On the Liberal Front


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  • Sen. Mark Kirk SOLD! To The Highest Bidder: voted to let Big Oil keep taking our money

    Posted on May 21, 2011 10:25 pm by G Comment

    The following is from CREDO Action, and I urge you to take action:

    This past week, 48 Senators, including Sen. Mark Kirk, put Big Oil before the American people and helped defeat a bill that would have ended tax breaks for the five biggest oil companies.1

    How could anyone vote against a bill that would have kept $21 billion of American taxpayers’ money out of the pockets of cash-rich oil companies?

    One big reason is oil money in our political process. A lot of it. Oil and gas companies spent $39.5 million lobbying congress in just the first quarter of this year,2 and have donated tens of millions of dollars directly to the political campaigns of current Senators, including $199,200 to Sen. Mark Kirk.3

    Tell Sen. Mark Kirk: Stop putting oil company profits and campaign contributions ahead of the American people. Click here to automatically sign the petition.

    In all, three Democrats joined all but two Senate Republicans to protect Big Oil tax breaks that even a former Shell CEO said weren’t needed.4

    But make no mistake. Even though we didn’t get the 60 votes required for passage, our pressure to end oil subsidies is already working. More and more legislators are acting defensive about their support of Big Oil over the American people.

    In February, similar legislation to repeal some oil subsidies got only 44 votes. This time, we got 52 votes. That comes after CREDO Action members sent more than 225,000 petitions to the Senate and made more than 1,000 calls to 11 key Senators, six of whom flipped their position and voted to end tax breaks to Big Oil.

    Senate Majority leader Harry Reid said that despite this defeat, he will continue to push for ending oil subsides as part of negotiations on the budget and to raise the debt ceiling.5

    We need to keep the pressure on. And one key to breaking Big Oil’s grasp on our legislators is letting Congress know that we know about the millions of dollars that Big Oil has given them — including the $199,200 to Sen. Mark Kirk.

    Let’s make sure that voting to protect oil company profits doesn’t go unanswered by those of us who actually pay the price.

    Tell Sen. Mark Kirk: Stop putting oil company profits and campaign contributions ahead of the American people. Click here to automatically sign the petition.

    Thank you for taking action.

    Elijah Zarlin, Campaign Manager
    CREDO Action from Working Assets

    P.S. — Want to find out more about the Big Oil money going to our elected officials? Our friends at the Dirty Energy Money campaign have the scoop. Click here to see how much dirty energy money your Senators and other elected officials have taken.

    1. "Senate GOP Votes Down Bill To End Big Oil Subsidies," Huffington Post, May 17, 2011
    2. "Senators Opposing End of Oil Subsidies Received Five Times More in Big Oil Campaign Cash," Oil Change International, May 17, 2011
    3. Dirty Energy Money campaign data
    4. "Ex-Shell CEO Says Big Oil Can Live Without Subsidies ," National Journal, February 11, 2011

    Why, after all, should we continue to subsidize oil companies that are raking in record profits? And why, pray tell, would any United States senator, let alone one from the great state of Illinois, who claims to be fiscally prudent, stand up for Big Oil over the Illinois Tax Payers???

    This entry was posted in Congress, Conservatives, Economy, Environment, Ethics, Jobs. Bookmark the permalink.

  • NYTimes Explosive Report: Sam Zell’s Culture of Stupidity at the Tribune Company

    Posted on October 6, 2010 9:54 am by G Comment

    I heard Sam Zell speak a couple of years ago at the Inland Press Association’s Annual Meeting. He was funny. Seemed full of energy, off the cuff, eccentric.

    An article in today’s New York Times reveals so much more, reporting on the bizarre culture Zell and those he has brought in have created at the Chicago Tribune and elsewhere at the Tribune Company.

    Clearly, Zell is steering company into the ground.

    From the NYTimes:

    In January 2008, soon after the venerable Tribune Company was sold for $8.2 billion, Randy Michaels, a new top executive, ran into several other senior colleagues at the InterContinental Hotel next to the Tribune Tower in Chicago.

    Mr. Michaels, a former radio executive and disc jockey, had been handpicked by Sam Zell, a billionaire who was the new controlling shareholder, to run much of the media company’s vast collection of properties, including The Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Times, WGN America and The Chicago Cubs.

    After Mr. Michaels arrived, according to two people at the bar that night, he sat down and said, “watch this,” and offered the waitress $100 to show him her breasts. The group sat dumbfounded.

    “Here was this guy, who was responsible for all these people, getting drunk in front of senior people and saying this to a waitress who many of us knew,” said one of the Tribune executives present, who declined to be identified because he had left the company and did not want to be quoted criticizing a former employer. “I have never seen anything like it.”

    The report goes downhill from there, where sexual harassment is justified as path to creative thinking, with disclaimers like this in the Tribune’s revised employee handbook:

    “Working at Tribune means accepting that you might hear a word that you, personally, might not use,” the new handbook warned. “You might experience an attitude you don’t share. You might hear a joke that you don’t consider funny. That is because a loose, fun, nonlinear atmosphere is important to the creative process.” It then added, “This should be understood, should not be a surprise and not considered harassment.”

    My jaw dropped several times reading this article. So sad. I don’t see how the Tribune can be taken seriously any more.

    This entry was posted in Business, Chicago, Chicagoland, Cook County, Economy, Ethics, Illinois, Jobs, Legal, Strange. Bookmark the permalink.

  • Garrison Keillor Comes Out In Support of Tarryl Clark Over Michele Bachman

    Posted on September 30, 2010 7:07 pm by G Comment

    This is no surprise, but it is good news, and a very powerful endorsement from a great guy.

    From Garrison Keillor:

    Dear Friends,

    Thirty years ago, when I started telling stories about Lake Wobegon, I put it smack in the middle of Minnesota – in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District, in fact – where staunch Republicans and loyal Democrats know how to live together without yelling at each other and do what needs to be done to work out our problems.

    It’s embarrassing to me and a great many Minnesotans that Michele Bachmann, a politician who is so busy grandstanding and giving interviews on Fox News that she doesn’t have time to serve the people who elected her, represents the 6th District in Washington.

    That’s why I’m proudly supporting Tarryl Clark – and I hope you will join me by contributing before today’s midnight deadline.

    Minnesota’s 6th District has some of the highest foreclosure and unemployment rates in the state, but in an interview with the St. Cloud Times, Congresswoman Bachmann was unable to name any "substantive" legislation she had passed.

    Michele Bachmann may still be counting on sliding through to re-election on November 2nd, but this year she is running against a smart and hard-working State Senator, Tarryl Clark, who is determined to make the talking heads of Fox News sit up and take notice.

    Tarryl founded Central Minnesota Habitat for Humanity and served as youth minister of her church for nearly twenty years. She grew up in a Navy family and has worked on behalf of veterans, families and children in the legislature. Service to her community is a part of who she is, and that spirit of service is sorely needed in Washington these days.

    I hope you’ll join me in making a financial contribution to her campaign – $25, $50 or $100 – before midnight tonight!

    Tarryl Clark will never embarrass our state in Congress. Let’s restore some respect for the Minnesota tradition of working together sensibly by electing her this November.

    Thank you,

    Garrison Keillor

    P.S. Instead of working to solve problems, Bachmann talks about us as a "nation of slaves" and about the need for smaller government even though she knows better – the biggest part of big government is military spending, Social Security, and Medicare. Which would she do away with? Bachmann’s so-called policies are just the old Bush economics that Alan Greenspan characterized as "disastrous." Help Tarryl defeat her by donating today.

    This entry was posted in Congress, Conservatives, Economy, Elections, Jobs, Liberals, Republicans. Bookmark the permalink.

  • Holiday Star Theater Operator Duped Park Forest, Officials Say

    Posted on September 16, 2010 11:18 pm by G Comment

    More on the mess in Park Forest due to a lapse at Matanky Realty (why, exactly, did they not perform a credit check on this man????):

    A man who served 18 years in prison for fraud duped the village of Park Forest into letting him run The Holiday Star Theater by giving them a phony name, village officials said.

    Kenneth Arron, of Lombard, was charged Thursday with felony forgery and fraud. He had operated the theater under the name Kenneth Yochelson for six months, village officials said.

    Arron’s world allegedly unraveled during a traffic stop Monday morning. Police recognized him as the theater operator, but he “quickly admitted his legal name was not Kenny Yochelson,’’ village officials said in a written statement.

    Arron admitted he used the Yochelson name because he feared his criminal background would keep him from doing business in the area, officials said.

    Yoy.

    And Double-Yoy.

    As Pittsburgh’s Myron Cope would’ve said.

    This entry was posted in Chicagoland, Crime and Punishment, Jobs. Bookmark the permalink.

  • Park Forest Theater Operator Was No Harold Hill

    Posted on September 16, 2010 10:40 pm by G Comment

    Kenneth Arron
    Kenneth Arron addresses the Park Forest Village Board as “Kenny Yochelson.” (Photo: ENEWSPF)

    First, the sad news from ENEWSPF:

    In the 1957 musical The Music Man, Professor Harold Hill arrives by train in River City Iowa and begins to work his a scam convincing parents he can teach their children music. At the end of the comedy when Hill’s fraud is exposed, parents and the town forgive Hill when they hear their children attempt to play Beethoven’s Minuet in G.

    Officials in Park Forest are not laughing, however, at the fraud allegedly committed by Kenneth Arron, who represented himself to the community as Kenny Yochelson.

    According to a press release from the Village of Park Forest, criminal charges were filed today against the operator of Holiday Star Theater in Park Forest.

    Kenny Arron, who had presented himself as Kenny Yochelson since first approaching Park Forest officials in January about taking over the then?Eagle Theater, was arrested Monday, the release said.

    Park Forest is a town that has struggled to regain a local business foothold for years. At one time the “Centre” of businesses in the south suburbs, Park Forest watched as businesses left for Matteson, IL, and then migrated north of Interstate 80. Many businesses have returned to Matteson, due, in no small part to the work of Park Forest’s current Director of Economic Development and Planning Hildy Kingma, who Park Forest wooed from Matteson where she worked in a similar capacity. Kingma was largely responsible for populating the plaza at the northwest corner of Cicero and Rt. 30 (Panera Bread, Borders, etc.).

    However, current Matteson Village officials deserves credit too. Mayor Ashmore has worked hard to move Matteson from the red, and it looks like he will succeed. Matteson suffered much during the Great Bush Recession, drastically understimating the impact the Great Recession would have on its sales tax revenue.

    All of that having been said, back to our topic.

    Village Officials in Park Forest were “had” by a professional con-man. Kenneth Arron, a.k.a. “Kenny Yochelson,” represented himself as the answer to all of Park Forest’s woes. Declaring that Park Forest Village officials had their “heads up their ass,” Yochelson was actually contemplating a run for Village Trustee in Park Forest, according to a group on Facebook.

    The problem?

    ‘Kenny Yochelson‘ does not exist.

    His real name is Kenny Arron, and he is no Harold Hill.

    Professor Harold Hill eventually discovered his conscience.

    Kenneth Arron never did.

    How sad for this man. According to the press release from Park Forest, he has spent 18 years, most of his adult life, behind bars.

    How sad.

    Park Forest deserves better.

    I hope the Holiday Star Theater survives.

    Park Forest deserves better.

    This entry was posted in Chicagoland, Economy, Ethics, Illinois, Jobs. Bookmark the permalink.

  • Simply Put: Google Kicks Ass

    Posted on September 15, 2010 10:25 pm by G Comment

    I don’t know any other way to put it: No matter what they do, Google Kicks Ass.

    I just switched to GMail from Yahoo! Compared to Yahoo!, GMail is lightening fast, and Yahoo!, in comparison, looks like it was created by a bunch of Yahoos, right out of Gulliver’s Travels.

    Google Docs is awesome, and may, indeed, put Microsoft Office out of business some day.

    You can now make phone calls for free to anyone in the United States and Canada on Google (if you live in the USA or Canada). "Free" won’t last forever, but, for now, it’s nice.

    And Mom and Dad tell me the quality is better than calls from my cell phone.

    The Android operating system is awesome. I love the ability to use my phone for my calendar, then go to Google Calendar to add or delete things.

    I love Google.

    Everything they do on the Internet works.

    Wonderfully.

    This entry was posted in Business, Economy, Jobs. Bookmark the permalink.

  • Where Are The World’s Billionaires?

    Posted on September 12, 2010 11:09 pm by G Comment

    From VisualizingEconomics.com:

    Each circle represents a billionaire but when appropriate the company that they associated with is labeled. And of course United States leads the way with number of billionaires. I liked seeing the data presented on a map; having a geographic distribution shows off the number of non-US billionaires. It would have been nice to see their net worth included in the infographic.

    map of billionaires in world

    Personally, I am of the opinion that billionairs are bad for the economy. Global or local. Macro or micro.

    A cesspool of wealth sitting still does nothing.

    Bring back the 90% tax bracket. Please!

    This entry was posted in America, Economy, Jobs. Bookmark the permalink.

  • Motion Filed Accusing Todd Stroger of Political Hiring and Firing

    Posted on September 11, 2010 9:36 pm by G Comment

    For a while, I was actually feeling sorry for Todd Stroger. I was concerned he might lose his home, and, much as I disagree with the manner with which he has conducted himself while in office, those differences are political. Then he paid his taxes.

    Now, however, we hear disturbing allegations of political hiring and firing based on political considerations:

    An attorney who has battled political hiring and firing in government claims Cook County Board President Todd Stroger violated political hiring more than 150 times since the start of 2008.

    In a motion filed in U.S. District Court, Michael Shakman said the Stroger administration altered the list of jobs not covered by a ban on hiring and firing based on political considerations.

    Shakman alleges the Stroger administration has been hiring people and putting them in so-called exempt jobs, even though the positions do not appear on the court list.

    This entry was posted in Chicago, Chicagoland, Cook County, Jobs, Legal. Bookmark the permalink.

  • Will the Chicago Tribune Die in the Aftermath of the Bush Recession?

    Posted on August 20, 2010 11:43 pm by G Comment

    Okay, so take some points away from me for sensational headlines.

    But, still, the Chicago Tribune, the only newspaper I faithfully subscribed to at the University of Notre Dame in the 80s, remains in trouble.

    From the SUN-TIMES:

    The Tribune Co.’s plan to emerge from bankruptcy has unraveled in the wake of an independent report concluding that talks leading up to the company’s 2007 leveraged buyout bordered on fraud, attorneys said Friday.

    The report released last month by a court-appointed examiner forced Tribune and its creditors to rethink a settlement agreement that formed the basis of its reorganization plan.

    Under Tribune’s plan, JPMorgan Chase and distressed-debt specialist Angelo, Gordon & Co. would have been among the new owners of the company’s media properties, which include the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, other daily newspapers and 20 broadcast stations.

    But attorneys told Delaware bankruptcy judge Kevin Carey on Friday that JPMorgan and Angelo Gordon had dropped out of the agreement, and that talks on a consensual reorganization plan had broken down.

    "The debtor has tried mightily to bring the parties together," Tribune attorney James Conlan. "That has not happened."

    Conlan also confirmed that Tribune had not been party to separate negotiations among its creditors.

    The Tribune Co. sent a memo to employees saying the restructuring plan “is moving more slowly and has become noisier than we had hoped.” The memo, signed by Tribune Co. CEO Randy Michaels and Chief Operating Officer Gerry Spector, noted that all of the Tribune Co.’s media businesses are profitable, and that the company’s monthly operating report for July will show that its financial results are strong.

    The memo thanked employees for their creativity, innovation and dedication, and urged them not to get distracted.

    Look: I hope the paper survives. And I hope the news industry finally gets the guts to lock down its online content for subscribers only. Free online content is the killer, right now.

    I hated it when the Pittsburgh Press went under. I really did. Even though I delivered the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette from age 13 through the end of high school.

    Competition is good. Competition is healthy. And I don’t want to be left with just one news company for the Chicagoland area.

    But then, if they all go under, we’ll always have ENEWSPF.

    I’m just sayin’.

    This entry was posted in Chicago, Chicagoland, Economy, Jobs. Bookmark the permalink.

  • Yet Another Bush Recession Casualty: Restaurants

    Posted on August 20, 2010 11:02 pm by G Comment

    As the nation still struggles to emerge from the Bush Recession and avoid a double-dip, we discover yet another industry suffering: restaurants (…and why, by the way, are my conservative friends hoping for a double-dip, exactly? They’re not rich, and they’re likely to end up in tents with the rest of us if we do double-dip. Are they that eager to see Obama and America fail???)
    .

    From the Chicago Tribune:

    With consumers and businesses keeping a lid on expenses, more and more small and mid-size restaurants are throwing in their dish towels and closing up shop.

    Southern California lost nearly a thousand more restaurants than it gained during the 12 months that ended in March, representing a net 2% drop that was twice the national average, according to the New York research firm NPD Group.

    Nearly all the closings were among independently owned restaurants: small, family businesses that just couldn’t hold on as customers held back. Earlier in the year restaurants reported modest increases in business, but the jumps in sales were too little too late for many.

    "We were going in reverse," said Ken Rausch, who last month made the wrenching decision to close his family’s 65-year-old San Gabriel Valley restaurant, Edward’s Steakhouse. The restaurant had weathered previous recessions, but this downturn drained the family’s resources — and showed few signs of letting up, Rausch said.

    Other well-known haunts have also succumbed: Orso on 3rd Street near Robertson Boulevard, a trattoria popular with the entertainment crowd, closed last winter after a nearby movie studio laid off a big chunk of its employees; across the nation, Koo Koo Roo, Bennigan’s, Bakers Square, Tony Roma’s and other chains have shut dozens of locations.

    Even in good times, the restaurant business is a difficult one. Many close simply because they fall out of fashion or favor, and most run on slim margins. But this downturn seems especially brutal.

    We’ve lost a few in the south Chicagoland area, but many have survived, some developing creative ways to stay afloat. The Big Apple Pancake House in Chicago Heights opened its table tops to advertising.

    I know: we eat too much in Chicago already. Still, it’s good to know that many places here have survived.

    Still, nationwide, the trend is not good.

    I’ll be George W., King of the "have-mores," is eating well, though.

    This entry was posted in America, Chicago, Chicagoland, Economy, Jobs. Bookmark the permalink.



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