-By Warner Todd Huston
On Friday, October 26, I attended Freepac, Chicago held at the Schaumburg Convention Center. The event, sponsored by Freedomworks, had many fine speakers including Judge Andrew Napolitano, former President of Poland Lech Walesa, John Fund, CL Bryant, Deneen Borelli, John Tillman, Congressman Joe Walsh, and Adam Andrzejewski, hosted by Freedmworks CEO Matt Kibbe.
Here is the video I took of 8th District Congressman Joe Walsh.
VIDEO: FreePac Speech of Congressman Joe Walsh”
-By Warner Todd Huston
On Friday, October 26, I attended Freepac, Chicago held at the Schaumburg Convention Center. The event, sponsored by Freedomworks, had many fine speakers including Judge Andrew Napolitano, former President of Poland Lech Walesa, John Fund, CL Bryant, Deneen Borelli, John Tillman, Congressman Joe Walsh, and Adam Andrzejewski, hosted by Freedmworks CEO Matt Kibbe.
Here is the video I took of Adam Andrzejewski, chief of For The Good Of Illinois.
VIDEO: FreePac Speech of Adam Andrzejewski of For The Good Of Illinois”
-By Warner Todd Huston
On October 27 I attended one last fundraiser held by Illinois Republican Congressman Peter Roskam (6th District). It was held in Lisle and featured a nicely filled room of supporters.
Congressman Roskam is a very popular fellow in the 6th District (even the newly configured one) and is always a gracious host.
Roskam is also one of the more powerful Republicans in Congress serving as the Republican’s Chief Deputy Whip.
I took just a few minutes after the event was over to ask the congressman for his final words, a pep talk, if you will, to get out the vote.
Peter Roskam’s Last Pre-Election Pep Talk”
It’s been a tough year, 2012. This state economy is in the tank. It’s got something to do with that income tax hike from a year ago: 67%. A ball and a chain for a guy like me. The boys in Springfield said it’d be temporary, that it’d expire in 2015, but I’m betting otherwise—they need taxpayers to bankroll their gold plated pensions.
It’s a hell of a gig, these pensions.The cats meow. Put in your due as a public servant and you’re retired early, living on easy street. Meanwhile, I just had to lay off my secretary Susie. It’s too bad, she does good work. But we can’t all put it on taxpayer tab, keep kicking the can down the road. And that’s all you’re gonna get from Springfield: a bait and switch, smoke and mirrors.You want real solutions? Voters better make some changes this November, starting with the big cheese at top: Speaker of the House Mike Madigan.
He’s been Speaker for three decades, he’s got more power than Mike Tyson’s left hook. The income tax hike, pension policy—nothing gets passed him without his 10-4. And voters have taken notice. Now, I’ve looked at it two ways to Tuesday and there’s no chance in voting the big cheese out of office. But listen up, if we knock out enough Springfield Democrats—six by my count—he’ll lose his leadership role and he’ll no longer be speaking for you and me. Sounds pretty nice, eh? Just remember, vote out the Springfield Democrats and this case will be closed.
Courtesy of http://www.taxpayersunited.org
-By Warner Todd Huston
On October 17, about 30 some supporters of incumbent Congressman Joe Walsh gathered outside Democrat opponent Tammy Duckworth’s suburban campaign office to protest what they say is her outright lies about her part in the firing of a pair of whistleblowers when she headed the Illinois Department of Veterans Affairs (DVA).
Duckworth essentially caused this controversy herself during the October 9 debate. At the debate, Walsh quizzed Duckworth about her time at the DVA, a tenure that included 12 violations from the Inspector General and charges of the illegal use of a government vehicle.
Walsh also confronted Duckworth on the lawsuit filed against her by several fired DVA employees who have charged the former Army Major with wrongful termination and public humiliation.
As Walsh explains the case, “the Plaintiff filed a complaint against a supervisor for allowing political campaigning on VA property. Duckworth received the complaint and subsequently terminated the employee who made the complaint and allegedly instructed the other Plaintiff to “keep her mouth shut” and she could keep job.”
During the debate, Duckworth flat out denied she is currently being sued.
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Walsh Supporters Protest Outside Duckworth’s Office”
-By Warner Todd Huston
Illinois ranks at the bottom of the nation in nearly every single category of rankings of successful states and now the Land of Lincoln can rack up yet another great failure. Illinois’ Governor, Pat Quinn, has received the grade of “F” in a new “fiscal report card” of the 50 states’ fiscal health.
Congratulations once again, Illinois. Your almost unbroken record of failure goes practically unchallenged. You are pretty much the worst of the worst in all of the country.
Oh, happy days.
So, once again Illinois rates at the bottom of the pile with a governor that gets a well-deserved failing grade. This time joined Quinn is joined at the bottom by four other guvs. Chris Gregoire (Washington State), Neil Abercrombie (Hawaii), Mark Dayton (Minnesota), and Dan Malloy (Connecticut), each received the grade of “F” for their monumental failure as their state’s chief executive.
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Illinois’ Quinn Gets ‘F’ in U.S. Governors Fiscal Report Card”
-By Warner Todd Huston
Brad Schneider is running for Congress in Illinois against 10th District incumbent, Republican Robert Dold. Schnedier claims he’s a “businessman” and is running on the pretext that, according to his campaign literature, he’ll “bring his business expertise to Congress.” Yet, this “businessman” has reported no income at all for the last three years from the very small business he claims is his primary occupation.
How is it that one can claim to be an expert businessman yet have no income from his business? That is a question that at least one 10th District constituent wants answered.
In his literature, Schneider claims that he’s “worked with small business, helping them grow and succeed.” He’s also said, “I’m a business guy. I like using numbers to solve problems and help people.”
Consequently, in his disclosures, at appearances, and on questionnaire forms, Schneider lists Cadence Consulting Group, LLC as his primary occupation.
Yet, despite claiming that Cadence Consulting Group, LLC is his chief source of income, he’s reported no income at all from the company for the last three years.
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Ill. Dem. Candidate Claiming to be a ‘Businessman,’ Reports no Earnings For Last 3 Years”
Why are teachers striking in Chicago? What are teachers unions fighting for? Is it for the students? For the schools? For the union?
Listen to the union officials themselves. You might be surprised.
-By Warner Todd Huston
In day two, the Chicago teachers strike is already starting to get vicious. In one of the many protests at least one protester was photographed holding a sign intimating that Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel is gay.
On the streets of Chicago, the Illinois Policy Institute found a protester carrying a sign that says, “Rahm Emanuel Likes Nickelback.”
You may not be aware of all the connotations of this sign. Firstly “Nickelback” is a Canadian rock band known for its somewhat sex-drenched lyrics. But the band is also a sort of slang for being gay among many kids these days. As the taunt goes, if you are a Nickelback fan, you’re gay.
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Chicago Teacher Protester Holds Sign Hinting that Mayor Emanuel is Gay?”
Here is a great video showing why teachers unions — and public employee unions in general — should be illegal.
The Machine: The Truth Behind Teachers Unions
For the first time in 25 years, the Chicago Teachers’ Union is planning to strike on Monday.
That’s because the machine that runs the K-12 education system isn’t designed to produce better schools. It’s designed to produce more money for unions and more donations for politicians. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children and now america’s public education system is failing.
Our kids deserve better.
For decades, teachers’ unions have been among our nation’s largest political donors. As Reason Foundation’s Lisa Snell has noted, the National Education Association (NEA) alone spent $40 million on the 2010 election cycle (source: http://reason.org/news/printer/big-education-and-big-labor-electio). As the country’s largest teachers union, the NEA is only one cog in the infernal machine that robs parents of their tax dollars and students of their futures.
Students, teachers, parents, and hardworking Americans are all victims of this political machine–a system that takes money out of taxpayers’ wallets and gives it to union bosses, who put it in the pockets of politicians.
“The Machine” is 4:30 minutes.
Video produced by the Moving Picture Institute in partnership with ReasonTV.
-By Warner Todd Huston
We’ve all heard the news of the strike forced on Chicago’s public schools by Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis, I’m sure. Barely open for a week, the greedy teachers are now walking off the job but the main reasons for this strike presented by the CTU really don’t stand up to close scrutiny, for sure.
The CTU wants a 30% pay raise and they want class sizes to be made smaller.
For his part, Mayor Emanuel is saying that teachers union reps are fighting his desire to allow local school administrators do the hiring of any new teachers (because they know better what they need) but the union is insisting that they do the hiring.
The union also rejected a 16% pay raise offered by the city – itself an absurdly high number that shouldn’t have been offered in the first place.
In fact, these teachers don’t deserve ANY raise, much less a 30% or even a 16% raise. Only just over half the kids in Chicago now graduate with a high school diploma and, worse, at $76,000 annually, Chicago’s teacher already make more on average than most other teachers in the nation.
By contrast, Chicagoans only earn $47,000 a year on average, so these teachers are already making almost double what the rest of Chicago is making!
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Chicago’s Teachers Strike, Just Another Corrupt Union Powergrab”
Perfect…
So, let me get this straight. This is a long sentence. We’re going to be gifted with a healthcare plan that we’re forced to purchase and fined if we don’t, which purportedly covers at least 10 million more people without adding a single doctor but provides for 16,000 new IRS agents, written by a committee whose chairman says he doesn’t understand it, passed by a Congress that didn’t read it but exempted themselves from it, and signed by a President who smokes — [laughter] — same sentence! — with funding administered by a Treasury chief who didn’t pay his taxes, for which we will be taxed for four years before any benefits take effect, by a government that has already bankrupted Social Security and Medicare, all to be overseen by a Surgeon General who is obese — [laughter] — and finally, financed by a country that’s broke.
Dr. Barbara Bellar Candidate for Illinois State Senate, District 18 sums up Obamacare in one sentence. Please go to my website and contribute to my campaign. I am running against the Chicago Machine and I could use your financial help! Go to electbellar.com or send your checks to Citizens to Elect Barbara Bellar – PO Box 557766, Chicago, IL 60655.
Remember, America, this is the man that wants you to re-hire him.
Don’t be a fool. Dump Obama.
-By Warner Todd Huston
We all know that Representative Jesse Jackson, Jr. is a huge anti-gun activist. It is also public knowledge in Illinois that he is a holder of an Illinois Firearms Owner ID (a FOID card). This state-issued ID that allows Illinois residents to legally purchase firearms and ammunition is supposed to be revoked for people that have been admitted to a mental health facility. So, will the state revoke Jackson’s FOID card?
Rep. Jackson was admitted to a mental health facility last month claiming “exhaustion” but it has since been learned he suffers from a more serious mental condition such as depression. His own wife said that he’s been “completely debilitated by depression.”
In fact, on August 13 it was reported that Jackson is suffering from a bipolar disorder.”
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Shouldn’t Jesse Jackson Jr. Have His Gun Rights Revoked by Ill. State Police?”
-By Warner Todd Huston
Rebel Pundit has discovered an interesting, and likely illegal, Obama campaign move in Illinois. It really does look like a Chicago alderman and the Obama campaign are breaking the law, here.
You’ll recall the little known alderman that tried to get himself some national attention by illicitly using the power of his office to deny the Chick-Fil-A company its right to its religious conviction and its right to do legal business in the city. His name is Proco “Joe” Moreno.
First of all this anti-American alderman is certainly violating the U.S. Constitution by trying to use the power of his office to attack a business that has broken no laws — not just broken no laws in Illinois, but broken no laws anywhere.
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Chicago Alderman Illegally Using His Office for Obama Re-election Campaign Workers”
-By Warner Todd Huston
Well, thank goodness for Rahm Emanuel’s “Chicago values,” eh? NBC Chicago is now reporting that it is more dangerous to live in Chicago than any other great city of the world.
Isn’t it wonderful that Rahm Emanuel came from Washington to save the city?
As the TV station reports it, Chicago is worse than even New York… even worse than MEXICO CITY, fer cripes sakes … in the number of murders we have here.
As measured in murders per 100,000 citizens, here is the list with worst (Chicago) listed first:
Thanks, Rahm!
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Mayor Emanuel’s ‘Chicago Values’: Chicago, Deadliest Global City”
-By Warner Todd Huston
It’s a “First Amendment buzzsaw,” that the mayors of Chicago and Boston have walked into over misuse of their powers in denying Chick-Fil-A the right to open and operate their fast food stores in the two cities. This is from TIME, yet. And if even TIME realizes that the Democrats are misusing their powers, well, let’s just say it’s a major violation of Chick-Fil-A’s free speech plain and simple.
For TIME, Michael Scherer goes over the whole series of events that led up to the two mayors — Rahm Emanuel of Chicago and Thomas Menino of Boston — imagining they have the power to deny Chick-Fil-A a right to operate merely because committed Christians run the company. Scherer’s analysis is that this mistaken belief in their powers puts the mayors in “tricky legal waters.”
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Even TIME Says Mayors Emanuel and Menino Wronging Chick-Fil-A”
-By Warner Todd Huston
Yesterday we reported that Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel said that the Christian values of Chick-Fil-A are not “Chicago values.” So, who does embody those “Chicago values” as far as Rahm is concerned? Why, extremist Louis Farrakhan, who else?
On July 25, Mayor Emanuel welcomed the “help” of hatemonger Louis Farrakhan, leader of the cult the “Nation of Islam,” in a non-violence crusade in a city awash with violence, murder, and gang crime. The Nation of Islam is a pseudo Islamic cult based in Chicago.
Emanuel has happily accepted Farrakhan’s “help” despite the fact that Farrakhan has a long, long history of anti-Semitism and violent rhetoric.
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Emanuel’s ‘Chicago Values’ Includes Supporting Gay-Hating, Jew-Hating Louis Farrakhan”
-By Warner Todd Huston
The Chicago School system is rapidly collapsing. Its graduation rate is a horrid 56 percent, its finances are in tatters, and even though the Chicago Teachers Union was offered a 10 to 15 percent raise, CTU officials still want to strike claiming it isn’t enough. So, what went wrong? CTU President says it’s all because of Chicago’s “lower class students” and “students of color.”
CTU President Karen Lewis recently took part in a strategy conference call with community organizer Jitu Brown, and retired professor and Bill Ayers associate Mike Klonsky. In the released audio of the conference call, CTU President Lewis tries to address the reason for the Chicago Public School System’s woes.
Lewis, it seems thinks that the whole decline of Chicago’s schools is because of lower class kids. Her comments are heard in the last 30 seconds of the audio.
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Chicago Teachers Union President Blames Woes on ‘Lower Class’ and ‘Students of Color’”
-By Warner Todd Huston
Anti-religion Chicago Alderman Joe Moreno has affirmed that the City of Chicago does not welcome Christians and stands four square against Christian principles. Further, Moreno says he has the “moral support” of Mayor Rahm Emanuel for his pronouncement.
Moreno is trying to shut down the opening of a new Chick-Fil-A restaurant in the city. Why? Because the chief of the company — well-known as enthusiastic boosters of Christian ideals — recently affirmed that his company does not support the homosexual lifestyle.
Moreno got on his high horse claiming that the fast food chain “discriminates” against homosexuals. This, of course, is a lie. No where has Chick-Fil-A been accused of any concrete discrimination against gays.
For his part, Mayor Emanuel agreed with liar Moreno.
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Alderman/Mayor Emanuel Admit: Chicago is NOT for Christians”
-By Warner Todd Huston
Finally, in part four we’ll hear from two solid Illinois Congressmen, the 8th District’s Joe Walsh and Randy Hultgren of the 14th. We’ll also hear the, perhaps not startling results of the straw poll, the most important question from which was who Romney should pick for his vice presidential candidate (hint, the top picks weren’t any of his one-time rivals for the nomination).
Congressman Joe Walsh
Rep. Joe Walsh gins up the crowd
Joe Walsh of the Illinois 8th District is the one Congressman that the left wants to eliminate more than any other Republican Congressman. This is because Joe has carved out from among his fellows an outsized voice for conservatism. He appears regularly on TV and radio to tout the conservative message. But he’s become a major target of Democrat redistricting and now faces a tough challenge to be reelected in his newly reconfigured 8th District. Me, I think he can easily beat the know-nothing candidate the Democrats have put up against him, but Joe is taking nothing for granted.
One thing is sure, though, Joe Walsh knows how to get a conservative audience in motion.
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CPAC Chicago, Part 4: Joe Walsh, Randy Hultgren, Straw Poll Results”
-By Warner Todd Huston
In part three of our series we’ll take a look at the speeches of Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, Illinois Congressman Peter Roskam, and Representative Michele Bachmann of Minnesota. Bachmann’s speech was quite interesting for its singular focus on a particular jihad-supporting Muslim group that is operating in America today. Bachmann was vehement that Obama ban this group.
Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal
Gov. Bobby Jindal on the main stage
Jindal is another favorite of the greater conservative movement. He has a very compelling story of immigrant parents that came to America to become part of this great nation to finally see their little son become the most powerful man in their adopted state. It’s the perfect American story, for sure.
Speaking of stories, Jindal has a lot of them especially where it concerns his involvement in the BP Oil spill from 2010. I’ve seen Jindal relate this tale several times and it is always a good one. His description of how the federal government was more interested in observing its silly OSHA than deal quickly with the emergency before them was telling and hilarious — though ultimately sad and infuriating. Since this is standard stump speech stuff of Jindal’s, though, I did not Tweet that segment.
Like the others Jindal started praising the Walker win in Wisconsin. One of his funniest lines was that all the news people were proclaiming that the vote would be so close that it would be a long night for Wisconsin as they tallied the votes. But reality proved that the whole thing was over in a matter of hours with Walker’s landslide. Instead of it being a long night for Wisconsin, Jindal joked that it was instead a “long night at Obama headquarters in Chicago!”
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CPAC Chicago, Part 3: Bobby Jindal, Peter Roskam, Michele Bachman”
-By Warner Todd Huston
In part two of my coverage of CPACs first Midwestern conference event, we will see some of the high spots of the floor speeches of Indiana Senate Candidate Richard Mourdock, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie – always a crowd favorite – and the redoubtable Herman Cain. Cain also visited the media room and I have video of that below the fold.
Indiana Senate Candidate Richard Mourdock
Richard Mourdock is the current Indiana State treasurer but he also just defeated long-time incumbent Senator Richard Lugar for the GOP nomination for the U.S. Senate from Indiana. He’ll face the Democrat come November. Mourdock has been widely touted as the insurgent Tea Party candidate that beat Lugar, the old line, establishment man.
“No one expected a lowly state treasurer could take out a 36-year Senator! But we DID,” Mourdock said triumphantly.
Mourdock also noted that Senator Chuck Schumer of New York has called him the “Hoosier headache.” Mourdock was rather proud of that appellation.
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CPAC Chicago, Part 2: Richard Mourdock, Chris Christie, Herman Cain”
-By Warner Todd Huston
Well, Friday evening, June 8, 2012, we marked the end of the first CPAC event held in Chicago and what a great event it was. The triumph in Wisconsin was on everyone’s mind but so was Obama’s dismal record. Not just dismal, but according to several speakers, even dangerous. The economy and the election of Romney were focal points but so was foreign policy this day. One theme, though, was constant: Obama has to go.
Because of other things going on and the several press availability sessions, I didn’t catch every speaker in the main hall, but I did hear the speeches of (in this order) former Senator Rick Santorum, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson, Indiana Senate Candidate Richard Mourdock, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, Illinois Representative Peter Roskam, Minnesota Representative Michelle Bachmann, and Illinois Representatives Joe Walsh and Randy Hultgren. I also heard and recorded the press availability sessions of Herman Caine, Peter Roskam, and Michelle Bachmann and I caught most of Kansas Representative Tim Huelskamp’s.
Other notables whose speeches I missed were Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton, Ohio Gov. John Kasich, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell, Heritage Foundation President Ed Feulner, and Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback.
The event was a great success with well over 2,000 participants, all seats filled for the most part during the speeches and some great groups like the United Republican Fund, the Illinois Policy Institute, the Heartland Institute, Champion News, and others hosting and participating.
I’ll say a few words about the speakers I did see in the order I saw them and I’ll do this in a few installments so that this won’t be one long, overly taxing post. Now, as each of these speakers appeared before us I live Tweeted their comments, so the following quotes are pulled from my Twitter feed.
But before I do that, each speaker was quite enthusiastic over the win of Governor Scott Walker who defeated an effort by the far left and their union overlords to recall him in Wisconsin. Each speaker praised Walker and crowed about the left’s loss in there. I won’t regurgitate the Wisconsin hunk of each speaker as they were pretty much all the same; exuberant. The essential point was that we are all cheeseheads now.
Rick Santorum
Rick Santorum on the main stage
Former Pennsylvania Senator and recent GOP Presidential candidate Rick Santorum gave one of his well-crafted, typically workman-like speeches. One of Santorum’s early points was that America is at a “tipping point” and we’d better be there to tip it in the right direction.
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CPAC Chicago, Wisconsin Praised, Obama Razed — Part One: Rick Santorum, Ron Johnson”
-By Warner Todd Huston
One of George W. Bush’s real achievements in Afghanistan was his push for civil rights for Afghani women. Real successes were had as girls were at last allowed to go to school and women began to enter the realm of Afghan politics. Bush made equal rights for Afghan women a priority. Not so with his successor, Barack Obama, and his speech at the opening of the NATO meeting on Afghanistan was yet another missed opportunity to reassert that drive for civil rights in Afghanistan.
The address before NATO during the opening minutes of the first ISAF meeting on Afghanistan — one with Afghan President Hamid Karzai right there in attendance — was the perfect time to at least mention the ongoing quest for equal rights for women in that region. Sadly, even as these rights have slipped backwards in some areas of Afghanistan in the last few years, Obama eschewed any reference to the subject.
At the end of his brief and perfunctory comments, Obama spoke of the “opportunity to ensure our [that] hard-won progress is preserved” and this would have been the perfect chance to at least mention civil rights for women. Instead, President Obama hewed close to the US support for Afghan security forces. “(A)s Afghans stand up they will not stand alone,” the president said as he hailed the “long-term relationship with Afghanistan beyond 2014” that was being cultivated.
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Civil Rights Make no Appearance in Obama NATO Afghanistan Address”
-By Warner Todd Huston
I was awarded press credentials for NATO’s 2012 Summit in Chicago and, having no idea what to expect, what I found on day one was a study in contrasts. What occurred was sometimes amusing, often mundane, and sometimes even violent. But it was all democracy in action.
Early on the morning of day one, Sunday, May 20, I boarded a western Metra train under threat of having my equipment bags confiscated or at least me prevented from boarding the train with them. I was not ruffed up the “the man,” though and downtown I went riding high on the rails. Literally. I took a seat on the top tier of the train.
The Summit didn’t start well as the NATO advance video called Chicago the Illinois Capital (It isn’t) and the place where Obama grew up (Again, it isn’t).
Upon reaching the gathering point for the press in beautiful downtown Chicago I boarded the super, double, secret press shuttle bus that took us down the service streets, steering well clear of the surface roads, straight to Chicago’s McCormick Place convention center, site of the NATO Summit.
Of course, before I was allowed on the super, double, secret press bus, bomb-sniffing dogs were loosed to make sure I had no underwear-bomb on my person or in my equipment bags. After I was officially cleared, I boarded the bus with local Chicago TV newsreader Jay Levine.
Everywhere I went there were knots of security personnel. A LOT of security personnel. The last time I saw that many security people I was in Cancun, Mexico during the 2010 UN Climate Conference.
There were members of the FBI, Homeland Security, Chicago Police, the U.S. Marshals as well as U.S. Airmen and Army officers all there on duty to make sure our tender media people were safe and secure.
I was later to learn that out on the streets of Chicago the number of security of all sorts made the way to McCormick Place seem like it was lightly guarded!
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A Blogger at NATO 2012, What I Saw on Day One”
-By Warner Todd Huston
Obama must not have been paying too much attention to what his folks at NATO have been doing as they prepare for the summit coming up on May 20, 21 in Chicago because the new video touting the gathering has a few whoppers included. Namely that Chicago is the capital of Illinois (it isn’t) and is “the city he grew up in” (he didn’t).
As the mellifluous tones of the European accented, female narrator begins, we see images of the shining City of Big Shoulders, The City That Works, the legendary Windy City, the, uh, Capital of Illinois? That’s what we are told…
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Ooops: NATO Video Says Chicago is ‘Capital of Illinois’”
-By Warner Todd Huston
Back in August of 2011 I finally made it downtown to take a gander at the tacky Marilyn Monroe statue that was placed at Pioneer Court near the Tribune building on Chicago’s Magnificent Mile. It was a horrible. But finally, we are told that the statue is going to be removed from its current perch. Now I call THAT a beautification project!
When I saw it in August I said, “It is nothing short of a gigantic pile of tackiness in the middle of the Windy City. But the sponsors call it ‘art,’ nonetheless.” My final word on it was, “Anyway, it is an ugly, kitschy, oversized, spectacle. I give it thumbs down.”
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Thank YOU… Garish Statue of Marilyn Monroe to be Removed from Chicago Scene”
-By Warner Todd Huston
This is the sort of thing that makes these idiotic Occupy whatevers… well, idiots.
Via Marathon Pundit, a cadre of comrades in the Occupy Chicago “movement” decided it would be a cool idea to have a “fare strike” and crash Chicago’s mass transit system in order to ride for free.
When Ruberry asked the gaudily masked nut what a fare strike was, he said that it means we pay “zero” to ride the bus and/or the train.
“It’s when a lot of people show up and say this is what we’re willing to pay for this public service,” he explained. “Today it was exactly zero.”
So, here’s a random question… how, exactly, do these morons think we can even have a mass transit system if no one even pays any fare to use them?
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Petulant, Occupy Chicago Protesters Want Everything ‘Free’”
-By Warner Todd Huston
Now the very same accused criminal that Chicago Democrats wanted people to vote for in Tuesday’s primary is being pressured to to step down from his office now that he won — pressured by the exact same Democrat officials that told people to vote for him only three days ago. This particular story is a perfect example of how Democrats a). Don’t care what voters want, b). Don’t care if their elected officials are crooks, c). Would rather see criminals in office than see a single Republican win an election.
To recap: Derrick Smith was appointed by the party to take a State Rep seat left empty by another Rep that moved on to a different office. As soon as he got in that office he began soliciting a bribe to fill his pockets. The FBI arrested him and charged him with the crime. Up comes the primary and Chicago Democrats, including Congressman Danny Davis, told Chicago voter to vote for this crook anyway because a criminal in office is better than having any Republican, says Davis and his crook-supporting crew The primary arrives and this crook wins his election. And now that he won…
The Democrats’ endgame is to muscle Smith off the ballot and out of the House. Gov. Pat Quinn and Secretary of State Jesse White on Wednesday called on Smith to resign; Davis said Smith should not appear on the November ballot.
Just what is going on here?
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Now Illinois Dems Want Crook They Supported in Primary to Step Down?”