Is Lightfoot providing a mayoral “plus” or “minus” for the Chicago P.D.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot is putting together the team of people who will comprise city government for the next four years, and it was interesting to see her initial moves that relate to the Chicago Police Department.

JOHNSON: Same police superintendent

Eddie Johnson, the man who became police superintendent after long-time law enforcement veteran Garry McCarthy was sacrificed by Rahm Emanuel to try to appease people p-o’ed about the shooting death by a police officer of teenager Laquan McDonald, is being retained.

IT’S USUALLY not at all unusual for a new mayor to want to have her very own police chief – someone whose political loyalties would be to her.

So if Johnson were really to be thrown out on his keister, now would have been the perfect time to do so. Nobody would have questioned it. If anything, it would have been expected.

For Lightfoot to keep the veteran Chicago police officer (beginning with the department as a patrolman back in 1988 is a sign of confidence in his professional abilities. Or at least evidence he hasn’t done anything that would offend Lightfoot.

So perhaps Lightfoot, whose past professional experience includes a stint as head of the Chicago Police Board, is not about to make radical changes in police operations – if she’s keeping the same person in charge.

BUT THEN, THERE’S the other decision she made on her first full day in office as mayor. As in the one involving her personal security team.

For the mayor of Chicago usually has a special detail within the Police Department whose duties include protecting the mayor, accompanying her to all public appearances, and usually serving as the driver of the mayoral automobile.

Yes, that’s a sworn police officer behind the steering wheel, while also keeping his eyes open for any potential that could become a threat to the mayoral persona.

SMITH: New head of mayoral security

Only not this time!

FOR LIGHTFOOT IS hiring the services of Silver Star Protection Group to handle her mayoral security detail. That company is run by James Smith – who prior to going into business for himself worked as a corrections officer at the Cook County Jail, then served for 26 years as a U.S. marshal based in Chicago who was in charge of providing protection for Supreme Court justices and other federal officials.

Perhaps it’s only logical that Lightfoot, who once also served as a prosecutor with the U.S. attorney’s office in Chicago, would turn to someone with a sense of federal law enforcement to provide protection with herself.

But as the Chicago Tribune reported Wednesday, Smith is married to Margaret Houlihan-Smith, who once was a managing director for United Airlines and now works as a lobbyist both for United and AT&T.

Is it a conflict for a lobbyist to now have a direct tie to the mayor? Is it the kind of thing that could be a mini-scandal in and of itself? As though it creates the appearance of a conflict of interest!

WHO’S TO SAY. For what it’s worth, a whole series of questions to various officials along that line of questioning resulted in a whole slew of “no comment”-type responses. Or maybe I should say, “nunayabizness”-type answers.

LIGHTFOOT: First law enforcement picks

Does the new mayor not trust Chicago police enough to ensure that no one tries to harm her while in office? Is she rewarding someone who comes from similar outside-the-established circles that she thinks she can trust better?

Or does James Smith really have a skills set that just isn’t possessed by anyone within the Chicago Police Department? That is something we’ll have to see.

While we also see if the retention of Johnson as police superintendent is a sign that the Chicago Police Department is on the right track, and not about to undergo significant change. Or is it really just a matter of Johnson getting about a year on the job before getting pushed into what she’ll call a “retirement” so she can make room for a police chief of her own pickings.

  -30-

So who wins if the activists interfere with O’Hare access – the CTA?

Monday is the day that activists upset with the problems of urban violence in predominantly-black neighborhoods of Chicago say they want to impact O’Hare International Airport.

Activists want to ruin postcard-perfect image of O'Hare -- for a day

Figuring that such an act will get themselves national attention in ways that clogging up the Dan Ryan Expressway or the neighborhood surrounding Wrigley Field earlier this summer could not.

THE ACTIVISTS SAY they want to make it difficult for motorists to drive to O’Hare on Monday, which is Labor Day (a holiday weekend with a significant boost in travel traffic). They hope that such an act will offend the sensibilities of people whose economic well-being relies upon the airport that they will then pressure Mayor Rahm Emanuel to do something to address the problem of urban violence within parts of Chicago.

There may be some people who have that reaction. Although I also wouldn’t doubt there will be many others whose reaction will be to order Emanuel about to have the Chicago police do an encore, of sorts, of their behavior during the 1968 Democratic Convention protests.

What with all the attention the activity of 50 years ago has received in recent weeks, I wouldn’t doubt the idea would crop up into at least a few heads.

I do find it interesting that these activists at least have the sense not to try to interfere with airport operations proper. That, after all, would constitute a federal offense. Which would mean the federal courts and prosecutors getting involved.

Could this be O'Hare's easiest access on Monday?

IT ALSO WOULD put them in the bullseye of the officials in charge of this Age of Trump our society is now in. Not exactly a crowd that cares much about urban problems – except to the degree they can score cheap rhetorical points off of them for themselves.

So what should we think of the activity, where protesters say they’re going to gather around Noon to try to interfere with traffic using the Kennedy Expressway westbound from Cumberland Avenue to East River Road.

Which is the path that takes motorists into the airport grounds.

Is offending these peoples' sensibilities the goal of Monday activity?

Some activists have told the Chicago Sun-Times they are considering having some people jump over the median to try to interfere with eastbound traffic taking people out of the airport and back into the city proper.

REGARDLESS, IT WILL be interesting to see just how law enforcement behaves on Monday – a day that I’m sure they will wish they could focus on the usual inanity that tends to take place during holiday travel weekends.

Because they’re going to venture onto the Kennedy, this becomes an Illinois State Police matter – rather than one for the Chicago Police Department to address. Just think if they ventured a little farther west onto airport property and all of a sudden it became an issue for the FAA, the FBI and any other federal agency that could be dragged into the alphabet soup.

It would be a jurisdictional nightmare.

Although I couldn’t help but notice reports in recent weeks urging people who have to travel to O’Hare on Monday to consider using the Chicago Transit Authority to get there.

SPECIFICALLY, THE BLUE Line trains that run from downtown through the Northwest Side and wind up all the way at the airport.

Or is it all about embarrassing Rahm?

In theory, you can ride your train in to the airport, and wave bye-bye to all the protesters who think they’re causing chaos and bringing our society to a shutdown. I suppose activists could try blocking train tracks, but that would be insane on account of the legendary “third rail” (the electrified one that feeds power to the rail cars).

I’d hate to think there are people determined to die for this cause, which is supposed to be about reducing the level of people who are killed in Chicago.

Because they’d learn pretty quick just how apathetic many Chicagoans can be about this particular issue, which really reeks of a strong overtone of “It’s not my problem” for those who don’t live in the neighborhoods where the violence tends to focus upon.

  -30-

Civil disobedience against violent crime? Or just a pain in the keister?

If the people of Chicago are complaining about something, there’s always a good chance that the Rev. Michael Pfleger is involved.

PFLEGER: Trying to 'tie up' Chicago?

That’s certainly the case these days, as Pfleger – the pastor of St. Sabina parish in the Auburn/Gresham neighborhood – has his plans to do a large-scale protest act come next weekend that is supposed to draw public attention to the level of urban violence we have in Chicago.

SPECIFICALLY, PFLEGER HAS plans to do his march along the Dan Ryan Expressway come the morning of July 7 – which is a Saturday.

Theoretically, Pfleger wants to have his supporters march along the highway that is a major thoroughfare leading people into and out of the various neighborhoods of the South Side.

He talks of wanting to clog up traffic so bad that people will have one heck of a time getting anywhere. Pfleger wants to create a massive inconvenience for the people of Chicago – which he says is nothing compared to the conditions that residents of select neighborhoods in Chicago have to endure when it comes to being at risk of being shot or killed in, or near, their own homes.

It seems the Police Department is trying to cooperate with the idea of a protest act. But the Chicago Sun-Times reports that they want Pfleger to turn his action into a march through the neighborhoods.

BECAUSE TO MAKE it anything other than risky for protesters to try to block up traffic along the Dan Ryan is going to mean several hundred police officers being diverted from their home police districts and doing duty along the Dan Ryan.

Anthony Riccio, a first deputy superintendent for the Police Department, says having that many officers reassigned potentially makes high-risk neighborhoods even more dangerous. Although it should be noted the Dan Ryan (Interstate 94) technically is under the jurisdiction of the Illinois State Police.

I already can envision the stories that will result if somebody gets killed in the Englewood neighborhood that Saturday because there were not the usual accompaniment of police in the South Side neighborhood.

Can Pfleger's protesters really jam up the Dan Ryan?

Not that Pfleger is swayed by such logic. He tells the Sun-Times that police are routinely diverted from their usual beats for events a lot less significant than his.

HIS BOTTOM LINE?

Pfleger and his followers plan to be along the Dan Ryan, starting around 95^th Street, at 10 a.m. on July 7 – which is next Saturday.

I suspect that Pfleger thinks he’s already made enough of a concession by holding his protest on a weekend, rather than a weekday, when traffic would be even more intense.

Then again, it’s a bit of practicality. I have no doubt that if protesters tried to clog up the Dan Ryan during the week – even if it wasn’t during a morning or evening rush hour time slot – there would be many of those commuters trying to get to, or home from, downtown jobs who would persist in driving right through the protesters.

AND AFTER SUCH an act of “hit and run,” they’d argue that they’re the victims, with the protesters being trouble-makers who are able to engage in such actions solely because they’re “out of work bums” (or perhaps they’ll use more vulgar language).

Law enforcement of Chicago … 

For what it’s worth, I understand the point of doing a Dan Ryan protest rather than a neighborhood action. It would be way too easy for people to dismiss the latter as something irrelevant to their lives because they never set foot in “those” places.

A part of me thinks one person posting their thoughts on Facebook had a point this week when saying that if Pfleger really wanted to get the city’s attention, he’d try to clog up the Edens Expressway. As in a road traveling north to those neighborhoods and suburbs where the locals think urban violence is irrelevant to them.

… and Illinois will be busy July 7

Although I must also confess the protest is unlikely to impact me, no matter how out-of-hand it gets. I have an aunt who’s organizing our family’s annual summer get-together for that very same day; which means I won’t be anywhere near the Dan Ryan – although I’m sure my assorted cousins and I will be able to debate the merits of Father Pfleger’s actions for ourselves.

  -30-

Does McCarthy have a political ‘base’ to support his mayoral fantasies?

It’s going to be intriguing to see just who, if anyone, thinks one-time Chicago Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy ought to become mayor of the Second City.

McCARTHY: Does anyone want him for mayor?

McCarthy is the guy who lost his police post more than a year ago when Mayor Rahm Emanuel canned him, with the hope that dismissal of a police chief would be sufficient to satisfy the public anger that arose from the shooting death of a 17-year-old by a Chicago police officer.

THE COP WHO pulled the trigger 16 times and caused the death of Laquan McDonald is facing criminal charges, and the mayor wants to think he cleaned up the police department by hiring a new superintendent.

Which, of course, angers McCarthy. He resents the notion that he is in any way to blame for McCarthy’s death.

In fact, there are some people in Chicago who are bothered by the notion that the police are at fault in the teenager’s death. They’d just as soon believe the “kid” had it coming.

But I’m skeptical that there’s going to be an outcry of people wishing to PUNISH Rahm Emanuel for picking on the police and placing blame on them.

BECAUSE IF THERE is a stronger sentiment, it’s that Emanuel himself deserves some sort of political punishment ALONG WITH the police for the death of McDonald.

The kind of people who are going to be inclined to want to vote against Emanuel because of Laquan McDonald certainly aren’t going to side with McCarthy in this particular political fight. They’re going to think he got what he deserved, but it isn’t enough to resolve the overall problem of police misconduct – or as they’d rather perceive it, police running roughshod over the citizenry of Chicago.

Of course, there’s always the chance that enough time has passed between the shooting (2014), the discovery of video (without audio) of the shooting that showed how graphic and violent an act it was (early 2016) and the next municipal election (February of next year).

 

EMANUEL: Will he have a serious challenger?

People do tend to have short memories, and it’s always possible that a good number will have gotten over their anger, or let the details slip into the crevasses of their minds.

THAT CERTAINLY SEEMED to have happened in the most recent elections with Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle who was supposed to become political history because she supported the “pop tax.” Instead, she won by a solid margin and appears poised to become the new Cook County Democratic Party chairwoman.

Yes, it’s true that Preckwinkle faced a less-than-stellar opponent in last week’s Democratic primary. But McCarthy, a career law enforcement officer with no electoral experience, could appear to be an equally-weak challenger to Emanuel.

If there is a real mayoral challenger to Rahm, it could be Paul Vallas – the one-time Chicago Public Schools CEO and career educator/administrator. But he hasn’t even formally declared a candidacy yet.

It is with all of this in mind that I find it amusing to learn that McCarthy is saying he’s the man who can “save” the lives of black people if he becomes mayor.

AS HE SAID on a recent WLS-AM weekend radio broadcast, 80 percent of people who die in incidents deemed murder are black men (or male blacks, in official police lingo that attempts to mimic legal language). Which makes him think only a police officer can solve the problem of urban violence.

Whether that is true remains to be seen.

VALLAS: Will he ever make up mind?

I can’t help but think that McCarthy shares the same problems in gaining the votes of black people that Emanuel would. If anything, more. McCarthy, after all, wore the badge and was supposed to be in charge of the department at the time of the violence.

Of course, we have some 11 months to go before the municipal elections – and 13 months to go, if we wind up needing to have a municipal runoff. I’m sure many of us will be so absorbed with the Rauner/Pritzker “battle of the billionaires” in search of a post to keep themselves busy that they will be completely frazzled by the time the mayoral election becomes a priority.

  -30-

‘Politicking’ police officers? Or just self-expression in an era of confusion?

The Chicago Police Department claims its policy is that patrol officers aren’t supposed to make political statements or take such actions while in uniform – which theoretically prevents them from taking on viewpoints that could be misconstrued as the official stance of the city.

First came the "support"

Which is why three officers in two separate incidents are now facing discipline – reprimands and, for one officer, a reassignment to new duties – because of pictures of themselves showing them engaging in actions that express controversial stances.

OF COURSE, THESE officers manage to cancel each other’s views out, since all were getting involved in the ongoing debate over the appropriateness of professional athletes to use National Anthem rituals at the stadium to express their own views on social issues.

In one case, two officers appeared in a photograph on Instagram with clenched fists and down on a knee, along with an activist who was expressing the view that the athletes were taking a just cause – in support of those who are concerned about police abuse of people based on race.

The Chicago Sun-Times managed to dredge up that photograph, and wound up making it a full-color, front-page cover for the newspaper last week.

Then, came the opposition

Which got the police department upset to the point where they said the two officers would face official reprimands – the kind of thing that gets written up and put in their personnel files. Which means the incident could come up again and be used against the officers under certain circumstances.

ALTHOUGH ODDLY ENOUGH, Mayor Rahm Emanuel said he was not upset about the image of uniformed police officers, both of whom are black, showing support for the activists on this issue. The mayor went so far as to say he hopes the idea of police officers supporting the cause means something is shifting in Chicago’s mindset, something for the better.

EMANUEL: First officers a 'plus' for Chicago image?

But if that was the hope, another incident came forth when officials learned of another officer who had posted a picture of himself where his intent was to show opposition to these types of activists – and support for the efforts of President Donald J. Trump whose rancid rhetoric on this issue is what has triggered the whole debate to begin with.

That photograph shows the uniformed officer waving a U.S. flag while standing in front of his police-marked SUV, with a sign in front of him reading, “I stand for the anthem. I love the American flag. I support my president and the 2^nd Amendment.”

Which, by the way, is the one often interpreted by social conservatives as giving them the right to carry whatever types of firearms they desire.

ASSOCIATED PRESS REPORTED that the officer in question, who is white, worked the past four years assigned to a high school, and also found students at that school who said the officer in question was a positive presence around the campus who often had helped avert trouble from occurring.

Which could mean he’s a good guy. Or maybe just that he’s in an environment where the masses are inclined to believe the protesters are the trouble-makers.

In short, where one comes down on these issues is going to depend on where one stands on many other social issues, particularly that of how concerned they are about the potential for police abuse of other individuals based on race.

I’m sure the Chicago Police Department would prefer it if none of this were to come up in public discussion. They’d rather not have an issue to deal with at all.

THE DEPARTMENT’S INTERNAL Affairs division is reviewing all the incidents, although there is a sense that the latter officer will get disciplined because of the need to create a perception that they’re not overly-harsh on the former officers.

TRUMP: All started with his trash talk

Which I’m sure there are others who will toss out the “politically correct” rant and claim that the latter officer is unfairly being tarred and feathered. Because they want to agree with him – no matter how much his stance (which was more reactionary and meant to hurt others) offends a segment of our society.

Much of the problem lies within the idea of a policy that our police are neutral. The reality is that it is near-impossible to stay out of issues – often, doing nothing winds up being an expression of content with the status quo.

And in a case where the status quo is questionable, perhaps the only just thing is to merely admit where you stand on the issue. Which is what these three officers managed to do; regardless of how some of us would rather not hear anything about it at all.

  -30-

What are we spending that money on?

People who are hoping for dramatic changes in the way the Chicago Police Department operates must truly be feeling depressed following a pair of reports published in the daily newspapers on Tuesday.

It seems that some $4.5 million has been spent on legal and consulting fees due to actions being taken in response to the 2014 shooting death of a teenager on the South Side by a police officer. The Chicago Sun-Times reports the figures likely will continue to rise in coming months.

THOSE CONSULTANTS AND attorneys were supposed to be coming up with new means and procedures by which the city’s police could operate in ways that would be more respectful of the populace.

Yet these legal actions also go contrary to the sentiments of the new attorney general. Jeff Sessions, who is the appointee of President Donald J. Trump, has made it clear he thinks our police department ought to have fewer restrictions placed on it.

He certainly isn’t going to have any kind of monitor placed over the department, not even if that monitor were someone appointed by him.

Because for as much as Trump likes to rant and rage about crime in Chicago being out of control, I doubt he wants to be put into a position where he’d be responsible for trying to find a solution to the problems of urban violence.

WHICH AREN’T REALLY any more out of control in Chicago than they are anywhere else in the nation.

And the general solution offered up by conservative ideologues to such problems?

It usually is something similar to the way that comedian/actor Redd Foxx’ “Fred Sanford” character would deal with bills that he didn’t have the money to pay. He’d put them back in the mail box, and pretend he never saw them in the first place.

So the fact that law firms and law enforcement consultants are managing to collect millions of dollars in Chicago taxpayer funds out of a dream that they will find some solution to getting the city’s homicide rate to drop back to the levels it was at a few years ago? It just seems like money that could have been better spent elsewhere.

BUT THIS WASN’T the only negative report that turned up this week. The Chicago Tribune looked into the results of the Chicago Police Academy – which would like us to think it provides rigorous training that gives our city some of the finest law enforcement officers in the land.

In fact, they claim to put prospective recruits through an intense screening process that weeds out many interested persons who might want to wear the uniform of a Chicago Police officer.

But once you get in, it seems you’re virtually a shoo-in to pass and get a job. The newspaper found that some 97 percent of people accepted to the Police Academy wound up graduating.

By comparison, some 86 percent of people graduating is more the average, according to a Justice Department study of about 600 police academies across the country.

THE TRIBUNE ALSO pointed out that in Los Angeles, as many as 25 percent of police academy students don’t finish – although in many cases that is because applicants change their minds and drop out voluntarily.

Who’s to say just how rigorous the training for a Chicago police officer truly is? It reminds me of a moment from that 1987 film where actor Kevin Costner gave us his take on Eliot Ness and “The Untouchables” where he and actor Sean Connery’s Malone character were interviewing a would-be cop who stuttered his way through some questioning, causing Connery/Malone to respond, “There goes the next chief of police.”

I’d like to think that was just a cheap-shot gag in a decades-old film. Although with such new findings, who’s to say that our city’s future officers will be the “best and brightest” we’d like to think we could attract.

Then again, with so many other funds going to pay for studies that likely will never be turned to for use, who’s to say what the future of law enforcement is here – largely because we seem determined to let the political gamesmanship set policy rather than what would truly be beneficial to the people at-large.

  -30-

Bloody, yet birthy during holiday weekend – Chicago now over 500 dead

Crystal Myers of the Back of the Yards neighborhood gave birth Monday to a son, and if he survives he’s going to have one heck of a birth story to share with people.

Because the Labor Day holiday weekend was one that saw 13 people killed and dozens more wounded – including his parents. It also was the tally that boosted Chicago to having in excess of 500 homicides for the 2016 calendar year thus far.

CONSIDER THERE ARE nearly four more full months to go this year. Who’s to say how high the death toll will get for Chicago – although I can only hope we won’t experience the days of the late 1980s when the city used to get close to 1,000 murders per year and where in some neighborhoods gunfire and death were just a common fact of daily life.

Myers’ son is going to be able to point to write-ups in both the Chicago Tribune and Sun-Times of the circumstances under which he was born a few weeks early on Monday.

His parents, Myers and Albert Moore, were sitting on a porch in the South Side neighborhood where the stockyards once existed when someone snuck up the gangway, fired nine shots, then fled.

Doctors at Stroger Hospital managed to save the baby, while both Myers and Moore were recovering from their own gunshot wounds and it was uncertain Tuesday how they would turn out.

THE SUN-TIMES REPORTED a lack of a motive for the shooting, although police speculated to the newspaper the incident may somehow be tied in to a shooting that took place the day before.

Here’s hoping for the kid’s sake, at least, that both survive along with the boy. Who gets to begin his life as the human face of just how absurd urban violence has become.

And how divided we are as a society in determining what the real problem is and what needs to be done about it.

For the record, 13 people were killed across the city, with 65 people suffering gunshot wounds. Most of the violence came on the holiday itself – some 31 of the 65 were shot from Monday 6 a.m. to Tuesday 3 a.m., according to the Tribune.

THE USUAL TRIVIAL analysis says that urban violence picks up during the summer months – the intense heat that we in Chicago think of as routine for August somehow gets us all riled up and crazy and our tempers go flying off the handle!

Could this line of logic mean that cooler weather will bring cooler temperaments and that the rate of shootings ending in death will decline in coming months? Who’s to say? The fact is that people tend to want to view the statistics concerning urban violence in ways that back up their own personal hang-ups.

There are those who will want to put the focus on trying to keep firearms out of the hands of people who can’t keep control of themselves, while others will want to view it as the fault of certain types of people living down to their nature.

Which usually will result in those individuals wanting to scream and screech their bigotries aloud and claim their own need to keep a weapon on hand.

WHILE OTHERS WILL want to “tsk, tsk” the situation away and pay attention to their own isolated neighborhood where they’d like to pretend such things never happen because the local residents are “just too civilized” to do such things.

I’m of the belief that such acts can take place anywhere at any time – a holdover from my own police reporting days of three decades ago where I encountered so many nonsensical acts that I came to realize there is no making sense of any of it.

With that thought in mind, I’m willing to wish Crystal Myers’ son into this world and I’d like to tell him the circumstances behind his birth are the screwiest he’ll ever encounter in life – it’s all uphill from here!

I only wish I could make him such a promise, and have it come true.

  -30-

Policing in pairs? We’ve got a ways to go before we reach enlightenment

The order went out to Chicago Police Department officers Sunday morning in the wake of an attack on officers in Baton Rouge, La., that left at least three cops dead and others wounded.

CPD showing their support, while watching their backs

They’re not to be going out on patrol all by their lonesome. They’re also to be in full uniform, to ensure that it is fully clear to the public who exactly the police are. Similar orders have been given to police officers in New York and Boston, to name just a couple of cities.

NOW SOME PEOPLE might think that makes the cops all the more of targets. It probably does. Although I suspect that to the kind of people inclined to want to attack officers, they’re going to know in advance exactly who they’re looking for.

If anything, this might reduce the chance of a non officer being mistaken by someone who thinks of themselves as some sort of revolutionary fighting for the rights of the people against an oppressive force.

Which is what I’m sure is the kind of cheap rhetoric we’re ultimately going to hear if any of the gunmen who attacked the officers in Louisiana Sunday morning are taken alive.

You know, the men dressed in black. And no, I don’t mean the late singer Johnny Cash!

FOR IT SEEMS that one of the gunmen was killed by cops right away, while the other two remained at large for much of the day – with the public in Baton Rouge being advised to look out for anyone black-clad. Not that any further description was given.

For it seems the people who might actually know something didn’t see nothin’, or at least that’s what they claimed when they talked to cops.

Honestly, I don’t know what to think of these latest attacks on Sunday – other than to say we shouldn’t be surprised by anything that happens these days. We have a national mood of mistrust concerning our attitude toward law enforcement personnel.

 

TRUMP: Too eager to mix it up in dispute?

Some of us are determined to view them as the problem, while others are quite eager to use this as an excuse to go after people whom they never trusted and have long wished they could fight back against.

IN SHORT, I’M saying I expect this kind of nonsense to continue on, and not just in Baton Rouge, where local residents remain miffed at the shooting death by police of a black man that got captured on video.

This is not a problem limited to any one city or part of the country. It is why I have refused to get as worked up as some people have over the officer now on trial in Chicago for the shooting death in 2014 of Laquan McDonald.

It’s bigger than any one incident, and it is not going to be solved with cheap rhetoric.

Which is what I think of Donald Trump, who couldn’t wait to rush out with a statement eagerly meant to support the police – claiming he expects that law and order attitudes will prevail. Eager to take sides, and I’m sure his followers will repeatedly parrot the same lines throughout the Republican National Convention being held this week in Cleveland.

PERHAPS HE THINKS we’ll rise up and start shooting people who aren’t sufficiently deferential to the police. Or maybe he’ll settle for an angry mob engaging in fisticuffs against someone who looks just a tad suspicious – from their life’s perspective.

It is a serious issue, this one of mistrust that some of us have with the police – which is really more about our racial tensions and hostilities flaring up!

As much as I wish we could be responsible and rise to a higher level, I won’t be the least bit surprised if our society continues to delve down in the muck for awhile longer.

It’s the kind of situation where I expect there’s going to be many more rounds of stupidity and ignorance that we’ll have to be ashamed of before we can finally attain a level of enlightenment in the future.

  -30-

I’ll pick my own black man to be police superintendent; thank you very much

This weekend was the quintessential Rahm Emanuel at work; as the mayor let it be known who his preference was to be the new superintendent of the Chicago Police Department while also making it clear he’s not about to give in to pressure from ANYBODY interested in influencing his pick.

JOHNSON: The new superintendent. Maybe

For the record (or at least according to various news reports starting with the Chicago Sun-Times that began cropping up Saturday night and into Sunday morning), Emanuel wants to pick Eddie Johnson, a veteran Chicago cop who currently serves as chief of patrol for the department.

WHAT MAKES THIS pick intriguing is that Johnson is NOT one of the three people proposed by the Police Board for Emanuel’s consideration.

Heck, technically he didn’t even apply for the job earlier this year when then-Superintendent Garry McCarthy got canned to appease those people who wanted someone to lose their job because of the shooting death of teenager Laquan McDonald by a police officer.

But Johnson is an African-American man with experience within the department, and it was reported that Emanuel thinks he can help calm the mood of Chicago – some of which would love it if Rahm himself were the one in danger of losing his job.

Which, technically, is what the black caucus within the City Council has said it wanted in terms of a new police chief. To the point where last week, black aldermen demanded the right to interview superintendent candidates themselves before the mayor took any action.

THEN, THEY EXPECTED Emanuel to go along with their recommendation, whom the full council would then get to advise and consent on. There also was the fact that the black aldermen had also made it clear already who they wanted to get the job – deputy superintendent Eugene Williams. Forget about those two out-of-town clowns under consideration!

ALEXANDER: Should have kept quiet!

That is the real reason for Emanuel’s actions this weekend. There was no way he was going to let a batch of bush league aldermen order him around. Not on a police superintendent pick, or anything else, for that matter.

What’s the point of being the “Boss!” if you have to take orders?

By doing things this way, the black aldermen get nothing. But Emanuel will have picked someone who is black and experienced in the ways of Chicago – which technically is what they wanted in a new superintendent.

IF THEY DECIDE to gang up and vote against Johnson’s eventual confirmation, guaranteed that the mayor will be the one accusing them of playing politics with the process.

EMANUEL: In the end, it's all about him

Technically, this pick complicates things because the rules say Emanuel is supposed to make his appointment from amongst the three people recommended by the Police Board.

The scenario that could happen, according to news reports, is that Johnson gets the nomination on an interim basis, the mayor rejects all three official candidates and the Police Board comes up with new candidates.

And if the Police Board knows what’s good for it, one of their new candidates had better include Johnson so his appointment can be made permanent.

OR AT LEAST as permanent as any political appointment ever is!

One other interesting angle to this process – Emanuel originally favored Cedric Alexander, a high-ranking law enforcement official in suburban Atlanta, to get the superintendent’s post (WMAQ-TV reported the mayor actually offered him the job). But it seems Rahm became very offended when Alexander told people back home he was likely to be offered the job; which hadn’t yet been offered.

Meaning Emanuel could yet change his mind again and Johnson could find himself out-of-a job before he ever got in.

This could turn into an ugly process – perhaps uglier than the partisan bickering taking place over the Supreme Court vacancy. Chicago political infighting truly has the ability to make the activity in Washington, D.C., look like a batch of sissies at work.

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EXTRA: Do we trust teachers more than cops? Or just hate Rahm Emanuel?

All the poll results the Chicago Tribune has published this week are meant to convey a single image – Mayor Rahm Emanuel is standing in a deep pile of doggie doo.

EMANUEL: "Boo!", says the polls

His personal approval rating is barely over a quarter of Chicagoans, people have little faith in the police department he oversees and they think so little of him that they’re willing to back the Chicago Teachers Union in their ongoing labor dispute with the mayor.

FOR THE RECORD, some 70 percent of Chicagoans say they don’t believe the Police Department provides equal protection to all city residents and visitors.

And as for the teachers’ union, it seems that for every person who sides with Emanuel in the attempts to negotiate a new contract, three people think the union is correct.

Then, of course, there is the other 20 percent who either have no opinion or are undecided. In short, the people who are clueless – just like the roughly 10 percent who couldn’t say “yea” or “nay” to the question about police providing equal protection.

I have to confess to being amazed at the idea of 60 percent of those surveyed siding with the Chicago Teachers Union, compared to 20 percent for Emanuel.

IF THERE REALLY was such strong support for the union, you’d think that Emanuel would not have done so well in last year’s municipal election cycle.

After all, the teachers union made it clear all along that they wanted Emanuel out of the mayor’s office. They were always the strongest backer of Jesus Garcia’s mayoral aspirations. You’d think they could have beat him.

Instead, while Emanuel didn’t get to win re-election without enduring a run-off election, there was never really a sense that he was going to lose.

Do we really trust teachers union more than police? ...

But Emanuel is now in the pile of pig poop caused by the impression of all those young black boys (they aren’t really old enough to be called ‘men’ yet) being gunned down in cold blood. It would seem some people are just expressing the knee-jerk negative thought toward Emanuel – no matter what the issue.

EVEN THOUGH I’M not convinced that the Chicago Police are any more racist or vicious toward black people than law enforcement officers in any other parts of the country, the issue is being called out now in Chicago.

... Or do we just despite Mayor Rahm that much?!?

Which probably is a good thing if it forces a serious discussion of what perceptions are permitted to be held by our police officers. It probably is a discussion needed nationwide – which is why the true racists would prefer to go overboard in discussing Chicago’s problem.

It means they can ignore the problem in their back yard. Just like those residents of lily-white communities that have NO black people going out of their way to say Chicago is the most-segregated city in the nation.

I did find it interesting that the polls showed even a majority of white people surveyed (53 percent) admitted Chicago police do NOT treat all people fairly – compared to 85 percent of black people who expressed the same sentiment.

BUT WE DO have a split in opinion. That same poll showed 59 percent of white people surveyed think Emanuel is able to address the problem of racial taint within the police department, while 61 percent of black people think he is not capable of doing so.

Whereas with the schools, some 35 percent of white people backed Emanuel in the teachers’ union dispute, compared to 42 percent siding with the union. Those figures get worse among black and Latino people (for the latter, only 13 percent would say they back Emanuel).

The target of all of this week's Tribune polls. Photograph by Gregory Tejeda

We probably don’t think much of Mayor Rahm these days. Although I still say we probably don’t really trust anybody, which is the mayor’s saving grace.

Anybody who tried to replace Rahm as mayor would wind up becoming even more detested than Emanuel is these days. Not exactly the right pitch to attract a would-be replacement, presuming the mayor could ever be urged to walk away from his post prior to the 2019 election cycle.

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Keeping ‘em covered; will we have more hot, sweaty cops during summer?

Why do I suspect we’re going to see a lot more police officers in long-sleeved shirts while on duty, regardless of how hot the temperatures become.

This is my reaction to learning of the fact that the Chicago Police Department is implementing a new policy this week concerning tattoos.

SPECIALLY, OFFICERS ON duty aren’t allowed to show off any tattoos they might have.

They’re not going to be forced to have them removed. But they’re going to have to cover them up. Either with their uniforms, or with matching skin tone adhesive bandages or tattoo cover-up tape.

The order, according to the Chicago Tribune, was issued Monday, and takes effect Friday. No official explanation was given, but considering that it also makes mention of “conservative business attire” I suspect that someone in the higher ranks thinks of tattoos as being unprofessional in appearance.

Perhaps they’re considered a bit thuggish. Almost as though tattoos ought to be on the people who get arrested by police, rather than by the law enforcement officers themselves.

I’LL HAVE TO admit that I find it a bit off-putting to see police officers with tattoos poking below their short-sleeve uniform shirts. It seems to go against the image that police try to create for themselves of a unified force of people.

Which may be why the top brass with the Chicago P.D. would want such a policy. Either that, or require all officers to have identical tattoos. That would probably create a bigger rebellion than the notion of having to cover up one’s tattoos.

Although I’ll also admit that the most heavily-tattooed police officers I have ever seen have been with certain suburban police departments.

And those officers won’t be impacted by this new policy. Perhaps it means that the Chicago officers who have a problem covering up their tattoos can go get jobs in those surrounding municipalities, where the need for qualified cops overrides a concern about appearance.
 

Let's hope Mayor Rahm never feels compelled

SO WHAT SHOULD we think about this new policy? Which also has a provision for headgear – no stocking caps or ball caps, even if they bear the Chicago Police Department logo. Be honest, a ball cap on anything other than a ballplayer during a game does look ridiculous. Think New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie in that recent photo from a charity ballgame in New York photo.

I’m sure some people are going to rant and rage about how this policy hits at what little individuality an officer might try to express. They also will complain about how monitoring an officer’s cap or tattoos does nothing to make them behave more professionally while on the job.

In fact, there already is (anonymous, of course) Internet commentary saying that officials ought to be more concerned about police brutality than about officer tattoos.

Although I’m not convinced about the latter. There are some people who manage to make it through the police hiring process even though they have character flaws that make it likely they will use their law enforcement authority poorly. Some of society’s bullies wind up becoming cops – just like some wind up becoming crooks.

WHILE OTHERS WHO get into law enforcement are those who have some noble aspects of their character and use police powers to benefit our society. I’m sure that some of those people, particularly amongst the younger types who now are of age to apply for police positions, are tattooed.

So perhaps this is an issue that needs to be addressed, even though some people who want to complain about everything will now choose to rant and rage about this.

Such a policy may be needed because of the prevalence of younger people who felt compelled to get something drawn on their bodies in their youth (or the youth-like years that they’re refusing to give up on).

And as for those people who managed to get something put on their face? Perhaps those cops will have to go around with cover-up bandages, forevermore telling people that they “cut myself shaving” that morning.

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