Judge trying to keep a handle on what happens during the Van Dyke trial

The legal proceedings meant to ready the Cook County courts to decide the legal fate of Chicago Police officer Jason Van Dyke are taking a unique twist – largely because we don’t know exactly what is happening.

GAUGHAN: Not going to win popularity contest

Judge Vincent Gaughan closed off the hearings related to the legal case on Friday, and also indicated that at least one day’s worth of legal hearings to be held this week also will be closed off.

THERE ARE THOSE who are trying to spin this as a judge behaving like a control freak; although when I think about it I see a judge who’s trying to prevent this particular criminal case from becoming a legal circus.

Which is something that could all-too-easily happen, because of the nature of this particular case. This is the officer who’s facing criminal charges for the shooting death of a 17-year-old boy, Laquan McDonald.

The kind of people inclined to view police as some sort of criminal entity itself are hoping desperately that “justice” will prevail and that the corrupt, killer cop will wind up going to prison himself.

I don’t doubt there are some people who will only be satisfied if Van Dyke winds up in a maximum-security prison and winds up being assaulted by his fellow inmates.

WHILE THERE ARE other individuals who are inclined to believe that far too much is being made of the concept of police brutality and that they want a sense of law and order to prevail. They want a police officer to be rewarded for using a level of force necessary to deal with a dangerous official.

Which means that in the Van Dyke trial, there’s going to be efforts to bring out as much dirt about McDonald as possible. To create a sense that perhaps the officer wasn’t reacting crazily out-of-line when he fired 16 shots at the teenager.

That, according to the Chicago Tribune and Chicago Sun-Times, was the purpose of the Friday court hearing. Up to nine people who could provide testimony about the teenage boy and his history of bad behavior supposedly were called upon during a more-than-two-hour court hearing.

VAN DYKE: Cop? Or crook?

For his part, Gaughan said the need for secrecy is because the people who appeared in court could wind up facing public harassment IF it became known they said something that could be used favorably on behalf of Van Dyke.

HE’S NOT WRONG. There will be some people determined to ensure that only the most derogatory impression of Van Dyke comes out. They’re going to react hostilely toward any mention of McDonald’s criminal record. They’re going to consider all that irrelevant.

While the “law and order” crowd will want to view it as the only relevant bits of evidence.

Gaughan is in a position where he’s going to have to balance out these conflicting views. He’s going to be deciding now just how much of all this is truly relevant and ought to be permitted to come up during the eventual criminal trial that likely will take place some time this summer.

One mistake now, and we could wind up with the Van Dyke trial being tainted and overturned on appeal.

IT IS A case that likely will offend many Chicagoans, regardless of how it turns out and what verdict ultimately is rendered by the eventual jury that is picked to decide the officer’s fate.

McDONALD: How honest is this image?

Gaughan, I’m sure, knows he’s not going to win any popularity contests, no matter how he conducts himself during coming months.

In fact, my own belief is that the anger over this case is going to be intense whether conviction or acquittal is the ultimate outcome for Van Dyke.

It’s just a matter of which group is going to be screaming the loudest.

  -30-

Political memories continue to crop up in our present-day public reality

OBAMA: Deciding one's guilt, or innocence

Election Day losses, or term limits, don’t necessarily mean the end of our political people in the public eye. Some of them just keep cropping up, no matter how much some of us want to forget them.

Take the cases of Barack Obama and Pat Quinn. It wasn’t all that long ago that these were the sitting president and Illinois governor, respectively. It would be expected for them to have their every utterances recorded for posterity.

QUINN: Wants to be the governor's lawyer?

THEY’RE NOW BOTH in political retirement – Obama because he served his two-term maximum allowed for any individual to be president, and Quinn because even with the advantages of incumbency, he couldn’t even beat Bruce Rauner for governor come the last state government election cycle.

But they’re both the subject of idle chit-chat amongst people who wish to think they’re saying something intelligent about our political structure.

For Obama, who’s living along with former first lady Michelle out in the District of Columbia, he’s going to have a return to our local scene. For the Obamas still own their home in the Kenwood neighborhood and maintain local voter registration – along with driver’s licenses.

Could Obama do jury duty in shadow of Picasso?

Which means that Obama’s name is in the pool of people who can be called upon to serve on a jury. The exact circumstances of which have occurred.

OFFICIALS ARE GOING out of their way not to let it be publicly known when Obama will return to Cook County to do his day of jury duty, although the former president is trying to appear as regular-guyish as possible in saying he won’t try to get out of such duty.

He’ll show up, watch that decades-old film of one-time WBBM-TV news anchor Lester Holt explaining the way the court system works, and will be kept in seclusion from the criminals who pervade the halls of the county courthouses, to see if he gets picked to be on a jury.

Which most people would think is a long-shot. I suspect any attorney trying to put together a jury to benefit their client (or a prosecutor seeking to nail his hide to the wall) is going to view Obama as a distraction. Something that could draw massive amounts of attention to an otherwise-trivial case.

Or in suburban Markham, a few blocks from Hazel Crest-based Obama school?

Better to just bounce him, give him his $17.20 check for one day’s service to the county, and send him along home. For what it’s worth, that amount of money is meant to cover the cost of mass transit to a courthouse, along with lunch. Nothing more!

BUT WHEN IT happens, Obama’s presence will cause a political circus – even though county officials say they’ll get him into and out of the courthouse in a way meant to draw as little attention to himself as possible.

Which is just the opposite of former Gov. Quinn – who in coming months is going to want to draw as much attention to himself as possible. He says he’s going to be amongst the many Dems wishing to run for Illinois attorney general.

Not that it’s surprising Quinn would try to seek a state office after losing his governor’s post in 2014. Quinn previously served as Illinois treasurer from 1991-95, and I lost track of the number of political posts he ran for unsuccessfully until he finally became lieutenant governor following the 2002 election cycle.

“The Mighty Quinn” isn’t really satisfied unless he’s running for office and using his campaigns as forums for making political statements about what he thinks is for the good of our society.

AS FAR AS why attorney general, it’s because the post is open; what with Lisa Madigan saying she won’t seek re-election in next year’s cycle. With some half-dozen or so Dems expressing interest in the post, perhaps Quinn thinks he could win a primary with some 25 percent voter support.

Could Harold give Quinn a fight for AG?

Although I’m skeptical he could even get that much. But it is a wide-open primary, meaning anything screwy could happen.

I have to admit it would be odd if Quinn were to wind up being the Democratic nominee running against possible GOP challenger Erika Harold. Could the man who gave us the cutback amendment and reduced by one-third the size of the Illinois House of Representatives compete against a one-time Miss America?

I’m sure Harold’s campaign is going to portray herself as an ultimate political outsider out to instigate change – yet one could argue she’d be taking on the ultimate political pain in the derriere who doesn’t care much what the political insiders think of him.

  -30-

Nobody wants to pay taxes, but they’ll also complain about lack of services

There’s a scene in the 1995 film “My Family” in which actor Jimmy Smits’ character marries a woman from El Salvador to bolster her efforts to avoid deportation, then tries to dismiss his parents’ disapproval of such cynical behavior against the sacred institution of marriage by sarcastically saying, “I’m a god---n revolutionary.”

Who'd have thought political statement being made?

I can’t help but think the same sarcasm applies to many of the people who these days are getting offended over taxes – particularly the one that is drawing the national attention to Chicago in the form of the pop tax.

JUST ON TUESDAY the Chicago Tribune reported about one of the latest lawsuits filed in Cook County Circuit Court. There’s a man from suburban Schaumburg who’s upset that when he went to his local Walgreens store to purchase bottled sparkling water, he was hit with the tax.

He argues the packaging clearly indicates the water is unsweetened, while the so-called pop tax applies to sweetened beverages.

The man who filed his lawsuit last week said he wants a jury trial (probably because he wants a court ruling based in public sentiment rather than the technicalities of the law) and class-action status, which would allow for other people who have objections to the Cook County pop tax to pile on.

Why have one lone person suing someone over the penny per ounce fee the county wants to charge on pop and other sweetened beverages if you can have many?

THIS IS ABOUT people wishing to make a stink over an issue which basically amounts to them feeling a bit cheap and not wanting to pay an additional cost every time they buy their 2-liter bottle of pop (which can come to about $0.65 more).

In the case of Walgreens, the Tribune reports that the company admits it screwed up when coding the products it sells – which means that when the cashier swipes the water bottles at the register, it comes up with the pop tax added on even though it’s not supposed to.

And since it’s programmed to do that, the cashier has no authority, or ability, to take it off. Walgreens officials say they’re working to fix the situation. Which is about all we should expect to happen.

PRECKWINKLE: Arousing cheapskate anger?

I think the people who are hoping to go after Walgreens as a way of attacking the pop tax itself are just more interested in hearing themselves yell and scream. Of course, they’ll scream even louder whenever government fails to provide the services they expect as part of their life’s routines.

THEY’RE BEING ‘REVOLUTIONARIES’ against the issue of about 20 cents being added on to the cost of a single-serving sized plastic pop bottle. All of which is meant to help balance out the Cook County government budget.

Maybe it’s because I’ve been making an effort for the past year or so to reduce the amount of carbonated beverages I consume (I enjoy an occasional Coca-Cola too much to totally give up the habit, but it certainly doesn’t have to be a daily purchase), but this particular pop tax just strikes me as being yet another increase in the cost of daily life. Nothing is as cheap as it used to be when I was younger.

Yet some people are determined to carry out this petty fee and their disagreement to an extreme. Maybe it’s because the more serious taxes are too complex for them to go after.

Similar to how some Chicago residents get all worked up over being charged 7 cents for the cost of a plastic bag whenever they buy something.

PERSONALLY, I VIEW that fee as a cost of convenience for not having to carry my own bags to the store. Although for those who have their own canvas totes or whatnot to bring with them when they shop, more power to them!

Yes, I’m aware of the new poll showing 87 percent of those questioned hate the pop tax. Then again, how many people are going to do anything about it? This is one tax that gradually is going to become a part of the daily routine – no matter how much some retail groups try to challenge it in court and how petty Cook County gets with their counter-lawsuits against them.

Personally, I’d feel like a phony revolutionary if I claimed I was opposed to either of these taxes (pop or plastic bags) on some high-minded principle involving the legitimacy of taxation.

It would be more honest if the people who are complaining were to just come out and tell the truth – they’re feeling cheap!

  -30-

How much is really gained from having public participation during govt mtgs?

The City Council in Chicago began Wednesday to permit public comment during its meetings, which really shouldn’t be a big deal.
 

Hot air emanates from da Hall, although not from pols

Illinois law actually requires municipal entities to set aside a portion of their meeting time to allow people to make statements about what their officials are doing. So the City Council really is just complying with the law.

IN FACT, AS reported by the Chicago Tribune, the City Council’s action was motivated by the courts – a lawsuit was filed and a judge issued an order requiring Chicago to permit some sort of public comment.

But as I have learned in writing about other government entities where public comment questions arose, Illinois law actually does not dictate what form the public comment must take.

Government entities are allowed to set their own rules.

I know that in my years as a reporter-type person, I have covered entities that strictly limited people to 3 minutes of talk and only on issues that were already on the council’s agenda. No trying to bring up anything else that might be of public concern, but that officials didn't want to discuss.

OTHERS HAVE PERMITTED people to bring up issues not on the council agenda, but usually in a portion of the meeting held at the end once all the actual business is complete and public officials are feeling antsy and are more interested in adjourning so they can go home.

I also know of one entity that requires people to submit their questions in writing, so that theoretically city officials can have their attorneys review them so that a proper answer can be provided. Although they’re not always rigid in enforcing that.

In Chicago, it seems the significant rule (as evidenced by Wednesday’s conduct) is that up to 30 minutes will be provided for public comment – with individuals allowed up to 3 minutes each.

If, by chance, there are too many people to fit within that half-hour, then it’s ‘tough luck’ for those individuals who lose out. We’ll have to see whether the courts accept this limit, since the people who filed the original lawsuit against the City Council indicate they intend to continue their court fight over this issue.

FROM MY OWN experience, I know that these government hearings usually attract characters. People who actually work for a living don’t have the time to spare to express themselves publicly.

We often get people who see it as their place in society to be the verbal pain in the political behind. I know one person who routinely shows up at Common Council sessions in Gary, Ind., who thinks his public comments are just as significant a part of the municipal process as the votes the council members take.

At the City Council, the Tribune reported that the first person to make a public comment to the City Council was George Blakemore. Although anybody who pays attention to local government knows Blakemore isn’t a stranger to speaking out.

Back when I used to write for a different newspaper, I covered the Cook County Board (amongst other things) and Blakemore’s presence was a given. He’d always have something to complain about. It would have been newsworthy if he hadn’t spoken.

PERSONALLY, I REMEMBER a time his rant turned into a diatribe against Latinos and how he saw them taking from black people – which caused President Toni Preckwinkle to cut him off and publicly denounce him for making racist remarks.

Of course, he insisted on perceiving the issue as one of being censored by the county board president. I suspect we’ll get lots more rants like this in coming weeks and months.

Personally, I have no problem with the idea of people being able to express themselves at a government meeting. Those officials, after all, are doing “the people’s business,” and the people ought to have a chance to say just what they think.

But now that we have public comment at the City Council sessions, we’re going to learn that the act of being a bloviated buffoon in public isn’t something necessarily limited to the elected officials.

  -30-

Battle steps up over reapportionment reform; a little closer to Supreme Ct

Kicking out the old lege for a new and better (more sympathetic in a politically-partisan way) one seems to be the strategy for reapportionment reform. Photograph provided by state of Illinois

Now, the fight can get really ugly as political interests upset with the current partisan structure of the Illinois General Assembly go about trying to force a change to a legislative body more in line with their vision of the way things should be.

For a Cook County judge on Wednesday used her authority to reject all those petitions put together by allies of Gov. Bruce Rauner to force a referendum question on the Nov. 8 ballot about how the General Assembly’s district boundaries are drawn.

FOR CURRENTLY, THEY are put together in a way that results in the General Assembly having Democratic majorities that give significant influence and control over the legislative process to lawmakers from Chicago.

They are the reason that Rauner has been able to get nowhere with his desires to impose a series of anti-organized labor initiatives meant to undermine the influence that unions have over state government.

They also are the reason why Rauner will continue to accomplish nothing, so long as he continues with such a legislative agenda.

He could try to go district by district in the upcoming elections and toss his money at candidates who might align themselves with him in hopes of undermining the veto-proof majorities that now resist him.

OR, HE CAN try to toss out the current Legislature and build a new one more in tune with his image. Which is what this referendum question is about – no matter how much Rauner will claim he’s leading a bipartisan political effort.

I realize there are some good-government activist types who have signed on with Rauner because they’re desperate enough for any form of change in the status quo. But I wonder how little influence they will wind up carrying if this measure were to finally go through.

 

Reconfiguring this jumbled mess of the Chicago area is the goal of some involved with reapportionment reform, while others are eager to preserve it

When it comes to redistricting, I’m aware that partisan politics is a part of the process. I have no doubt that if different people were put in charge (ie., Rauner allies), the resulting district boundaries would wind up favoring their interests.

There is an inherent bias that occurs in the process. Which is why I’m wary of anyone who claims they’re going to impose real reform. Define reform!

EVEN THOSE PEOPLE who would say we ought to create a computer program that puts together boundaries, so as to take the human element out of it. I’d question the biases of the people programming the computer!

I do sense a certain self-righteous tone to the people arguing for the referendum – who largely are ones who couldn’t win at the ballot box so they want to kick the box over and ignore the results of the electorate.

It’s almost as though they think this is 1980s Chicago and the City Council, where the boundaries of wards had been put together in a way that created the 29-member majority that openly thwarted Harold Washington’s mayoral desires.

It took a special redistricting to create more equitable districts to break that stranglehold against the mayor.

IN THIS CASE, I feel like it would be the interests of people who would have opposed Washington trying to get back the control they used to have. I’m skeptical of the whole process.

Which is why I’m not bothered by the ruling of Judge Diane Larsen, although I can already hear the criticisms of it by the partisan ideologues pushing for the redistricting change – she’s a Cook County judge, which makes he biased.

Similar to how when a Cook County judge ruled that state officials could not be paid their salaries while there was a lack of a budget, the ideologues went and got another court outside the Chicago area to issue a contrary ruling so they could follow that one.

 

The gang at Second and Capitol in Springfield will likely have to resolve this legal issue

The Illinois Supreme Court eventually ruled in a way indicating that Cook County’s court likely got it right, and this is another case that ultimately is going to wind up before the state’s high court before we can get resolution.

  -30-

Who knows what exactly is legal with regards to government being able to reform its pension funding mechanisms

There were partisan political people who clapped with glee, so to speak, when the Illinois Supreme Court struck down the measure that state government tried implementing to reform the way it covered the cost of pension programs for retired workers.

NOVAK: Created more work for Rahm

It was, after all, a measure that now-former Gov. Pat Quinn got credit for implementing. The people who were eager to dump him were ever-so-happy to be able to say that Quinn was inept and incapable of revamping the mess.

THEY CERTAINLY HATED the idea that he’d have to receive praise for fixing a long-lasting problem whose origins date back so many decades – so far back that it is nothing but wrong to place the blame on any one political person.

They all deserve the blame – regardless of what political party they belong to.

And it’s obvious our state government officials don’t have a clue what they need to do to ensure that the cost of providing the pensions for retired state workers and educators across Illinois (except in Chicago proper) doesn’t wind up consuming ALL of the income state government has.

That may actually be a plus for state officials these days; the lack of a state government budget for the fiscal year that began 25 days ago means they now have an excuse to not be concerned with the pension funding problem.

SO WHAT SHOULD we now think of the pension funding problems that exist within city government; where an attempt by city officials led by Mayor Rahm Emanuel got struck down Friday by a Cook County judge?

EMANUEL: Needs a new solution

Could it just be that any attempt to impose a scheme that limits retirement benefits to something government officials think they can afford is going to fail?

Could it be that the wise one in all this is Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle? The county has its own problems and shortfalls to overcome, but has done nothing because they want to see if some other government can come up with the model solution for them to follow.

It would seem that the county has a long way to go – since nobody seems to have come up with the solution.

THE STATE HAD tried passing a measure that would protect the pension benefits already accrued, but would encourage changes in benefits for future work done so that it would not come to quite the same amount of cost.

Whereas the city said it tried to negotiate some changes to get support from the future city retirees who will be counting on that money to ensure they don’t live their “golden years” in poverty.

PRECKWINKLE: Waiting for guidance

Judge Rita Novak wasn’t swayed, saying the Illinois Constitution provides for an “enforceable obligation” to pay retirement benefits.

It would be odd if the same state Supreme Court that struck down the state pension reform plan were to take it upon themselves to overrule Novak’s ruling and say that the city actually got it right.

IT HAS ME wondering what solution, if any, is going to someday be determined to be acceptable to the courts.

Because something is going to have to be done, and it is already long past due. This was an issue in need of a solution years ago – and the fact that the efforts made thus far to fix the problem have been struck down means the problem only gets worse and worse.



QUINN: Not the only failure

I understand why the labor unions that represent government employees are all concerned and willing to fight to the death, so to speak, on this issue. Part of the perk of having a government job is gaining something resembling a passing retirement plan.

If they didn’t offer that, many of those workers would have found more gainful employment elsewhere during their working lives – and we’d probably have great difficulty finding the current level of workers willing to put up with the bureaucratic nonsense that some people want to impose because it fits their own partisan ideals.

  -30-

EXTRA: Suburban gun runners?!?

It seems the Rev. Michael Pfleger has come up with a new tactic, both to get his name in the public eye and to try to go after gun shops that for decades have managed to frustrate himself and others who are concerned about the number of firearms that are currently spread out amongst the public in Chicago.

He’s suing the suburban villages where he often has protested in the past, contending those municipalities are lax in their enforcement of firearms-related laws.

AS A REPORTER-type person, I have covered protests held in the past by Pfleger and the Rev. Jesse Jackson outside of Chuck’s Gun Shop in suburban Riverdale. Their objections to that shop are long-running – they believe the store’s owners let just about anybody buy a firearm.

Even if the few existing laws concerning firearms ownership would ban those individuals from having pistols of any type.

Because I have covered these protests, I also know the ownership of Chuck’s says it is in compliance. The letter of the law is being followed, they say. They’re probably telling the truth!

Which means the laws themselves are lax. In need of revision. Except that the NRA-types who want to believe that firearm ownership is a God-given right will go out of their way to intimidate political people from doing any serious revisions.

WHAT MAKES THIS particular store so unique is its location. Riverdale is right on the southernmost border of Chicago, not far from the Altgeld Gardens public housing complex.

The store itself is about five blocks from the city limits. There likely are firearms originally purchased there that eventually wind up in the hands of Chicago residents who aren’t supposed to have them.

I suspect similar conditions exist for Midwest Sporting Goods in suburban Lyons and for Shore Galleries in suburban Lincolnwood.

So that led to the lawsuit filed this week in Cook County Circuit Court. Not against the gun shops or their owners. But against the municipalities themselves.

PFLEGER AND HIS allies on this issue want a judge to issue an order requiring the local governments to be more aggressive in policing those local businesses – even though in the past, local officials have said they’re doing everything the law requires of them.

WBBM-TV reported Tuesday that the lawsuit seeks to have the local governments require background checks of gun shop employees, more training for employees to prevent sales to people who intend to sell them to others who can’t make the buy themselves, keeping lists of those who are not allowed to buy firearms and also of all firearms they sell that later turn up as being used in the commission of a crime.

That’s a lot of work. I’m sure the store owners, when they eventually get around to responding, will claim it’s an undue burden being placed upon themselves.

Then again, there is the nature of the product that they’re selling. One that can be too easily misused to cause bodily harm to others in our society.

IT WILL BE interesting to see if the courts accept this line of logic. Even if a local judge does, how quickly will it wind up getting appealed to a court located outside of the city where the perception might be that someone will want to believe that some hunter seeking to shoot elk or deer or whatever is being denied his chance because of such restrictions?

This could wind up as a long-running battle – one that I wonder if it will outlast even Pfleger’s time on this planet.

There are certain issues that it seems will perpetually linger on; we’re never going to come to a resolution. Particularly since there are those in our society who believe that the solution to public violence is to require everyone to be armed.

Which is something the gun shops would probably like – more business for them and a boost to their financial bottom line.

  -30-

Will we have a state government ‘shutdown’ where nothing shuts down?

Illinois government employees got paid their salaries on Wednesday knowing it might be a long, long time before they see another paycheck, or direct deposit, made in their names.

RAUNER: Wants workers paid to keep them quiet

People who work on the state payroll get paid twice a month – the 1^st and 15^th. Wednesday was also the first day of Illinois’ 2016 fiscal year.

THAT MAKES THE money state workers received on Wednesday for work done the second half of June, or the end of Fiscal 2015.

Because that is off the old state budget, they can be paid without conflict. The next pay check will be for work done during Fiscal 2016 – which is a problem because the budget for that fiscal period has yet to be set.

In accordance with the Illinois Constitution, government cannot spend money if it hasn’t been specifically appropriated. Which is why things are a mess this year – Gov. Bruce Rauner and the General Assembly’s leaders are stuck in a disagreement over the budget that has little to do with financial matters.

It’s all about partisan politics and ideology and the desire by each to make the other squirm and whimper like a little school girl.

ALTHOUGH I HONESTLY suspect that analogy is gross because the average little school girl probably shows more maturity and sense than our state’s political people these days.

On this issue, state officials argued in Cook County Circuit Court earlier this week, and a judge is expected to rule come Tuesday on what exactly can, and cannot, be paid by state government during this interlude when there is no set budget.

MADIGAN: No signs of compromise

Rauner and his legal advisers want to believe they can keep making the state payroll in full on the grounds that money still comes into state government. It’s there – it just hasn’t been appropriated yet.

Although the traditional interpretation of needing an appropriation before money can be spent would also impact the payroll – just as it has in past years when there has been a budgetary stalemate. Long-time state employees know to keep a little extra money in the bank come the beginning of summer; on the off-chance that they’d miss a pay-day or two.

BUT RAUNER KNOWS that if state workers miss a paycheck come July 15, they’re going to be fickle enough to shift blame for this whole mess to him. They’ll turn on him so quickly – and he’ll be the one who winds up at the mercy of Mike Madigan & Co.

MADIGAN: Acts could benefit her dad

Because the reason we have a stalemate is because Rauner is refusing to consider figuring out how to fill the financial shortfall that exists in the budget UNTIL some of his ideologically-motivated desires get enacted into law.

Which is a tactic I wouldn’t object to so much (I’d be bothered by his issues, but he has a right to tout them) if it were still April or May and we had the General Assembly and governor trying to reach a deal.

But that time has passed. We’re now at the point where officials need to concoct a budget agreement so that government can operate and fulfill its obligations to the people of Illinois. As for what those obligations can be, that’s a debate for another day.

SO WE’LL HAVE to see if the Cook County courts wind up issuing the ruling that restricts the amount of payroll that can be met while the political people engage in their equivalent of a street fight over who controls state government.

I’d compare it to “West Side Story,” except I suspect that neither Rauner nor Madigan nor Illinois state Senate President John Cullerton, D-Chicago, can dance worth squat. Nor do I think Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan is comparable to Maria (nor Natalie Wood).

Will Rauner have to squirm this holiday weekend (while marching in that parade  Saturday in suburban Arlington Heights), wondering if the courts hold him to the letter of the law concerning state spending, rather than let him pay off some people to buy their political good will with state funds?

I kind of hope they do. Because ultimately, this problem won’t get resolved until our state officials quit thinking in terms of how they “win” and instead focus on how to balance the budget – which is how we, the people of Illinois, will “win.”

  -30-

How bad does behavior have to get before ball club becomes responsible?

It has been 36 years since I first attended a ball game in Chicago, and the closest I ever came to having an incident was one White Sox game I went to with my brother and cousin when I was in high school.

Sometimes, the beatings come outside the ball park

It was the end of the game and the three of us were waiting outside Comiskey Park for our pre-arranged ride home to show up. We became aware of the fact that a couple of guys appeared to be eyeing us a little too closely.

BEFORE ANYTHING COULD happen, the three of us decided to walk around and mix in with the crowd that was leaving the stadium. We literally took a lap around the ballpark – which put us right back in the same spot.

By then, our potential attackers had moved on. Our ride wound up arriving a couple of minutes later, and the night ended without incident.

It stands out in my mind solely because it reinforces the fact that the stadium crowds usually are harmless. Some people overserve themselves. But, by and large, they are a hazard solely to themselves.

So what should we make of an incident that occurred at U.S. Cellular Field last season that has resulted in a lawsuit recently being filed.

FOR IT SEEMS that a couple attending a ball game last year left the ballpark, only to find that a trio of men were publicly urinating in the parking lot – and chose their car as the place to spray their piss.

When the couple tried telling the men to get lost, the men allegedly took offense and started beating up the couple.

As it turned out, the three men were arrested a couple of days later. They all now face criminal charges in Cook County court. Those cases are still pending.

Where the legal fight is now taking place

But the couple has now filed their lawsuit against the White Sox and the Illinois Sports Facilities Authority – the state agency that owns the stadium. Admittedly, they’re also suing the men who allegedly did the beating – claiming they incurred medical expenses because of the incident.

THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE reported that the couple said in their lawsuit that the ball club’s security did absolutely nothing to try to intervene to prevent the beating from taking place. They argue that since it was ballpark property, the ball club is responsible.

Now aside from those whiny losers who look for any excuse to take a White Sox pot shot, what amazes me is to read some of the (anonymous, of course) Internet commentary that implies the couple themselves should have known better.

As though they should have let the trio finish their public urination and go staggering away, then drive their vehicle to the nearest car wash to have the stink of piss removed.

There are those who think the couple got what they deserved.

OF COURSE, THERE also were those who felt the need of the multiple stories of public urination that has taken place throughout the decades outside of Wrigley Field. Which is about as irrelevant to this incident as is possible.

Personally, I’m inclined to think of anyone who can’t control where they piss as something of a loser. Particularly at U.S. Cellular, where there are actually public restrooms accessible from outside the stadium.

I can see where a couple would be upset to see nothing being done about such a scene being made all over their automobile. Why security would deliberately ignore such actions is beyond me. But it will be intriguing to see how the courts ultimately rule with regards to this lawsuit.

Do we need to have the Piss Police patrolling the areas outside of both of our ballparks? Or is an occasional coating of urine on our automobiles now an occupational hazard, so to speak, of attending a ball game and watching our hometown teams get their butts whomped once again?

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The disappearing airplane winds up crashing into a remote part of the Indian Ocean? Of course it’s a Chicago story

One of the reasons why I have never really sought to work as a reporter-type person outside of Chicago (even when I was in Springfield, I was surrounded by Chicago-oriented people) was because of the fact that it seems just about every story of significance on Planet Earth has a Chicago angle.

The story of how an airplane like this ...

Have a disaster or military conflict that is killing people? There ARE ethnic enclaves somewhere in the city filled with concerned people wondering if their relatives are suffering.

THERE ARE GOVERNMENT officials around the globe who were educated, if not outright raised, in Chicago.

And how many foreign governments feel compelled to have consulates in our city to supplement the official embassies they maintain in Washington, D.C.? I can recall once having a job a couple of blocks from an ominous – and heavily secured – building I later learned was the Chinese consulate.

But back to the point – this is a place that is most definitely a part of the global economy; and one that takes full advantage of it. Our courts can wind up making rulings that have a significant impact on the planet.

Which is the real focal point of this commentary – because it seems the dominant news story of recent weeks is about to get not only a United States angle, but one that will cause it to get the dateline “Chicago.”

FOR A CHICAGO-based law firm (Ribbeck Law, to be exact) filed a lawsuit this week in Cook County Circuit Court that demands information about the airplane specs of the type of jet used by Malaysia Airlines for the flight that disappeared – only to have officials convinced it lies in pieces at the bottom of the ocean.

... winds up in a remote place like this ...

The airplane was one designed by Boeing Co. The law firm – which says it may try to organize a lawsuit on behalf of the families of the Malaysia Airlines flight in question – claims its actions this week are to gather information so that they can hire experts who can find potential defects in the design.

That could potentially allow for any lawsuit to include Boeing; and we all know that having a big and rich company legitimately involved in a legal action increases the potential for a financially big payout.

That big payout, of course, is the reason why people would want to get involved in a lawsuit of any type.

... may be learned at this place.

WE DON’T KNOW officially what happened with that Malaysia Airlines flight that had 239 passengers – of which it would be miraculous if any of them survived the disaster itself, let alone were still alive now.

The early speculation was that the airline pilots themselves may have somehow hijacked the flight – although no one ever carried that theory out to the point of trying to explain “Why?” they’d do that!

Which would make it hard to sue anybody. How many international terrorist organizations are public enough to have assets that could be seized as part of a lawsuit settlement?

That is why the legal types are telling the Reuters wire service that they’re trying to show that it was a mechanical defect that caused the airplane to disappear, then crash into the ocean.

A FIRE ON board the plane, or perhaps a loss of oxygen in the cockpit? Either of which would have the effect of causing the plane to fly out-of-control for awhile before finally crashing.

Because it could be believed that if the pilots had been fully aware and conscious, they would have tried to make an emergency landing somewhere – anywhere – on land. Instead of letting the flight fly out so far into the ocean that there was no chance of survival for the passengers.

The world has been focused on Malaysia in recent weeks to find out where the plane disappeared to. It’s going to wind up focusing on that rust-colored building near the Picasso statue to learn “Why?”

  -30-

11 or 12 inches? It’s just a sandwich

I once worked in a bookstore – one of those places that stocked nothing but remaindered books.

The newest hassle?

Which meant that everything was marked down significantly in price compared to what it cost when it was brand-new and had promise of significant sales. In fact, the store (which has long since shuttered) had a giant sign on the front window promising up to “70 percent” off the book price.

NOW TO SOMEONE who enjoys books and the process of scouring for them, the joy of such stores is that you might actually find an interesting volume amidst all the junk that nobody wants – priced for about $6, compared to the $25-30 that new books go for these days.

That’s not a bad bargain!

Yet there’s always someone who’s going to find something to complain about with regards to just about anything. And I still remember the one customer who came into the store with a couple of books that were marked down to about $4 each, then tried to argue that the “70 percent” discount ought to be on the $4 price – not on the original price of the book.

In short, someone who had a chance to buy something for $4 (plus tax) was complaining because he couldn’t get it for $1.20.

THAT’S JUST BEING cheap and petty. I still remember the hysterics he went into when I refused to buy into his tightwad line of logic.

And somehow, that same sentiment is popping into my head when I read the reports in recent days about people complaining that a Subway Sandwich foot-long isn’t really a foot-long.

It seems somebody actually felt the need to take the tape measure to the completed sandwich – and came up with an 11-inch measurement.

There is now even a lawsuit pending in the Cook County Circuit Court, and attorneys are trying to get as many people as possible to sign on to make it a class action suit – in which Subway would ultimately have to pay out some huge sum that would be split equally amongst the participants.

THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES reported that an attorney actually believes customers are owed a refund for the one inch of sandwich they did not receive.

So for the $5 foot-long sandwich that Subway sells, that comes to about 42 cents per inch.

It sounds more like a bad Saturday Night Live sketch – a Subway executive being forced to write out $0.42 checks to people to reimburse them for the inch of sandwich they did not receive.

Or $0.21 checks if all they had was a six-inch sandwich that was probably closer to 5-1/2 inches long.

I UNDERSTAND THE concept of “Truth in Advertising” as well as anyone else.

But this seriously strikes me as somebody being excessively petty in the way they approach life.

Besides, anybody who paid attention during school ought to know about certain levels of shrinkage – which is why that bag of potato chips often appears only three-quarters full when you first open it.

And why a loaf of freshly-baked bread is never going to come out to a precise length – which, it seems, is the line of logic that the company is trying to use to defend itself against this talk.

PERSONALLY, THERE ARE other places I would go to if I wanted a fresh deli sandwich with all the trimmings. I’m fortunate enough to live near a real nice Italian-themed grocery store where I could get a good Italian-style sub, or an Italian beef, sausage or meatball sandwich – if I so desire.

But I actually worked in a Subway Sandwich franchise back when I was in high school, and the product they put out is passable – a mass-produced sandwich made to order.

With relatively fresh bread; although I understand that most Subway franchises no longer have someone doing what I did some three decades ago – standing in a back room at the meat slicer turning logs of genoa salami or entire hams into perfectly-thin slices for someone’s edible edification.

Still, how much can one expect if the primary appeal of Subway is that they’re promising you a $5 price above all else?

  -30-