto actually mean.”
Picayune Plus: “Read it again and weep: How Trump will try for a third term” (Picayune Plus)
Politico: “Rod Blagojevich has a new gig: Working for the ‘Bosnian Bear’” The story says the disgraced former governor, who was pardoned earlier this year by by President Donald Trump, “has agreed to lobby on behalf of the Republic of Srpska, a Serb-majority territory in Bosnia and Herzegovina long mired in the bitter ethnic tensions of the region” and “the interests of an ultranationalist politician known as the ‘Bosnian Bear’ who has ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin.”
Forbes: “AI Deepfakes On The Rise Causing Billions In Fraud Losses.”
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:
■ Disaster’s “only a matter of time”: ProPublica talks to flight attendants working for an airline that has become the dominant player in a network of deportation contractors known as “ICE Air.”
■ Time: How to prepare for Social Security’s new ID policy.
■ Wired: Elon Musk’s “Department of Government Efficiency” is trying to gift itself a $500 million federal building.
■ Behind the scenes in The Atlantic’s coverage of the story: Apple founder Steve Jobs’ widow, Laurene Powell Jobs, who Daring Fireball proprietor John Gruber calls “an owner committed to the cause.”
■ Der Spiegel reports that the private data, phone numbers and passwords for some of the president’s most important security advisers have been freely accessible on the internet. Also out there, Wired reports: National security adviser Mike Waltz’s Venmo friends list.
■ “A racist, sexist attack on … the true purpose of history”: Stop the Presses columnist Mark Jacob calls President Trump’s executive order that the Smithsonian Institution abandon programs advancing “diverse narratives” something “straight out of Orwell.” The order also puts Vice President Vance in charge of the Smithsonian-administered National Zoo—where The Daily Beast suggests giant pandas on loan from China “might want to start packing.”
■ Journalism critic Margaret Sullivan: “The first sentence in a New York Times article this weekend ticked me off.”
■ CWBChicago: “Mayor calls for more ‘safe spaces’ after teen mobs overrun Streeterville, already one of the safest spaces in Chicago.”
■ A DuSable Black History Museum exhibit curated by Anjanette Young—a woman whom Chicago police handcuffed while she was naked during a wrongful raid on her home in 2019—showcases art portraying the trauma of women victimized by cops.
■ A (white) woman writes for Business Insider: “We lived in Seattle for 12 years. Life looked good on paper, but in reality we were miserable. … We finally moved back to Chicago and are thriving.”
You can (and should) subscribe to Chicago Public Square free here.
Mary Schmich: Cory’s Glory
My former colleague Mary Schmich posts occasional column-like entries on Facebook. Here, reprinted with permission, is another in a series of her TrumPoems, this one titled “Cory’s Glory.”
I am the greatest president! These are my days of glory! I don’t know why the world’s gone mad For some nut who’s named Cory. I’m not sure who this “Cory” is— You say he stole my thunder? He stood up on the Senate floor Condemned my grift and plunder? You say he beat me at my game Of grabbing for attention? Well, I ignored his silly stunt It’s hardly worth a mention. Yada yada yada yawn I didn’t watch his schmoozing The only thing he’s greatest at Is losing and more losing. You say he got great ratings and The Tik-Tok crowd went crazy? Three-hundred fifty million “likes”? I say he’s dumb and lazy. So what he talked for one whole day No peeing and no eating So what he talked for so damn long Strom’s record took a beating. So what he talked of freedom And the need to make good trouble? Those lib’rls and their platitudes— Just watch me pop their bubble. Why, everything he said was fake And some of it just cheesy— He’s dumb as those Wisconsinites— Those voters are so sleazy. They didn’t fall for Elon’s bribes Although the sums were hefty! They voted for some woman judge Another evil lefty! But never fear, my countrymen I’ll have my retribution I’ll run for yet another term And damn the Constitution. So what that Cory did his schtick His strutting and his fretting— The stage will soon again be mine At least that’s what I’m betting. You say he’ll run for president You say he’s young and zealous? He won’t, he can’t, I won’t allow! And no, I am not jealous!
Media notes
Hey, what about us?
The Tribune recently wrote a lovely editorial bidding farewell to the departing Sun-Times journalists.
Much Chicago talent walks out the metaphoric door of the Chicago Sun-Times Friday, a consequence of buyouts offered to help plug what reportedly is a multimillion dollar operational deficit at our tabloid rival. … Chicagoans who love consuming news in return lose some 23 of their most experienced sources. … We mostly just want to pay tribute here to those writers and editors making their exit. … This city owes this particular class of journalistic excellence a debt of thanks. The Tribune tips its collective hat to all of you.
Not to be churlish, but the Tribune offered no stirring valedictory to a similarly large exodus nearly four years ago of journalists from its own newsroom. Nor did the Sun-Times offer thanks and godspeed to departing Tribsters (of which I was one). Admittedly, the Tribune Editorial Board was under different leadership then, and I should probably just offer praise for the recent classy gesture. But still …
Meanwhile, I’m impressed that the Sun-Times has been running letters to the editor that are far from complimentary about the latest developments at the paper:
I am deeply concerned about the state of your “newspaper.” After some heavy-hitting cuts we are left with this? May I suggest that you say “good night” and just turn off the lights and close the door. It really hurts to see a once great newspaper become nothing more than a cruise line tablet. — Kevin ODoherty, Naples, Florida
I’ve been a reader and a subscriber to the Sun-Times for more than 50 years. After the restructure (force out), last Sunday’s newspaper was a colossal failure. Few columns, no editorials, an anemic sports section and mostly crime stories that highlight the city’s problems. I’ll also tell you that I’m tired of the constant trolling for donations. My paid subscription for home delivery is my contribution. Is there anyone in management who can tell me why I should continue to subscribe to a paper with little content? — John C. Nuccio, Park Ridge
I understand that nonprofit organizations cannot endorse political candidates, but editorials are a different matter. A newspaper without an editorial department just doesn’t feel like a true paper. I’m very disappointed with that decision. — Dan Kuska, Palos Heights
Readers want editorials. … Abandoning editorials and endorsements is bad business. And what’s more, it’s just plain wrong. — Robert Howard Cloud, Gold Coast
It was a sad day for Chicago journalism when the Sun-Times announced this week that there would be no more editorial board content in its newspaper. Oh for sure, there will still be an “opinions” page with lots of different opinions coming from all quarters of Chicago. Sorry, but that’s not the same. Editorial boards and their editorials are the heart and soul of the newspaper. It’s that component that allows readers to know where the folks putting together the newspaper stand on the relevant issues of the day. Killing the editorial board relegated the Sun-Times to other faceless corporate affiliates who do not want to offend or challenge the readership, heaven forbid, with its vision and world outlook. Sad, another nail in the coffin of democracy. — John Labaj, Crystal Lake
While it’s common for newspapers to run letters disagreeing with certain columns, editorials and stories, it’s rare for newspapers to run such comprehensive slams at the entire publication.
R.I.P. Tom Hardy
My former colleague Thomas Hardy died at age 72 last week. He was the suburban editor at the Tribune when I was abruptly transferred to the Hinsdale office from my desk downtown after getting crosswise with the editor-in-chief. I was ready to quit or look for another newspaper job. But then Hardy took me for a long car ride around DuPage County, not just giving me the lay of the land but telling me how many great stories were out there and how he intended to give me the chance to write them and become “the next Bill Geist.”
It was an interesting comparison. Geist — the father of MSNBC pundit Willie Geist — had written a brilliant, funny news feature column for the Suburban Trib, but left in 1980, the story went, after the paper refused to bring him downtown to make him a full-fledged columnist. The New York Times hired him and made him the “About New York” columnist. This gained Geist a national reputation and made him the subject of a cautionary tale for editors with a prejudice against “mere” suburban reporters.
I did not become the next Bill Geist, but Hardy was among those who gave me a chance to show my range in a feature column originally called “Hometowns.” He moved on to the political beat shortly thereafter, but I’ve always been grateful for the confidence he showed in me, and I should have told him that on the several occasions we got together after he left the Tribune.
R.I.P. Jim Johnson
Neil Steinberg’s obituary for the sweetly funny WLS-AM newsman/sidekick appeared in Wednesday’s Sun-Times. Johnson, who was 80, retired 12 years ago and had lived with Alzheimer’s disease since 2019.
Andy Shaw has a Substack
Former WLS-Ch. 7 political reporter and former leader of the Better Government Association Andy Shaw has joined the ranks of Substackers. “Broken News: Media cutbacks are perilous” is a recent posting. Along those same lines, former Sun-Times sports columnist Jay Mariotti asks “Why did $61 million at Chicago Public Media lead to 35 staff buyouts?” in another one of his self-glorifying rants. He throws shade at any number of former editors and colleagues, but for some reason declines to name them, therefore no one can try to get the other side of his unflattering stories.
Apropos of CPM …
New job titles for leaders at Chicago Public Media
Lots of corporate-speak in this article from the Sun-Times about changes the top of the parent organization of the newspaper and WBEZ-FM, the public radio station:
Tracy Brown (former chief content officer) has been named chief partnerships officer. … Jenn Kho, the Sun-Times executive editor since 2022, will serve as interim editor in chief for Chicago Public Media, a new role overseeing the content produced by both the Sun-Times and WBEZ. … Meanwhile, Gilbert Bailon, who joined WBEZ as executive editor in the fall of 2023, will take on a new role as executive editor, news platforms.
It sounds like a major effort is underway to fully combine the two newsrooms and reduce duplication of effort. Whatever will sustain or boost these two vital local media institutions is good by me.
Minced Words
Cate Plys, Brandon Pope, Austin Berg and I joined host John Williams on this week’s episode of “The Mincing Rascals” podcast.
We chatted about Tuesday’s election result in Wisconsin, argued about the decision by the White House Correspondents’ Association to cancel the appearance of a comedian at this year’s banquet and discussed the new Chicago teachers’ contract about which Pope said, “The math ain’t mathin.’” His reference was to how the school system only has enough money to cover the first year of the four-year deal and will need significant help from the cash-strapped state to cover future structural deficits.
We touched on President Donald Trump’s new tariffs, but he was still speaking as we were recording so we had few specifics.
Big beefs
A new occasional feature in which the panelists let their Andy Rooney flag fly:
Cate: Delivery drivers who don’t ring your doorbell when they bring packages.
Eric: Supermarkets that require you to use their app at checkout to receive discounts.
Brandon: Old timers who bang on about how much better the players in the NBA were in the ‘90s than they are today, when it’s just not true!
Austin: The lack in Chicago of a multi-venue, multi-genre music festival similar to Big Ears in Knoxville.
John: The bag of pretzels on his recent Southwest Airlines flight was too small!
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 regular panelists here.
Quotables
A collection of compelling, sometimes appalling passages I’ve encountered lately
Show us. Show us that all lives matter. Show us that you believe every life is worth protecting. Show us that you believe every life is worth honoring. Show us with your policies. Show us with your appointments. Show us with your executive orders. Because so far it’s hard to look around and discern that all lives matter. It’s hard to read about a 281-page spreadsheet that the United States Agency for International Development just sent to Congress, listing which foreign aid projects are about to be terminated — including funds to combat malaria, one of the deadliest diseases on the planet — and conclude that all lives matter. … If your rally cry is all lives matter, there’s no time like the present to start leading like they do. — Heidi Stevens
The most obvious lesson to draw from the leaked Signal chat is that these people really are morons. It's not a public act, it's not shtick, there's not some secret backroom where they drop the facade. They are genuinely stupid, incompetent people. — David Roberts
It’s cold as shit here! Nobody told me! — JD Vance, visiting Greenland
The biggest advantage of extremism is that it makes you feel good, because it provides you with enemies. … The great thing about having enemies is that you can pretend that all the badness in the whole world is in your enemies, and all the goodness in the whole world is in you. Attractive, isn't it? So if you have a lot of anger and resentment in you anyway, and you therefore enjoy abusing people, then you can pretend that you're only doing it because these enemies of yours are such very bad persons, and that if it wasn't for them you would actually be good-natured and courteous and rational all the time. So if you want to feel good, become an extremist. … You can be as nasty as you like and yet feel your behavior is morally justified. So you can strut around abusing people and telling them you could eat them for breakfast and still think of yourself as a champion of the truth, a fighter for the greater good. And not the rather sad paranoid schizoid that you really are. — John Cleese, in 1987
America hates Elon Musk so much that he can literally wave millions of dollars under voters’ noses and they’ll still tell him to fuck off. You love to see it. — Kat Abughazaleh
I don’t want Canada or Greenland. I want PBS, Social Security and The Smithsonian — unknown
I want my tax dollars to support national parks, science, education, conservation, mental health and helping marginalized people. In case that wasn't clear. — unknown
A guy who can’t even successfully bribe people is in charge of government efficiency. — Andrew Nadeau
America isn't falling apart because Trump got reëlected. America is falling apart because it became the kind of country that would elect Trump to begin with. Trump isn't the disease. Trump is just the worst symptom to date. — Tennesseine
Good Sports
Back off, chain gang
Sony’s Hawk-Eye technology will be used by the National Football League as the primary method for measuring the line to gain (for a first down), beginning with the 2025 season. … Hawk-Eye … consists of six 8K cameras for optical tracking of the position of the ball. … As on-field officials are notified of the measurement outcome, virtual recreations of measurements are produced in real time for the in-stadium and broadcast audience. The full operational process takes around 30 seconds, saving up to 40 seconds from a measurement with the chains.
I’m sure there are some old-school types who enjoy the suspense of the sideline “chain gang” coming onto the field to measure the progress of the ball, but it’s become a silly waste of time in the technological era. Next, the leagues should embed sensors in the ball to pinpoint forward progress within millimeters. Since there is virtually no sport that’s not “a game of inches,” let’s accommodate that reality whenever possible.
Mixed results on my proposed rule changes for basketball
I put my proposals before readers last week, and here are the click-poll results:
I’m puzzled and disappointed about the enthusiasm for letting players foul out. Enhancing penalties for excessive numbers of personal fouls — now done on the team level when bonus free throws and then double bonuses are awarded as the number of team fouls increases — would solve the problem of excessively aggressive play. But, oh well, the people have spoken.
Other ideas:
Jeff Cebulski — My suggestion is to eliminate the tactic of saving time by not touching the ball immediately when it’s thrown in bounds, but allowing it to bounce or roll until a player touches it and the clock starts. This tactic extends the five-second throw-in rule and, in fact, allows the defense to touch the ball even when it is technically still “dead,” which wouldn’t be allowed if the ball were still out of bounds. I suggest that the clock start as soon as it touches anything, including the floor.
D. Dale Walker — All but eliminate the “possession arrow” that alternates which team gets the ball when both teams have hold of the ball. Instead, give the ball to the defense. In situations where it isn't clear who is offense and who is defense, the refs could then use the possession arrow.
I agree with Cebulski and would add to Walker’s suggestion eliminating the jump ball that starts the game. Let the visitors start with the ball or, like we do in many pickup games, shoot for first possession. Then switch for the second half.
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 nomination, “Mouth of a Flower” from Haley Heynderickx in 2004, is from Chris Wills “just because it's a beautiful song.”
The mouth of a flower The hummingbird waits Guarding his morsel As he takes, and he takes, and he takes
In his review of the album containing this song, Wes Cochran of Swim Into the Sound wrote:
Haley Heynderickx is a Portland-based singer-songwriter whose debut album, “I Need to Start a Garden”, has netted her a devoted following in the six years since its release off the back of its enchanting take on indie folk. Where many of her peers blend folk with indie pop and rock influences from the 90s and 2000s, Heynderickx seems to draw from a much older well of inspiration, with mid-20th century folk and jazz chief among them. …
“Mouth of a Flower” ponders the hierarchy of the world, tracing the life cycle from a hummingbird drinking a flower’s nectar to the various ways that humans have taken from the environment and each other. … It’s easy to imagine this inducing some eye rolls in the hands of a less compelling writer, but Haley’s tone is never accusatory. There’s so much beauty in the give and take between man and nature, but also an underlying concern about how imbalanced these exchanges have become as our consumption continues to expand. Flourishes of cello and electric guitar inject extra moments of color into the song, but the former sours towards the end, its chugging rhythm twisting the core refrain, “And we take, and we take, and we take,” into something unnerving.
Info
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. Browse and search back issues here.
Contact
You can email me at ericzorn@gmail.com or by clicking here:
I read all the messages that come in, but I do most of my interacting with readers in the comments section beneath each issue.
Some of those letters I reprint and respond to in the Z-mail section of Tuesday’s Picayune Plus, which is delivered to paid subscribers and available to all readers later Tuesday. Check there for responses.
If you don’t want me to use the full name on your email or your comments, let me know how you’d like to be identified.
Social media
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ejzorn
Twitter: https://x.com/EricZorn
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@ejzorn
Help?
If you’re having troubles with Substack — delivery, billing and so forth — first try “Picayune Sentinel Substack help, Frequently Asked Questions.” If that doesn’t work check out the Substack help page. And if that doesn’t work, shoot me an email and I’ll be happy to help.
Thanks for reading!
The deportation of a legal resident to El Salvador and the entire operation should appall and terrify everyone. Even before the story broke about Kilmar Abrego Garcia, Time magazine published a photo report about the circumstances and conditions surrounding the operation: https://time.com/7269604/el-salvador-photos-venezuelan-detainees/ The pictures are right out of a dystopian movie. One quote: "The intake began with slaps. One young man sobbed when a guard pushed him to the floor. He said, “I’m not a gang member. I’m gay. I’m a barber.” I believed him."
Then there are the snatchings of international students like Rumeysa Ozturk, kidnapped off the street by masked ICE agents and renditioned to Louisiana. Others, whose re-entry into US denied because of some political posts found on their phones. Trump wants to make a show of dominance and as always, there is no shortage of officials and agents and judges more than willing to go along and follow orders.
I hate to keep bringing up 1984, but Orwell is yelling "Told you so" from the beyond. The incompetence is certainly on display, but the complete disregard for due process and the rule of law (in 1984 nothing was illegal because there were no laws, the only crime was thoughtcrime) and the overwhelming cruelty (in 1984 Orwell explains how power is the only goal and the ultimate expression of power is making someone suffer) are the overarching drivers of this regime.
The international trade system that has been constructed since WWII has had one overwhelming beneficiary--the United States. No wonder that Agent (of Russia) Orange has an idee fixe that is causing him to destroy that system, alienate all the US allies, and cause economic misery at home and abroad.