Slapping Around Checkerboard Chat

LONG POST. Evidently, we've been tweaked by the boys over at the "Official" blog of the Chicago Police Department. We say "tweaked" because their effort is a really half assed attempt to seize the high ground after getting punked and owned by a reader of ours. Well, we're about to slap them around big time and hand them their ass - strap in boys and girls. Our comments are in the italics. And by the way, if Pat Camden had anything to do with the below post, we'll eat our hat, but as his name is on the bottom, he's getting the same treatment:
-------------------

Are We For Real. . . or What?

Well, I guess we are "official"! We've gotten hate mail, coded messages. . . the works! It's funny, though. I thought that the biggest critics would be the so-called "unappreciative public" or even the "unscrupulous media". HA! WRONG!!

(We don't know about hate mail and how it makes you "official." Usually, hate mail means someone somewhere really dislikes you. We've gotten a ton of it, too. So now we're "official"? And what makes you think the public or the media actually knows about you? Or cares? You're a bunch of sanitized press releases for crissake.)

If you haven't taken the time to really check us out, I'll simply remind you that we ARE "of, by and for the Police". The REAL police, not the clout-heavy police, not the "whining" police--the every day copper who straps on a duty-belt, gets in a squad and does the job. If you think the site is all BS or propaganda or whatever, do me a favor and don't use it. This site has been created to get factual information to the rank and file and also let the public see the everyday success stories of the Chicago Police Department. We are here to give information, provide a voice and FINALLY give credit to the men and women of this Department who truly deserve it. . . YOU. . . the "everyday copper."

(BWAHAHAHAHAHA. You are "of...the REAL police"? Since when? In what parallel universe are you living? When was the last time either one of you bozos strapped on a full duty belt? Besides Closed Market. And we haven't seen Pat in a Closed Market car lately. Bravo on the giving credit to unsung heroes though - that's about the only thing worthy of mention on your site. As to your being propaganda, didn't you notice that every comment must be approved by the Office of the Superintendent? You tools.)

Those of us working on this blog do so because WE WANT TO. Believe it or not, there are still a lot of police officers who take pride and honor in the work they do. There are problems and issues that make us unhappy with the job, that is part of life. But then again, do you know of ANY job that is problem-free? (If so, send me an application--I could use a stress-free gig!)

(Glad you "WANT TO" work on a blog - we'll bet it's a great gig to get paid $60,000+ a year to do also. Thanks for acknowledging that there are problems and stresses on this job - how about addressing a few of them? Like how to get that $60,000+ rewriting press releases and tossing them up on a website. Morons. We take pride in everything we do, too, but we're doing it in the trenches, not from a sanitized cubicle.)

If you simply want to rant, rave, whine, moan and complain without adding anything constructive, find someplace else to spend your time. Coded messages and inappropriate comments (while creative and SOMETIMES humorous) are not what we are about and will not be posted. There's plenty of space to do that. . . elsewhere.

(Hey! You must mean us. Thanks! It must be nice to be so far separated from the reality of District law enforcement that you have no fucking idea what we put up with in an eight-hour shift - backlog 4 or more hours per tour, lunch denials, stupid bosses, dangerous bosses, 2-year wonders working inside, unattainable mission goals based on what some computer geek decides is the "correct" approach to policing, etc. Need we go on? Humor is what we've got - and we are DAMN proud to provide coppers with what they want, not what the bosses THINK they want.)

Criticism is cool. Stupidity is not. Police officers already face enough adversity on a daily basis. There are enough "haters" out there without us having to turn on each other.

(Have you trolled through our comments sections lately? We can cite dozens of instances where our readers have been denied their posts being published on your site because they bring up uncomfortable truths about the Department writ large. And stop with the pretend concern about what adversity officers face on a daily basis - you have no fucking clue.)

If you are proud to do the job, say so. If you don't like the job, quit. It's easy to be "controversial" and "subversive" when you can do so with an electronic pseudonym. If you have a legitimate complaint or concern, you are more than welcome to express an intelligent opinion. If your concern is legitimate, have the courage to sign your name.

We do..... John Henry and Pat Camden.

(That's real mature - "if you don't like the job, quit." This Department can't hire enough bodies as it is - or don't you remember the days of 35,000 applicants dwindling to under 3,000 for three tests a year? And the bodies that are actually hired are either (A) burned out by the time they get 10 years on or (B) so clout heavy that they never see the inside of a squad car outside of their training cycles.

Fuck you, you sanctimonious pieces of shit. It's morons like you who have and are destroying the greatest job known to mankind. We'd love to have a job writing a blog for the Department at $60 grand a year. [post amended - son of the State's Attorney is still in 015 at the moment - but the pool says not much longer]. Or the daughter of a certain retired exempt who gets an entire spot created for her along with take-home vehicle, all paid for by Federal money.

And a great big FUCK YOU to the snide comment about us being "controversial" and subversive" with an electronic pseudonym. Fuck You. You are naive beyond belief if you think for a moment that any one of us here would have anything like a normal career or a normal life or a normal assignment the minute our name was attached to an alternative blog. We'd be hammered. We'd be bricked. We'd be walking a foot post in a district located at the furthest point from our actual geographic home. No thanks. Our name isn't Pat Camden or John Henry and thank god for that - at least we still have our balls attached to our bodies. And we did notice that you allow anonymous comments anyway - are your commentators afraid to be accused of being company suckasses? You speak with forked tongues, hmmm?

Here's a challenge for you jackasses - let's see your numbers. Throw up a Sitemeter counter open to the public. Lets see how your numbers stack up against any of the other blogs out there. Let the Free Market decide who coppers want to read. Of course, it's easier for you to pretend to be the voice of the Department when you can just have the Department censors block out an entire swath of websites that just happen to have the "blogspot" name attached to them. We'll bet we know what the numbers read, because even with an unlevel playing field, we're still pulling in almost 2,500 visits a day and moderating over 200 comments a day. We don't think you've published 200 comments total yet.

So, John Henry, you steel-driving man, that twinge you feel is a steel rod being driven up your ass courtesy of the alternative blogs. And Pat Camden, if you had anything to do with the listed post, we are truly ashamed of you. We hope it isn't really you because you seem to be such an advocate for the street guys and gals on camera (don't forget to pick up your asses on the way out the door.)

POST AMENDED TO REFLECT CURRENT ASSIGNMENT OF SERGEANT IN QUESTION.

Council Shakeup?

Since aldercreatures need a "50% plus one" to win, we're looking an a number of runoff elections on 17 April that could change quite a bit of the make up of the City Council. We have always been an advocate of "any change is good," especially in the case of Chicago and Crook County politics. Some of the races we're watching with interest:

• Natarus - out!
• Troutman - out!
• Beavers (the offspring) - out!

Beavers lost to Mrs. Jesse Jr. Another political dynasty continues.

And trailing (in some cases trailing badly) and facing runoff elections:

• Madeline Haithcock, Dorothy Tillman, Shirley Coleman, Howard Brookins, Michael Chandler, Ted Matlak, Rey Colon and Vi Daley.

Of course, a couple of these might shake out before sun rise, but it's always good to see some of these leeches sweat a little. Hopefully a few are unemployed by morning.

More County Hijinks

First of all, she ain't all that. We've seen the picture and damn, we'd probably ask to be fired if she placed any sort of demands on us. But then again, getting $70,000 a year just to be a chauffeur?

But that isn't the best part. How about this?

• Adams once disciplined her chief of staff for instructing Estes to pick up her dry cleaning on state time, court records show. Wertz has gone by a handful of names, has an undisclosed criminal conviction and holds several Social Security numbers, court documents show.

  Estes also has three convictions from the early 1990s.

Estes has THREE convictions, yet still maintains a government job paying him $70,000 a year to drive around someones Chief of Staff. Wertz (the Chief of Staff in question) has an undisclosed criminal conviction, numerous aliases and multiple social security numbers? What the hell is that? And who is going to be on the hook for any judgements against Wertz? The taxpayers again?

Will someone please disband county government? Mr. Fitzgerald? Faster please.

Oh Please, Let This Come True

From Channel 2:

• Second Ward Ald. Madeline Haithcock might need a little luck at the polls tomorrow. Despite endorsements by Congressman Bobby Rush and Mayor Richard M. Daley, two well-financed opponents seem to be making a race of it.
  
  At the eleventh hour, attorney David Askew is calling as many voters as he can, reminding them that both the Chicago Tribune and Sun-Times have endorsed him. He's also accusing Haithcock of paying too much attention to the new super high rise development corridor in the South Loop, and not enough on the hard scrabble neighborhoods on the West Side.

This is the hater who wants to name streets after those who advocate murdering police officers. We know a lot of city workers have been moving into her ward in the past few years as the Western Avenue corridor gentrifies. Anyone who can cast votes against this particularly low class aldercreature really ought to.

AND DON'T FORGET!! It's Election Day Vote early, vote often, but vote.

Embarrassing Report Becomes Public

Another sordid bit of history:

• An audit the city kept secret for more than a decade shows the Chicago Police evidence warehouse was in such disarray in the 1990s that guns vanished from the facility and were later recovered from criminals.

  A federal judge last week lifted a protective order on the audit reports, which revealed the status of 133 guns was "undetermined" because of a failure to record the movement of evidence. Officials also could not account for nearly $7 million in drugs.

  The audit showed at least four confiscated handguns disappeared from the warehouse between 1991 and 1995, and were seized again in weapons and drug arrests on the South Side.

133 guns unaccounted for. $7 million dollars in dope. "Embarrassment" is a mild description of what happened at E&RPS back in the 1990's. No wonder they tried to keep this one under wraps. How many bosses and exempts were held accountable for this debacle?

SWAT Job

Old news, but worthy of recognition:

• Chicago police say they've resolved a hostage situation on the city's South Side without incident.

  Spokeswoman Monique Bond says an armed 19-year-old man took four people hostage in an apartment on the 8400 block of South Bennett around one a-m today.

  Bond says the hostages included a 12-year-old girl, a five-year-old girl, a five-year-old boy and an adult woman.

Of course, most police incidents only make the news when bad things happen. And the coverage of this was minimal at best. But it sounds like a good job all around.

Forgotten Anniversary

We confess - this one even slipped our minds (via Michelle Malkin):

• Lawhawk reminds us that today is the 14th anniversary of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. We always hear "Never forget." But how many still remember anymore?

  And how many have really learned?

Yesterday was the anniversary. And we saw just about zero coverage anywhere. What should have been a wake up call was just another blip that went unrecognized for years and years.

Michelle also has a very haunting video some tourists took of an elevator ride to the observation deck of one of the towers. The video shows the floor counter moving up to 107 and the doors opening to a long hallway that leads to a number of windows through which you can see New York City. Then the camera pans downward and we couldn't help thinking that 8 years later, that was the last view that hundreds of people had prior to jumping. Haunting.

From the Comments

First, the question:

• Too Old to Rock & Roll said...

• Pardon the slightly off topic post.
  
  Has anyone heard anything about the "beating of the bushes" program at 35th Street to roust up 50 bodies for some new unit?

What we've heard:

• They've been sending bodies to a couple of districts to learn how to do reverse stings. Someone had the bright idea that all the house mouses could be utilized outside of "Closed Market" and are supposed to serve their street time as a mobile sting squad. Unfortunately, many of the people sent don't want to have to spend their street days in some of the crappiest locations in the city in all sorts of weather, so the number of volunteers is lower than expected.

Of course, this info was from some young gun who was half gassed at the tavern, so it could be completely wrong. There might be a number of "new units" being created somewhere to do another crazy numbers game. All we know is we're still short about 1,200 bodies on the street. And that's a generous assessment.

Who Cares?

This is just one of the stupidest articles we've ever seen:

• Genealogists have revealed that the Rev. Al Sharpton is a descendent of a slave owned by relatives of the late Sen. Strom Thurmond — a discovery the civil rights activist on Sunday called “shocking.”

  Sharpton learned of his connection to Thurmond, once a prominent defender of segregation, last week through the Daily News, which asked genealogists to trace his roots.

This was all over the news shows tonight and the radio this afternoon. Is there actually a point to this? Associated Press plays up the obvious angles:

• Thurmond, of South Carolina, was once considered an icon of racial segregation. During his 1948 bid for president, he promised to preserve segregation and, in 1957, he filibustered for more than 24 hours against a civil rights bill.

  Sharpton, who ran for president in 2004 on a ticket of racial justice, said he met Thurmond only once in 1991 when he visited Washington, D.C., with the late soul singer James Brown, who knew Thurmond. Sharpton said the meeting was “awkward.”

  “I was not happy to meet him because what he had done all his life,” Sharpton said.

If all you caught was the news reports, you miss this little paragraph though:

• The long-serving senator was originally a Democrat but became a Republican in 1964.

So that would mean in his 1948 bid for president and preserve segregation, Strom ran as a DEMOCRAT! And when he filibustered the Civil Rights Act in 1957, he did it as ... a DEMOCRAT! Strom was one of the original "Dixie-crats." It wasn't Republicans running around Alabama in sheets burning black churches. We wonder if anyone is doing a little historical research on former Klan Kleagle and current DEMOCRAT Senator of West Virginia Robert Byrd to see who his ancestors used to own or advocate the lynching of.

Strom's ancestors are even more ancient history than he was. Get over it already. He's dead and has absolutely no bearing on any sort of debate today. Kind of like Sharpton's career.

Post #2000

Post number 2000.

636 days of blogging.

Over 925,000 total visitors viewing 3,442,000 pages!

Readers from across the country and 5 different continents.

You humble us. Thank you.

Open post in the meantime.

Remember That Olympics Bid?

No, not the 2016 Games for Chicago. The 2012 London Games that Great Britain is preparing for:

• It has been reported that the cost of the 2012 London Olympics could soar to £9 billion, almost four times the original estimate.

• The BBC says that the Treasury and the Department for Culture, Media and Sport are discussing the price, up from the £2.35 billion set out in London's bid document.

  The Government reportedly believes construction alone could cost £3.3 billion, with an extra £2 billion allocated as a contingency fund.

Any of this sound familiar? "almost four times the original estimate"? And we thought "contingency fund" was a Chicago term. Given Chicago's history of crooked contract awarding and checkered political past, cost overruns and the like are pretty much a guarantee.

Just for comparison purposes, £9 billion translates into about $17 BILLION US dollars. You think the Machine and the Daley connected construction firms aren't drooling in anticipation of a $17 billion dollar payday?

Is it Getting Hot in Here?

Once again, the "teflon" mayor in the hot seat:

• Mayor Daley said Friday he has "no problems" answering questions under oath about allegations that -- as state's attorney and as mayor -- he failed to investigate torture allegations against former Police Lt. Jon Burge.
• "If they require me to be deposed, I have no problems with that. That's all I have to say," he told reporters at police headquarters.
• Daley noted he had been "deposed already" by a special prosecutor appointed to investigate the allegations against Burge.

And as we remember, the "I don't recall" defense was exercised to its fullest extent in that deposition. But as the city settles everything that comes its way and is all too eager to give away taxpayer money, we expect another monumental settlement to wend its way to the City Council within the year.

What's up with Old People?

We were writing about a senior citizen farmer chasing down a gasoline thief last month. Now we have a 70+ year old Korean War vet strangling an armed mugger in Costa Rica:

• An American tourist who watched as a U.S. military veteran in his 70s used his bare hands to kill an armed assailant in Costa Rica said she thought the attempted robbery was a joke - until the masked attacker held a gun to her head.

• Suddenly, one of the tourists, a U.S. military veteran trained in self defense, jumped out of the van and put the gunman in a headlock, according to Limon police chief Luis Hernandez.

  Hernandez said the American, whom he refused to identify, struggled with the robber, breaking his collarbone and eventually killing him. Police identified the dead man as Warner Segura, 20. The other two assailants fled.

Score one more for the old folks.

GPS Rumors

Both from the comments section.

Rumor #1:

• Heard it from the horses mouth!!! Tac and Gangs city wide will have gps installed in their squad cars within the next 90 days!!!! Guess the party is over....

Rumor #2:

• Supposedly, gps is not going on cars..too expensive...radios are going to get chipped with gps.

So which one is it? Radios or cars? Cars or radios? Or are they just going to chip us the way they do dogs and cats at the pound and zap us when we misbehave?

Daley Confident

And why shouldn't he be? He has two no name, no chance people running against him. OK, Dorothy Brown isn't exactly no name, but she's a machine creation, brought in to dilute the earlier attempts by Gutierrez and Jackson Jr. to actually run an alternate choice that might have a chance (not that either one of them were any great shakes anyway).

Dorothy Brown has a point though:

• The torture lawsuit, which is about to be settled for nearly $15 million dollars, is another example of what Daley's opponents are calling the "corruption tax" that city residents have to pay. Other examples include a $10 million settlement this week in another police misconduct case, 40 million in the hired truck scandal, and a $100 million minority contract scam perpetrated by the Duff family, longtime friends of the mayor.

  "People should realize that enough is enough," said Dorothy Brown, Candidate for Mayor.

Enough should be enough, but the bar is set so high as to discourage someone who could actually make a difference from even starting the paperwork to explore a candidacy.

Crook County Outrage

This is just coming to light:

• State Sen. Rickey Hendon (D-Chicago) admits he has no background in health care.

  But that didn't stop him from signing a $24,900 contract last year to work as a health care consultant to Cook County government.

  He signed another $24,900 contract weeks later to advise the county on attracting revenue-generating festivals and serve as a liaison between state and county officials.

This 3 month contract (and numerous others) fell under the $25,000 threshold that necessitates full Board approval. Funny how it just happened to fall under by a hundred bucks, eh? Acting President Bobbie Steele managed to hand out at least 6 of these contracts and looks to have facilitated the hiring back of certain connected retirees at wildly inflated salaries - something that we've heard the CPD is doing with certain exempt spots to get around the mandatory age limit.

Got to love those thieves on the Book County Board. Bobbie Steele (or Steal) learned well from Stroger and company - tell us again how Urkel won this thing?

Checkerboard Chat Got OWNED

We have got to have the funniest readers in the world. A little more than a week ago, someone put one over on us, writing a secret message in a comment stating "RIP Anna Nicole" in a thread for Officer Vazquez. Although humorous, we deleted it because that thread was for Officer Vazquez. But we appreciated the humor and congratulated whoever it was for getting one by us.

It has been topped and in doing so, they have PUNKED and OWNED the Superintendent's office. Edward Nigma (E.Nigma - the Riddler from Batman) posted the following comment in the Monthly Department Commendation Ceremony thread:

• Thank goodness there are people there to
  honor our brothers and sisters in blue.
  is there ever a time it shouldn't be done?
  send us more good police officers.
  send us more elite units.
  i for one would welcome them
  to the community I think
  everyone would. And it
  isn't a matter of good p.r.
  save your thoughts on that, instead
  put your faith in the many beat
  cars on the street. Believe me, the
  boys in blue are more than welcome, the more
  units the better. I say
  let us give thanks to the officers and
  love to their families. The more
  support we gather the better. Lets
  have a show of support for the
  intriquite workings of the CPD. Lets
  thank them for their hard work. Bravo.

And if you read the bold letters straight down, you come up with "This site is PC Bullshit." Amazing. Our hat is off to whomever dreamed this one up and got it on the site. We hereby promote you to "Seiser of the Month."

Whoever published it, cross referenced it to our comment section for recognition and we're sure that it's going to be deleted this morning as soon as some little humorless crybaby goes whining to the Superintendent's people. We have preserved it here so everyone can see it before they take it down over there. In the meantime, that is a truly hilarious bit of creativity. Good job. Everyone else ought to try to get a little bit like this published on the "official" site - anagrams, word play, etc.

UPDATE: Still up as of 0645 hours this morning.

UPDATE: Down this afternoon - fun while it lasted. Anyone down at 35th Street get the lowdown on who missed the hidden message?

Dirty Tricks

Getting word of an Aldercreature's people being caught hacking into an opponent's campaign website. Combined with the recent "missteps" of 41st Aldercreature Doherty, it looks like Machine dirty politics is alive and well up north.

Let's see if this one makes the papers.

Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?

Actually, a couple of million dimes:

• A jury awarded a husband and wife $9.75 million in damages Thursday for a smear and terror campaign aimed at them after they accused a police officer of corruption while working as federal agents.

• Jurors leaving the court scoffed at city officials' claim that they conducted an 18-month investigation of Miedzianowski but never interviewed Klipfel and Casali, and were unable to uncover evidence of corruption at the time.

• The jury awarded Klipfel $7.75 million for violation of her rights by both Miedzianowski and the city. It awarded her $1 million for defamation of character by Miedzianowski while acting in his role as a city employee.

  It also awarded Casali $1 million for Miedzianowski's violation of his rights while acting as a city employee.

  Saltzberg said the city would have to pay the entire $9.75 million because Miedzianowski is believed to have no money. She said the couple's attorneys would ask the court to award them fees in the $1 million range.

From Channel 7's coverage:

• Jurors deliberated for almost two days before reaching the decision Thursday afternoon. They listened to testimony from current police Superintendent Phil Cline and from the former head of internal affairs Ray Risley.

  The couple accused Risley and the department of covering up Miedzianowski's illegal activity. And jurors believed them.

  "It gets down to, Were we dealing with a crooked Chicago police officer? And was the system protecting him? It sure seemed like it," said Joe Karl, juror.

$9.75 million PLUS lawyers fees of another million. Cline and Risley sure looked good on the stand though, didn't they? Un-freaking-believable. Risley ought to be jailed for perjury at this point. And Cline? Well, one can only wonder what other surprises are going to come out over the next few years. Morale is in the shitter and events like this only drive it further underground. What with the SOS trial starting soon and at least one other scandal percolating in the background, we still haven't hit bottom yet.

Change in St Jude's Route?

Anyone care to confirm this from the comments section?

• Did anyone notice that Special Bulletin "From South Chicago to Gold Star Park." According to the bulletin, the St. Jude march is not going to be on Michigan Ave this year. The parade route will assemble at Gold Star Park. That's understandable, but I'm gonna miss Michigan Ave though. It will be a special day, as it always is, no matter where we march. Stay safe.

Personally, we prefer the Michigan Avenue route. Yeah, parking was sometimes a bitch, but at least we were out in the open, down in front of the ritziest shops in the middle of all the lakefront liberals a few thousand strong. Sure, most of them were sleeping, but it was a great show for the early rising tourists who were always impressed by the show.

Now, if this is true, it looks like we're going to be shunted out of the public eye and visible only to the dedicated joggers out on Sunday morning. We're sure they aren't going to shut down Lake Shore Drive just for us so we have no idea of what kind of route they're going to try. Even Roosevelt Road to LSD means we're only showing off for the Maxwell Street vendors. And where would they have Mass? McCormick Place? Lovely.

Who's got the legit info?

Share the Web Traffic

Rue St. Michel writes a great essay regarding Department morale after reading a comment on our blog:

• He or she is completely correct. My biggest issue with the Chicago Police department is that their policies are completely reactive - never proactive. We aren't being run by police officers; we're being run by accountants and lawyers.
  
  Whenever an officer uses deadly force, the press automatically assumes that it wasn't warranted. When some shitheads were running a robbery team downtown and the police chased them in a vehicle pursuit (because the criminals decided to drive away in order to defeat the arrest) and a woman was killed when the shitheads jumped a curb (because the criminals decided to drive fast and dangerously in order to defeat the arrest) then all of a sudden it was "the fault of the police" for the death of an innocent civilian. Therefore they changed our chase / pursuit policy which virtually ceased all vehicle chases because the directive was so prohibitive.

We've touched on some of these points in passing. But we always appreciate when others can take the time to do a little more in depth than we manage to with our limited time. Rue often fills the bill admirably - and his latest on certain diseases making the rounds of the homeless on the left coast is an eye opener for first responders. Go visit.

And speaking of other blogs, SecondCitySarge dissects the recent beating death of a 13 year old kid on the Albany Park neighborhood and the subsequent denials by Mom that a child out past curfew on a school night not reporting in for 9 hours and on the way home from visiting his brother at County could have anything to do with gangs. Right Ma.

The Joys of a Conservative Court

You have got to love the impact Reagan, Bush and Bush have had on the Supreme Court over the past few decades. Sure, they've rolled out a few clunkers of judiciary opinion here and there, but over all, a Conservative court is good for the police.

• WASHINGTON---- A deadline is a deadline is a deadline, the Supreme Court said Wednesday in refusing to allow a man wrongly imprisoned for more than eight years to sue the police officers who arrested him.

  Andre Wallace, whose murder conviction was overturned in 2002, waited several years too long to file his false arrest lawsuit, the court said in a 7-2 ruling.

We'd hope that Bush gets one more chance to put a strict originalist on the Court before he leaves office. It'd be a bloodbath with a democratic controlled Senate, but entertaining politics to say the least and energizing to the Conservative base at the outside. It'll give the liberals nightmares for the next 15 years.

World Wide Influence

Sitemeter stats show a slight decline of about 200 to 400 visitors a day to this site after the Department did a blanket banning of any and all "blogspot" accounts. That's OK by us - we aren't losing any sleep or money over it and we appreciate all the people who check us out daily from their homes, libraries, public school fixed posts and the uncensored computers down at 35th Street (yes, we know you're out there visiting - hi!). But still, 2,500 hits a day is probably 2,450 more than the "official" CPD blog.

We were scanning the other stats checking out foreign visitors and we had a visitor from Albania, Saudi Arabia, and for the first time we can remember, Parow, South Africa. So SCC is now known and read in FIVE continents (North America, Europe, Asia, Australia, and Africa). Our plan to take over the world from Seiser proceeds apace. If anyone has friends in South America, we'd like a few visits from our southern neighbors and anyone who can direct traffic to us from Antarctica will be made honorary "Seiser for a day."

In the meantime, an open post to amuse everyone.

SOS Cops Plead Not Guilty

As this wretched saga draws closer to a court date, the rumors continue to abound:

• one more set of indictments coming down - involving supervisors?;
• every one of the people at 311 will be gone before the end of the year;
• charges will be filed with the Police Board to fire the "cooperating individuals" who've testified in front of the Grand Jury - they won't be charged criminally, but administratively separated

This might end up as the largest mass firing in CPD history. It's certainly a black eye for the Department and we'll bet it doesn't get mentioned on their blog. It's also raising the profile of one of the candidates for the Superintendent vacancy due to occur sometime this year - Kirby.

But we also have to wonder if the recent perjury by a former head of IAD is going to besmirch the reputation of anyone coming out of that office. Combined with Maher falling out of favor due to poor clearance rates and personality conflicts, Skahill is looking more and more like a front runner.

Who's got some speculation on the next Supe?

Are We Heartless Bastards?

From the Sun Times and Channel 5 websites:

• Commonwealth Edison customers disconnected for non-payment but ineligible for low-income assistance could get one-time, $400 grants, thanks to a $1.5 million plan unveiled today to prevent a repeat of a Rogers Park fire that killed six children.
• Low-income families and individuals in the dark might get a hand from a new one-time grant available to those whose electricity has been disconnected after failure to pay bills. Mayor Richard Daley and Commonwealth Edison officials on Tuesday announced the creation of the PowerUp fund, which will provide one-time grants of $400 to pay the electric bills of people who have been disconnected for nonpayment, according to a release from the mayor’s office.

Here's a bright idea - pay your bills. Get jobs and earn money to pay, even if it's a fixed percentage of the bill. ComEd contributing to this fund is just passed along to everyone else in the form of higher bills. The mask slips and Daley shows his true colors as a committed leftist and communist:

• The Ramirez family’s plight touched a nerve with Daley, who lashed out at the landlord for ignoring his “moral responsibility” to assist a family in need.

What about the renter's moral responsibility to pay their own way? How many times have we responded to landlord-tenant disputes where the "tenant" hasn't paid rent in a year or so and the landlord is the one jumping through hoops to evict these leeches draining their investment? And this is just the priceless quote that makes the article:

• Neighbors of the Ramirez family were apparently well aware that electricity to the apartment had been cut off because the family had tried without success to make an illegal connection in the hallway or an adjoining apartment.

So instead of applying for aid or some other legal means to acquire electricity, they tried the illegal route. Sorry, our sympathy meter just isn't registering here. If you can't afford to live in the city, then maybe you ought to move somewhere more affordable. We pay so much in taxes to support an already overburdened social services network for people with neither the desire or inclination to support themselves.

Yeah, yeah, we're heartless bastards who don't understand what it's like to try to raise half a dozen kids in poverty conditions and yadda yadda yadda. Too freaking bad - don't have kids you can't afford, don't live in places you can't afford, don't expect us to bail you out of your bad life decisions.

One Week - No Obama

Our self imposed exile of writing anything about Obama ends with this post. We managed to stay away for 7 whole days. But then he goes and says something so inane that we feel obliged to assist in pointing it out to everyone and just poking fun at him.

• Hitting one of the early primary states in the first week since announcing his candidacy for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination, Obama told supporters he doesn't believe those who say a black man can't be elected.

  "Twenty years ago, nobody would have believed this crowd in South Carolina," he said of the racially mixed group.

Um, Barack? Twenty years ago, Jesse Jackson of all people WON the South Carolina primary. And he WON in ten other states besides. So Barack's supposed "unbelievability" is at least 20 years past expiration. Anyone in the mainstream media catching this?

Hat tip GatewayPundit

Believe the City? Or the Inmate?

We know who juries have been siding with.

• Three men who were pardoned from death row allege the City of Chicago isn't honoring a $14.8 million settlement on claims of police torture.The filing was submitted electronically Monday on behalf of Madison Hobley, Leroy Orange and Stanley Howard.
• Jennifer Hoyle -- who's a spokeswoman for the city Law Department -- said no settlement was reached and any discussions between the parties are confidential.

First of all, if the City didn't try to settle every damn case that came their way, we'd have a lot fewer problems. But again, Corp Counsel doesn't exist to win cases for the City - Corp Counsel exists to provide jobs for a lot political hacks who couldn't get honest employment elsewhere (and your odd lawyer who actually tries to do the right thing - but they're hidden in the basement).

But then you have Hoyle saying that settlement talks are confidential and nothing has been reached. As a party to a couple of settlements told us, when lawyers make a play like this, they're risking quite a bit - they want to force the City's hand but they also risk alienating judges, juries and the aforementioned Corp Counsel who they have to deal with.

Maybe this is a ploy by the City? Offer all sorts of settlements and then refuse to pay as everything negotiated is "confidential"? Or delay paying so as to have the opposition "violate" the terms of agreement and then negotiate lower? Anything to save a buck or avoid actually having to appear in front of a judge we suppose.

George Ryan's Appeal Coming

This jackass going to jail won't come a day too soon for us:

• Did U.S. District Judge Rebecca Pallmeyer "abuse her discretion" when she replaced two jurors -- after eight days of deliberations -- for concealing their run-ins with the law?

  That likely will be the focus of questions from the judges of the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals today, when they take up the convictions of former Gov. George Ryan and his friend Larry Warner.

We didn't (and still don't) expect Cook County juries to be screened any where near properly as the entire system is corrupt and rife with crooked judges, attorneys (on both sides), and riddled with political hacks. But we were surprised at the time that Federal trials didn't do background checks on jurors as a matter of course. We haven't heard if they're doing it now, but they ought to be.

Must Be Sweeps Week?

Channel 2 covers girl on girl fighting:

• They graduated from pushing and shoving and name-calling to straight up duking it out. Now a furious debate is on over the reasons girls are fighting and how we can stop it.
  
  As CBS 2's Diann Burns reports, the urgency is underscored by the millions of references and thousands of videos of violent fights on the Internet.
  
  The beatings are punishing fists flying, hair pulling and kicking. This is how more and more girls these days handle disputes.

We don't know about other areas of the city, but we'd say 80% or more of the fights in high schools nowadays is girls fighting. Its been steadily increasing for years. Some of it is gang related, some is narcotics related, but loads of it is just BS over some boy.

Seiser said its sure come a long way from jello wrestling through.

Favors Outlive the Giver?

No wonder no new blood can get ahead in this city.

• Chicagoans long have known that they may vote from the great hereafter. Similarly, a political campaign worker aced a city job interview a few years back, even though he had died a few days earlier.

  And Mayor Richard Daley's swelling re-election campaign fund now has received money that originally was donated for the political account of Democratic powerbroker George Dunne. The late George Dunne.
  On Monday, almost nine months after Dunne's passing, the Daley campaign reported receiving a $10,000 contribution from the George W. Dunne Campaign Fund.
  Since Dunne died, other beneficiaries of the fund have included Todd Stroger's successful bid for Cook County Board president ($5,000); losing Democratic congressional candidates Dan Seals and Tammy Duckworth ($1,000 each); the International Ministry in Chicago ($10,000); and the University of St. Mary's of the Lake in Mundelein ($3,000).

So whomever is controlling the estate of the late George Dunne is able to make contributions in his name to politicians and get favors on behalf of an entire new generation of politicos? One wonders if this is all the graft money stashed away in various safety deposit boxes and under mattresses that was collected over the decades.

Stories from Comment Sections

A couple of stories we've been keeping an eye on and looking for more info about. From the comments section - please excuse the all CAPITAL letters. We didn't type it, we just thought it might deserve front page exposure:

• LISTEN TO THIS B.S.!
  2 FEMALE PO'S RESPOND TO A DOMESTIC THE FEMALE [citizen] SPITS ON ONE OFFICER THEN CLAIMS SHE HAS AIDS, THEN PULLS A BOX CUTTER ON THE OTHER CLAIMING SHES GONNA KILL HER,,THEY DISARM HER AND GET KICKED A FEW TIMES TOO WHILE PUTTING HER IN THE POLICE VEHICLE. WHILE IN THE STATION THE [citizen] SAYS SHE IS GONNA GET HER GD BOYFRIEND TO KILL ALL OFFICERS OF THE DISTRICT AND TRIES TO THROW FECES AT THE OFFICERS TO GIVE THEM AIDS AND SHE ADMITS TO THE W/C SHE WANTED TO SLASH THE PO'S. EASY AGGRAVATED BATTERY PO RIGHT? NOPE WATCH COMMANDER CLAIMS THE POLICE ARE MAKING UP STORIES AND SHOULDN'T WORK TOGETHER ANYMORE AND TELLS THE ON SCENE DICK THAT OFFENDER WILL BE RWOC!!! WTF!!! THIS IS 100 PERCENT TRUE..DON'T GO TO 007 people
  
  2/16/2007 02:39:00 AM
  
  Half way through the story, I knew the punch line would be Mary Rozell. Easily the worst, most dangerous W/C in the city. And this nut wonders why she can't keep people on her watch.

We know we have readers in 007, even if they don't have access to a computer during work hours. Anyone got the scoop on this?

Next up, we're going to paraphrase a comment we were asked not to publish as it was typed, presumably so we didn't inadvertently ID the writer:

• Shooting in 012 at 18th Place and Hoyne. Gangsters shot at a car and it's learned the Beat guys did a contact card that night. Tact gets the suspect who confesses, surrenders the gun and the second shooter. Dicks take a statement but the ASA is pissed that she's missing nap time and pushes the offender to lawyer up. ASA refuses to charge - no exempt override.

Again, this is paraphrasing and who knows what axes are being ground in 012 and Area 4 lately. But does anyone have info on this one? If we're getting exempts refusing to back their officers and ASA's refusing to charge felons, we really need to start bringing it to light.

New Dollar Coins to Fail

The US Mint is rolling out a new set of dollar coins this month and for the next few years. This follows on the heels of a number of aborted attempts to replace the dollar bill as a standard of US currency. Unfortunately, as so many times before, this effort is doomed for a number of reasons:

• Vending machines not accepting the coins. Ease of use is one of the keys to getting the public to be comfortable with the coin enough to want to use it regularly. We've only ever seen one vending machine that accepted the Sacajawea dollar and never one that took the Susan B. Anthony.
  
• The regular paper dollar is still out there. The only reason Canadians accepted and used the one dollar "loonie" coins was that the government pulled the paper dollars out of circulation as they were taken in by retailers and banks. We still have some Canadian paper dollars lying around here somewhere from a few fishing trips and when we bring them up north, the citizens are amazed to see their old paper dollars outside of a museum.
• Strippers can't put dollar coins in their thongs. Seriously. How are guys (and gals) going to tip for lap dances and the like with dollar coins? A roll of these things is going to be awfully inconvenient when out for a weekend worth of fun. Especially cheap coppers - they aren't going to be tossing five dollar bills around and who ever sees a two dollar bill anymore?

Just a few thoughts.

Place Your Bets!

Is history repeating itself? Anna Nicole style?

• US Magazine reported that Spears went into a hair parlor to get her head shaved and that when the hair stylist refused to shave her head, Spears grabbed the clippers and shaved it herself.
• The woman said Spears "wasn't making sense at all" and that it seemed like she wasn't in a good place. She said Spears was "totally freaking out."
• Earlier in the week, Spears checked into a rehabilitation facility and then quickly checked out, People Magazine reported. People reported that the pop diva checked herself into Eric Clapton's Crossroads Centre in Antigua but left after one day.

OK, any bets on what the hell she's on? Meth? Heroin? Coke? And any bets on where it's going to end up? Rehab? Intervention? Medical Examiner case?

It's amazing - you can take the girl out of the trailer park, but you can't take the trailer park out of the girl. And get a load of this melon:

Sinead O'Connor she ain't. Or Grace Jones. Or Annie Lennox. Hell, she's not even Howie Mandel, though if you throw a soul patch on her, she's close.

Mayor Minds Own Business?

Amusing:

• Mayor Richard M. Daley said he was staying out of Cook County's current budget crisis.

Well sure - when your enemy (or political rival or convenient fall guy) is busy cutting his own throat, you don't get in the way. You merely observe where to stand so as to avoid most of the splatters. And Devine's quotes from the article are highly amusing, too:

• Fifty-three of the 800 assistant state's attorneys, as well as 12 of the 160 investigators have received their two-week notice, NBC5's Natalie Martinez reported. Eventually, 65 of the 500 administrators will also be laid off."We are going to lose a lot of veteran prosecutors who would be the ones with the biggest and toughest cases," Devine said. "That's really going to undermine the criminal justice system."

6% of the ASA's - which is quite a bit less than the 17% demanded by Urkel - are all going to be First Chair veteran prosecutors? Hasn't Devine ever heard of seniority/reverse seniority? Shouldn't he be laying off the recent hires and political hacks of an overburdened bureaucracy? One would think that Devine is running interference for someone by keeping the spotlight focused on County mismanagement rather than another person whose administration is currently under a Federal microscope.

Foie Gras Nonsense

And the waste of taxpayer's money continues:

• Chicago officials have issued their first citation for violating the city's new ban on the duck-liver delicacy known as foie gras.
  
  And it wasn't at some high-end French cafe -- it was at a hot dog restaurant on the city's Northwest Side. Doug Sohn, the owner of Hot Doug's, has been serving foie gras-laced hot dogs for several months, and he was slapped with a citation just before opening time on Friday. His foie gras was confiscated and Sohn faces a fine of from $250 to $500 at his March 29 court date.

Watch for this poor guy to get slapped with the maximum fine, just to make an example. Was it Sun-Tzu who said "Kill one man, terrorize a thousand"? Regardless, it's a Chinese proverb being applied to the restaurant business in Chicago - "Fine one man half a grand and everyone else will fall into line." What single proprietor business, let alone a larger corporate entity, is going to spend a part of the profit margin on fighting the stacked deck that is Chicago licensing? Very very few. So much easier to go along with the mindless drones and lemmings that are prevalent in this burg.

The trouble is every time you or anyone else goes along with what is easy instead of resisting what is obviously a case of government overreach and intrusion into private enterprise, everyones rights get eroded. And little by little, people begin to expect government to take care of things that citizens used to take care of on their own and the "nanny state" continues its march into every single aspect of what used to be your life.

The Tribune also covers this stupidity.

Farewell Officer Vazquez

A bunch of stories in the media.

Tribune, Channel 2, Channel 5, Channel 7.

We've also heard that the investigation into this case has hit a brick wall. This isn't for lack of effort on the Detective's part but rather the fact that the investigation is being run out of 35th Street rather than Area 4.

We won't speculate aloud on this one, but the rumors and e-mails have been flying back and forth between ourselves and a large number of disgusted PO's, bosses of all levels and more detectives than we'd care to mention regarding the conduct of this investigation. Rumors will NOT be published at this point - keep the BS to yourselves - we've read a bunch of it and it isn't going to get aired here at the moment. Stay sharp people.

Fun Times in the Big Easy

New Orleans never impressed us an anything but an overly hyped humid city that was miles and miles of crap surrounding a square mile or two of anything worth visiting. And after Hurricane Katrina, when every other state and municipality was able to recover within a year with the biggest Federal bailout in history, dysfunctional New Orleans continued to wallow in self pity and self destruction.

It continues:

• With tourists streaming into town for Mardi Gras celebrations, a spasm of gun violence left two people dead and seven wounded -- more bad news for a city struggling to rebuild itself and its tourism industry.
  
  Officials noted the bloodshed did not occur near any of the parades Thursday night to celebrate Carnival, which culminates Tuesday in Mardi Gras.

Funny how the crime rate in communities that accepted New Orleans refuges continues to skyrocket and New Orleans itself is averaging violent crime on a scale far in excess of cities three, four and five times it's size.

Justice to Prevail

On 04 February, we wrote about a 74 year old Minnesota farmer who chased down a gasoline thief and ended up facing felony charges for doing what we hope decent citizens everywhere would do - namely, get involved.

Well according to this Sun Times article, the felonies have been downgraded to two misdemeanors AND the thief (who pled guilty) is defending the farmer for doing the right thing and offered to help in any way possible:

• CAMBRIDGE, Minn. -- A man pleading guilty to stealing gas and a car radiator offered support for the retired farmer who was charged with threatening him with a shotgun.
• Englund chased [Christian Smith and an accomplice] while calling the sheriff's office on a cell phone. After the vehicles stopped and a deputy sheriff arrived, Englund's shotgun was found to be unloaded, according to police.
• ''I don't think he should be held responsible," Smith said. "I committed a crime and, you know, he did what he probably thought was right.''

As good as it is to see this 74 year old farmer chasing down a thief, it's amazing to see the thief step up and take responsibility for his actions. And it's even more gratifying to see this goofy sheriff who originally approved these charges back pedalling so fast he's leaving skidmarks.

No Paychecks?

Citywide PDT message a few minutes ago (#070713). Seems the City is claiming a "printing error" and there are no paper checks available for pick up this morning. Some people who have direct deposit are saying that they got their money, but if you still get an actual physical check, you're out of luck.

If the City doesn't meet is payroll by 1400 hours, they are in default and lawsuits are your primary recourse in the event that automated withdrawal of bills and mortgage payments start bouncing due to insufficient funds.

Does anyone think Dorothy Brown might be able to pay the employees on time?

Corruption? In Chicago?

Wasn't it just last year or so that Daley was touted as one of America's best mayors?

How fortunes change. Via GatewayPundit:

• A mayor whose administration is under federal investigation. An alderman who just got hit with a federal bribery charge. Four politicians who served time for corruption and want their old jobs back.

  All are candidates in this month's municipal elections in Chicago, a city legendary for graft.

And they don't even touch on the endemic corruption in the Department of Transportation, Buildings, Personnel, Streets and a myriad of police scandals (some manufactured, some not) along with the mysterious powers of low bid contracting turning out to cost somewhere in the neighborhood of 33% more than originally listed.

Imagine if we actually had competent local media investigative reporters.

Dorothy Brown Pulling Away

From reality evidently.

Attempting to generate an issue that she can hitch her wagon to, Dorothy proceeds to attack that old whipping boy - the Police Department!

• Mayoral challenger Dorothy Brown vowed today to overhaul the Police Board and the Office of Professional Standards and seriously consider realigning police beats to remove what she called the “long shadow” over the Chicago Police Department cast by former Lt. Jon Burge.
• “We don’t have adequate policing in some communities. . . . There is a need to have the Chicago Police Department to be fairly and equitably placed throughout the city of Chicago. I have heard from many citizens . . . that beats [are not] being patrolled in some communities. . . . We absolutely will review the beats as they are now and determine whether or not a beat realignment is necessary,” she said.
• Brown also promised to: install more cameras in squad cars; order “cultural sensitivity training” for police officers; breathe new life into community policing; and intensify the recruitment of minority officers. She wants to bridge a “racial divide” of police mistrust that shows 64 percent of whites, but only 40 percent of blacks, give favorable ratings to the Chicago Police, according to a recent survey.

Oh joy! More cameras that no one watches; more cultural sensitivity that pulls officers off the street for a non existent problem; more dollars wasted on a community policing program that has run it's course; more minority recruitment for what is already one of the most culturally diverse departments in the city (why not look at the Department of Transportation Dorothy?)

The proposals to overhaul OPS are just as ridiculous and tying in beat re-alignment with Burge is just goofy. And don't even get us started on which communities are being shorted police service - the answers would no doubt surprise Dorothy and her handlers.

Who writes this policy drivel for her?

SecondCityDick Missing in Action

The SecondCityDick.blogspot website is gone. Missing. Kaput.

We hope it's just a case of their people getting fed up or tired of attempting to maintain a site and not something sinister like the old SCCN bulletin board that was shut down after R.M.G. sued the webmaster.

It's always interesting to read and get the different views like SecondCitySarge and the two dispatcher blogs we have listed in the side bar. We're still hoping that someone starts up the SecondCity Lieutenant, SecondCity Captain or SecondCity Exempt blogspot sites one of these days.

In the meantime, a moment of silence for a fallen blog.

Daley Sued Over Burge

Give a lawyer enough money and they'll file all sorts of lawsuits:

• Mayor Richard M. Daley was added Wednesday as a defendant in a civil suit alleging that city officials have conspired for 25 years to cover up the torture of suspects by Chicago police.
• Former Mayor Jane M. Byrne and Cook County State's Attorney Richard Devine were also added to the lawsuit filed on behalf of Darrell Cannon, who claims he was tortured into confessing to a murder he didn't commit.

Daley was the State's Attorney back when these allegations took place and it's been suggested that he rode Burge's clearance rate to the 5th Floor of City Hall. If so, how is he riding on today's clearance rate? We suppose citizens get the politicians they deserve, too.

A Couple of Nice Stories

Nice story from the Tribune and Channel 2.

• A Chicago police officer was credited Wednesday with leading a South Side family to safety overnight from their burning house.
  
  Officer Michael O'Connor said he was driving to work shortly before 11 p.m. Tuesday when he saw flames shooting out of the windows of a two-story home in the 1700 block of West 71st Street in the West Englewood neighborhood.

Too bad they can't balance out all the negative press we get so much more of.

And it's too bad these articles had to be written at all - Jose Vazquez remembered by his family (Sun Times story) and his team (Channel 7 article). We should all be remembered as well as he seems to be.

Quick! Check Your Pockets!

Toddler Stroger just "discovered" $25 million lying around that will (A) spare public defenders from a 4 day work week, (B) increase the pay for Assistant State's Attorney's, thereby reducing the gap between prosecutors and public defenders, (C) save "drug school," and (D) fund a number of other social programs that had fallen to the axe.

• The money will come from the transfer of $13.2 million from the Forest Preserves, $4.25 million from the sale of the old Domestic Violence Courthouse, the elimination of jobs exempt from the federal Shakman decree and other sources, Mayberry said.

Who knows what Urkel will discover tomorrow - stay tuned! And keep voting for democrats.

Chilling Reminder

We hate to point this out, especially in light of the recent articles about the very poor clearance rate posted by the Department in past days, but this is depressing:

• The murders of two suburban police officers late last year remain unsolved.

  On Sept. 27, 2006, Metra Police Officer Thomas Cook was shot in the back of the head while keeping watch over a train station in south suburban Harvey.

• On Oct. 23, 2006, Maywood Police Officer Thomas Wood was shot several times in the head as he sat in his police sport utility vehicle. His police dog, a Malinois shepherd, was unharmed.

One would hope that all murders are solved. One would expect that all murders of police officers, whether on or off duty would be solved, too. But the fact remains that many times (and in recent years, a majority of the time) murders go unsolved. And there was a study years ago that said when there was no progress within 72 hours, the chances of a homicide being solved dropped precipitously.

We heard that the west side is crawling with police from all over the city: Tact teams, Gang teams, Specialized Units, Detectives, even a few hundred recruits beating the bushes for evidence. Keep it up boys and girls - someone somewhere knows something. Find them.

The reward is up to $21,000 according to Channel 7.

Why Cut Taxes Again?

Oh yeah, because lower tax rates generate more investment which increases tax receipts and decreases the deficit. But don't believe us. Via Ace of Spades:

• "Very Real Possibility" Budget Will Be In Surplus At End Of Bush's Term

  The deficit keeps falling, falling, falling.

  I seem to remember the media taking an interest in such things when they could be credited to a Democratic President.

  Another blogger, TaxProf, notes the tax receipt bonanza.

  Make sure you read each of the bloggers covering the story, because you damn sure ain't gonna see it on the network news.

You aren't going to see this on the network news because whenever "it's the economy stupid" makes a republican look good, the media buries the story. Hell, the price of oil has been below $60 bucks a barrel for quite a while lately and you won't hear a peep from the left about it.

Disarm the Police Off Duty?

Thank goodness there actually was an off duty copper carrying a gun in Utah Monday:

• An off-duty police officer having an early Valentine's Day dinner with his wife was credited Tuesday with helping stop a rampage in a crowded shopping mall by an 18-year-old gunman who shot five people to death before he was killed by police.
• Ken Hammond, an off-duty officer from Ogden, north of Salt Lake City, jumped up from his seat at a restaurant after hearing gunfire and cornered the gunman, exchanging fire with him until other officers arrived, Burbank said.

We never understood why anyone would carry a badge off duty but not a gun - the two go together or not at all. And especially in light of the recent changes in Federal Law, there's no reason not to carry. Are we all going to run into gun wielding maniacs in the mall? No, probably not. But should one ever appear, wouldn't it be nice to be able to defend your family or other people's families because you can?

Planting More Guns

That's the only explanation. The jury certainly ate it up (Channel 2 coverage):

• Now, almost four years later, Ware's mother and her attorneys have won a wrongful death judgment from a federal civil jury. The City of Chicago has agreed to pay $5.25 million in damages.
  
  During the trial, before federal judge Joan Lefkow, attorneys for Ware's mother argued that the victim, who was shot six times from behind, was in fact, unarmed and that police placed the weapon in the car later.
  
  "People from all walks of life spent a week of their time listening to the evidence and concluded that this gun was planted,” said Jon Loevy, the Ware family’s attorney.

In-fucking-credible. In this day and age, planting a gun at a crime scene. People still believe this shit. Not only believe it, but are prepared to award damages based on it.

We'd sure like to see which city, county and state politicians this lawyer makes contributions to. $5.25 million based on a justified shooting. Channel 7 also has coverage.

Blogging While Banned

We assumed that we'd lose a few hundred visitors right after we were banned by the Department. It only made sense that our hits would plummet when no one was checking the blog during business hours. In the below chart, you can see the dip right around Superbowl Sunday (04 Feb) and the slight drop off for the three days following as the Department filters took their toll.

But Thursday (08 Feb), with the Sergeant Test results arriving in the mail, we topped 3,000 for the day, our weekend numbers have recovered nicely and on Monday (a holiday) we approached 4,000 hits on the day. If you hop over to the BlogShares website, our blog is now valued at $22,599.98 as of February 11th.

Now, we aren't greedy - we'd entertain offers of a flat $20,000 from any interested parties. And if a certain individual wanted to make a "Seiser Special" offer, we'd go as low as $18,000 just because we respect the fact that he runs everything. But until that day arrives, we'd just like to extend our thanks to our loyal readers who are actively seeking us out despite the efforts of the Department. Keep on spreading the word - we're still here.

Obama Steps In It

From the Washington Post:

• Sen. Barack Obama, circling through Iowa on Sunday before returning here on Day 2 of his presidential launch, challenged his Democratic rivals to lay out specifics for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq and declared that the thousands of lives lost so far in the war had been "wasted."

  The senator from Illinois later said he regretted his choice of words, telling an interviewer that he meant the troops' sacrifices "have not been honored" by an adequate policy.

Evidently, Barack Obama has gone over to the Howard Dean wing of the democratic party. Appealing to the "Dean-iacs" will get you a bunch of crazy money early and a boost in the left wing polls and websites. Unfortunately, this isn't going to win you a national nomination and certainly isn't going to win you the center moderates of either party. And capturing the center is what's going to win the race in 2008.

We hate to see conspiracies where there isn't one, but Obama is coming off as a left wing whacko that is going to make Hillary look like a moderate. Our prediction - Flash in the pan.

Further Objections to Obama

If needed, Tribune log in "garbagegoeshere@gmail.com" and the password is "123456"

In our humble opinions, Obama has hit his high water mark. There's only so far that he can run being the "anti-Hillary." John Kass writes an exceptional column this past Sunday that will be the subject of numerous investigations and commercials, not from the Right, but from Hillary's people.

• Listen to giddy tones of the TV cheerleaders, the sweeping rhetoric about Obama transcending this or that, the breathlessness of it all. Yet pay most attention to what is avoided, and you will learn much about the heart of American journalism, and of the liberal candidate being championed.
• Another aspect often ignored in the approved national narrative is Obama's perplexing endorsement of Chicago Mayor Richard Daley. As the national Democratic Party's anti-corruption poster child, Obama correctly lectured Republicans on corruption scandals that would help cost them control of Congress.
• Daley's people were all around him by then, the mayor's brother Bill, and their media consultant, David Axelrod, who also is Obama's media guy. The Daley administration in Chicago is one of the most corrupt in history, roiling with federal investigations, convictions of top aides, convictions of Outfit-connected mayoral cronies, scandals costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars. And amazingly, the uncynical Obama endorsed Daley's re-election bid.

Go read it all. Kass is no dyed in the wool conservative, nor is he blinded by liberal dogma. He makes a lot of sense sometimes and there is no way that Obama can duck his Illinois connections in a national campaign.

Open Post

Listen - we have asked that the previous post be used ONLY for sympathies or condolences or even prayers for the fallen. We have about 25 or 30 posts below that one that are still open and can be used for all sorts of goofy crap. We'll even open up this post for off the wall comments. But leave the other one alone for shit's sake. There's a dead cop out there.

Off Duty Cop Killed in 011

Info to follow

Channel 2, Channel 5, Channel 7, Sun Times coverage.

WBBM Radio has broadcast the name Officer Jose Vazquez (we aren't sure of the spelling), but no word on the officer's unit of assignment. He leaves behind a wife. Prayers and Condolences only in this thread - all others will be deleted.

One comment has stated he worked in SOS.

Channel 5 - Anti Police

Well, looks like Channel 5 wins the race to the bottom. At least they're the ones who put it up on their website - we seldom watch actual local news anymore.

• "For a young child to go that early, it ain't right. It ain't right," said the boy's grieving mother, Canery Rucker.
• A tearful friend Dominick Boden said, "I don't think he rally tried to rob them, man, because he already knows something's happening around here, and he's not with that. He doesn't gang-bang. He doesn't do none of that. He just goes to school and dances."
• The family was claiming police brutality and said they planned to hire an attorney.
• Camden said police identified themselves as officers, warned Lazeric to drop the weapon and have witnesses to back up that account.
• Lazeric did have a prior arrest.

Yup, police brutality. Never mind the pistol on the scene - everyone knows that most street coppers carry around half a dozen spare pistols just in case they manage to shoot someone who isn't really carrying a firearm.

In fact, we remember posting that every single gun located within city limits was brought there by a police officer. Every damn one of them. No one on the west side, south side or north side even knows what a gun looks like until the police bring a gun there and drop it off at homicide scenes and robbery scenes and battery scenes. And when the guns arrive, the police have to teach the "offender" how to point it in a threatening manner so as to provoke a deadly force reaction from other police.

It's a rough job sometimes, hunting down completely innocent individuals, arming them, killing them and then fabricating entire crime scenes and criminal histories in order to get a few ribbons and medals. But someone has to do it.

Cameras - No One Watching

Sun Times columnist (and occasional reader of this website) Mark Brown writes about an incident on the CTA the last year:

• Ted and Kathy Ptak were coming home from a late dinner a few days before Christmas when a pickpocket lifted Ted's wallet as they were boarding the CTA's Blue Line at the Jackson Street station.

Ted chased and caught one of the pickpockets, but lost him when the criminal's partner showed up and tossed Ted his wallet in a diversionary tactic.

• Ted, you see, is a veteran Chicago Police officer who was off duty and unarmed on the night in question. As a police officer, he was pretty confident the pickpockets could be caught -- especially with an assist from the new surveillance cameras the CTA has been installing at mass transit stations throughout the city as part of the big Homeland Security push.
  

• Ted figured that would be enough to get somebody to make sure the video was preserved for a follow-up investigation.

  It wasn't until a detective did contact him -- three weeks later -- that Ted was told nobody had put a hold on the video and now it was too late. It had been recorded over. Ted couldn't identify his assailants from photo lineups of known pickpockets. Basically, the investigation was at a dead end from the point it started.

  And that really ticked off Kathy Ptak, who did something the wives of police officers don't normally do, that is, complain to the press.

  In particular, Kathy wondered why we're spending all this money to install these cameras if they aren't being put to proper use.

Hopefully, there isn't a brick placed upon Ted Ptak's career due to his wife's wondering what all of us have probably wondered and most likely speculated about over beers - does anyone ever really monitor or view all this camera data? It seems the answer (as everyone suspected) is "No."

These cameras are merely flashy devices that the mayor and aldercreatures throw up on poles so that citizens feel that someone is watching over them when the police are out of sight. We know that district teams are required to run POD missions daily, but the cameras are limited by being fixed in place and dope boys merely have to move around a corner to operate with impunity. Then you have these other cameras run by other agencies that have just about no capability to be monitored live and re-record over themselves within a day or less if holds aren't put on tapes. The camera's purpose isn't to record crime - it's to make the camera manufacturers rich.

Career advice to the next ambitious up and coming mayoral Chief of Staff - figure out a program by which you can collect, analyze, process, sort and store all the camera feeds from all the city agencies that run cameras. You're going to need storage capacity in the magnitudes of several terabytes per month. Just credit SCC for the idea.

Missing Tow Trucks

This has been the subject of a large number of citywide all-call messages and PDT notifications. Three city owned tow trucks decked out in the fluorescent yellow-green of the Traffic Management Authority have gone missing. Now it's the subject of a few media blurbs:

• Chicago police were trying to locate three city tow trucks.The trucks were stolen from a fenced lot in the 900 block of South Exchange Avenue on Super Bowl Sunday.Police said, so far, they've had no reports of unauthorized towing and the motive behind the thefts remains unclear.

Inside job? Someone starting a towing business? Or a hot car ring? Or something more sinister? Speculate away.

Another Dead Altar Boy

How long until the pictures start appearing of the dead teen in his cap and gown or the altar boy get up? We say by tonight's 10 o'clock news coverage of the Pizza Delivery robberies here at Channel 2, Channel 7, Tribune and the Sun Times.

• An undercover Chicago police officer posing as a pizza delivery driver shot and killed a 15-year-old boy late Saturday night after the teenager allegedly tried to rob him.
  
  Police said three suspects tried to rob the officer, who was part of an investigation into a string of robberies of food delivery drivers on the South Side. An alert had been issued about robberies in the area between 75th and 83rd Streets and Kedzie and Homan Avenues.

"String of robberies." "An alert had been issued." Remember those phrases when the baby's momma-drama starts up in time for the next news cycle. Let's see which news outlet starts the BS first - our money is on Channel 7. Good shooting people. Excellent job.