OK Dumbass

Language Warning

Knock it off already with the bullshit racist crap. This is exactly the sort of thing that drove the good sergeant who ran the previous secondcitycoppernetwork nuts. You want to start that crap, go get your own fucking blog and post your shit there. This is a public board and your half assed smears are painting the entire department with a pretty ugly brush. We have a hundred better things to do than police the comments for your garbage, so go crawl back under your rock, indulge in your self abuse fantasies with your blow up dolls, and stick your head back up your ass. This is a place for coppers to relax, exchange war stories, and bitch about the management. We ain't recruiting for the klan here.

Fair warning folks

Blogger provides us with tools to make it harder for people to post. We can (and will) add word verification to eliminate spam. We can also require everyone to register and ban anonymous posting completely, but that defeats the purpose of having an open board. And it also CREATES A TRACEABLE LIST that can be subpoenaed by a court. See that little "SiteMeter" button at the very bottom of the page? If you don't think your IP address is traceable, you are smoking crack. You have been warned.

Again, with the Quick Hits

As we look at the devastation in New Orleans, stories you might have missed:

• 1,000 casualties in a bridge disaster in Iraq. Over 600 dead when someone shouted "suicide bomber" on a crowded span.
• You still think Europe has the right economic ideas that we ought to copy here? Only if you want to DOUBLE the unemployment rates.
  
• PowerLineBlog takes the ny times to task for its "gloom, doom, we're all gonna die poor and broke" article about the alleged "rise" in the poverty numbers. As usual, the ny times is full of shit.
• Com-Ed looks to raise rates again. Someone stop these people. Please.
  
• Despite her claims that this was a politically motivated prosecution, congressweasel jan schakowski's husband, pleads guilty to bank fraud and tax evasion. Apologies forthcoming jan? Didn't think so. Being a democrat means never having to defend slander or libel.

Daley apologizes

In today's sun-times, Frank and Fran avoid tipping over the apple cart and allow Lisa Donovan to write the story of Daley apologizing for the corruption that has been taking place on his watch.

Fine. Apology accepted. Now resign. Soon.

The rumors we are hearing about the mayor not finishing his term just keep growing louder and louder. Remember a few days ago, the mayor going to the US Attorney's office to answer questions and bringing one of clinton's high powered criminal defense attorneys along? Does anyone recall why the feds call you down for "interviews?" The only reason they call you in is to nail down your side of the story. Firmly. They know something that you don't think they know and if your attorney is halfway intelligent, he or she might figure out what it is the Feds know by listening to their questions. But they want you committed a story.

Quick legal tip boys and girls: the Feds NEVER ask you a question that THEY don't already know the answer to. EVER. We recall the story of a copper who was visited at home by a couple of feds one evening. They wanted to ask him a lot of questions without his lawyer around. The copper went into his closet, pulled out a hand towel and stuffed it into his mouth. Then he annoyed the feds by writing "I can't talk. I have a towel in my mouth" on a piece of paper and showing it to them for the duration of the interview every time they asked a question. They left and he never heard from them again. Never went to jail either.

Here endeth the lesson

Police Layoffs in Detroit

Ask and you shall receive. We were unaware of this story until a reader pointed it out in the comments section. Seems Detroit is going to merge it's 12 precincts into 6 districts, downsize command staff by 40 spots, combine or eliminate redundant job positions, all of which will lead to 100 more officers on the street while eliminating 150 spots.

This is VERY interesting on many levels, especially in a bureaucratically bloated department like ours. It has been suggested that 25 districts is about 3 to 5 districts too many, especially in light of the improved technology and shifting demographics over the years. This city hasn't had a district remapping since the Summerdale scandal. It's long overdue. The trouble is that this city isn't going to eliminate 5 complete command spots, command staffs, equipment draws and housemouse positions just to save taxpayer money. Or would they?

The city has either built, are building or have on the drawing board 19 new district stations. 19 is awfully close to 20. Manpower is down to 9,700 (title code 9161). Could the city be preparing behind the scenes for a wholesale district realignment down to 20 districts? No layoffs would be involved as we are already short a couple districts worth of officers and they could always stop hiring to let attrition cut the numbers.

Quick survey! What 3 to 5 districts would you eliminate for realignment tomorrow? We shall begin: 013, 021, 023

Just when you think ...

... that the left can't get any nuttier, Robert F. Kennedy Jr comes out with this article blaming Bush for Hurricane Katrina! Seriously! We were just teasing when we said the left was going to dream up some way to blame Bush/Cheney/Rice/Rove and the Republicans for this hurricane, AND KENNEDY GOES AND DOES IT!

We tell you, if Rove really is behind this all, he is a freaking genius. Here we have hundreds of thousands of people fighting for their very survival, no power, no water, looting, dead bodies floating in the streets, countless missings and god knows how many people unable to reach out and contact their loved ones ... AND THE LEFT BLAMES BUSH FOR A HURRICANE!! Once again proving that the only good kennedy is a Dead Kennedy (love that band!)

We have always heard good things about New Orleans. Yes, there are parts that were sh#$holes, but as long as you stayed in the touristy parts, life was grand. We know many coppers who went there and told tales of the N.O.P.D. welcoming C.P.D. with open arms. If we aren't mistaken, Louisiana was one of the few states we could carry guns in before the National Concealed Carry Law was passed. Even if it wasn't, N.O.P.D. loved having Chicago guys down in the French Quarter and bought them drinks all night. Maybe it was the common culture of political corruption that pervades both cities? Hopefully, those days are not too far gone and New Orleans will rise again from the bayou.

UPDATE: A second levee has collapsed and it looks like the governor has ordered a complete evacuation of New Orleans. Have you ever wondered what a complete dissolution of society might look like? Here it is in miniature.

Recruits began Monday

100 recruits embarked on a journey yesterday morning. Hopefully, by the time they hit the streets, they won't be so indoctrinated that we can't beat it out of them so they can become bitter, cranky human beings like coppers we know the world over. Hahahahaha.

Seriously, it's good that they're supposedly going to push through a couple classes of 100 before the end to the year, but this isn't even going to keep up with this years retirements. Manpower is stretched thin. We need a hiring wave like 1995 or 1989 where they had about 1,200 people at once rolling through. It would definitely get us a better furlough, that's for sure.

The rain may have stopped, but a 200 foot break in the 17th St. Levee is flooding New Orleans. This isn't over by a long shot. 80% of the city is experiencing flooding, some of it 20 or more feet deep. The National Guard is on hand to deter looting, but sporadic reports are trickling in. Read any of the links on the right hand side of the page - all have many more story links than we could ever hope to gather.

It's just like "The Fugitive!" (sort of)

If all criminals were like this, maybe we could ALL be heroes.

Sharpton the victim of Profiling

"Velocity Profiling" that is. Read this humorous post from "Scrappleface"

From the article: "The Rev. Al Sharpton, whose chauffeur today led police on a nine-mile chase at speeds up to 110 m.p.h., lashed out at the Texas sheriff's deputy who arrested his driver and impounded his rental car, accusing the officer of "velocity profiling." "He wasn't pulling over every car on the Interstate," said Mr. Sharpton,"

Go read it all, for it is funny.

Lack of posts - how about some numbers?

We were overly busy today, lots to do away from the blog (no, we weren't out golfing, we were actually working). We were VERY happy to see over 110 comments on the "Good Boss" thread, even if some were about the not so good bosses. Thanks for the participation. By our calculations, "Bush Boy" has about 5 days or so until we hit 15,000 visitors and then "leftisthebest" can come over and see what a styling studio apartment he has.

We had an acquaintance of ours run the title code 9161 last week. Since they can track everything you do on the computers now days, we like to "parcel out" tasks and then talk about them a bit later to keep everyone safe. According to the data, there are 9,740 patrol officers out there. We are told that there are a few in there without star numbers, which means they might be recruits or POW's. Can anyone verify if this is short? We seem to recall there being well over 10,500 at one point in the last decade, maybe even 11,500. Anyone got the budget numbers for authorized strength?

If the city budgets money for 11,500, but there are only 9,740 active, where is that money? Is it stuck back into the general fund? Is it spend on polishing the "Bean?" Is it used to hire trucks? Enquiring minds WANT to know! Hey Fran? Frank? Could you let Warmbir and Novak know we might need some real reporters to look into this? Thanks.

New Orleans, LA & Mobile, AL

Just catching up on the Hurricane Katrina news on The Weather Channel and FOXNews. If this storm holds together as it comes ashore, the Big Easy is going to get hammered badly. For those unfamiliar with New Orleans, most of the city is actually 12 feet below sea level and relies on levees and pumps to keep dry. The storm surge alone is projected to be 20 to 30 feet high which, while going over the sea walls, might completely destroy them. They're currently talking about 100,000 people unable to evacuate. The human cost and property destruction could be horrendous. Some people are predicting hundreds dead like Camille did in 1969 (225 dead, 8,900 injured, 75 missing - presumed dead). And that's not all.

Look for gas to jump another 10-20 cents a gallon, maybe 50 cents or more if New Orleans and nearby Port Fourchon get hit. According to this article at HogOnIce, 75% of the drilling in the Gulf of Mexico (600+ platforms) is within 40 miles of Port Fourchon, an island supplied by a single two lane bridge. Port Fourchon offloads 18% of domestic oil production and 13% of foreign imports, meaning ANY interruption of service is going to be felt immediately at the pump. Along with the 7 refineries shut down in the Gulf until Katrina disappears, $4 a gallon looks likely very shortly.

Everyone better go buy a Honda and ditch the SUVs for a bit.

UPDATE: Make sure your pop-up blocker is active before visiting "The Drudge Report." He has links to alot of coverage and is reporting 65 foot waves in the open waters of the Gulf.

Quick Hits Road Trip!

For Sunday:

• We're looking for anyone interested in a quick trip to New Orleans. Meet in front of our house by 1400 hours and we'll see if we can't get there in about 12 hours to watch Katrina come ashore. It's gonna be a bad one people. We hear that "leftisthebest" thinks this is another plot by Karl Rove to distract from the war.
• "Look! Fran actually writes about scandal!" should be this headline. Of course, Fran takes great pains to point out its all the fault of the former Inspector General Vroustouris, not the corrupt political culture that infects everything this city does.
• Meanwhile, back in the real reporting world, the Federal corruption squad here is now the biggest in the nation. We're number 1! We're number 1! We're number 1! Hooray!
• And short coverage of the Memorial Fund Raising Event last night.
  

A poor use of manpower

Rumors abound of a good sized sergeants class in September/October, maybe 80 to 120 total. As we pointed out in a previous post, the department is starting to notice that it is shorthanded. The obvious solution? Hire more people. But even if they were hired tomorrow, it's 6 months before they can alleviate any shortages. This is just poor planning.

Here's another poor plan: the class of sergeants will leave the districts (on average) another 2 people short along with the Units. But they'll be on the street supervising shortly, right? Wrong. Continuing one of the more poorly thought out ideas, the sergeants to be will be in class for a few weeks, then assigned to the D units for 90 days of training. Training for what we ask? We can't get good answers on that count. We've asked guys who have gone through it: they called it a waste of time. We've asked detectives what they thought of it: they said most of the guys aren't ever coming back to a "D" unit, so its a waste of their time babysitting. We've asked a couple of LTs in the "D" units what they thought of it: they said it was horrible, that they could teach these guys in 3 weeks TOPS, that ride-alongs got boring after 4 weeks. So why keep doing it? We can't get an answer on this either. But it means you're going to have a boatload of guys, sitting in a "D" unit, when they could be out on the street getting a little seasoning before the next wave of recruits hits the street.

Here is our proposed training schedule: (1) Don't touch the gun. (2) Secure the scene and the witnesses. (3) Call the dicks. If you can't grasp these concepts in a week or two, god help this department.

The best boss I ever knew

We've seen a couple comments floating around in the other posts about bosses who were just absolute princes to work for. We won't bore you, or identify ourselves, by naming names of some of the bosses we worked for, although we might toss a few in the comments section anonymously, but who are some of the best of the best you've worked for? Remember the statute of limitations if you decide to relate war stories, although stories about bosses who have passed on to their heavenly reward are fair game.

NOTE: This thread is for GOOD bosses. We'll cover the dogs later.

Another good shoot

025 District guy kills a brawler off duty after getting hit with a club of some sort. Good job buddy.

Open thread to start the weekend

If you aren't watching the National Geographic channel right now, do so. It's 276 on DirectTV. The special on the 9/11 attacks is one of the most superbly done pieces of investigating reporting done in the 4 years since that awful day.

Otherwise, treat this thread as open commentary.

The beginning of the end?

Breaking news from Channel 9 and the Tribune. Daley questioned for two hours by the US Attorney's Office with both Mara Georges and his own personal attorney. What might they have been talking about?

UPDATE: sun-times article; tribune article.

Manpower shortages & Short sighted Thinking

If Frank "how high mayor?" Main and Fran "hired what?" Spielman want a free story, read this. If they can't do the heavy lifting, maybe Warmbir and Novak can get another Pulitzer out of this. Let them know about it, Frank, ok?

Manpower shortages appear to be becoming acute. Time off is denied regularly, even in Units; furlough extensions are again being held to the absolute minimums; one man cars (once only on the day watch) are being seen increasingly on midnights and even third watch rapids in some districts; rumors of ghost cars (on the sheets, but actually at details) abound; and they're stripping at least one car per district in the "lower crime" areas to send them west and south.

What does it all mean? Aside from the dangerous practice of sending coppers to areas/districts they aren't familiar with, it is contributing to rising rates of property and violent crime in formerly "safe" districts. Let's face it: criminals aren't stupid (well, not always.) The way to not get caught is to go where the cops aren't. And why aren't the cops there? Because there aren't enough of them. And the ones that are, are stretched thin, thinner than they have been in years. There hasn't been a new class going into the academy in about 6 months (next one starts 29 August) and the classes that just graduated were what? 40 or 50 people? Sergeants, already short of strength, have been shortened by another 46, and now they're sending sergeants to other districts to alleviate shortages. The only thing we don't seem to be short of is bosses (LTs and up).

Frank Main wonders why attacks on coppers are up? Because the assholes KNOW there aren't as many cops out there. They see the one man cars. They know that back up is minutes or miles away. They know their chances are better one-on-one to avoid jail than if two or three cars are nearby. Comments?

No honest judges

Once again, proving the saying that "there are no honest judges in Cook County, just lesser degrees of dishonesty," a cook county judge gave the sons of the current cook county medical examiner court supervision and a $1,000 fine for a bar fight in 2004 on the north side during which a battery was committed against an officer. Judges Crooks (HA!) is quoted as:

• "You came very close to torpedoing your careers," Crooks told the young men as they stood in court. "Do you understand?"

Yes, judge crooks, WE understand perfectly. With a criminal conviction the boys couldn't have followed in the grand county tradition of patronage hiring. Remember that boys and girls when you run across some lawyers named donaghue in the next few years.

• "You'd do well to apologize to your parents," Crooks said. "Your father is one of the most respected medical examiners in this country, and I know he and your mother raised you better than that."

Maybe the judge ought to list another person to apologize to: Like the POLICE OFFICER that the battery was committed against because the donoghue boys can't handle their liquor? Hey Frank? Investigate this one, please? It would tie into your recent article so well about how the number of batteries against police officers are climbing.

Another political favor?

We love conspiracies. Conspiracies make the world go round. How about this one: Fran "my, you look handsome today, mayor" Spielman writes today about rahm emanuel attempting to raise the "political capital" of the embattled mayor. Why would rahm do that? Rahm spent a lot of time raising money for daley back in the day, then went to work for the clinton white house in the 90's, where he was also a successful fund raiser and leading strategist, then returned as head of the CHA before running for Blago's open house seat when Blago was governor. If we recall correctly, clinton campaigned here for him and daley actually endorsed him. We can count on one hand the number of times the mayor actually came out and endorsed what has usually been a "safe" democratic seat. So is rahm merely paying back a political favor by backing the mayor at this crucial junction? Throughout his career, rahm has only backed winners - he's no dummy. Losers can't do you favors. Barak Obama, whom the mayor pointedly didn't endorse, won't commit to the mayor either way. But rahm did. And rahm worked for the clintons. And the clintons campaigned for him. And there might be a clinton running again who needs a strong hand at the helm of the Illinois party to ensure that Illinois votes go to the right democrat. Hmmm.

THAT is why we like conspiracies. So much fodder to speculate on.

PO Battery Article in the Times

According to Frank "there's a racial profiling angle here somewhere" Main's most recent article, batteries on the police are up 32% and citizen complaints of excessive force are down 26%. He then writes:

• From the numbers, it might appear cops are facing skyrocketing levels of violence and fewer citizens feel they're being mistreated by the police. But those statistics could be skewed by changes in how officers' reports and citizens' complaints are taken, Bayless said.

Maybe, just maybe, the department is finally getting an ACCURATE picture of what has been going on for years? We won't insult our readers by asking for their own recollections of batteries committed upon them that were then turned down for charges by shaky bosses and even shakier assistant state's attorneys, but we've been involved in several. In fact, up until the advent of the TRR, if you weren't bleeding or broken or had "E.T. Friendly" visible injuries, you couldn't get a Officer's Battery Report.

Frank obviously got a hold of an "Officer Battery Annual Report - 2004" put out by R&D. So did we. It's a glossy little 12 page publication breaking down stats about 50 different ways. The four beats with NO batteries in 2004 are 0923, 1031, 1232, and 1621. The top beats for batteries (all with 26 or more attacks per year) are 0134, 0321, 0531, 0623, 0624, 0713, 0723, 0823, 1112, 1134, 1524, and 1824. It's broken down by age, sex, race, location, injury, day of week, time of day, etc, etc, etc, but all ol' Frank can quote out of it is the strange jump in batteries on POs while batteries on citizens decrease. Do you think he's carrying water for the mayor again? Maybe? When in doubt, slime the police.

If this isn't copywritten material, we will look into scanning and publishing it.

A short Quick Hits (yes, again)

Focusing on the National and International scene in recent days:

• Some wise ass professors have proposed re-populating America with large predators. It's called Pleistocene Re-Wilding, but the way we see it, nature is already reintroducing large predators as evidenced by the number of wolf sightings and bear and mountain lion attacks. Mountain lions are stalking joggers in Colorado and have killed at least one high school athlete, which reminds us why we wiped them out in the first place: without guns, we're merely nice, big, soft appetizers. Three suggestions: (1) start the program along the southern border to reduce illegal immigration. (2) expand the program on college campuses to reduce tenured professor spots. (3) Everyone gets a gun. (hat tips to Rightwingnews and Ann Althouse)
• Once again, Canada is on the verge of a constitutional crisis and we for one would like to point out that this country cannot stand idly by while civil war breaks out along the largest undefended border in the world. As Canada has the largest proven oil reserves following Saudi Arabia (200+ billion barrels in the tar sands of Alberta) we propose an immediate invasion. It could probably be accomplished by Chicago Police working their regular days off if they don't get distracted by the musky fishing. (Hat tip to Captain's Quarters)

That boy just ain't right

Apparently unsatisfied with breathing the warm, dry desert air, the Iraqi dictator formerly known as Saddam has begun to grease the skids of his own hanging. Bravo for a man who knows what he wants and isn't afraid to go after it with gusto. We just hope that they tape the whole thing because it would definitely go platinum in short order.

Hired Truck Getting New Legs?

Feds are squeezing "Quarters" Boyle to see what pops out. Since he's already looking at 7 years Fed time, maybe cooperation won't look so bad. How long until a certain exempt's name appears in this investigation?

Meeks' story falling apart

Meeks' driver admits the rev ordered him around a squad car that was paused at the stop sign and "said it appeared that the sergeant had stopped to check a street address." So if the sergeant suddenly got out of his car, he would have been run over by the rev because the rev is an important politician who had things to do, places to go, people to see and couldn't wait for sarge to move out of the way? Guilty as charged (click this link for the story).

It was pointed out to us that there actually WAS racial profiling going on in this instance. But it was by Meeks, not by the sergeant. Meeks expected that since he is a quasi famous, semi recognizable BLACK state senator/preacher that a WHITE police sergeant was going to let him off with a warning. And maybe that would have happened if Meeks had staying in the car and just mentioned to the sergeant that he was off to some political or god-squad emergency. Hell, the sergeant might have given him a quick escort there. But we'll never know. And now it's a tempest in a tea pot and no one is going to win.

Hey Frank? Fran? Any chance of you writing about THAT?

Police shooting

39th and Giles. Looks like an off duty copper in barber shop lit up a stick up man. Details still trickling in.

UPDATE: Bad guy wounded. Seems the copper was getting a haircut and goof tried to stick up the joint. Copper identified himself and drilled the asshole. Copper and everyone else OK. Sounds like a good shoot all around.

UPDATE II: Here is the Tribune story. Frank and Fran are still trying to work in some racial profiling angle for tomorrow's slum-times.

UPDATE III: Guess Frank and Fran couldn't find the racial profiling angle. They passed it to Sweeney.

C'mon, more info please

We're still trying to paint an accurate picture of what the D2A results look like. We've had almost 30 people post their scores and rank (rounded to the nearest 10 to protect anonymity). We are missing one crucial element though; the people who just out and out bombed this test.

To really get an accurate snapshot, we need almost 100 scores and we need some of the people who tanked (and tanked hard) to 'fess up to a few. C'mon, it's an anonymous board. Post it. It might even be lighten your soul. We skipped the test ourselves or we would have posted our score, but we'll tell you how we did on the last test: We were over 1,100 out on that one and we studied our asses off. We sucked. We were demoralized. We went on a three day bender. And then we blamed it all on the city testing process because we KNOW how smart we are. So let's see some more participation out there! We need your score and rank, no matter what it is. Remember, even Jamaica entered a team in the Olympic Bobsledding competition. Thanks.

Recalling the reason

You know, we had almost forgotten why we started this blog. We wanted to rant and rave and help to advance the BushCheneyHalliburtonWarforOilNeocon Conspiracy. Rush Limbaugh has ordered us to relate the following:

Chuck Hagel (rino-Nebraska) is either an ass or is facing re-election in 2006. He certainly isn't a Republican. To bring up the specter of “Vietnam merely echoes the defeatist logic of the democratic party. We have freed 50 million people from two violent dictatorial regimes and set them on the road to democracy; pressure in Lebanon resulted in a Syrian withdrawal after 15 years of occupation; Egypt is set to hold elections for the first time since Sadat was assassinated; and if Iran wasn't killing students every weekend following soccer matches, the entire "mullahocracy" would collapse in a popular uprising never before imagined. To undercut Bush's policy in a bout of nervousness following B.S. poll numbers shows Hagel to be a political coward in the face of his Purple Hearts earned in Vietnam.

How do you rig poll numbers? Check the internals. The media runs with surveys that show something like 49% of the surveyed persons identify themselves as democrats and 35 % as republicans while the actual numbers of registered voters show that 39% of voters identify themselves as democrats while 36% as republican. Should the media ever conduct a legit poll with numbers that reflect the voting population, support for the war (while far from strong) would at least be rock steady.

Sgt. Innocent of Racial Profiling Meeks Says!

Clear this Sergeant already. According to reports on Channel 5 -

• "The next reason I got out is because I have one of the most identifiable faces in Roseland," Meek said. "Since I instructed the driver to go around the police car and we were stopped, I felt it was my responsibility to get out and start a dialogue."

Identifiable to whom? As far as we can tell, this sergeant doesn't live in Roseland, doesn't worship in Roseland and probably doesn't vote in Roseland. Maybe the sergeant doesn't even own a television. Why would he recognize reverend meeks in a routine traffic stop? Does this seem overly pompous to anyone but us?

And he (meeks) "instructed the driver to go around the police car" which everyone agrees was stopped at the intersection. Excuse me? THIS ISN'T RACIAL PROFILING!! The reverend has just admitted that he instructed his driver to BREAK THE GODDAMNED LAW! Game Over! Maybe the sergeant saw a dope deal going down. Maybe the sergeant saw some drag racers flying down the street at high speed. Maybe the sergeant saw a little old lady crossing the street and gave her some time to get across. Regardless, just because you are a quasi-famous, semi-recognizable state senator/preacher DOESN'T MEAN YOU GET TO DISREGARD TRAFFIC LAW!

The simple fact that meeks is calling in political favors and having TV and radio stations cover his nonsensical ranting and has a tame first deputy to push around tells us that he is losing this battle. Of course, the mayor could still push the "dump" button on this sergeant and shaft him big time, but if you go to the channel 5 news site, there is a survey there and it's running 70% to 30% IN FAVOR OF THE POLICE. Be sure you go there and vote. SOON. NOW!!!!!!

UPDATE: Hey Frank and Fran? Why not write a story about the reverend admitting his "racial profiling" was a big publicity stunt? You two pinheads sure fell for it big time.

Burning up Freebies

OK, we don’t want to be ungrateful wretches. Police officers nationwide are underpaid, overworked and underappreciated. So be it. HOWEVER, we aren’t really sure that the Chicago Police Memorial Foundation should be strong arming businesses for contributions to the Gold Star Memorial Park (read this link).

Now don’t fly off the handle and say “Hey F#$% you SCC! Coppers should take what they can while they can and it’s about damn time the business community gave something to the cops.” The only reason we bring it up is a story we heard the other day. Someone was trying to set up a fund raiser. It might have been for a sick kid, a deceased PO’s family, a lost spouse, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that they went to a local business looking for a contribution to defer the cost of this fund raiser and the business owner told them, “I gave to the Memorial Foundation.”

Sure it’s good that the business contributed. But it seems lately that the bosses are really pushing HARD, for more money for the Memorial Foundation, both by payroll deduction AND selling knickknacks (T-shirts, pins, gold ball markers, stickers, etc.) In typical copper fashion, they’re burning up the places that treat us well. Do we need a Memorial Park to honor the fallen? Damn right we do. But what about those living among us who need a helping hand? The guy fighting cancer? The kid with medical costs above and beyond what insurance will pay? If the Memorial Foundation uses or kills off formerly generous donors, who do we turn to then?

USMC joke

A Marine squad was marching north of Basra when they came upon an insurgent Iraqi soldier badly injured and unconscious. Nearby, on the opposite side of the road, was an American Marine in a similar but less serious state. The Marine was conscious and alert and as first aid was given to both men, the Marine was asked what had happened.

The Marine reported, “I was heavily armed and moving north along the highway here and coming south was a heavily armed insurgent. Seeing each other we both took cover in the ditches alongside the road. I yelled to him, ‘Saddam Hussein is a miserable low-life scumbag’, and he yelled back that ‘Teddy Kennedy is a fat, rich, good-for-nothing drunkard’.

We were standing there shaking hands when a truck hit us.

Suburban Car Chase

Channel 2, Channel 5, Channel 7, Channel 9 (Tribune) coverage of the incident.

Channel 7 actually had footage of a woman commenting along the lines of "I thought police chases were illegal in Illinois." We know they AREN'T illegal, but rather, made onerous by many department policies. We surprised that everyone who sees blue lights in the rearview mirror doesn't flee at the drop of a hat. Does anyone think that public awareness of what we AREN'T allowed to do might provoke a backlash against politicians stopping us from doing our jobs? We're just curious.

Speaking of curious, be sure to read all the weekend posting. We are looking for more D2A results in order to create a graph of what the test results look like.

D2A Results and an Appeal for Info

Back in the post entitled "This was a test?" on 14 August, a reader asked for people to post their scores along with their rank on the list anonymously. About 3 people did - way to participate! Anyway, we've tracked down a couple of other scores and we'd like to let everyone look at them and draw some conclusions. We are going to round off the scores so we aren't pointing too obviously at the people who participated. Here we go:

Score/rank
154/50 ish
149/140 ish
146/190 ish
143/490 ish
140/790 ish
138/1470 ish

As you all should know, the city uses seniority as the tie breaker for tests like these. There is no way for us to know where the participants fall on the seniority roster, but a few things do stand out here. First, the top given score 154 out of a possible 175 and ranked 50 (actually under 50 but we rounded everything to the nearest ten) compared to the second given score. There are only 5 points score difference and 70 or so rank spots. Compare that to the bottom two scores given - only a 2 points difference but almost 700 rank spots. We really need a bunch more scores to paint an accurate picture but this seems a bit extreme. If the ratios of rank to score maintain anything like what is seen here, the numbers will not line up into what is known as a "bell curve" which just lends credence to the theory that all city tests are B.S. Of course, test results are guarded closer than nuclear secrets in this town, so there really isn't any way to tell what the results might actually look like.

We'd hope that one day the city, the test company and the FOP could come to some form of agreement to post all the result similar to what NYC does but we've a better chance of seeing a World Series, a Superbowl and a Stanley Cup Final in town than seeing that. So, in conclusion, if a bunch more people wouldn't mind posting their score and their rank (round off to the nearest 10 for rank if you're nervous) we'll see if we can't set up some kind of graphic.

Open thread for Late Saturday/Early Sunday

We're going to be taking a little break from blogging Sunday. We shall return in the evening unless something big breaks. Use this open thread for comments and suggestions. Be sure to check out the "D2A" thread above and participate in our survey.

Wait for it ... wait for it ... 10,000!

Hooray! We hit 10,000 visitors today! In just a little under 3 months of actual publishing, we are averaging just under 400 hits and over 2,000 page views a day. We've got something in the works that we hope may push us well into the 1,000's range, but it's taking a little while. Hopefully, this will become THE information exchange clearinghouse we envision it to be, especially if we can keep it going through the next elections (local, state, national and FOP).

Oh, and because we like to needle him/her so often, we'll name "leftisthebest" as our honorary 10,000th visitor. Free lifetime subscription for him/her. Congrats.

Fair and ... Biased?

Headline on the left hand cover of the Slum-Times this morning:
"Cop probe backs Meeks claim"

Headline of the actual story on page 3 (read the linked story):
"Probe may back Meeks' claim"

Subtle differences, but differences none the less. One says that the investigation is complete and meeks' word is being taken. One implies that there may be wiggle room.

In any case, it's ridiculous that the Superintendent is commenting on an ongoing investigation, especially taking sides with a complainant over his supervisors. Hasn't anyone ever seen lawyers always declining to comment on ongoing investigations? It prejudices the outcome. Of course, if you are already TOLD what the outcome must be, then we guess it doesn't matter. But should this end up in an actual courtroom instead of the chain of command, the city taxpayers (of which WE are one) are on the hook for any damages.

The fact that yesterday an anonymous exempt leaked information that the sergeant appears to have done nothing wrong compared with today's story that the superintendent is backing meeks' claim over his own supervisor hints at a huge rift developing between HQ and actual street officers. If you can't count on downtown to back you, or at least not actively hurt you, we're about to have some serious morale and confidence issues here. That elevator ride to the bottom we spoke of earlier this week? Looks like we're at the bottom and downtown is starting to dig.

UPDATE: Did you notice that no one mentioned "racial profiling" at all in today's story? That's because Frank and Fran didn't write this one. Big surprise there ... NOT!

UPDATE II: We concede to "paladin" in the comments section that the rift isn't developing. It's been there for years and it's just getting wider. As more and more political animals ascend to command rank, the ties between them and the street coppers get more and more tenuous. It's a shame, really, but not unexpected.

Quick hits to impress your friends

People and police allegedly acting the fool:

• Minister at meeks' church charged with possession of 7.3 grams of cocaine in Harvey. Surprisingly, meeks was unavailable for comment on this story. He must have been trying to figure out how to spin this into another profiling case, except the Harvey cops were probably black.
• Two more charged in "Hired Truck." Novak and Warmbir continue to show Frank and Fran what investigative reporting is all about as the number of indictments reaches thirty two. The two new indictments appear AGAIN to be mob related as both seem to have close association with bookmaking and point shaving figures. Wow, the mob and Chicago politics. Who'd have thunk it?
• Another cop in trouble. Dude, if you need to use your badge to see a naked woman, head to Dugan's on the weekend. Lots of star chasers there and it'll only cost you a few drinks, not your job.
• A good shooting down south side way. If it was easy enough for this goof to get two guns, he probably should have left them behind at the scene and gotten two more later. He'd have run a bit faster and might not be in the hospital.
• If you live in 016, there's at least one pervert running around grabbing and flashing girls. Let's hope he doesn't get grabbed in a Target or JC Penney store by a really irate father who happens to be CPD. The brass will serve him up on a platter for sticking up for his girls.

Be sure to check back this evening. We're still working on a little essay about the dick's test.

Lt. List update

Someone asked about the list changing. We updated the original entry to reflect the change. Here it is:

Robert KONRATH is staying at Forensics - Unit 177
Thomas CZARNECKI will be taking his place - Unit 025

Someone call Czarnecki and let him know he has achieved internet immortality here on the blog. Congratulations!

The story changes AGAIN!

Wow. We just posted earlier today about how the rush to prejudge is constantly screwing up and hampering investigations and putting reputations out on limbs, when we get a slum-times and we open it up and find this story. Meeks is saying that his bodyguards weren't out of their car and weren't even on the scene until 5 minutes later after he radioed for them.

We won't even touch the one about why "bodyguards" were five minutes away from their primary assignment, but doesn't this PERFECTLY illustrate our point about prejudging an incident before an investigation has been completed? PERFECTLY? If Frank and Fran are to be believed (which they shouldn't be as they carry water for the city administration on a daily basis), someone is changing their story. Seeing as how the sergeant remains on duty and not stripped, we tend to think it's the good reverend trying to protect his off duty guys who, as we stated a month ago, SHOULD HAVE KNOWN BETTER THAN TO APPROACH A TRAFFIC STOP FROM BEHIND THE SERGEANT! Someone needs to investigate where these bodyguards were, when they were there and what the hell they did. Because it seems obvious it's their fault, more than anyone else's, that the sergeant is in hot water. What's really sad is they try to teach you the proper way to do police work in the academy, then hang you out to dry because they didn't teach you about the political considerations and the fact that there are "untouchable" people who think they're better than anyone else because they have the word "reverend" or "representative" in front of their names.

And thanks again to Frank and Fran for quoting the mayor saying "Racial profiling is unacceptable in any part of this country." You just had to throw that one out there to keep smearing the Department as a bunch of racists. Can someone point out to these two ignorant pinheads that there is, as yet, NO indication that racial profiling played any part in this traffic stop? Oh wait, we just did.

Rushing to prejudge

Well, according to our readers/reporters Fran and Frank, the police brass and city hall are facing a "dilemma" following their rush to judgment in the reverend meeks case. Fueled by the reporting of that very same Frank and Fran, the mayor pulled out all the stops, promising justice to be done, sending his superintendent to church to make nice with meeks, having his aldercreatures and state representatives propose all sorts of rules and regulations to further intimidate the department from doing police work. Now comes word that the sergeant may have done nothing wrong.

Oops.

Instead of shutting up and allowing a legitimate investigation to take place, the powers that be have gone all the way out on a very shaky limb and it's beginning to crack. By allowing certain parties to casually make repeated allegations of racial profiling without actually explaining the language of the actual racial profiling law, they have contributed immensely to this political "dilemma." Of course, we don't blame the reporters nearly as much as we blame the bosses, who really ought to know better. Ought to, but don't. This rush to prejudge and CYA has led to something like a 80% rate of reduction/reversal of suspensions and punishments when the FOP goes to disciplinary arbitration. This rush to prejudge led to an $18 million dollar settlement when a former superintendent couldn't wait for an investigation to be launched before blaming the officers and firing them all (remember the ones that were overturned?) Hopefully, this rush to prejudge is again on display in at least ONE of the store videotaped incidents.

Hey look! We're in the Slum-Times

Well, not by name. But in this article by Frank Main, he points out that "The charges against Martinez and Guy unleashed a flurry of Internet activity by officers furious at Target and J.C. Penney for turning over their tapes to the police department. One posting called for officers to check city stickers in the stores' employee parking lots. Other messages suggested that officers make the store detectives' jobs more difficult." That would be word for word from some of our commentators!

Hi Frank! Glad to see a member of the main stream media is actually researching their stories instead of making stuff up like so very very many of our formerly respected media outlets. Tell Fran we said "Hi." If we can ever help you get facts straight or let you know how things really work, let us know, because you must get tired sticking up for the current political administration the way you and Fran do constantly. How did it feel to get beaten like a drum by those guys doing the "Hired Truck" stories? Was it Warmbir and Novak taking you and Fran to the cleaners? Man oh man, did those boys do some REPORTING. They might just get Pulitzers and bring down a corrupt machine. And you've done ... what lately?

CONFIDENTIAL TO OUR POLICE READERS (so stop reading Frank): See, the media is noticing the board. You can bet bosses do, too. And the public at large. Watch yourselves because you know they are.

Pussification continues

Be sure you read our previous rant and rave below this one.

If you can look beyond the fact that Frank Main and Fran Spielman have been in the pocket of city hall for years and never hesitate to slam the police, this article in today's Slum Times actually summarizes the reverend meeks incident halfway decently until the last few paragraphs. We would also refer you to our "Archives" page in the right hand column. Go to the "July" page and scroll down to the middle of the month (it's above and below the Chappaquidick picture) and see that a month ago WE SAID that the sergeant had lost any tactical advantage in this traffic stop and there is no way we WOULDN'T have had our gun out, no way we WOULDN'T have displayed it, and no way we WOULDN'T have used some salty language. Anonymous bosses are quoted as saying that the sergeant did nothing wrong (duh) and that they are in a political bind, not being able to move forward or backward.

NEWSFLASH for BOSSES! This is what happens when you stop being the police and start being politicians/lawyers. If you never back your guys and you bend over backwards to accommodate insane amounts of political correctness, why are you surprised that you've put yourself in a corner? We are forcibly reminded of the old question "Why do the LTs and above have balls on the points of their stars?" Answer: "When they promote you, they cut yours off and put them there."

ADDITIONAL NEWSFLASH for REPORTERS! It isn't racial profiling if a white cop stops a black citizen. White police officers are actually encouraged to stop all lawbreakers. Seriously! Black cops, too. And Hispanic cops. And Oriental cops. And anyone wearing the uniform. At 116th and Kensington, what the hell else are they going to stop? If they stop whitey, trust us, THAT'S going to be racial profiling. The media is certainly doing their part in "uneducating" the public at large as to what racial profiling is and what is disheartening is there isn't anyone (especially spokespersons for the department) correcting them. But then, it's just another club they can beat you with and scare you into NOT doing police work.

We're on an elevator ride to the bottom boys and girls. Hold on tight.

The Pussification of the Department

Bad Language Warning - Don't read this kiddies.

OK boys and girls, time for a little ranting. What the fuck is happening to this Department? Yes, the days of handing out "candy," rubber hoses, telephone books and "electro-shock therapy" are gone, and the Department is better for it. But the pendulum seems to be swinging too far the other direction. No, we aren't talking about the first incident where the female PO is accused of/videotaped slapping a handcuffed 14 year old girl. You can throw the book at her. We'd say more, but we'd probably get ourselves in trouble.

We're talking about incident #2 where the PO asked (ASKED!!) the arrestee if he had anything on him that might cut the officer and the arrestee said "no" and then the copper got cut. The shithead got a well deserved rap for that one. We ask again - What the fuck is going on? That hype just committed an aggravated battery on the PO.

AGGRAVATED FUCKING BATTERY!

Will you ever see charges? No, because this Department and this City and this court system lack any sort of balls to go after people who endanger officers lives by deliberate acts of lying and omission. Now the officer has to go through all sorts of testing for AIDS, hepatitis and god knows what else for the next 6 to 12 months because the shithead lied. Damn right the asshole ought to get a "reminder" not to lie, because that's about the ONLY damn justice the PO is ever going to see in this case. The primary victim is the store - you're just collateral damage.

Here's the kicker though. The partners in both cases have been stripped. Great. The Department, not content with destroying your ability to earn overtime, stacking the merit process with their political cronies, rigging the tests with "sooper-sekret" study groups (the list goes on and on), now wants to create a generation of snitches. Not that we object to snitches per se; you get caught stealing, torturing prisoners or taking out insurance claims on people you plan to kill, you deserve whatever they can pin on you. People like that make us all look bad. What we object to is suspending the partner for not reporting what was a completely justified reaction to getting cut by a concealed razor blade after the prisoner LIED about having it.

We challenge any boss to state if they have ever:

• (A) seen a copper ask a hype if he had any needles, razors, or sharp objects that might cut an officer,
  
• (B) then seen a copper FIND a needle, razor or sharp object in the jagoff's pocket,
  
• (C) seen the hype get a rap in the head for lying about what he had, and
  
• (D) RAN OFF LIKE A SISSY TO TELL EVERYONE THAT BIG BAD OFFICER XYZ SMACKED A HYPE FOR LYING ABOUT THE NEEDLE OR RAZOR BLADE

That would be a damn short list. Not many people with gold stars got where they are because they snitched if a hype got whacked for lying about what he had in his pockets. Yes, we know there are gold stars that got where they are BECAUSE they snitched and wore wires on certain tact teams, but we're not talking about them today. We're talking about the City and the Department NOT wanting you to be the police anymore.

We're done. Comment away. Use bad language if you want. We did. Please avoid slandering anyone by name, also like we did. We're sure we'll have more to say on this later.

More quick hits!

File these under "bad choices and weirdos:"

• Dateline: London - man in a diaper asks passing women to "change him." The comments for this one write themselves. Go ahead.
• Dateline: Atlanta - definitely NOT the way to impress a jury of your peers, even if you are trying for the insanity defense.
• Dateline: Chicago - this reminds us of so many stories of coppers waiting in line with the rest of the crackheads, and the dealer doesn't even realize it's the police.

Use this as your open thread for a bit. We're going to be away from the computer until much later this afternoon.

Why be the Police?

Debra Saunders, a columnist at the San Francisco Chronicle, writes a piece entitled "Cops Held to Impossible Standards." Click on the link and read it.

If you recall, L.A. police accidentally killed a 19 month old child as her father used her as a human shield while he shot at police, wounding one. The mother, predictably, blames the police for her daughter's death. Ms. Saunders takes her to task for her choice of domestic partners as the primary cause of her daughter's killing. It is quite refreshing to actually see a member of the media who "gets it."

We wonder what is expected of the police in this situation. Show up at a hot call and watch him kill people? Become targets ourselves? Sorry, not in the job description. Now that the Feebs and a US representative are involved, look for the investigation to really get f#$%ed up.

A Couple of Quick Hits for Tuesday

Be informed! Or at least pretend to be informed.

• More corruption at City Hall. Does it ever end? We sure hope not! It's all nails in what we hope is the mayor's political coffin. We mean, Spring Break in Brazil? C'mon.
• More corruption at Cook County? Well, maybe not, but it sure is financial mismanagement of the highest order. When are the people of this county going to get around to disbanding County government? It's a completely extra layer of taxation to support patronage hacks. It's redundant for pete's sake. Hopefully, this is a nail in Stroger's political coffin as well. We can have a double funeral! (free registration may be required)
• Mosley-Braun for mayor? According to the article, her brother, a CPD sergeant, is actively researching the FOP endorsement process. Word of advice to the FOP: research the former Senator's background - thoroughly. She is one of the ONLY democratic senators to ever lose a seat to a Republican in this state (which was good as it gave us Fitzgerald and Fitzgerald) and there seems to be a trail of international corruption that follows her around. We'd look damn foolish endorsing her without A LOT of answers.
  
• Food Sprays! According to the article, it's not just for eating. "Honey? I'm on the way home and feeling frisky. How about that "bacon" spray you know I love?" No calories, fat or carbs. Hopefully, side effects WON'T include massive abdominal disruption like that veggie oil substitute a few years ago. That'd put a damper on the friskiness.
  

Wow!

We just hit over 525 visits in a single day (Monday). This was a number we weren't expecting until at least the end of the year with a little more publicity material and word of mouth. We know part of it is civilians wandering in (we can tell by the number of advertisements that pop up in the comments section) but still, 500 is a good number to be at. In the last 7 days, we've received over a full quarter of our visits. We might hit 10,000 total visits around the end of the week or beginning of next.

Ahem, children?

Alrighty, the comments in the last few posts are becoming a bit borderline. We have again deleted a large number of advertisements and a couple other over the line ones. We shall repeat it again: THIS IS A PUBLIC BOARD! Civilians can wander in at any time and have a number of times already. Do you really want to leave them with the impression we are all a bunch racist homophobes making fun of crippled commanders? Knock off that crap already.

Don't make us shut off the comments.

Update please

We haven't heard about Commander Murphy lately. We'd always worry when someone drops off of the radar like he seems to have, especially following a horrible accident. If someone could post an update on his condition or even a place to send cards/flowers, we are sure many readers would appreciate it, and you can update in the "Open Threads" comments that appear every so often.

Go Howard Go!

Again, in the "Open Mouth, Insert Foot" world of Howard Dean, Chairman of the democratic national committee, states that women were better off under Saddam. Read it here.

Keep talking Howie, you are locking in a Republican majority for the next 20 years.

That was a test?

Ok, we're looking for stories regarding the just released Detective exam results. We understand it was graded on a scale of 175 points. There are people who scored well over 80% correct (140 or so points) and they are relegated to the 700 and downward spots on the list. Maybe Mr. Shakman and Sgt. Northern (retired) can make some hay with the stories.

Here's the way we see it. The test is simple enough so that the LEAST intelligent merit pick can pass part 1. After that, it's all a game. The truly heavy people don't even show up for part 2; they know they're getting it. But the 20% "merit" (and 30% for Sgt. and Lt. spots) isn't enough for downtown. Someone has a "sooper-sekret" study group downtown for favored individuals who aren't going to make it legit AND aren't one of those blessed with a chinaman (or relative) heavy enough to make them. The "sooper-sekret" study group is directed to certain key words and phrases that will get them full points on the essay type questions. Suddenly, that 20% becomes 30% or more in the case of Sergeants and Lieutenants. Prove us wrong?

But did he taste like chicken?

Trib article on one of our fellow co-workers. What more is there to say?

UPDATE: Seems free registration may be required. We'll copy and paste the article below:

Cop stripped of police powers after scuffle

By David Heinzmann
Tribune staff reporter
Published August 12, 2005, 12:06 AM CDT

An off-duty Chicago police officer allegedly shoved one officer and bit another during a confrontation over the arrest of her neighbor for drinking cognac on the sidewalk, police said.

The incident happened late Sunday in the 400 block of West Evergreen Avenue Street near the Cabrini-Green housing project. The charged officer, Dyone L. Taylor, has been stripped of her police powers and was charged with two felony counts of battery to a police officer, said police spokesman Patrick Camden.

Taylor, 37, was allegedly part of a mob that gathered around the two officers at 11:45 p.m. as they tried to arrest Ernest Shed for drinking in the public way after the saw him drinking from a bottle of cognac Hennessy Cognac, outside his apartment building at 445 W. Evergreen, Camden said.

Shed became combative, Camden said, and the crowd formed, shouting at the officers to let him go. The police called for backup because of growing tension, he said. Among the people yelling was Taylor, who lives in the building at 435 W. Evergreen.

According to the officers, Taylor shouted obscenities at one officer, a woman, and shoved her. At the time, the officers did not know she was a fellow police officer, Camden said. When they moved to put her in handcuffs along with Shed, she allegedly bit the female officer's partner, a man, on the arm. He was later treated and released, Camden said.

In all, five people were arrested in ended up under arrest from the incident.

As police walked her to the car to be transported to the East Chicago District station, she told officers she was a police officer, Camden said. Taylor is assigned to the Monroe District on the West Side and has been in the department since July 1998, according to police records.

Once in custody, she declined to give a statement to detectives, Camden said. He acknowledged that a complaint had been filed on her behalf with the Office of Professional Standards alleging excessive force in the arrest. Camden said Shed gave police a statement in which he said acknowledged that Taylor shoved the female officer. He was charged with drinking in the public way and disorderly conduct.

Taylor could not be reached for comment Thursday.

Terror alert

The Terror alert has returned to YELLOW. Continue on about your business Citizens.



Don't know who to credit on this. It was e-mailed to us and it's been seen on a number of websites. Apologies to the creator if he/she happens to run across this site.

So ...

Any Bud Billiken Parade horror stories yet? How many lost children? Disorderly arrests? Overtime totals? Enquiring minds want to know.

More truth from Cartoons

Summarizing the Able-Danger data very succinctly. From Day by Day by Chris Muir.

Ain't this the truth?

From Cox and Forkum

Well, at least the Blackhawks are back

Grossman out for 3-4 months (call it the whole season) with a broken left ankle. We are truly cursed.

Off duty incident in 006

We've been contacted by e-mail and in the comments section regarding an incident in the 006th District involving an off duty PO from Englewood who confronted some garage burglars, got beat up, dropped her gun and to top it off, seems to have gotten royally screwed by the 006th District sergeant and POs who showed up and didn't want to make arrests it might involve overtime and one offender is the mother of some sergeant's baby. Who has definitive information on this?

Quick hits for Friday

Read on, be informed, impress your friends:

• You want to loosen some tongues in the "Hired Truck" scandal? Start handing down a bunch of sentences like this: 7 years for Quarters Boyle. It certainly is difficult to find someone to do 7 years in the Federal pen for you. There can't be many more like Boyle, can there?
• Patriotism has been called is the last refuge of the scoundrel. We submit that religion is much more deserving of that designation. Look at all the people who "find god" behind bars and insist their last minute conversions spare them from long incarceration or death.
  
• CPD v CFD baseball. We just received word that the game was cancelled. Be sure you phone first before you go to Sox park.
• In case you were wondering, the threat level for mass transit is going back down to yellow. This after the past few days of government officials and such speculating that terrorists might use fuel trucks as rolling bombs.
• And on a lighter note, here is one of the first announced candidates for president in 2008: May we introduce Christopher Walken!
  

Happy Bud Billiken Day to all our Tactical and Gang Teams and others fortunate enough to be working Saturday. Good luck at the World's Largest Lost Child Exhibition! We expect to hear lots of stories starting Saturday night.

More trouble for dems

We realizes politics bores some people. It's sleazy, corrupt and you want to take a shower after you swim in it - and that's just talking about the Illinois Republican party. But it interests us, so we type about it.

Have you ever been flying down the highway, doing about 80 miles an hour, just enjoying the ride, passing cars left and right, and you accidentally throw the gear shift from 4th gear into 1st instead of 5th? No, we've never done it either, but that must be what the dems and liberal media are feeling like this morning after the new york times actually ADMITS the 9/11 commission omitted details from it's final report including the Able-Danger data and the Czech intelligence report that Atta met with Iraqi intelligence in Prague in April of 2001. Why is this going to unhinge the left even more? Because it completely undermines it's case that Iraq and Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11, which means they've been wrong (or lying) for 4 years. It also means the Reno/Gorelick connection to the "chinese wall" between intelligence agencies and the FBI is much a much bigger blunder by the previous administration and may tie into Sandy Berger's efforts to purge the National Archives of certain incriminating documents.

This is huge. Really huge. This makes Watergate look like the "third rate burglary" Nixon apologists always tried to pass it off as. And it's still going on. Any legitimacy the 9/11 commission had is looking like that transmission that slipped from 4th to 1st gear at 80 MPH. This could be the democratic's "Watergate" and how they respond to it could condemn them to the political wilderness for 20 years or more.

But don't just take the new your times word on it. Read more at Captain's Quarters, National Review and Red State.

New Chief of Patrol?

Thursday was Jimmy Maurer's last day. Love him or hate him or be ambivalent about him, he was a character the likes of which we shall probably never see again, one of the last of the "old guard." So who's the replacement? We predicted Dan Dugan, Area 3 Chief. Others say Risley or Shields, but previous comments hint at A LOT of baggage for Shields. Don't know much about Risley, though we hear some good things. Skahill's name is also in the wind here, but we can't see the political powers that be having two women in charge of the two largest Bureaus of the department (we're not sexist, just an observation.) We'll stick with our Dugan prediction for now.

Just on FoxNews

Over 46% of the American population will suffer some form of mental illness in their lifetimes. This is quite a shocker to the rest of the medical establishment, but we were among the first to diagnosis this years ago. The disease is "Liberalism" and the symptoms are voting for democratic candidates. Hahahahahaha, just a little right wing humor there. Sorry "lefty."

Disappearing comments

Blogger (the hosting company we use) appears to have a feature when you log in that notifies the blogging community of when there are updates on various blogs. It seems to be an automated feature, so when we update posts or post new, it will show "Second City Cop" as a recently updated entry and we get strangers wandering in. Some visitors appear to be automated programs that simply post a "Great Blog, visit me at www.mybloghere.blogspot.com" type posts. We shall be deleting those when we run across them.

Also, if you are interested in bringing an article to our attention or our readers attention, post a link, NOT the entire article. Firstly, the article may be copyrighted, so posting it is improper and may be illegal. We don't want that kind of attention. Secondly, by posting the link, we generate publicity for someone else's endeavors and steer our readers to their efforts. This is a nice thing to do as the entire "blogosphere" operates best on a referral basis.

Thank you for your patience.

LT List is out

46 names, just like we predicted. We are busy at the moment, but we shall be typing them up and posting them shortly. Congratulations to those who made it.

UPDATE: We typed it out for everyone, so you BETTER appreciate it!

BLOCK, Arthur 002/211; EVANS, Regina 005;
LOTT, Cornelia 005; BRUNDAGE, John 007;
FITZGERALD, Patrick 008; MOSS, Susan 011;
MAGRUDER, John 012; HLAVATY, Doreen 013;
MULLANE, William 016; STONE, Dean 016;
AMATI, Mark 016/124; CACCAVALE Ben 017;
GALE, Jeffrey 017; McNAUGHTON, David 017;
BICKHAM, Timothy 018; DOWD, Donna 020;
MITROS, Gregory 022; PLATT, Mary 025;
ROUSSELL, James 050; BAUER, Paul 055;
GRECO, Jon 055; DALY, Brian 112;
PASCUA, Deborah 112; CALLOWAY, Keith 121;
ENGSTROM, Michelle 124/012; GUERRIERI, Victor 124;
SAHNAS, Ken 124; MAROSE, William 129;
MOY-BARTOSKI, Lucille 129; LANCE, Cynthia 132;
PENA, Lupe 153; JUDON, CASSANDRA 171;
KONRATH, Robert 177; CARTER, Eric 189;
FRANKLIN, John 189; MALONE, Michael 192;
GORMAN, Joseph 193; O’BRIEN, Thomas 253/153;
ESCALANTE, John 603; PANEK Norbert 608;
WOLF, Albert 610/606; DEMBOWSKI, Gene 640;
STAPLES, Melissa 640; WELCH III, Eddie 650;
MANOS, John 650/606; HARMON, Mark 701

UPDATE: 19 AUG 2005 1645 hours

Robert KONRATH is staying at Forensics - Unit 177
Thomas CZARNECKI will be taking his place - Unit 025

Does anyone know...

... if Tennessee has a death penalty? If Tennessee doesn't, maybe there were some Federal laws broken that could allow them to step in and prosecute this one. Another name for the wall in Washington DC. Keep his family and co-workers in mind, and let's all be careful out there.

More "Able Danger" revelations

Captain's Quarters has devastating further observations on the 9/11 Commission's exclusion of the "Able Danger" information. We had forgotten about the Jamie Gorelick connection to the clinton administration and the cheap shots she took at the Bush administration before the 2004 election. Those of you unfamiliar with Gorelick, she was the lawyer (along with Janet Reno) most responsible for building the wall between the intelligence apparatus of the United States and the FBI. She complained the government didn't do enough in the preceding months to thwart 9/11, EVEN THOUGH IT WAS HER HANDIWORK that hamstrung the possibility of an investigation even taking place! Then, by some insane bit of chance (hahahaha), Gorelick ends up as one of the members of the commission investigating HER OWN role in drafting the law. When this conflict of interest was pointed out, she refused to resign and was one of the persons who continued to ignore the "Able Danger" data to cover her (and the Clintons) woeful inaction in the face of rising terrorist action against the US. Only in America.

Lieutenants tomorrow?

Word is still active that they will announce 46 lieutenants tomorrow so that they can start class on Monday. This is supposedly the LAST class off of the current Lt's list, which would make sense as some sergeant with an "important" last name has 2 years as of 01 December and will be eligible to take the next test. Anyone been keeping score on how many they've made total (legit and merit)?

Same source says that the next class of sergeants will be 67 to 80, beginning at the end of September, early October and there will be at least one, maybe two more classes off of the list before a new exam in the fall of 2006.

Quick hits

We are tired. But we couldn't leave you with nothing today, so here are some quick hits. Free Registration may be required at some sites.

• Dogs being used by soldiers to detect explosives and by "insurgents" to deliver them. Someone call that Animal Abuse team that operated out of Housing and let them know about this please.
• Daley dodges more questions about running again. We are stilling hearing a whispers of a rumor of a story that he won't even stick around to finish his term. Let's face it, the support isn't there at the moment if he did run in 2007, BUT as the republican party is non existent in this county, all Daley has to do is win a primary battle. If Jesse Jr and Gutierrez run, they'll split the minority votes, Daley wins anyway. If Jr runs solo, watch for a tame minority to split the black vote, and Daley wins again.
• Look at this! Nephews of a mobbed up aldercreature have been tied to paying bribes to a Hired Truck scandal figure for more than a decade. If anyone tells us this city and yes, this department, aren't still run by Outfit interests, we'll tell them to go soak their heads. Also, the 23rd conviction has been entered for Hired Truck. We are beginning to approach "Greylord" type numbers for convictions with no end in sight. Go Fitzgerald Go!
• And once again, the clinton years come back to haunt us. The slum-times, Captain's Quarters, Little Green Footballs, FoxNews and others cover the recent news that a Government program named "Able Danger" actually tracked muhammed atta and his cronies as a "probable al-qaeda cell" months BEFORE 9/11, but because of the restrictions on sharing information between intelligence agencies, no one could put the pieces together and initiate action. Thanks again bill and hill!
  

Questions for the crowd & an open thread

Someone answer in the comments please. We saw a Personnel Order come out this week and it had the assignments for the 12 promoted Captains on page 2. On page 1, however, there are two names that weren't part of the class, but were being assigned captains rank and assignments. We THOUGHT that we had seen one of those names on a retirement list a short time ago. Anyone have any info? Have they been hiring back retired bosses and making them Captains? What gives?

Is there anything you, the readers, would like to see more of? We try to keep abreast of the rumors and publish them as they come to light. We try to read the local police news and link the more important articles. We even try to track international information that could be useful if you ever ran across a similar situation. This blog isn't a static process. It evolves.

We are going to be out Wednesday and won't return until late. We are leaving this thread open for comments and suggestions. We'd like to again thank everyone who visits, reads and participates, even "Bush" and "Lefty," because without disagreement, there cannot be discussion. Our numbers keep climbing and it is thanks to your word of mouth that this is (so far) a decent place to sound off and be heard. We had our best day ever on Monday with over 370 visits and over 1,000 page views. 500 a day is looking VERY possible by year's end and if this was an FOP election year, we could imagine we'd be hitting 1,000 without a problem. Again, thanks, keep reading, and continue spreading the word.

NEWSFLASH!

In the comments section, someone has posted that the Detective results are arriving in the mail. Can anyone else confirm? Look for at least one lawsuit based on the infamous study group at 35th St.

UPDATE: We guess it's true that results are arriving based on all of the comments. Questions now arise as to how far down the list they will go. As most veterans know, it varies. One year, a lawsuit killed the list after SINGLE class of about 80 or 90 guys. Someone here can tell the story we're sure. We do have a hint of a rumor on how you make it into the top spot in the Detective Division though: Just make sure you buy your out of state vacation house right next to or up the block from the next Superintendent's out of state vacation house, and before you know it, BANG! You are the boss of detectives. Amazing how that works, eh? We don't think Mr. Shakman can work any magic on that one though.

Quick hits!

Yes, CPD is in the news yet again.

The Ryan Harris murder; the short version? CPD framed a child for a brutal murder.

Cleaning up the streets. Hooray for Commander Rottner! Good call.

Shooting in Hyde Park. We repeat, everyone is going to be bidding south if this keeps up. All the action for the last few days has been down there.

Look for Lieutenants to be named Wednesday or Thursday. Looks like just under 50 so far. We don't know if we'll post the whole list; depends on what kind of typing we are in the mood to do.

Just a question, but

didn't there used to be a psychological test to get on this job? And haven't we seen people accused of much less than this guy (yesterday's sun-times article) sitting down at Call Back answering phones, out of contact with the public? Just wondering. Don't bother posting his name. The slum-times didn't, and you don't want to be seen as less ethical than the slum-times, do you?

I am a Republican! Hear me Roar!

Whew. Quite a day of posting and typing. This will be our sixth post today and we've gotten 300+ visitors on the day! Hooray for us! We shall continue to cruise the board tonight, most likely poking holes in someone's arguments or supporting others. Again, thanks to all our visitors, readers and contributors for making this work so well. Keep spreading the word. We'd love to get 500 hits a day before the end of the year.

More morons!

Man, when we get in this sort of mood, we just can't stop finding fools to criticize and poke fun at. The tribune finally gets around to reporting a motion passed by the American Library Association back on 29 June. Guess what they want? Right, the troops home and the billions of dollars we spend there diverted to, of all things, libraries here. Just a few points here:

• The billions we're spending? It's keeping you safe at home. You think if we pulled out tomorrow anything would be better? You think if we scaled back troop numbers, Iraq wouldn't collapse into a boiling cauldron of civil war that would make Bosnia look like a tea party? Grow up. The second we leave, it's the Taliban II taking over an almost westernized arab nation with modern infrastructure and educated work force. The hundreds of mass graves we keep finding over there? They'd triple overnight.
• Money on libraries? Book sales are plummeting, Harry Potter not withstanding. People don't buy books anymore. That's why you see fewer and fewer publishers. Libraries are museums to the golden age of books. Google is paying hundreds of thousand of dollars, maybe millions to digitalize entire libraries, including Harvard and the University of Michigan. The Library of Congress is preserving books electronically. Ever hear of a little program called "encarta?" That Bill Gates may be a ruthless business man, but he can see the future and guess what it isn't? Paper books. Encyclopedia Britannica laid off its salesmen about 7 years ago. You think libraries will be around in 50 years? Pardon our laughter.
  

Here's a little clue to all the movie stars, celebrities, librarians, and musicians who constantly demand we simply pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan and stop acting "unilaterally." If the islamofascists take over, guess who they are going to imprison, oppress and kill? Not the farmers. Not the industrialists. Not even the skilled laborers. You know, there aren't many movies (at least movies like we like) in the islamic world. Libraries? In many countries, the koran is the only reading allowed. Musicians? Got any other skills? Like maybe goat herding or camel raising? No? Then get back to prison. And don't even get us started about what they do to "sexual deviants." You think you're oppressed now? Try getting some in an islamic state. And those bags they put over their women? Lovely.

Now please, shut up and let the adults run the world so you can remain safe in your little dream utopia. We'll let you know when we're done and you can go back telling us how you would have done it differently some other day.

The hypocrisy of the media

Since we are in a particularly satisfying right wing rant sort of mood today, here's another one: The new york times, the self declared paper of record, the paper that every newscast producer reads religiously to see what should be deemed worthy of prime time coverage, printed the following paragraph in their sunday edition entitled "Where are the War Heroes?":

ONE soldier fought off scores of elite Iraqi troops in a fierce defense of his outnumbered Army unit, saving dozens of American lives before he himself was killed. Another soldier helped lead a team that killed 27 insurgents who had ambushed her convoy. And then there was the marine who, after being shot, managed to tuck an enemy grenade under his stomach to save the men in his unit, dying in the process.

Their names are Sgt. First Class Paul R. Smith, Sgt. Leigh Ann Hester and Sgt. Rafael Peralta. If you have never heard of them, even in a week when more than 20 marines were killed in Iraq by insurgents, that might be because the military, the White House and the culture at large have not publicized their actions with the zeal that was lavished on the heroes of World War I and World War II. (bold emphasis added by moderator)

Do you notice anything missing from this list? The MEDIA maybe? Believe it or not, we recognized each and every one of those incidents the NYTimes listed and we could even name one of the heroes by name without prompting (Sergeant Hester, the first ever female recipient of the Silver Star). But that's because we DON'T read the NYTimes. We wouldn't line a bird cage with it or wrap a fish in it.

The single biggest obstruction in the successful prosecution of this war is the so called main stream media. Back in the days of WWI and WWII, the media actually wanted us to win. They recognized evil and unchecked aggression and realized the danger it presented to the world. Today? They broadcast forged documents attempting to bring down a president, present skewed data collection as public opinion, conduct investigations of a Supreme Court nominee's adopted children, openly slander presidential advisors or anyone with a conservative point of view and ignore genuine acts of heroism while asking why no one is aware of the heroes that walk among us. No wonder americans distrust the media more and more every day.

Tell your friends!

If you didn't check us out over the weekend, scroll down a little bit and check out the "Award Proposals" posts. If any suggestions are forthcoming, post them or e-mail them. We aren't the best hand with photoshop, but we can always try. Tell your friends and have them visit us, too. We're up to almost 230 visits a day and it's only getting better.

By the way, check back a few times today. We're in a particularly right wing mood today and are planning multiple posts. Batten down the hatches "lefty!" Warm up the grill "bush boy!" Everyone else, enjoy!

Don't you feel bad now?

After all that criticism everyone made last week, the 022nd District up and kills guy last night. A few more of these instances and all the young guns on the department will be demanding to bid to 022 because that's where the action is.

Another reason to dislike judges

You all know our position on judges. We feel about judges the same way the mayor feels about the police department - a necessary evil. Yes, someone needs to be at the top of the legal process to render decisions after a verdict has been reached, but at the same time, activist judges legislating from the bench seriously tick us off. And since they're lawyers, when the revolution comes, there'll be a spot against the wall for them. Their attitudes are particularly irksome too. Read Judge Marvin Aspen's comments in the sunday tribune. Here's a few:

U.S. District Senior Judge Marvin Aspen said law enforcement needs to find a better way to identify threats to the judiciary as well as better procedures to protect judges and their families. Hey judge? We know how to do it. You just won't let us. Or it's too expensive. Or too intrusive. Or not secure enough. Anyone can kill anyone if they're willing to make the effort, even four presidents, remember?

Aspen said it took the bombing of the Oklahoma City federal courthouse in 1995 for officials to get serious about court security and the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to make the issue "even more mindful." We recall McViegh's (may he rot in hell for all eternity) beef was with the federal government as a whole, not the judiciary as a single target. And 9/11? That wasn't about the judiciary either Marv. That was about being Americans. Way to cloak yourself in the memory of almost 3,000 dead Americans!

He also decried the political debate that has targeted the judiciary for criticism. Marv? It's called "freedom of speech." NEWSFLASH!! You aren't above it. The day we can't criticize our political leaders is the day you ought to start to worry. And if you STOP legislating from the bench and leave it to our ELECTED representatives, that criticism will go away.

"What we have now is really a wholesale attack on the judiciary," he said. Really? Can you name a few more attacks that have occurred other than a lone psycho killing a single judge's family? We've already destroyed your OK City and 9/11 cards. Hmm? Nothing? Atlanta? That was a breakdown in court security, not a targeted killing, try again. Hmm? That's what we thought. Bupkiss.

Let me tell you what we have here: A grandstanding "know-it-all" who thinks he can score cheap political points off of dead children and dead Americans. Marv sure has a bunch of free spending ideas with your tax money, though. Maybe Marv would like to go over to North Lawndale or Englewood and check out their casualty rate? Maybe Marv can go to Washington next spring and watch them carve the names of 100 more police officers into the granite of the memorial? Where is our protection for our houses and families Marv? Because it seems we might need it just a tiny little bit more than you. Hypocrites like this really tick us off because, in the position they hold, they really ought to know better. Or at least know enough to shut up.