Zorn: Readers and I offer our best guesses about what will happen in 2025
and a lengthy update on the misadventures of Chicago's maladroit mayor
1-9-2025 (issue No. 175)
This week:
News and Views — Hot takes, fully baked
That’s so Brandon! — Updates on the misadventures of Chicago’s maladroit mayor
Land of Linkin’ — Where I tell readers where to go
Squaring up the news — Where Charlie Meyerson tells readers where to go
Mary Schmich — On her mother’s untapped talent and an upcoming party for her new podcast
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 — Calling shenanigans on the two-minute warning
Tune of the Week — “Take Me Away,” a Zydeco song by Zachary Richard as nominated by reader Marcy Schuering
Last week’s winning quip
I taught my kids about democracy tonight by having them vote on which movie to watch and pizza to order. I then picked the movie and pizza because I'm the one with the money. — @Dadsaysjokes
Here are this week’s nominees and the winner of the Tuesday visual-jokes poll. Here is the direct link to the new poll.
What readers and I predict will happen in 2025
Last week, I asked readers to answer 43 questions in my annual guess-the-news survey. Here are the results after more than 600 votes, with reader percentages in parentheses and my commentary in italics.
On 31 predictions, readers and I are in agreement that …
The Chicago Public Schools will take out a loan of $100 million or more to cover costs of a new teachers contract. (66%) The gap between the union’s ask and the available funds will remain large, and a compromise loan package will be approved.
Mayor Brandon Johnson’s approval rating will not exceed 20 percent in polls taken near the end of the year. (88%) To date, Johnson has shown little ability to exhibit the competence and leadership that many of his voters hoped for. The budget battle at the end of 2025 will be uglier than the 2024 battle.
The Chicago Bears will still be dithering at year’s end about their stadium plans. (67%) Neither the state nor the city has the money to fund either a rehab of Soldier Field or a new stadium on the former site of Michael Reese Hospital. I expect the Bears will finally to come to terms with this in 2026 and break ground on a massive stadium/entertainment complex in Arlington Heights.
The White Sox will still be dithering at year’s end about their stadium plans. (89%) There is so little love for this team that I can’t imagine the city investing in a new stadium in "The 78" along the Chicago River.
Chicago will have fewer than 550 homicides in 2025? (51%) The preliminary number for 2024 is 573, 44 fewer than in 2023, and I’m optimistic that the downward trend will continue.
The annual rate of inflation, 2.7% at the end of November, will be higher than 4% at the end of November 2025. (54%). I certainly hope we’re wrong, but, as The Associated Press reports, “most mainstream economists say (incoming President Donald) Trump’s policy proposals wouldn’t vanquish inflation. They’d make it worse. They warn that his plans to impose huge tariffs on imported goods, deport millions of migrant workers and demand a voice in the Federal Reserve’s interest rate policies would likely send prices surging.”
Elon Musk will still own the social media company formerly known as Twitter at the end of the year. (91%) Control over the increasingly toxic micro-blogging site is one of Musk’s claims to political relevance, and he’ll hang on to it even if he’s losing money.
The price of Bitcoin will be below $100,000 at year's end. (53%) The volatile cryptocurrency hit a high of $106,490 on Dec. 17, but I still think the idea of a currency based on solutions to really hard math problems is bizarre and that the current value is a bubble — a monetary sand castle, an emperor’s new clothes investment. Yet, I admit, I have long been wrong about this.
The average national price of a gallon of gas will be higher than $3 at year’s end. (81%) It’s currently $3.01, and the guess here is that the price will rise along with inflation.
The social media site TikTok will continue to be operated in the United States by a Chinese company. (53%) Legislation calls for a shut down or a sale to a company not controlled by a foreign adversary, but Trump is now an ally of TikTok, and the guess here is that he’ll save it in order to curry favor with the estimated 150 million Americans who use the platform.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average will be higher than 40,000 at year’s end. (73%) The fundamentals of our economy remain strong, and the Dow, which burst through the 40,000 mark in mid-August and has remained there ever since, will stay up there.
2025 will be the hottest year on record, breaking the record just set by 2024. (85%) Seems inevitable, doesn’t it?
In the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump will pardon or grant clemency to more than 1,000 of the more than 1,500 defendants charged in connection with the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. (89%)
In the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump will not push through the House a plan to eliminate the annual changes between standard time and daylight saving time. (54%)
In the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump will not impose a 25% tariff on all products entering the country from Canada and Mexico, and an additional 10% tariff on goods from China. (63%)
In the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump will not eliminate federal income taxes on tips. (76%)
In the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump will not attempt to regain U.S. control of the Panama Canal. (78%)
In the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump will not eliminate federal income taxes on overtime pay. (91%)
In the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump will not make a serious effort to purchase or seize Greenland from Denmark. (91%)
In the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump will not recover damages from The Des Moines Register and pollster Ann Selzer for the publication of a faulty pre-election poll. (91%)
In the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump will not announce a fully fleshed out plan to replace Obamacare. (95%) The optimistic net takeaway on most of these is that Trump is a blowhard who lacks the attention span and the will to do most of the things he harrumphs about.
The U.S. Senate will confirm Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as secretary for health and human services. (71%)
The U.S. Senate will confirm Kash Patel as FBI director. (68%)
The U.S. Senate will not confirm Pete Hegseth for defense secretary. (58%)
The U.S. Senate will not confirm Tulsi Gabbard for director of national intelligence. (62%)
Russia and Ukraine will sign a peace treaty or agree to an extended cease-fire by the end of 2025. (60%)
Israel and Hamas will not sign a peace treaty or agree to an extended cease-fire by the end of 2025. (51%)
Vladimir Putin will still be Russia’s president at the end of 2025. (95%)
The Chicago Cubs will have a winning record in 2025. (70%)
The following teams will have losing records in the season that has ended or is ongoing at the end of 2025: Chicago Bulls, Chicago Fire, Chicago Bears, Chicago Blackhawks and Northwestern University football (approximately 75% for each). I gave the dreadful White Sox their own question.
Ohio State will win the college football playoffs. (57%) The Buckeyes looked awfully good smacking down Oregon, and I expect they’ll meet and defeat Notre Dame (30%) in the final game. Yet because they lost to my beloved alma mater, the University of Michigan, they will not be able to consider their season a success.
On 12 predictions, readers and I are in disagreement that …
The Chicago Teachers Union will strike in 2025. (55%) I believe the union will see a strike as too damaging to their chosen candidate and former employee, Mayor Brandon Johnson, and will come to an agreement before Feb. 5, when they are legally allowed to walk out.
Former House Speaker Michael Madigan will spend time in prison in 2025. (51%) We are making this guess before the conclusion of Madigan’s trial. Federal prosecutors have a very high winning percentage at corruption trials, but even if Madigan’s convicted, there is typically a gap of many months between conviction and sentencing, and then another gap of many months for sentenced white-collar criminals to “get their affairs in order.” It was nine months between former 14th Ward Ald. Ed. Burke’s conviction in December 2023 and the day he reported to prison in September; it was 18 months between former Gov. George Ryan’s April 2006 conviction and the day he reported to prison in late 2007.
A major local print publication will turn some editions into digital-only in 2025. (53%) I’m guessing not yet, but any year now.
Time magazine's Person of the Year for 2025 will be someone or something other than artificial intelligence, Elon Musk, Donald Trump or Vladimir Putin. (62%) Though Trump has dominated the news for most of the last 10 years and twice been named Person of the Year (most recently 2024), I expect AI to receive the designation in 2025.
In the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump will make an effort to end birthright citizenship that will end up before the U.S. Supreme Court. (70%) This is just bluster.
In the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump will bring criminal charges against one or more members of the United States House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack. (59%) This is also just bluster.
In the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump will not deport more than 2 million undocumented immigrants. (71%) Trump made mass deportations such a central theme of his campaign that I expect this is one promise he will try to keep. CBS reported, that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement “deported more than 271,000 unauthorized immigrants in fiscal year 2024, the highest tally recorded by the agency since fiscal year 2014,” so it will be a heavy lift. I hope I’m wrong!
Benjamin Netanyahu will still be prime minister of Israel at the end of 2025. (51%)
The White Sox will not lose 110 games or more in 2025. (57%) Again, I hope I’m wrong, but this team will not be good.
The WNBA Chicago Sky will have a winning record in the 2025 season. (56%) I say not yet with this young team and its new coach.
The Detroit Lions will win the Super Bowl. (33% in a multiple choice field) Though I will be rooting hard for the Lions — my boyhood NFL team — they have endured so many injuries that I don’t see them winning it all. Twenty-eight percent of readers chose the Kansas City Chiefs, but I’m picking the Buffalo Bills (15%).
Pop star Taylor Swift and Kansas City Chiefs starTravis Kelce will still be an item at the end of December 2025. (80%) I hate to be a cynic, but even though this romance has lasted a lot longer than I expected (it began around the end of summer 2023), I have little confidence in celebrity romances.
Readers narrowly edged me out last year, and smart money ought to be on them to repeat. But be sure to click through in late December to see how we all did.
News & Views
News: Former Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan decides to testify at his ongoing federal criminal trial.
View: The logical inference is that Madigan’s legal team has advised their client to take this unusual and risky move because they think he’s losing.
News: “Biden awards the 2nd highest civilian award to leaders of the Jan. 6 committee.”
View: Fine. I’m still waiting for Biden to honor Alexander Vindman, former and future President Donald Trump’s director of European affairs for the U. S. National Security Council who was blackballed by Republicans and subsequently fired because he testified before a congressional committee in the fall of 2019 regarding Trump’s effort to bully Ukraine into investigating Hunter Biden.
Trump attacked Lt Col Vindman's reputation … (tweeting), "Actually, I don't know him, never spoke to him, or met him (I don't believe!) but, he was very insubordinate, reported contents of my ‘perfect’ calls incorrectly, &. was given a horrendous report by his superior, the man he reported to, who publicly stated that Vindman had problems with judgement, adhering to the chain of command and leaking information. In other words, "OUT.”
Awarding a medal to Vindman — who is now retired from the military — would be a proper thumb in Trump’s eye. So would ordering the release of special counsel Jack Smith’s final report on the classified documents case against Trump — a move at least temporarily blocked Tuesday by U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee. The U.S. Supreme Court says presidents have criminal immunity for such official acts, after all.
We are running out of time for Biden to show a bit more spine.
News: Facebook took away former media columnist Robert Feder’s personal Facebook page, then reinstated it without explanation after Feder’s friend and former colleague Neil Steinberg wrote a column about it.
View: For all the billions Meta makes, its public relations and customer service interfaces are outrageously dreadful. Feder posted:
Meta permanently disabled my Facebook account on New Year's Eve, saying it “doesn’t follow our Community Standards on account integrity.” I had no access to any of my content or contacts. Poof — I was gone.
Steinberg wrote a column about it that posted Sunday morning at the website of the Sun-Times, the newspaper where Feder first made a name for himself:
The incident might not be worth airing in public, were it not a glimpse of the world we are all hurtling toward. Someday, we will not just get booted off of social media but admitted to — or rejected from — college without human eyes ever weighing credentials or reading essays. Medical procedures will be permitted, or denied, without an actual doctor glancing at a file.
And we will comply, knowing the only thing worse than social media molding our lives will be suddenly being exiled from the garden. …
I reached out to Facebook’s alleged media representative: nothing. Facebook has claimed it has removed hundreds of millions of fake accounts. How many are later reinstated on appeal? A million? None? No one’s telling.
As a curious journalist and friend of Feder and Steinberg, I, too, reached out to Meta/Facebook’s media team to ask about this. I also heard nothing.
Tuesday afternoon, then, Feder posted:
As abruptly as I was banished, I learned I was restored without any human contact with Facebook. The news came this morning in a text from Neil, who wrote simply: “Meta just called me — you’re good to go.” And so I was.
It seems like every day I receive friend invitations from scammers and spoofers that Facebook is evidently helpless to identify, even though they brazenly copy photos to make fake accounts. Why is it so hard for them to police this activity in real time?
(Feder is featured prominently in the just-released Netflix documentary, “Jerry Springer: Fights, Camera, Action.”)
News: Donald Trump is doubling down on his desire for U.S. to take ownership of Greenland
View: I am going to try to resist automatically dismissing every seemingly daffy notion of Trump’s and consider the the ideas on their merits. Seizing Greenland by force would be terribly destabilizing and wrong on every level. But would it be good for the United States to buy Greenland from Denmark? I mean … maybe?
Even a blind hog finds an acorn once in a while. So I pledge to be open minded. Ommm.
That’s So Brandon!
Updates on the misadventures of Chicago’s mayor
Independent elected school board or mayoral puppets? MBJ can’t decide.
Monday evening, Mayor Brandon Johnson sat for an interview with WTTW-Ch. 11 “Chicago Tonight” host Brandis Friedman. See if you can spot the internal contradiction in what he said about the school board:
I'm the first mayor in the history of Chicago to actually keep to my word in advocating for an elected, representative school board. This is something I fought for as an organizer, as an educator, as a parent, as a county commissioner, and now as mayor of the city of Chicago. The Board of Education, which I have the incredible responsibility to appoint to make sure that they exemplify the interest of families from the North Side to the Southeast Side and everywhere else in between. … This is about the direction of our public schools. This is about a duly elected as well as appointed school board that will carry out my vision to transform our school district. … We have a school board, right? It is their responsibility to make sure that they are carrying out my vision, and that's what I fully expect that school board to do.
That’s right! He wants and expects a “duly elected” school board not to be independent but instead to simply carry out his vision. This desire sheds light on why Johnson’s enthusiasm for a fully elected school board weakened when he won the mayoral election in 2023. He and the Chicago Teachers Union began advocating to start with a partially elected board, one in which more than half the members are still mayoral appointees, for another two years.
Johnson offered Friedmasn his vision for schools:
We are fighting to ensure that we have smaller class sizes. … We're fighting to ensure that there are social workers and counselors in all of our schools. … We're fighting to ensure that we have a well-rounded curriculum that gives young people the opportunity to study foreign languages and extracurricular activities, so that students after school can participate in sports activities. We have schools right now in the city of Chicago where their students do not have a bus to get them to their activity. (I am promoting) transportation, bilingual education, special education.
But he filibustered his way past the critical question of where the money to realize this vision — as well as teacher raises — is supposed to come from.
Friedman: You’ve got to pay for those demands. How are we going to do that?
Johnson: It's worth the investment, right? You have to pay for everything. Brandis right?
Friedman: You have to figure out how to pay for it.
Johnson: Listen, for too long, we've tried to nickel and dime our education system, right? And that didn't work. When previous administrations closed schools because they said that that was going to be a financial decision that allowed for better equity in our school district. Turns out that that was wrong. When they took raises from teachers, when they privatized our schools, they said that was going to actually fix our financial woes. None of it has worked. That's why I fought hard for evidence-based funding, where schools can be funded based upon needs and not on a per people basis. That has never happened. I fought to ensure that that became a reality. Because as a parent, I want what I want for my children. I want for every single child across the city, and I will stop at nothing when it comes to ensuring that every single child, Black, brown, white, Asian; North Side, West Side, Southeast side. Wherever you are in this school district, you deserve a high-quality education. And the city of Chicago, we are leading the way by creating more opportunities for everyone to have a high quality education.
It was campaign rhetoric, not governing rhetoric. Lofty goals — creditable goals! — but vaporous given the reality of the question he seems to have no idea how to answer.
And speaking of not answering questions, here’s an excerpt from Johnson’s interview with Becky Vevea of Chalkbeat Chicago:
ChalkBeat: On the campaign trail, you said, “Who better to deliver bad news to a friend than a friend?” Is there an example you could give of a time you’ve had to deliver bad news in the contract talks (with the teachers union) right now?
Johnson: I don’t think there’s any debate that our schools are not fully funded. I wish we had the evidence-based funding model that the state of Illinois has calculated, that $1.1 billion were available to us today. You know, it’s unfortunate that that doesn’t exist.
But that’s not just confined to my friends. That’s the state of Illinois. There’s $3.6 billion that the state of Illinois, just based upon this funding formula, should be appropriated for school districts.
We have this strong triangulation — probably for the first time in the history of Chicago or, I don’t know, for the first time that I’ve ever experienced — with the Board of Education, the mayor’s office, and workers all aligned around the vision for our public schools and that that is progress in and of itself.
Short answer: No. There is no such example.
About that conflict of interest
Reema Amin of Chalkbeat Chicago has the best explainer I’ve found about the conflict of interest accusations concerning the mayor’s decision to take a leave of absence from the school system rather than resign:
Johnson taught for four years at Chicago Public Schools before going on leave in 2011 to work for the Chicago Teachers Union and ultimately launch a career in politics. …
Under CPS policy, Johnson — or any CPS employee who leaves to work for the union — can accrue seniority during their time away and return to CPS with the guarantee of a job. … If Johnson went back after his first term in office, in 2027, he would be considered a 20th-year teacher, even though he taught for just four years before his 2011 departure.
While it seems doubtful that Johnson would push for his school board to approve a more generous contract for the comparatively minor additional personal benefit he would get should he return to the classroom, the conflict is not a good look.
The latest wrinkle in this controversy is that the Chicago Board of Ethics is denying claims by City Hall that ethics advisers had no concerns with the mayor’s failure to resign from CPS.
Collaborate on this: Gov. JB Pritzker slams Johnson’s lack of outreach
Asked Tuesday about the nature of his relationship with Johnson, Pritzker said, “They don’t reach out that often.”
“It seems like they don’t have good relationships in Springfield, in part because they don’t do the outreach that’s necessary,” Pritzker said. “He doesn’t call very often. Maybe in the time that he’s been mayor, he’s called me, perhaps, five times?” …
Regarding the city’s recent push to pass a 2025 budget, in which Johnson raced to plug a $1 billion deficit, Pritzker said: “Literally the last call that we got from them was in September and then once in December.”
“We, by the way, scheduled calls,” Pritzker said. “And then they didn’t show up. And then there was a December call that happened in which they didn’t ask for anything. … But again, he has my number.”
Johnson loves to talk about how “collaborative” he is — “We are working collaboratively, and we are in constant conversations with the state of Illinois, with the governor's team, with the leadership in Springfield,” he said in the WTTW-Ch. 11 interview, but the evidence for this boast is scanty.
The immediate context here is that a bill Pritzker championed to better regulate and restrict the sale of hemp products failed to advance in Springfield. Johnson opposed the bill, and thus scored an at least temporary victory over Pritzker.
From a Tribune editorial:
What was behind the mayor’s intense concern? It most definitely wasn’t the welfare of Chicago’s kids, who continue to have ready access to gummies and the like, infused with synthetic marijuana and sold in vape shops, gas stations, convenience stores and other locations, many of them near schools.
Instead, Johnson’s progressive allies justified continuing to put Chicago kids at risk by singing a familiar refrain: the need for more revenue to support a bloated city government as federal pandemic dollars are spent and the local economy remains moribund. The mayor sees intoxicating hemp as a business ripe for new taxes; the state legislation Pritzker supported effectively would have banned these potent synthetic THC offerings such as delta-8 to give lawmakers time to establish a regulatory regime keeping this stuff away from minors and ensuring we know what’s actually in these products.
It was a strange time for Johnson to pick a fight with the governor whose help will be valuable in securing state funds the city needs. Fran Spielman at the Sun-Times offers her analysis:
With a rock-bottom public approval rating and a fast-approaching midterm benchmark, Mayor Brandon Johnson is running out of time for a course correction.
But don’t start writing his political obituary just yet.
An already contentious relationship with Gov. J.B. Pritzker — further frozen over by this week’s conflict over the governor’s stalled hemp regulations — can still be salvaged if a governor and mayor who need each other to solve their budget troubles start communicating frequently and privately, instead of taking public shots at one another.
Spielman quotes Southwest Side Ald. Marty Quinn, 13th who referred to Johnson as —
An inexperienced, unpopular and ultra-liberal mayor who is beholden to the Chicago Teachers Union, talks more than he listens, and is in way over his head.
Meanwhile, Chicago Teachers Union Vice President Jackson Potter, who is white, has tossed down the race card, since that always promotes collaboration:
The white billionaire Governor decides to publicly dress down the two highest ranking Black male elected leaders in the state instead of building a united front to defend our Black and Brown communities from the imminent MAGA attacks. So much for being a happy warrior.
Land of Linkin’
Wired: “The 10 Coolest Things We’ve Seen So Far at the Consumer Electronics Show 2025,” including “the Nékojita FuFu, a portable cat-shaped robot that will blow air to cool your hot food or drink so you don’t have to.”
Published this week, “Mayo Clinic Guide to Better Sleep: Find Relief from Insomnia, Sleep Apnea and Other Sleep Disorders,” written by former Tribune metro editor Peter Kendall under the direction of two Mayo Clinic physicians.
In Tuesday’s Picayune Plus, I took on The Washington Post’s decision to spike a cartoon critical of the paper’s owner, Jeff Bezos, and other oligarchs who are kissing up to Trump.
Also: Another entry in the “Unpopular opinion?” feature and the resounding result of my “bar soap or body wash?” poll.
Also: See how I found myself involved in the online spat between Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates and Fox 32 political reporter Paris Schutz.
Alex Nitkin of the Illinois Answers Project: Chicago is Debating Lowering its Speed Limit. Other Cities Aren’t Waiting: New York, Seattle, Boston and other cities have long since lowered their speed limits — and gotten results, data shows.“ I’m coming around on this idea, myself.
On the off chance you are not sufficiently alarmed about the future, read “The Incredible, World-Altering ‘Black Swan’ Events That Could Upend Life in 2025:
15 futurists, foreign policy analysts and other prognosticators provide some explosive potential scenarios for the new year” in Politico.
Note the reference to “The Piccayune Sentinel” in this online biography of my grandfather, Max A. Zorn.
Every time, it’s a dream come true: Fiddling a dance with my son Ben. If you like this sort of thing, “Cousin Sally Brown” is the sort of thing you’ll like.
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:
■ Wonkette’s Evan Hurst details “the free speech Mark Zuckerberg traded his dick to Donald Trump for.”
■ In his inimitable style, columnist Jeff Tiedrich recaps Trump’s “batshit press conference.”
■ USA Today’s Rex Huppke: Now’s the time for Americans to declare war on stupidity.
■ “Fear is beginning to settle in”: The Tribune reports that at least one Chicago church has canceled in-person Spanish services—a potential target if Trump carries through with his threats of mass deportations.
■ Law professor Joyce Vance fears the resurrection of Trump’s “zero tolerance” immigration policy: “6,000 children were separated from their parents and guardians. About 1,000 have still not been reunited.”
■ Columnist Lyz Lenz’s pick for Dingus of the Year: “What happens when you put eyeliner on a potato, give it a Bible and send it to Yale Law.”
■ Popular Information spotlights 10 corporations that have stuck to their 2021 pledges not to support politicians who voted to undermine democracy.
■ Biz watcher Matt Stoller explains why a Disney corporate deal should scare you.
■ Fans and former employees of Chicago’s shuttered Blue Man Group show held a silent protest outside its home for decades.
You can (and should) subscribe to Chicago Public Square free here.
Mary Schmich: My mother’s untapped talent
My former colleague Mary Schmich posts occasional column-like entries on Facebook. Here, reprinted with permission, is a recent offering:
A few days ago I stumbled on this newspaper photo of my mother at the age of 12. She'd just won some kind of contest for young would-be radio announcers.
I grew up with Mama's stories of working at WMAZ in Macon, Ga., in the 1940s and early '50s. She was both a news announcer and a show host.
God, she loved that job.
She quit at the age of 28 to get married and then raise 8 kids.
She always dreamed of getting back into radio. She never did.
This photo reminds me of how early in a person's life talents and interests emerge. And how we're all held hostage by the expectations and limits of the time we live in.
Of course, I'm glad she quit that job because otherwise my siblings and I wouldn't be here.
Still, I think about this part of her that went untapped, and how in her unresentful, philosophical way she always yearned to use that part of herself again.
She's the girl on the left in the front row, Mary Ellen Findlay, holding the WGST sign.
Additionally, Mary posted:
Hey, friends. Will you join us for the *FREE* launch party for “Division Street Revisited,” the podcast I've been working on?
The podcast follows up on 7 people in Studs Terkel's 1967 oral history collection, "Division Street:America." What happened to those people? To their descendants and their dreams?
The first of the seven episodes will air on Monday, Jan. 27, on WBEZ and be available on various podcast platforms. The party is on Jan. 29.
Melissa Harris came up with this idea and we've been working with the incredibly talented Bill Healy, Mark Jacob, Cate Cahan, Libby Lussenhop, Chris Walz and Chijioke Williams. These are stories about people but also about places and ideas. What can learning this history teach us about the present?
We'll explain it all at the party, which will be held in the gorgeous Winter Garden at the Harold Washington Library. All you have to do is register. I'll put the registration link below.
Come connect with fascinating people and our beautiful city. RSVP to the launch event.
I love this: ‘Yeah-yeah-yeah’
I’m not sure where I picked up quickly saying “yeah-yeah-yeah” in a way that suggests strong agreement or even excitement, but I began noticing myself saying it recently, and then hearing others using it as well.
“You looking forward to the party?” “Yeah, yeah, yeah! It’ll be fun.”
At other times, I’ve said the same words in the old-fashioned sense, slowly as though separated by commas, and with a steadily dropping pitch to express weariness tinged with sarcasm and disgust.
"Did you see where Donald Trump wants to rename the Gulf of Mexico?" "Yeah, yeah, yeah. What a blowhard."
I saw a social media post recently from someone who wanted “yeah-yeah-yeah” in the positive sense to join the annual list of banished words. It is not included in the new list from Lake Superior State University, which has been wagging its finger and clucking its tongue at us for nearly 50 years:
Cringe
Game Changer
Era
Dropped (as a synonym for introduced, released, or offered for sale)
IYKYK (shorthand for “If You Know, You Know”)
Sorry Not Sorry
Skibidi (a viral nonsense word)
100%
Utilize (“Why complicate things when ‘use’ works just fine?”)
Period (as verbal punctuation to emphasize a statement)
I say sorry not sorry, no matter who might find it cringe, we are 100% in the era of the affirmative “yeah-yeah-yeah.” Period.
Minced Words
Cate Plys, Austin Berg, Marj Halperin and I joined host John Williams on this week’s episode of “The Mincing Rascals” podcast. We discussed former Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan’s decision to testify at his trial, incoming President Donald Trump’s more provocative ideas and Facebook’s new approach to content moderation.
Panel recommendations:
John: “Emilia Pérez,” a movie on Netflix
Marj: “Beautiful Ruins,” a novel by Jess Walter
Cate: “Say Nothing,” a series on Hulu
Austin: “Dont Look Back,” a 1967 documentary about Bob Dylan available on many streaming services and YouTube.
As discussed in the podcast, here is one of the sketches from the Madigan trial by courtroom artist Lou Chukman that Austin purchased.
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
Trump’s reckless venality is a reason for hope. Trump has the soul of a fascist but the mind of a disordered child. He will likely be surrounded by terrible but incompetent people. All of them can be beaten: in court, in Congress, in statehouses around the nation, and in the public arena. America is a federal republic, and the states—at least those in the union that will still care about democracy—have ways to protect their citizens from a rogue president. Nothing is inevitable, and democracy will not fall overnight. — Tom Nichols in The Atlantic.
I cannot think of a more ‘80s movie premise than the president and his annoying best friend who thinks he’s co-president. — Andrew Nadeau
(Voting for) Donald Trump before January 6, 2021 was an act of gullibility. (Voting for) Donald Trump *after* January 6, 2021 was an act of malice. — Betty Bowers
MAGA is not normal. It is a corrupt, racist, sexist movement, barnacled with con men and grifters, ultimately serving a borderless, nationless oligarchy that only pretends to care about the welfare of the people of the United States. — Nina Burleigh
In the months since the election, every major tech company executive has made a pilgrimage to Mar-a-Lago to kiss the ring of Donald Trump. It's not just Meta, not by a lot. Amazon, Apple, Uber, OpenAI, the list goes on and on. At this point trying to extract yourself from all of the companies that have bent the knee to Trump would involve extracting yourself from most of the internet. — Dan Sinker
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. It was nearly a three-way tie at the top this week, but at this writing, here is the leader:
The new nominees for Quip of the Week:
My cold is worse than yours because it's happening to me. — @Syrup_Tishus
My girlfriend and I love to play hide and seek. She's been hiding for 10,922 days straight. She's so silly. — @DaddyJew
Cybertrucks look like how a science fiction movie made in 1952 would imagine vehicles would look in 1992. — @jlock17
The worst prison is an OK book. — @wildethingy
I thrive in a waiting room. You need me to sit in a chair and look at my phone? No worries, love. I do this at home. — @steph_mcca
Why do people always ask, “What do your tattoos mean?” Bro, they mean I had $200 and a free afternoon. — @blondehotcoffee
Alligators can live up to 100 years, which is why there is a very good chance that they will see you later. — Unknown
How dare this person in traffic delay me by mere seconds on my way to a location that doesn’t require my immediate presence? — @Ann_Hedonia1
Croissants are shit aren't they? You sound affected ordering one, they're nearly 600 calories each and it takes about 8 to fill you up. — @IHPower
We call them “red onions” even though everyone knows they’re purple. This is why I have trust issues. — unknown
Vote here and check the current results in the poll.
For instructions and guidelines regarding the poll, click here.
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
I call bullshit on football’s ‘two-minute warning.’
Referees call a timeout with two minutes remaining in each half. Ethan Trex of Mental Floss explained why in a 2009 post:
The custom of giving teams a two-minute warning dates all the way back to the NFL's first years. In those days, fans and coaches couldn't just take a look at the stadium clock to see how much time remained in the half. The official game clock resided in the pocket or on the wrist of one of the officials, and the stadium's clock was just a rough estimate of how much time remained in the game. Thus, the NFL instituted a two-minute warning where the referee would stop the clock and let both teams know exactly how much time remained in the game.
The stadium clock has been the official time since the 1960s and the “warning” is no longer necessary. But rather than disappearing, the stoppage of play with two minutes remaining in the half and in the game continues, and has spread this season to college football.
The only reason I can fathom is that the additional timeout gives broadcasters an extra opportunity to air commercials, similar to the scheduled “media timeouts” in college basketball and the “mandatory timeouts” in each quarter of NBA games. Scheduling a timeout when the game is likely to hang in the balance and viewers are riveted to the screen makes additional economic sense, I suppose, but why not at one minute, then?
How many steps would LeBron James have to take before being called for traveling?
More than five, I guess.
Bye bye byes?
All four teams that had byes in the first round of the 12-team Division I college football tournament — Arizona State, Boise State, Georgia and Oregon — lost in the quarterfinal round. Having that extra week off didn’t seem to offer any advantage, and, anyway there was no way that Arizona State and Boise State deserved such high seeds simply for being champions of their conferences.
Make it a 16-team tournament or and eight-team tournament, and seed the teams by performance only.
Can we also say goodbye to conferences? Northern Illinois is joining the Mountain West for football? Just no.
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, “Take Me Away” by Zachary Richard, is from Marcy Schuering. I selected this nomination as a tribute to New Orleans in the aftermath of the terrible New Year’s attack on Bourbon Street. Schuering writes, “This is a great accordion Zydeco song that gets you moving!”
I've been looking for you all of my life, But I never ever knew it ‘til I saw you last night. I can barely tell you how it made me feel. When the world stopped moving and my heart stood still. Take me away.
Mistakes were made
When I become aware of errors in the Picayune Sentinel, I quickly correct them in the online version, but since many of you read just the email version, which I can’t correct after the fact, I will use this space periodically to alert you to meaningful mistakes I’ve made. (Not typos, in other words.)
In last week’s email issue and the initial draft of the predictions poll, I asked if the U.S under incoming President Donald Trump would try to buy or seize Greenland from Norway. I was fairly quickly inundated with messages telling me that it’s Denmark that controls Greenland. I corrected the online versions and admitted to all who asked that, to me, in my Midwestern ignorance of Scandinavia, Denmark, Finland, Sweden and Norway are all one undifferentiated clump of Nordic nations (and yes, I now know that Finland is not generally considered part of Scandinavia and the Nordic nations include Iceland and Greenland).
I do not offer the fact that Greenland was originally colonized by Norwegians as a defense, just a point of fairly useless information.
In a couple of questions on the poll, I mistakenly asked about what would happen in 2024 because I’m so used to typing those numbers.
The Picayune Sentinel regrets the errors.
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
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I read all the messages that come in, but I do most of my interacting with readers in the comments section beneath each issue.
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Thanks for reading!
I think Zorn has become jaded and forgotten how to believe in love after reading his comments about Tay-Tay and her beau. Add to my predictions for 2025 a Christmas rom-com about this. The heartwarming ending will be Zorn really hearing a Taylor Swift song that turns around his perspective and reinvigorates his relationship with wife Cheryl Scott.
I think Garry Spelled Correctly should play the jaded Zorn.
Someone published this gem on Blue Sky:
Gulf of America?
He tried to name it after himself, but "Bay of Pigs" was already taken!