Romance (and baseball) are in the air. Yet city’s homicide rate looms heavy

It’s Valentine’s Day, a chance to celebrate our affections for that special someone in your life. Or, if by chance you’re unattached, it’s also the return of baseball (as in spring training camps opening in Arizona and Florida).

Life would truly be wonderful if a Ferris Wheel ride ...

Maybe you’re even capable of combining the two; as in contemplating the chances of an all-Chicago World Series occurring any time in the near future while enjoying with your loved one the free Ferris Wheel rides being given away Tuesday at Navy Pier.

ALTHOUGH I CAN’T help but feel an ominous feel in the air as we consider the level of violence that is falling upon us. We seem to be in a mood of anger that is pushing the number of outbursts to alarming levels.

Which is appalling because the record-high levels we reached in the late 1980s had declined to such significantly low levels that many of us probably were deluded into thinking we had “solved” this particular problem.

What caught my attention was a Chicago Tribune story published Monday morning that pointed out the 27 shootings that occurred this past weekend – including a pair of incidents involving girls ages 12 and 11.

That’s a lot of people lingering in hospital bed who may well have lapsed into death by the time you actually read this Tuesday morning.

NOW I NOTICED these incidents were confined to neighborhoods of a certain socio-economic status that makes the bulk of Chicagoans want to ignore them. For all I know, there are people out there reading this who think I’m engaging in extremely poor taste by bringing up dead people – instead of the chance the Chicago White Sox will actually be able to get some talent in exchange for their current ace pitcher Jose Quintaña.

... or a 2nd all-Chicago World Series could be top concern

Yet it’s because of the fact that many of us would be inclined to ignore the bloodshed that I feel compelled to bring it up. I always was, and likely will be, a malcontent cuss like that – which may be the reason I’m currently not seeing anyone steadily on this Valentine’s Day.

Because we have to take one fact into account.

There have been 69 homicides in Chicago the first month-and-a-half of 2017 – compared to 78 for the same amount of time last year, according to the Chicago Tribune. Technically, we’re down.

Will urban youth live long enough to attend Chgo St.?

BUT DOES ANYBODY feel that as a literal truth?

Now I don’t want to hear from the ideological crackpots who are going to start raging that Donald Trump is telling the truth whenever he goes on his near daily rants about how Chicago is all fouled up.

For I know the truth is that Trump is very much a part of the problem, and could care less about finding a solution. If anything, I suspect he needs for Chicago to have a high homicide rate because it gives him something to complain about. I doubt he's willing to do a thing that would actually help resolve the problem of urban violence rates in Chicago. The talk that passed between White House and D.C.-based officials and Mayor Rahm Emanuel likely is just idle chatter.

Besides, it seems that the people who are suffering are the ones who didn’t vote for him. Maybe he thinks a re-election strategy is to let his detractors kill each other off?!?

SO WILL SERIOUS help come from Trump? No! Although I doubt that image of National Guard troops in Chicago would come either, because then people could blame Trump for anything wrong those part-time soldiers would do – and accepting blame for wrong-doing is as far removed from the Trump experience as anything!

Chance got his recognition -- a Grammy

The year 2017 is one in which we have our share of troubles. Bloodshed we consider to be ignorable, similar to another “story” I encountered Monday – the New York Times reported on the financial struggles of the athletic program at Chicago State University, which are the extreme end of the financial troubles many state colleges are facing these days because of the Illinois government budget fiasco.

Which also is ignorable because of the many of us who dismiss Chicago State as just some sort of school for the few people in select South and West side neighborhoods who manage to live long-enough to even consider attending college.

Although the Chicago kid known as “Chance, the Rapper” did manage to win a Grammy Award this weekend. All in all, a heck of a way for 2017 to say, “Happy Valentine’s Day.”

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EXTRA: Cupid’s coming!

I have to confess. I found a place that had already taken down its Christmas decorations.

And promptly replaced them with all kinds of hearts and Cupids getting ready to shoot us with feelings of love and joy.

WE’RE JUST ABOUT one month from Valentine’s Day, and that is the theme for a White Castle franchise that I set foot in, seeing all the red and pink hanging from the ceiling to put me in the mood for romance, I suppose.

Personally, that much use of paper makes me wonder how long it will take to deteriorate in a landfill someday.

But the fact that it was Cupid and not Santa Claus looking down on me did give me a feeling of joy for a few seconds that wasn’t connected to the taste of one of those famed White Castle burgers.

Besides, even I’m not so much of a grouch to want to take off on Valentine’s Day, which will come and go in due course so we can pull out all the green and pretend we’re all Irish come March and St. Patrick’s Day.

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So close, yet so far apart on many issues. Illiana concept is such a myth

It never fails to amaze me the knee-jerk reaction that political people in Illinois and Indiana will face.

So close, yet so far apart!

On so many issues, it seems that whatever one state does – the other will do the exact opposite. Perhaps we ought to stare each other down while standing on opposite sides of State Line Road.

ALTHOUGH IN ALL honesty, a part of me thinks the REAL boundary between the two states is Indianapolis Boulevard. Or perhaps somewhere just east of Gary down by the Indiana Dunes.

The latest issue that we can’t seem to agree upon is one that many of us can’t reach a consensus on – whether or not gay couples ought to have any right to the legal benefits derived from marriage.

The trend is turning towards realizing that what one couple does really doesn’t impact another couple. It’s not like anybody is talking about forced marriage between two men, or anything even close.

But there are those who have hang-ups when it comes to the concept of choice – if the choice that one person makes somehow manages to offend the moral compass of someone else.

PERSONALLY, THE IDEA of denying someone their freedom of choice is what offends my moral compass. But back to the issue, and the fact that our state’s legislators are not on the same side of this.

For the Chicago Sun-Times on Friday reported the musings of state Senate President John Cullerton, D-Chicago, who says that a bill permitting gay couples to marry in Illinois could get legislative approval this coming week and that he’d like to have a final vote in the Illinois Senate on the issue one week from this coming Thursday.

That, of course, is Feb. 14, also known as Valentine’s Day. How sweet!

Although I’m sure there are some ideologues out there who are now gagging at the very thought of the commercial holiday for romance being used for such a gesture. Perhaps many of those people are Hoosiers who think their state’s officials are more in line with sense – although personally I can’t help but view them as being a couple of decades behind the times on this issue.

FOR IT SEEMS that the Indiana General Assembly has a state Constitution amendment pending – one that would set it in parchment that gay marriage is something that goes against the very being of being an Indiana resident (perhaps that is why Abe Lincoln left the state when he became an adult and moved to a more sensible place like Illinois).

The new political protest battleground?

The Times of Northwest Indiana newspaper reported Friday that Republican leadership in the Indiana Legislature has decided to wait a few months before doing anything with the proposed amendment that says a, “legal status identical or substantially similar to that of marriage for unmarried individuals (of the same gender) shall not be valid or recognized.”

They want to see if the Supreme Court of the United States offers any guidance when they rule (as expected) on the issue come June.

We literally could wind up with an issue where the state border becomes a political battleground marker. Are we literally going to get gay rights protests occurring at State Line Road in sight of all those Indiana-side stores that tout their ability to sell cheap cigarettes?

THE TIMES NEWSPAPER reported that Democratic legislative leaders in Indiana are saying they expect action on the issue to be delayed for at least one year, which they say is progress. Past Legislatures would have given a knee-jerk approval to the idea.

But learning of the Indiana idea reminded me way too much of 1996 when the then-Republican controlled Illinois Legislature felt compelled to alter state law to emphasize that marriages between gay couples (never permitted) were NOT valid.

That law, which then-Gov. Jim Edgar signed into law on a particularly busy legislative day when there was much other activity meant to occupy public attention, was an embarrassment. I still wonder why officials felt compelled to act, and I suppose we should be grateful that Illinois officials didn’t see the need to muck up our state constitution like Indiana is considering.

But seriously, we in Illinois got this out of our systems a couple of decades ago, and are now getting with the program on this issue – even though I expect a few die-hards to fight this fight to the very end.

DOES THAT MEAN the people living east of State Line Road will finally follow Illinois’ lead some time about 2030?

That thought is almost as laughable as the tale of Steven Robbins – who was serving a 60-year prison sentence at the state prison near Michigan City. Until he made an appearance Wednesday in Cook County Circuit Court on drug-related charges that were dropped.

Somebody on our side goofed, and Robbins was allowed to leave the Criminal Courts building. The Gary native with extensive family in and around Indianapolis gets to be our state’s newest resident.

Ouch!?!

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