Oh Boy -- Obama is So Screwed!

Even Obama's base
is drying up and blowing away

Forget the polls that show Barack Hussein Obama with the lowest approval ratings at this point of any American President in recorded history.

Here is what I have heard on the streets of Chicago and Evanston:

-- A very animated Irish 20-something guy was in front of the Whole Foods on Chicago Avenue in downtown Evanston 2 Saturdays ago collecting signatures to get his wife on the ballot as an Obama delegate to the Democrat National convention. He was good looking, engaging and had an endearing smile.

He was striking out a lot.

Ultra-liberal Evanston went more than 70% for Obama, last time and Whole Foods generally attracts a health-oriented, lefty crowd.

I asked him "How're you doing?" He replied -- "Holy shit -- this is a rough crowd -- even our people seem to be pissed off at Obama."

--- I ran into Charles, a well spoken, well attired -- but with a slight growth of beard -- black man in the Starbucks on Main St. in Evanston yesterday. He was reading -- I was on my laptop. We began chatting and it turned out that we knew a lot of the same guys from our same era who had played sports on the North Shore.

He told me -- "Do you know 30% of the men in the US are unemployed today --the men --what does that say for our future?" he said. "I don't care what they say -- Obama and all the rest of them have just totally screwed up," he said.

--- I ran into Kenny -- a 53 year old black guy with a glass eye. He was coming outside of the McDonald's on Dempster and Dodge in Evanston. He asked me for a light. I asked him for a cigarette. He split his in half and we both smoked.

He told me tht he had worked for a black entreprenuer, who owned an auto repair shop on Main, near McCormick for more than 30 years. He just went out of business -- Kenny lost his job -- the entrepreneur is now driving a bus for $8 per hour, Kenny said.

"I don't care what they say about Obama being a black man and all that," he said. "This guy has totally fucked us all up."

Hey David Axlerod -- are you listening?

Even your base has dried up and blown away!

Teddy Kennedy Was An Even Bigger Moron Than We Thought



B.O. and Teddy: Icons of the American Socialist Left


I actually met U.S. Senator Teddy Kennedy. He lumbered into the urinal next to mine to take a leak -- it was in a mens room on the Senate side of the U.S. Capitol one fine autumn day in the early 80s.

Freshly out of college, I was there to deliver some news releases to the Senate Press Gallery. It was one of my duties in my exciting new job as semi-writer, semi-gofer.

As the years went on, I had ample time to extensively study Kennedy's horrendous voting record. He was a socialist, pure and simple -- and unlike his older brothers, he was decidedly anti-American in almost every public policy and foreign policy position he took.

He consistently garnered 0% ratings from the American Conservative Union and 100% ratings from the ultra-left wing ADA.

I thought him an idiot.

But I didn't realize what a complete nincompoop Teddy Kennedy actually was until I read recently, Laurence Leamer's fascinating 2001 tome, The Kennedy Men, 1901-1963.

This was no right-wing diatribe book. Leamer, a former New Republic writer, had the full co-operation of the Kennedy family.

And among the things he chronicled was the fact that:

Teddy was thrown out of Harvard for cheating on a Spanish test!

Now I can see perhaps getting tossed out for cheating on a calculus final exam, or a physics test -- or even a classical Greek exam.

But Spanish?

Only the absolute dummies took Spanish at my prep school, where you were expected to at least carry your weight in Latin, if not both Latin and Greek.

But Spanish?

In the fall of 1950, Teddy found himself in danger of flunking Spanish and losing his eligibility to play intramural sports unless he scrambled to pull off at least a C-minus in Spanish.

So he persuaded a less intellectually challenged student than he was to take the Spanish final in his place and the test proctors immediately caught on to the ruse. (Leamer, Page 277)

Both Teddy and the test taker were thrown out of Harvard for at least a year. So Teddy was told by his father's lawyers that it would look good for his readmission prospects if he spent a year or so in the U.S.Army.

So the great iconic liberal -- the genius of health care reform -- went down to the Army recruiting office and Teddy compounded his display of boneheaded Spanish cheating idiocy, by accidentally signing the wrong Army induction forms and enlisting in the U.S. Army for 4 years! (Leamer, Page 278)

His father Joe, was furious and was no doubt convinced that he and Rose had spawned a complete imbecile.

So the politically formidable former bootlegger and pro-Nazi U.S. Ambassador to England, Joseph P. Kennedy had to spend the next year pulling strings to get his moron son, Teddy, out of the Army after only 2 years, instead of the 4 to which he had contracted.

Although, in fairness, Teddy might have a mitigating excuse.

He might have been drunk that day.

So there you have it -- political icon of the American Left, Teddy Kennedy,  flunking Spanish and filling out the wrong form so as to accidentally sign on for 4 years in the Army, instead of 2.

And Teddy was the genius, de-facto architect of our new Obama socialized health care scheme.

Chicago's Zany Salvation Army Bell Ringers

Orwell said he'd never give
a Farthing to the Salvation Army

In his eminently wonderful chronicle of the plight of the homeless in depression era England, Down and Out in Paris and London, the great journalist of that era, George Orwell, ended his wonderful book by saying  "I will never fail to give money to a panhandler -- and I will never put another farthing in a Salvation Army kettle."

Orwell's complaint was that, when he was a member of the multitude of homeless in depression-era England of the 1930s, the Christian sect of the Salvation Army, wouldn't give the hungry guys a lousy piece of bread with margarine, unless they endured a long-winded evangelical religious diatribe.

The Salvation Army religious sect is better than that in the USA today.

No question, they help out a lot of people with food, clothing, etc. But their vaunted drug and alcohol religious-conversion re-hab program is an absurd throwback to their idiotic religious past.

Today they collect our money via bell ringers outside various Jewel-Osco and Walgreens stores throughout the Chicago metro area.

I would just -- in the past -- throw a little change into their kettles -- a nice Christmas gesture, you know.

But this year, I actually got to know some of the characters that the Salvation Army hires.

Some are decidedly weird -- some are outright scary.

Chicago Salvation Army bell ringers:
Some are decidedly weird -- some are outright scary

I got to know them while I spent the last few weeks gathering signatures outside of Walgreens' and Jewel-Osco stores, on behalf of a candidate for Appellate Court Judge.

I was standing right next to them, enduring the same bone-chilling cold and soliciting just as they were.

This is what I found:

-- The bellringers are paid employees of the tax-exempt 501(c)3 Salvation Army corporation.

-- They are paid, on the average, $400 a week.

-- One that I met, a black man named named Kenneth, outside the Walgreens at Waukegan and Lake Ave. in Glenview, was spouting wild political diatribes on behalf of Barack Obama (is this the official position of the tax-exempt Salvation Army Church?)

-- Another that I met, a Puerto Rican man, outside the Jewel-Osco at Kedzie and Howard in Evanston told me that he was a "streetwise" salesman -- who had sold a variety of items, including socks, T-shirts and drugs. He also told me that he that many bell ringers carried tweezers, so that if a dollar bill was just sticking up out of the top of the kettle, they could just pluck it out and pocket it. (Somehow, I got the idea that he might have had a pair of tweezers in his pocket.)

-- Another that I met, a rather loud, fat black girl from Lombard, in front of the Walgreens at Howard and Western, on the Chicago/Evanston border, wildly complained when I was smoking my pipe about 5 yards from her, in a fully legal fashion, 15 feet from the entrance -- with the wind blowing the smoke in the opposite direction. She wildly complained to the Walgreens manager -- who essentially told her to go F--- off. Great PR for the Salvation Army (don't ya think?).

A few years ago in Ohio, a Salvation Army bell ringer was convicted of stealing his entirely cash-packed drum.

Having seen the Chicago Salvation Army bell ringers, I am not at all surprised.

No wonder the great English writer, George Orwell told the Salvation Army to go F--- off.

Hitler Declares War on the USA: And Americans Respond with Might -- And Music

Four Days after his Axis partner Japan
attacked the USA, Hitler declared war on America

We're a little late on this one, since the 70th anniversary of Adolf Hitler's wildly self-destructive unilateral declaration of war on the USA was 6 days ago.

But reprinted below is a wonderfully cogent explanation of American's powerful mobilization against Hitler's National Socialists -- as well as against his murderous Imperial Japanese allies, that it provoked.

Included, very nicely, is music from the era. It is reprinted, by permission from the Chicago Schlager Music Review -- ed.

Here it is from the Chicago Schlager Music Review of December 11th, 2011:

Hitler Told Germans That The American Men
Would Not Fight -- WOW!, Was He Ever Wrong!

70 years ago today, Adolf Hitler, the elected National Socialist leader of the German Reich, unilaterally declared war on the United States of America.

Four days earlier, The USA had been attacked by Hitler's Axis ally, the Empire of Japan, which bombed the US naval base at Pearl Harbor in the American territory (now a State) of Hawaii, killing 2,800 Americans.

Declaring war on the USA was, perhaps Hitler's biggest mistake ever.

The Anglophilic US President, Franklin D. Roosevelt, had been looking for a way of getting the US involved militarily in saving Great Britain from the Nazi onslaught.

But due to formidable pressures from the millions of German-American and Scandinavian-American voters in the Midwestern US (who did not want to send their sons to fight German boys) and the millions of city dwelling Irish-American voters (who had nothing but contempt for their long-time enemy, Great Britain)  Roosevelt was unable to convince Congress to enter the European war.

But with his unilateral declaration of war on America on December 11, 1941, Hitler unwittingly solved Roosevelt's political problem.

After Hitler declared war on the American people, its elected representatives in the U.S. Congress reciprocated on December 12, 1941.

By 1944 American Workers Were Turning Out
9,000 Warplanes a Month -- More Than 300 a Day

In so doing, Hitler put the German people at odds with the greatest industrial power on the face of the earth.

Within a few short years, American workers would be turning out 300,000 combat aircraft -- (at one point 9,000 planes a month --  more than 300 a day) -- and 200,000 tanks and almost 1 million heavy artillery pieces.

20 million American men would leave civilian life and take up arms (including this writer's German-American father and uncles) and become one of the most potent fighting forces ever to take the field in world history.

Those civilian-soldiers fought two powers on two widely divergent fronts, ranging from Burma and China in the West all the way to Berlin and Prague in the East.

Hitler scoffed at Americans calling them "a bunch of undisciplined gangsters who would never fight."

But one Wehrmacht Lieutenant in Italy wrote in his memoirs after the war, "They told us the Americans would never fight. But when the Americans kept coming and coming up the hill at us -- wave upon wave -- I was never so scared in my life."

As Usual, The Americans
Went To War With Song

His sentiment was echoed by the Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS men who looked out from their bunkers on Hitler's fortified "Atlantic Wall" on the morning of June 6, 1944, only to see the sea filled with thousands of American and British ships of all kinds and the skies filled with US warcraft in what was the greatest amphibious military invasion in world history.

38% of the United States Armed forces consisted of German-Americans, including the Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in the Eastern Theater of Operations, General Dwight D. Eisenhower (later an American President) and a key combat General on MacArthur's Pacific command, General Robert Eichelberger.

In fact, Americans had a wartime joke that went: "The reason we won the war was because our Germans were better than their Germans."

And as usual, Americans went to war with music.

Here is the very famous Big Band hit of 1943, "The American Patrol," by the famed US trombonist and Big Band orchestral leader, Major Glenn Miller.

At age 38, Miller was too old to join the US Army, but he pulled political strings and obtained entry into the US Army Air Corps and was tragically killed when his plane went down over the English Channel when he was on his way to entertain US and British troops in France. "The American Patrol" was among his greatest ever compostions:



Here is the Andrews Sisters big US wartime hit, "The Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B":

"He was a famous trumpet man from 'round Chicago way.
He had a boogie style that no one else could play.
He was the top man in his craft.
But then his number came up and he was called to the draft.
He's in the Army now.
A blowin' reveille.
He's the boogie woogie bugle boy of company B."

It's Chicago Election Season: Irish Fillipinas, Polish WASPS and Stealth Jews.



Jessica O'Brien - A Fair Irish Lass
From County Cork on the Auld Sod

 The 2012 Chicago election season officially began last night at 5pm. That was when hopefuls for state and local judicial office in Illinois needed to have submitted their nominating petitions to the State Board of Elections down in Springfield.

For weeks now,candidates and their ward heelers have been accosting and annoying citizens in train stations and at shopping malls, pleading for signatures on the petitions requisite to getting a spot on the March primary election ballot.

A perusal of the submitted petitions suggests that this years' crop of hopefuls has been as skillful as ever at playing the Chicago ballot ethnic name game.

In ethnically Balkanized Chicago, the stealth ethno name game has been elevated to a high art form.

On the ballot, you will see a dizzying array of ethnically transmorphed names. all designed to convince you that the candidate is really a reliable member of your tribe.

That is why you will invariably see a large number of female judicial candidates resurrect usage of their maiden names and append them by way of hyphen to the non-descript names of their WASP husbands.

For instance, Susan Smith, Attorney, will become Susan Murphy-Smith, candidate for Cook County judge and ardent daughter of Hibernia.

The most notorious example of this was a Northwest side State Representative in the 70's and 80's by the name of Pete Peters.


Peter Piotrowicz Peters -
Kielbasa Between 2 Slices of Wonder Bread


That white bread moniker was good enough to get him elected when his district consisted of white bread Sauganash and Lincolnwood.

But when his district was gerrymandered to include heavily Polish, Niles, Mr. Peters miraculously re-discovered his maternal Polish roots and thereafter appeared on the ballot as Peter Piotrowicz Peters.

You might say he put a little kielbasa between the two slices of Wonder bread.

This year we have a Cook County judicial hopeful by the name of Jessica O'Brien.

The name conjours up images of a fair Irish lass, strolling the lanes and byways of County Cork on the auld sod.

Thing is, Mrs. O'Brien was born Jessica Arong in Cebu City on the Philippine Islands, half a world away from the Emerald Isle. But Filipino's are not a potent voting bloc in Chicago and her feminism notwithstanding, Ms. Jessica Arong-O'Brien is more than happy to bear the male oppression of using her husband's name -- for ballot purposes, at least.

In the still heavily Waspish North Shore suburbs, the Democrats favor Jewish candidates with decidedly Waspy-sounding names.

Lake County's 58th State Rep. district was for the past decade represented by a peroxide blond with the non-descript name of Karen May. Ms. May, along with her husband Mort, belongs to a prominent Highland Park Jewish congregation   but saw no real electoral upside to putting her name on the ballot as Karen Rubin-May, her feminism also notwithstanding.

May is retiring now, but to replace her the Democrats are putting up an ultra-left wing civil rights lawyer, a  U-Cal Berkeley grad named Scott Drury.

Scott Drury - High Anglican
Name and Yiddish Accent

Despite his High Anglican moniker, Mr. Drury is a Jewish gentleman and member of Highland Park's Congregation Solel.

In the same Lake County District, Republicans are running a State Senate candidate - a former U.S. Army combat helicopter pilot and distinguished Highland Park medical doctor, family man, and avowed Conservative Jewish congregant, named Arie Friedman MD.

He is using his real name.

Barney Frank To Retire From House -- Seeking Syracuse BBall Coaching Spot?

Frank Demonstrates his
Basketball Dribbling Technique

Barney Frank, the longtime Massachusetts Democrat and first openly gay Member of Congress announced today that he will retire from Congress at the end of his current term.

Frank made national news in the mid-80s when he was censured by the full Congress for sharing his home with a gay man who ran a homosexual prostitution ring from his basement.

Syracuse Asst. B-Ball Coach Bernie Fine
 -- Is Barney Frank After His Seat?

He was also the co-author of the Dodd-Frank financial regulatory bill that is widely believed to have caused the national housing crisis by encouraging sub-prime home loans.

Meanwhile, word comes that longtime assistant Syracuse Basketball coach, Bernie Fine, will also be retiring from his current gig albeit involuntarily. Fine has been implicated in a series of homosexual attacks on pre-teens who he had hired to be "ball boys" for the Syracuse athletic program.

This synchonicity of events moved WLS radio's resident wag and former WFLD-TV sports reporter, Bruce Wolf this morning to question aloud whether Barney's true motivation for leaving Congress was so as to be freed up to seek Mr. Fine's vacated position at Syracuse.

Word is that Mr. Frank is telling anyone who will listen that he is a long-time and ardent follower of the Boston Celtics, has been an enthusiastic friend and mentor to a variety of young men and as such would be well suited for the Syracuse assistant coaching spot.

Michelle Obama Big Butt Theme Music By Sir Mix-a-lot

Should Sir Mix-A-Lot's "I Like Big Butts"
 be Michelle Obama's campaign anthem?

When Presidential aspirant, Cong. Michelle Bachmann was introduced on Jimmy Fallon's NBC Late show Monday, Fallon’s house band, the Roots, played as intro music, Fishbone’s song "‘Lyin’ Ass Bitch."

Needless to say, If Michelle Obama or Hillary Clinton had been so treated by NBC, there would have been howls of protest from feminists and other lefties. There would have been calls for wholesale dismissals of those involved.

But to date, we've heard only a tongue-in-cheek quasi apologia from O'Fallon and NBC has been totally mum.

Today Rush Limbaugh wondered aloud what would have transpired if Michelle Obama had been greeted on stage somewhere with a background rendition of Sir Mix-a-Lot's 1992 rap song, "I like Big Butts."

Limbaugh played excerpts but  below I have put a video of the whole thing. Should "I Like Big Butts," be Michelle Obama's 2012 campaign theme?

Journalism Northwestern Style: What, Where, When, Race (Censored)

Militantly Colorblind
 NU Infobabe Susan Du

There they go again. I'm talking about the babes who run Northwestern University's Daily Northwestern -- the Big-10's only all-girl student newspaper.

It seems like these Medill journalism acolytes are devoted to reporting all the news, all the time, except when the criminal miscreants preying on Northwestern students happen to be black.

That little tidbit of information goes right down the NU Orwellian memory hole.

In last Monday's edition, on page 2, crack Daily Northwestern news sleuth, Susan Du, apprised the student body of the latest criminal assault on an NU student by the local toughs who populate the "other: Evanston.

"A Northwestern student standing on the porch of his apartment was robbed early Sunday morning... At approximately 1:20 a.m., four male teenagers walking on the 2000 block of Ridge Avenue...grabbed the student's smart phone and fled westbound on Leon Place, the student told officers. Evanston and University Police were unable to locate the four teenagers, described as 16 to 17 years old and ranging from 5'7" to 5'10" tall.

The student could not offer a more detailed description of the teens, according to the notification."

HMMM. What's wrong with this picture?

Evanston Youths of Indeterminate Race

How about the race of the assailants? Does the erudite Ms. Du mean to suggest to us that the victim was capable of reporting the precise heights and age range of these latest assailants yet was incapable of distinguishing the fact that they were, in fact, black?

This comes on the heels of a September 26th report in the Daily Northwestern about a white student who was pistol-whipped and robbed near campus, when they likewise neglected to report that the assailants were black.

So NU students, go ahead and live in your little Daily Northwestern induced PC fantasyland, if you like. As for me, I'm walking down another street when I see a gang of 4 black Evanston "youths" approaching.

And maybe also putting my hand around the grip of my concealed firearm.

Our Salute to Polish Hip-Hop Culture

We have been quite remiss in neglecting coverage of Chicago's teeming Polish-American community. With a total of 179,868 Polish born as of 2007 Community Survey U.S. Census data, it no longer can boast of being a larger population than Krakow, but Chicago's Poles remain a very formidable presence here.

We heartily apologize for having overlooked this year's big Taste of Polonia festivities in Jefferson Park over the Labor Day weekend. So to compensate, however belatedly, we are offering our readers this bit of interesting Polish culture, seldom experienced in Chicago, genuine Polish hip-hop:

Enjoy! or perhaps we should say: Cieszyć się!

Michelle Obama Should Shut Down Gene & Jude's Hot Dog Stand

Gene & Jude's were ranked best
hot dogs in nation by several surveys

Our petite First Lady, Michelle Obama is in Chicago today to lecture us on inner city "food deserts" and later dine with members of the upper 1% to cajole them out of their money for her spouse's campaign.

As most know, the svelte Michelle has spent her White House years busily sermonizing over the need for healthy food.

She has been shaming and forcing schools into replacing nachos and pizza with carrot sticks. She has bullied soup makers into purging their products of dreaded salt.

And she has sponsored a "National Dance Day" to encourage us sluggards to exercise so that we too might have buttocks and thighs as firm and pert as her very own.

So while she is back here, I say she should take a side trip out to suburban River Grove and safeguard our very lives by shutting down that house of gastronomic terrors and early sclerotic death, Gene & Jude's Hot Dogs.

I was recently out in the near Western Chicago suburbs with a friend who regularly works out that way and he insisted that we lunch at the famous Gene & Jude's hot dog stand.

By 11:30 the place was packed
with lots of city employees

I had never heard of the joint, but he raved about it. He said it was voted the best hot dog in America, bar none. And sure enough, an internet search revealed that it was voted as making America's best hot dog by "Every Day with Rachel Ray" and the "Serious Eats" blog.

When we got there at around 11:30 the place was already packed. The parking lot was 80% full and a line snaked around the interior of the diner-like edifice.

Inside, assembly line style, 11 workers mechanically took and filled orders for Gene & Jude's very limited menu of hot dogs, double dogs and tamales and fries.

All the dogs came with heavily salted, fresh cut, oily fries packed in the wrapper atop the dog. In a rather idiotic nod to Chicago tradition, you can't get ketchup there, even for your fries. But the counter along the walls had at least a dozen full-sized cardboard salt containers, in case you wanted an extra dose.

Self-appointed food
nanny Michelle Obama

I noticed that the place was packed with Chicago city employees (the city is just across River Road) and airport employees. One guy wearing a shirt emblazoned with "Airport Security" walked out with about eight orders. Seems like the TSA crowd needs oily fast-food fare to fuel up for a busy afternoon of goosing and groping the travelling citizenry.

The place has been inducted into the Vienna Beef Hall of Fame, but I wasn't exactly bowled over by their dogs. I'd rather mine slathered in green relish and mustard with tomato slices, raw onion bits, a kosher pickle atop and a dash of celery salt as opposed to Gene and Jude's rather Spartan garnishment of mere onions and mustard.
Still the fact remains that the iconic establishment is very popular and wildly unhealthful. This is of particular import to the Chicago taxpayers, since so many city payrollers flock to the joint. We will be stuck with the bills for their artery cleaning and post-gripper care and future gripper prevention.

Self-appointed food nanny Michelle Obama should swoop right in there and snatch up those death provending salt cans. She should confiscate those cancerous red hots and pour those gallons of artery clogging oil (is it unsaturated?) down the drain.

Michelle should give them the ultimatum -- fresh raw vegetables and fruit juices fill your menu from now on or out of business you go!

But just as Chicago's school kids are filling cafeteria trash bins with Michelle's healthful celery stalks and carrot sticks -- with a menu like that -- out of business Gene and Jude's would go.

Now Durbin Wants Baseball Chewing Ban

Sox Hall of Fame 2nd Baseman
and noted tobacco chewer Nelly Fox

This Illinois Democrat Senator Dick Durbin is getting to be one annoying asshole.

First he sponsored a bill to preclude banks from collecting fees for debit card use from his pals at Walmart and his other big retailer contributors.

Consequently, banks now have to shake you and me down $5 a month to underwrite the costs of processing debit card use.

Now Durbin, ever the buttinsky, has urged Major League Baseball to ban chewing tobacco and any other tobacco products during the upcoming World Series.

Let's see, unemployment's effectively above 10%, mortgage foreclosures are still rampant, the cost of living's climbing -- yea, this is what I want my U.S. Senator to be agonizing over -- baseball players dipping Skoal and chewing Red Man.

Nelly Fox must be turning over in his grave.

Schaumburg District 211 Foot-Dragging on Transparency: Teachers Salaries Listed

Million dollar decisions are made at HS District 211's
sparsely attended Board meetings

For several months, parents and taxpayers' advocates have been politely asking the Board of Palatine-Schaumburg High School District 211 to stream their school board meetings on-line.

This is hardly an onerous request. Many school districts do it gladly to save parents the trouble of getting a baby-sitter and travelling out on a work night to see their elected representatives making decisions that effect their kids.

But the honchos at District 211 have been hemming and hawing and finding scores of obstacles. To hear them explain it, you would think parents and taxpayers were asking them to land a unionized teacher on the moon.

District 211, the state's largest school district, operates 5 High Schools -- Palatine H.S., Schaumburg H.S., Hoffman Estates H.S., William Fremd H.S., James B. Conant H.S. and serves more than 12,500 students from Hoffman Estates, Inverness, Palatine, Schaumburg, and portions of Arlington Heights, Elk Grove Village, Hanover Park, Rolling Meadows, Roselle, South Barrington, and Streamwood in the northwest suburbs of Chicago.

Those facilities are crawling with hi-tech devices and one would guess more than their share of techno geeky kids who could have a webcam up and running on-line in no time.

So why the High School District 211 foot dragging?

Maybe they would just as soon keep parents and taxpayers in the dark about some of the decisions they make at their meetings.

Like their acquiescence in the bloated District 211 teachers and administrators salaries. Here is a complete list of 2010 District 211 salaries, garnered from the Family Taxpayers Foundation teachers salary database:

Teacher Salary Database

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Township HSD 211 2010 - --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

NAME SALARY
Abbott, Charles $69,340
Acosta, Andres $113,227
Adamski, Suzanne $109,033
Adcock, Jason $87,388
Ahn, Mark $68,761
Aikens, James $128,158

CUSD 300 Teachers Rally To Drive Sears To Texas: CUSD 300 Teachers Salaries Listed Here

CUSD 300 union teachers
rallying to milk Sears dry

Posted below are the salaries of all teachers and administrators in the Algonquin/Carpentersville/Hoffman Estates area Community Unit School District 300.

That district runs Dundee High School, H.D. Jacobs High School and Hampshire High School as well as 13 pre-schools, 17 elementary and 6 middle schools in the Northwest Chicago suburbs.

It's been in the news lately since Sears, which was induced to move its corporate HQ and training facility into their taxing district, has threatened to move unless its promised tax breaks are extended.

Interestingly, Sears has been seriously looking at moving out of high-tax, heavily Democrat Illinois to 2 states, Ohio and Texas, which are run by Republican Governors committed to job growth thru low taxes and a laissez faire regulatory posture.

Sears' relocation would cost the area 6,000 private sector jobs at a bare minimum.

The union teachers and education establishment administrators of CUSD 300 have been in a frenzy over the prospect of the tax incentive extension for Sears. They don't want it.

The CUSD 300 Superintendent is one Michael Bregy who just moved into the $242k job and has 96 teachers and administrators who haul down more than $100k a year.

He says he wants some vague, unspecified, "alternatives to be developed" to save Sears' 6,000 jobs while at the same time milking them for all they're worth. Bregy wants "creative thinking" and a resistance to the "hostage mentality" of fearing corporate relocation.

CUSD's education establishment held a big rally yesterday to whip up opposition to the tax incentive for Sears. And if they succeed in pressuring legislators to tax Sears, it is almost a certainty that the corporation will pick up its 6,000 local jobs and simply move.

That reminds me an awful lot of the black sheriff in "Blazing Saddles" who threatened to shoot himself if he didn't get his way. (You can see the hilarious clip of that scene here.)

Here is a complete list of the 2010 teachers and administrators salaries for CUSD 300 as reported by the Carpentersville-based Family Taxpayers' Foundation's Teachers' Salary Database:

Teacher Salary Database
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CUSD 300 2010 - --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

NAME SALARY Aalfs, James $103,112
Aboy, Cristina $0
Acevedo, Nicole $50,490
Achtstatter, Julie $35,825
Adame, Shiloh $49,349
Adams, Belinda $53,478
Adler, Leigh $77,328

Chicagoan Jan Terri in Running For Worst Music Video Ever

Chicago Chanteuse and
YouTube Sensation, Jan Terri

With more than 1.7 million views so far, Chicagoan, Jan Terri may well win the YouTube competition for worst music video ever.

The charming Windy City chanteuse has created a video containing her ethereal musical strains accompanied by panoramic Chicago sites -- the skyline, Edens Expressway, (the former) Sears Tower, River North, the lakefront, O'Hare airport.

Particularly of note is the lyrically elegant and grammatically interesting line: "I can't take it no more."

We are told she was entirely serious when she did this:



Ms. Terri has a complete CD (we are not making this up)containing this and many more of her interesting vocal offerings which may be perused here.

It comes with free shipping.

It's Skokie Police Seatbelt Revenue Day

For about the past 40 years, the Village of Skokie has been trying to figure out ways of revitalizing its decrepit downtown section.

They tried calling it a "Fashion Center" hoping to attract clothiers to its vacant storefronts, but all it attracted was one of those cheap fruit markets and a bunch of Tae Kwon Do storefront self-defense schools. (These are proving immensely popular now that Skokie is home to many Section 8 apartment dwellers from the old CHA housing projects, including a celebrated member of last summer's Chicago black mob attacks.)

Potemkin Village-style, they tried putting fancy facades in front of all the vacant storefronts with uplifting slogans about a revitalized downtown Skokie. It looked a bit better, but generated not a farthing in new tax revenue.

So it seems that the big-spending, ever burgeoning Skokie government has hit upon a tried and true cash-generating strategy, as old as the small town Mississippi speed trap: shaking down passing motorists.

Today at 9:15 am, there were 4 Skokie Policemen, on foot, conducting a roadblock at the corner of Niles Center Rd. and Lincoln Avenue -- the gateway to (or exit from) Skokie's downtown commercial ghost town.

They were checking for seatbelt use and issuing tickets.

A beautiful clear sunny morning -- scores of cars equipped with airbags and a plethora of hi-tech safety gadgets, on a 30 mph street -- and Skokie is using government force to insure that all you entering and exiting drivers are safely ensconced in your seatbelts.

And to see that you are safely relieved of your cash.

Germany's Perplexing Love Affair With David Hasselhoff

To Germans the American B grade
actor is bigger than the Beatles

People say that the Germans have no sense of humor, but I say that is a bum rap.

For instance, Germans think that David Hasselhoff is one of the greatest pop singers of all time.

Now that is funny!

I first learned this several years back when a German friend told me that David Hasselhoff had become a big star in Germany.

My first reaction was: who? But upon reflection I recalled that he was the big, hunky grade B TV actor of 70s soap operas, 80s Knight Rider and 90s Baywatch fame.

And then my German friend apprised me that Hasselhoff was famous in Germany as a pop music singing sensation.

To which I replied: You've got to be kidding!

You see, among sentient Americans, the chisel-featured, barrel-chested, 59 year old German-American is barely considered an actor. And he decidedly is not considered a singer.

There is one basic reason for this and that is that David Hasselhoff cannot sing.

AOL Radio rated Hasselhoff's big German hit
among the top 100 worst pop songs of all time

Oh yes, he can passably carry a tune, just as any Chicago electrician might after downing several pitchers of beer while out with the boys at the local saloon on karaoke night.

And put him in a hi-tech recording studio with knob-turning, audio witch doctors and a large chorus of back up singers and he might turn out something with a vaguely discernible resemblance to music.

And yet for the past two decades, from '89 to the present (he has a 2011 album at #3 in Austria and high on the German charts), David Hasselhoff has been to German audiences and record buyers, bigger than the Beatles -- better than Elvis.

To Americans, this is befuddling and mind-numbing.

It ranks in incomprehensibility with the adulation that the French have accorded to the asinine 50's American comic actor, Jerry Lewis. The surrender monkeys actually think that Lewis is a comedic genius. YIKES!

In Germany, Hasselhoff cashed in with an output of genuinely banal, garage band-quality, soft rock, reminiscent of AM radio fare from his 80s and 90s TV heyday.

Baywatch buddies Hasselhoff and
Pamela Anderson now (l) and then (r)

Compounding the aural atrocity, Hasselhoff churned out some truly hideous covers of iconic American pop classics.

If you ever really want to ruin your day, just listen to Hasselhoff mangle the soft, vibrant Mamas and the Papas '67 classic, California Dreamin'. (You can hear it here, if you really feel you must.)

And if you live in a high-rise, please, stay away from the balcony if you should decide to listen to Hasselhoff butcher the Beachboys' classic ode to summer fun, California Girls -- you just might be tempted to jump off.

Hasselhoff's European anthem is a tediously droning song entitled, Looking For Freedom. AOL Radio ranked it as #98 on the list of the 100 worst pop songs ever recorded. No self respecting American record label would give it a second glance. No American FM pop station would give it the time of day. Yet this audio atrocity reached #1 on the German and Swiss charts in 1989.

There are 310 million Americans and I would hazard to say that about 200 million of them possess greater vocal talent than David Hasselhoff -- yet he is the one we exported to Europe.

Worse than that, the Germans not only bought his shtick, but they actually think that Hasselhoff is the greatest thing to hit Europe since the panzerfaust --- or the Stuka dive bomber.

Here is Hasselhoff's Looking for Freedom, rated among top 100 worst pop songs of all time by AOL radio, it reached #1 in Germany and Switzerland and #3 in Austria in '89:



Here he mangles Johnny Rivers' Secret Agent Man. (Warning, if you have dogs, please put them in the yard as Hasselhoff's off key screeching may induce them to howl in agony.) This is arguably the worst vocal effort you may ever hear in your lifetime:

Eurovision Song Contest Worried About Muslim Terrorism

Eurovision organizers are worried over possible
Moslem Terrorism at their 2012 event in Baku

The Eurovision Song Contest is a big deal in Europe. It's kind of a super, multinational version of American Idol that has been going on every year since 1956.

But this year, for the first time ever, it is being held in a Moslem country and European officials are scared to death that Moslem terrorists might try to turn the event into an anti-European bloodbath.

Customarily, the event is hosted by the country which produced the preceding year's winning act. Last year it was won by Ell/Nikki, a singing duo from Azerbaijan who aped American pop sounds with almost perfect Midwestern US accents.

As a result, the 2012 event will be held in scenic Baku. (So after Oslo and Dusseldorf, do you think there might be just a little dropoff in Euro music fan attendance this year?)

The event, by tradition should go to Ell/Nikki's country, a former Soviet state with a 99.2% Moslem population, a strong radical Wahabi Muslim sect, an Al Quaeda presence and a history of Moslem terrorism.

As a result, the governing board of the Eurovision Song Contest has taken the odd step of demanding written assurances from the former Soviet, Moslem host country of: 1) security guarantees for the thousands of participants and guests 2) a relaxation of Soviet-style travel and visa impediments and 3) guarantees of freedom of speech and press in accordance with the European Convention on Human Rights.

Eurovision's chief honcho, anticipating resistance from the former Soviets issued a blunt statement:

 "A commitment to these fundamental circumstances has been the cornerstone of the success of the Eurovision Song Contest since its foundation in 1956," says Dr. Frank-Dieter Freiling, Chairman of the Reference Group, adding that "2012 is no exception to that."

(I have a copy of the Eurovision news release which contains all of the above. The news release has strangely disappeared from the Press section news release archive of the Eurovision Song Contest website.)
In an email to the Chicago Lampoon, Jarmo Siim, a PR shill for Eurovision tried to pooh-pooh the unusual request as a routine matter. But when asked if the same worried request was made of the last 2 previous host countries, Germany and Norway, he sidestepped the question.

No doubt, the Eurovision bureaucrats, with a strong interest in making things seem normal, will play down their worries over Europeans getting massacred by crazed Moslems at the May 2012 event in Baku.

But I'm taking no chances. I think I'll just stay home this year and enjoy my old clips of ABBA's 1974 Eurovision Song Contest win. Here is the official 1974 Eurovision video of ABBA singing its winning entry, Waterloo:

Benson & Hedges 100s: Saturday Smoking Lounge

It's odd, but true. The 100mm cigarette or "longs", so common today did not exist until 1967 when Benson & Hedges introduced them.

Benson and Hedges was a long-standing British cigarette manufacturer which was the official supplier of smokes to the British Royal family.

Its American branch was bought by Phillip Morris in 1954. The brand was among the least popular here until 1967, when B&H retained the ad agency of Wells, Rich, Greene to introduce its new, longer, 100 mm cigarette.

They came out with a series of semi-humorous, Clio-award winning ads playing, tongue-in-cheek, on the "disadvantages" of the longer cigarette.

Benson & Hedges became a big seller almost instantly and competing brands hurried out their own 100s to try and keep their brand loyalty.

Here is one of the Clio award-winning commercials. Look closely at the character in the boat, he is an, as yet undiscovered, McLean Stevenson:

Cheese in the News: Controversies Abound

Barristers for Foamation Inc. threatened a lawsuit
over the use of their trademarked headgear

The busybody health-nut assault on the American gastronomy marches on unabated.

News now comes from North of the cheddar curtain that the iconic Green Bay Packers and Wisconsin Badgers cheesehead has been subject to a sacrilegious assault.

It seems that a group of health food buttinskys calling themselves the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, erected a billboard outside Green Bay's Lambeau Field illustrating the horrors of cheese consumption with a grim reaper attired in a cheesehead.

Barristers for Foamation, Inc., makers of the Wisconsin hi-fashion haberdashery, cried foul and forced the medical chicken-littles to airbrush out their trademarked headgear.

Still the medical flimflammers remain unrepentant, insisting that cheese consumption is a major source of most of what ails America. They rail against consumption of cheeseburgers, pizza, nachos and other cheese-laden death traps.

The health-nut MDs also rail against
cheeseburgers, pizza and nachos

The killjoy quacks have also come out against hot-dog consumption and we are eagerly awaiting their guilty verdict on Wisconsin's beloved bratwurst.

Our self-appointed First Food Nanny, the svelte, Michelle Obama, is reportedly watching the Wisconsin food fight with rapt attention.

Now Its Payback Time For IL GOP Dream Act Sellout Senators

Flanked by members of the ICIRR illegal alien lobby
Gov. Quinn celebrates passage of "Dream Act"

On May 4th, the Illinois State Senate passed a bill to grant in-state tuition to the offspring of illegal aliens illicitly residing in Illinois.

Eleven Republican State Senators voted for the bill along with the Democrat majority.

With a mariachi band playing giddily at the state capitol, that august body voted 45-11 to pass the cutely monikered, "Dream Act," which also facilitated the setup of a scholarship fund for the illegals, which, for now, will be privately endowed.

The illegal alien lobby, ICIRR was ecstatic and with good reason. For two decades they have been pushing illegal alien amnesty, one drink at a time. So this was a full fledged boilermaker with 100 proof booze.

Veiled with high-sounding humanitarian concern "for the children," (it's always for the kiddies) it constituted yet another step toward legitimizing the half million illegals who snuck across our borders and squatted  within the confines of this particular state.

A mariachi band played giddily at the State Capitol

The bill would have waltzed through the Democrat dominated upper chamber without the encouragement of the RINO 11. But their apparent insulting dismissal of their middle class conservative voting base -- and their apparent unconcern for the citizen children of the middle class -- is more than a simple insult.

The "combine" GOP establishment should be told to kiss their dream of a GOP state Senate majority goodbye, because thoughtful citizens shouldn't consider even lifting a finger for these sellouts. These 11 pols cast their lot with the imagined  power of pro-illegal alien voter cohorts. I hope they get lots of liberal Latino votes, because I think -- some of them at least -- will need them.

Of the dirty eleven, nine are seeking re-election and will be on the ballot on March 12th. Some are in safe seats. Some are not. And some will face primary challenges.

Here's a rundown:

State Senator Pam Althoff 32nd district, McHenry County has announced that she is running for re-election. She not only voted for the de-facto amnesty grab, but sent out a news release saying what a great thing it was.

State Senator Larry Bomke Springfield area, 50th district has announced that he, having been gerrymandered out of his base, is not running. He is going back to his real estate business. Good Riddance! (And good luck in this RE market.)

State Senator Bill Brady, from the 44th district Springfield area, was the milquetoast GOP candidate for Governor last time who defied a nationwide anti-Democrat trend and lost to the clownish Pat Quinn. He has announced that he will be running for reelection.

Brain dead GOP combine clowns Dillard and Brady
were all for the illegal alien aid bill but Dillard
may have a primary fight

State Senator Kurt Dillard of the DuPage suburban 24th district has announced that he is running, but in his redrawn district he will likely face a primary challenge from State Rep Chris Nybo. Watch this one!

State Senator Dan Duffy 26th district Lake & McHenry Co. & Barrington announced he will be running.

State Senator Tom Johnson, of the 48th West suburban dist, was the 65 year old seat warmer, hand picked by the RINO party chairmen to fill Cong. Randy Hultgren's seat. He said he is not running. Good riddance!

State Senator Matt Murphy said he will be running for reelection to his Northwest suburban, 27th district seat. This is the fat-faced guy who is always making noises about his fiscal conservatism, but he's happy to turn a blind eye to the costs of educating (and feeding and giving hospital care)half a million 3rd world illegal alien settlers. Perhaps he should have noticed the fact that the ICIRR illegal alien lobby was one of the groups down in Springfield in February 2010 demanding an increase in the Illinois state income tax rates.State Senator Christine Radogno will be seeking reelection from her 41st dist West suburban seat which includes Burr Ridge, Darien, Downers Grove, Homer Glen, Indian Head Park, LaGrange, Lemont, Lisle, Naperville, Western Springs, Willowbrook & Woodridge.

She is the first ever female Republican State Senate minority leader. Kind of makes you want to re-think woman's suffrage, doesn't it?


If she can avoid domestic battery charges
 illegal alien fan Suzi Schmidt will run again


State Senator Ron Sandack of Downers Grove, was appointed to his seat and he was then thrown into the same district as Radogno. So he is now seeking the 81st district House seat. He'll likely have a primary challenge. Watch this one!!

State Senator Suzi Schmidt, she of domestic battery fame, has announced that she will seek reelection to her 31st district seat which includes Beach Park, Grayslake, Gurnee, Ingleside, Lindenhurst, Old Mill Creek, Round Lake, Third Lake, Wadsworth, Winthrop Harbor and Zion.

State Senator Dave Syverson, the perennial combine poster boy has said that he will be running in his Belvidere, DeKalb area rural district.

Keep an eye on these clowns. And remember how they spit in your face this past May 4th.

Evanston Cops Beat Bushes For Teen Potheads-NU Student Mugged At Gunpoint

To combat its burgeoning crime rate, Evanston has begun putting walking beat cops on the streets. They can be regularly seen in the downtown commercial district but I didn't know they were out beating the bushes along the sewerage canal on the North suburban city's West side.

Word comes on page 2 of last Friday's edition of the Daily Northwestern (The Big-10's first all girl newspaper) that 2 Evanston cops were on foot patrol last Tuesday at 5pm traversing a path in the weeds along the Peter Jans golf course.

There, along the sewerage canal they spied 2 teen age miscreants sitting on a bridge and smoking a yellow bong.

Crack EPD Wilderness Trackers
nabbed Teen potheads

The EPD Daniel Boone wilderness trackers nabbed the fiends, confiscated the bong and a green organic substance which tested positive for cannibis, and carted these vicious desparados off to the Evanston hoosegow.

All in an Evanston lawman's day's work.

Meanwhile word comes from WLS radio news of the first armed mugging of a Northwestern student of the fall semester.Barely had the orientation guides finished herding around the gaggles of incoming freshmen in their geeky green "Class of 2015" t-shirts, than the local Evanston toughs were resuming their annual open season on Northwestern students.

At 12:15 on Sunday morning, two black men in their 20s found a stray Northwestern student sauntering on Orrington near Simpson St. They put the NU kid in a headlock and pulled a gun on him demanding his wallet. When he said he didn't have his wallet, they pistol-whipped him, shoved him to the ground and drove off.

Evanston's hate crimestoppers in action

Evanston police say they are investigating and Northwestern University has issued its predictable student security alert.

Meanwhile the Evanston City Council has stepped up its anti crime regimen by 1) outlawing Tilted Kilt sexy bars, lest libidinous middle aged conventioneers begin accosting Evanston's maidens in the streets 2) declaring war on plastic bag litterers by considering a city-wide ban on all grocery store bags , 3)reaffirming the city's status as a "Nuclear Free Zone" and 4) sponsoring its annual 5k run against "hate crimes."

So the moral of the story is if you find yourself with an uncontrollable urge to stoke up a blunt while in Evanston, be sure to do it in the weeds on the Skokie side of the sewerage canal and if you must travel to Evanston be sure to bring your own recyclable shopping bag --- and a bullet-proof vest.

Saturday Smoking Lounge: Come To Marlboro Country

Anyone who was old enough to sit in front of the boob tube in the 60s certainly remembers the Marlboro Man TV commercials.

With the stirring Western theme (it was the musical score for the classically great movie, The Magnificent 7) and the Marlboro Man with his chiseled masculine features, they were as much a part of the 60s TV landscape as Andy Griffith or the Beverly Hillbillies.

More than anything, the Marlboro Man ads were responsible for propelling Marlboro from an also-ran brand in the 50s to the #1 worldwide best seller.

"Boros" as we called them, were this writer's constant companion through the first two years of undergraduate education (we could even smoke in lecture halls and in discussion rooms), before they were replaced by Camel straights, with their higher quality Turkish tobaccos.

Take a trip down memory lane with this 1963 black and white video of the softer-themed version of the Marlboro Man TV commercial:

(you have to adjust the video down to 240p to get this to run)

Chicago Media Maintains Race Reporting Double Standard

WLS reported that the suspect in the
Avondale hit-and-run killing was a "man."

The racial censorship double standard continues in Chicago's ever politically-correct liberal news media.

WLS radio reported this morning that the suspect in Monday's River North bank robbery was "a blond haired, white woman wearing a baseball cap and pony tail."

For the past 2 days they have reported that the suspect in the Sunday hit-and-run killing of 82 year old Margaret Heffernan was "a man in his 20s or 30s wearing dark clothing."

Privately, Chicago Police say the suspect is "dark skinned, Hispanic in appearance."

Given the epidemic of Latino hit-and-run crimes in the Chicago area, that should come as no surprise.

But the Chicago news media won't give the full description of the Latino suspect. They just want you to keep on the lookout for a man.

The Chicago Tribune's milquetoast editor, Gerould Kern said on June 10th that racial descriptions of suspects serve no useful social purpose.

And lefty Tribune columnists Mary Schmich and Dawn Turner Trice wrote that racial descriptions of minority criminal suspects make minorities feel bad so they should be relegated to the Orwellian memory hole.

So all you citizen crimestoppers out there, keep a sharp lookout for a man, 20 to 30 years old.

Big Chicken Flap in Chicago's 18th Ward

Alderman Lona Lane of the far South side 18th ward has embarked on a crusade to keep Chicago chicken-free. I have seldom been in agreement with this Obamaite, liberal Democrat solon, but on this score I am 100% in her corner.

Ms. Lane has introduced a bill to the Chicago City Council to ban chicken coops, chicken breeding and chicken keeping in her Marquette Park area ward.

Why, you might ask, has this become an issue?

Well it seems that some of our fellow citizens are chicken fanciers who have taken to keeping sizable assemblages of the fowl things on their urban properties.

Much of this activity seems to be taking place in Ms. Lane's 18th ward.

In fact, the 18th ward chicken advocates have organized themselves into a Google group entitled (I am not making this up) The Chicago Chicken Enthusiasts Group.

There and on their Facebook page, they gather to chat about chicken lore, exchange chicken-raising tips and to hatch dark plots to foil Alderman Lane's onerous anti-chicken legislation.

I learned about this roiling controversy by tuning in left-wing WCPT radio's Sunday morning Mike Nowak gardening show yesterday. On the "sustainable food segment" of his broadcast Nowak interviewed one Michelle Thoma, a chicken-fancier and ringleader of the Google chicken enthusiasts group.

Ms. Thoma said she raises chickens on the roof of her urban abode. Kind of free roof range chickens.

She says she does this because the chickens supply her with healthful, organic, chemical free eggs and because chickens are really nice animals.

Her cantankerous neighbors do not agree.

They object to her rooster's around-the-clock cock-a-doodle-dooing (as loud as a dog's barking), to the defecatory odors emitted by the fowl creatures and to the notion that her aviary is giving the neighborhood the ambience of Jed Clampett's pre-Beverly Hills, Bugtussle, N.C.

Alderman Lane tends to agree and adds that urban chicken-keeping can lead to avian diseases that would kill robins and sparrows and other nice birds.

The WCPT chicken enthusiast said that she will be conducting her annual informational chicken tour of the ward (formerly called hen-a-palooza) this coming Sunday for the benefit of Aldermanic staffers and others to allay citizen chicken concerns.

To counteract this insidious pro-chicken propaganda, The Chicago Lampoon, in conjunction with Alderman Lona Lane's office will be conducting an anti-chicken teach-in at the very same time.

It will take place next Sunday from 1 to 2pm at the W. 87th Street and Western Avenue KFC.

All are invited.