Free Republic

Someone standing at the intersection can see Stroger Hospital to the east, where many gunshot victims are treated; the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center to the south, where many shooters are incarcerated, and the Cook County medical examiner’s office to the west, where many shooting victims lie dead. That intersection would be a good spot to reflect on the huge cost of Chicago’s gun violence and why Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle’s proposal for a tax on guns and ammunition is more than reasonable. Trying to close a $115 million gap in the 2013 budget she will present...

The danger for Tammy Duckworth in the November election is that Congressman Joe Walsh is a better, more nimble, more natural retail politician than she is. Thanks to a new redistricting map, there are 6 percent more Democratic voters in the newly revised 8th District. Almost two-thirds of voters here went for Obama in 2008. So Duckworth arrived with a substantial advantage. A Public Policy Poll last month put her 14 points ahead of Walsh. But there is a growing sense that the race is tightening. Sean Trende, an election analyst for RealClearPolitics.com, said Tuesday that the website, which aggregates...

SPRINGFIELD — More than 1,100 people have collected nearly $2 million in unemployment benefits while they were in county jails or state prisons, including $43,000 that went to a person in the Cook County Jail, a state agency said Tuesday. In Cook County alone, there were 296 inmates tied to $722,689 in wrongful payments. In Will County, 21 inmates collected $85,159. Lake County was another leader with 20 inmates collecting $84,533, the agency said.

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) paid Chicago consultants over $200,000 in taxpayer money to put on diversity training workshops that included activities in which employees were instructed to chant "our forefathers were illegal immigrants." The government watchdog group Judicial Watch alleged in documents released this week that these programs only served to promote and enforce left-wing political agendas. A USDA department official said the statements were not reflective of USDA policy, and the consultants merely had "participants repeat provocative and potentially offensive phrases as part of an exercise to examine stereotypes." According to Judicial Watch, the USDA has...

October 7, 2012 (CHICAGO) (WLS) -- Republican vice-presidential candidate Paul Ryan came to the Chicago area for a big fundraiser, and protesting Democrats were waiting for him. His motorcade arrived at the Hyatt Regency O'Hare. The top price was nearly $76,000 per person. Outside, Democrats demonstrated against the Republican agenda and Big Bird joined them to protest Mitt Romney's plan to end the federal subsidy for the Public Broadcasting System. They were upset about his Medicare plans, but Republicans say they're on a roll after the first Presidential debate. "The Romney-Ryan voucher plan would leave seniors at the mercy of...

Pennsylvania legislators, grappling with capital city Harrisburg's $340 million of debt, set out on Thursday to tighten the state law that governs how cities and towns win approval for complex, taxpayer-funded projects. In a day-long hearing, members of Pennsylvania's Senate Local Government Committee questioned former local officials publicly for the first time about how Harrisburg could have racked up so much debt tied to renovations of its ill-fated trash incinerator. ... A handful of other U.S. municipalities - in particular, Alabama's Jefferson County, which filed the country's largest Chapter 9 bankruptcy last November - were also undone largely by debt...

Fox & Friends interview of Beverly Perlson.

When an incumbent Democratic president is virtually tied in a congressional district he carried by high double digits in 2008, and is losing in the suburbs of his hometown, there could be trouble brewing. In August, a poll by the Joliet, Ill.-based polling firm of McKeon and Associates, found President Obama leading challenger Mitt Romney in Cook County, which includes Chicago and its suburbs, by a 12-point margin 49-37. That would seem to be a comfortable edge, but it is significantly smaller than traditional margins needed to outweigh the more Republican downstate vote... Now comes a new poll from WeAskAmerica...

Campaign 2012: When an incumbent Democratic president is virtually tied in a congressional district he carried by high double digits in 2008, and is losing in the suburbs of his hometown, there could be trouble brewing. In August, a poll by the Joliet, Ill.-based polling firm of McKeon and Associates, found President Obama leading challenger Mitt Romney in Cook County, which includes Chicago and its suburbs, by a 12-point margin 49-37. That would seem to be a comfortable edge, but it is significantly smaller than traditional margins needed to outweigh the more Republican downstate vote. "He has to come out...

When I was in school, I was taught that newspaper reporters and editors were wise and learned individuals to be respected. They were experts at the use of the English language and generally unbiased and unemotional in their reporting of the news. Today, thanks to the “new” media, we better understand how biased the major media is in its reporting of news. We’ve heard of the disgraceful work of Jayson Blair at the New York Times. “All the news that’s fit to print,” trumpets the Times everyday in the little box on the front page. Looking back, I guess that...

Black Activist Urges Schools to Change Names from White Segregationist President FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact Ted Hayes 424-222-6010 ted@tedhayes.us LOS ANGELES – Ted Hayes, homeless activist and host of the weekly radio talk show America’s Black Shield on WNJC 1360-AM in Philadelphia (www.wnjc1360.com ), is calling for for the School Districts of Portsmouth, Virginia and Peoria, Illinois to change the names of the Woodrow Wilson High School and the Woodrow Wilson Primary School, respectively, from a white segregationist U.S. president to a name that will honor a figure in the civil rights struggle for Descendants of Chattel Slaves (African Americans)....

The President of the South Suburban Branch of the NAACP alleges a director of the re-election campaign of Barack Obama has threatened and intimidated him because he doesn’t support the president. David Lowery says he believes he was threatened during a phone conversation with Louis Raymond, the Obama for America Illinois regional director. Lowery says he doesn’t personally support the president because he’s not addressing issues important to the black community. He said he was explaining that to Raymond when the Obama campaign official told him, “You know what? I know everything about you.” Lowery says Raymond added, “We’ve been...

Back in August, a poll showed Obama with just a 12 point lead over Romney in Cook County, Illinois. While he posted a huge lead in the city of Chicago, the poll found him actually losing to Romney in suburban Cook County. It was a shock that I set aside as an outlier. A new poll of Illinois' 10th Congressional District, which includes parts of Cook County, however, suggests the August poll might not be such an aberration. The poll, from WeAskAmerica, finds Obama with just a 2 point lead over Romney, 47-45 in the suburban district. Obama won the...

$2.1 million stake in 94 properties is part of federal pilot program to sell distressed real estate in bulk ___ A New York-based private equity firm is the latest investor entering the Chicago area's market for distressed homes. The Cogsville Group LLC paid about $2.1 million for an equity interest in 94 foreclosed properties from Fannie Mae that stretch from the Wisconsin border to the South Side of Chicago. The properties include 111 rental units, 68 of which are occupied. The transaction, part of a pilot program to sell foreclosures in bulk in hard-hit housing markets, was announced Tuesday by...

A poster last night read Mitts lips at the opening greeting. He said, "I'm coming for you." Man-o-man, this is just like sending a stale pizza to Axeldouche's Chicago headquarters last spring. I'M COMING FOR YOU, loser!

Urban farming is usually thought of as a niche business for high-end food produce. In Chicago, it has taken on a new meaning. Police in a helicopter stumbled upon what may be the largest outdoor pot farm in the city’s history. Planted in rows and spread over an area the size of two football fields, as many as 1,500 plants averaging 6 feet tall were growing amidst heavy brush in an industrial area on the city’s South Side. “This would not be visible from the street,” said Chicago Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy at a press conference today. “It’s surrounded by...

Businesswoman and philanthropist Susan Crown, a former Obama supporter and a member of one of Chicago’s most influential families, told an audience of over 300 women and men, “In the midst of the Obama administration, I became profoundly disappointed, disillusioned and actually a little angry.”

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – A little-publicized amendment to the Illinois Constitution on this November’s ballot could have a big impact on the pensions and health care of state workers if Illinois voters approve it, a University of Illinois expert in legal policy says. According to John Kindt, a professor emeritus of business and legal policy, Amendment 49 is a “cleverly crafted feat of legislative legerdemain” that’s designed to concentrate more money and power in the state capital. “This is a potentially major change to the Illinois Constitution that has received very little publicity and has been the subject of almost no...

His name is on the ballot. But Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. hasn't made a campaign appearance since the primary. The Democratic congressman from Chicago is running for re-election for his seat in the House of Representatives, but has been out of sight for the last three months, being treated for bipolar disorder. Campaign advisers told the New York Times, which noted that the campaign's office was locked shut, that the candidate is waiting for the doctor's approval to campaign again. The son of Rev. Jesse Jackson was expected to win the election easily, but the Washington Post reports he is...

She's a former nun, an Army major, a lawyer, a college professor and a physician. Now Dr. Barbara Bellar wants to be a state senator from Illinois, and she has one question about ObamaCare. “What the blank could possibly go wrong?” Bellar asks, tongue in cheek, after delivering a one-sentence indictment of President Obama's health care law. Bellar, a Republican candidate running for office in the state’s 18th district, gave the extended one-liner while warming up the crowd at a recent event for GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney. Someone captured it on video, and now the doctor's diagnosis of the...