Chicago Ripped by NYT Book Critic?

As a New York Time book critic, this might qualify as "piling on:"

• “Poor Chicago,” a friend of mine recently said. Given the number of urban apocalypses here, I couldn’t tell which problem she was referring to. Was it the Cubs never winning? The abominable weather? Meter parking costing more than anywhere else in America — up to $6.50 an hour — with the money flowing to a private company, thanks to the ex-mayor Richard M. Daley’s shortsighted 2008 deal? Or was it the fact that in 2012, of the largest American cities, Chicago had the second-highest murder rate and the ­second-highest combined sales tax, as well as the ninth-highest metro foreclosure rate in the country? That it’s the third-most racially segregated city and is located in the state with the most underfunded public-employee pension debt? Was my friend talking about how a real estate investor bought The Chicago Tribune and drove it into bankruptcy? Or how 15-year-old Hadiya Pendleton, who performed at Barack Obama’s inauguration, was shot dead near the president’s Kenwood home?

And those are just some of Chicago's high points!

Seriously, she goes to town on the town. The column is supposed to be about three Chicago books, but she uses each one as a microcosm of what's wrong with Chicago, including one by Neil Steinberg where Neil brags about getting his brother a job in Cook County government. She makes some pretty acerbic observations, too, mostly accurate.

One might assume that the New York Times is settling up some scores and making sure Hillary and/or Cuomo have a clear field in 2016 against anything Rahm might try to do.