Awaiting anxiously these days for word from the groundhog and the Trumpster. Then again, maybe we shouldn't be!

The Donald or The Groundhog (below), … 

So just what is that gol-danged groundhog going to have to say to us come Saturday about whether springtime is on the way; or if we’re going to have to wait six more weeks for the coming of pleasant weather?

Although a part of me is now wondering even more just what that gosh-darned fool we call a president is going to have to say to us come Tuesday – the date he finally gets to stand before Congress and give the annual State of the Union speech.

… who do you place more faith in?

NOT THAT I expect anything of real significance to come from the lips of The Donald – who at times reminds me of the old Chicago White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf wisecrack about New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner.

Remember. “How can you tell when Steinbrenner is not telling the truth? His lips move!” It sounds like a pretty accurate assessment of Trump – who actually once had his own ties to the Yankees owner and has about as overbloated an ego as the one-time shipping magnate-turned-baseball boss.

The only difference is that Steinbrenner put together teams that achieved their goal of winning World Series. While Trump, for the good of us all, has consistently failed to achieve his goal of building that ridiculous wall along the U.S./Mexico border.

Steinbrenner and Trump -- two of a kind?

Which is what I really suspect Tuesday’s address in the House of Representatives will be about. He’ll harangue Congress for not meekly giving in to his every political desire.

HE’LL TRASH THE Democratic caucuses of Congress for behaving responsibly and standing up to his nonsense desires.

I couldn’t help but notice that yet another Trump e-mail received Friday asked us all to take a five-question “State of the Union” prep survey. Trump wants us to say that Democrats aren’t being blamed sufficiently for the 35-day-long shutdown of federal government, and that we’re being told lies about the conditions along that U.S./Mexico border that Trump probably wishes he could erect an electrified barricade along its 1,900-plus miles.

Punxsutawney Phil will do his act Saturday; will he be more accurate than Trump?

Above all, we’re supposed to say we approve of Trump and are happy with the economy – so that Trump can use all of this as the factual basis of a speech that claims The Donald is being unfairly maligned.

Which will truly be a level of nonsense that I suspect the masses won’t be swayed by in the least. We’ll believe it about as much as we’ll believe the silly little poem that the people of Punxsutawney, Pa., write up as the “words” of their groundhog – who is supposed to tell us Saturday just how close we are to springtime.

YOU KNOW THE drill. The groundhog supposedly knows the date, comes out of hibernation, then flees back into his hovel if he sees his shadow. Which would mean six more weeks of winter weather.

Whereas if that groundhog stays outside and enjoys some fresh air, then spring is nearby! The worst of winter is over!

What I’ve never understood is this; if Saturday is a nice sunny day (as it’s supposed to be in the Chicago area), doesn’t that increase the chances of the rodent-like creature seeing a shadow?

Should we be desperately hoping for a cloudy, overcast day on Saturday so as to increase the likelihood of shadows being invisible?

OR IS IT more likely that the only people who place any faith in the weather-predicting ability of the groundhog are the same ones who fall into the 37 percent (according to the Gallup Organization) who these days still look favorably upon Donald Trump’s performance as president?

More faith in Bill Murray than either!

I’m actually inclined to think that the groundhog and anything Trump has to say as part of his national address will be equally absurd and filled with nothing but pure horse-hockey.

But then again, the concept of Groundhog Day did give is that somewhat entertaining 1993 film by Bill Murray – the one in which every day is Groundhog Day and he has to keep reliving the experience no matter how insipid.

Just suppose that same concept happened to Tuesday and every day we would have to hear Trump give a ridiculous address for the State of the Union? That would be the worst thing that could happen to all of us!

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Celebrating Chicago baseball, '80s-style

The Baseball Hall of Fame will take in at least two new members come 2019 -- and it seems the inaugural day in Cooperstown, N.Y., will wind up as a tribute to the baseball played at Comiskey Park and Wrigley Field back in the 1980s.

Harold Baines, the outfielder-turned-designated hitter, and the relief pitcher, Lee Smith, are now amongst the baseball "immortals" whose memories will be preserved in bronze.

BAINES LIKELY WILL have a plaque depicting him as a Chicago White Sox player, for whom he played three stints between 1980 and 2001 while Smith says he wants to be depicted as a Chicago Cub -- for whom he began his career that lasted 18 seasons and saw him pitch for eight different teams.

We'll be able to remember the 1983 White Sox, for whom Baines was a star hitter and right fielder, and the 1984 Cubs, for whom Smith established that he was a top-level relief pitcher.

Those two teams both won division titles and made it to the playoffs. Although the names Jerry Dybzinski and Leon Durham will remind the hard-core of Chicago baseball fandom of why those two teams didn't make World Series appearances -- and why we had to wait until 2005 and 2016 for World Series victories.

I can already hear the complaints of some crackpots who will claim neither Baines nor Smith are worthy of Hall of Fame recognition. But I suspect those people would have been peeved no matter who got chosen. Just think how p-o'ed they'd be if the announcement had been long-time New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner (who also once had a stint as a Chicago Bulls minority owner) been inducted into Cooperstown.

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EXTRA: Even with the sides changed, partisan politics will carry on

My e-mail Friday morning about an hour before the presidential swearing-in ritual contained a plea for cash from the Democratic National Committee.
 

TRUMP: The official presidential photo

Now that we have Donald J. Trump as our president, the party wants to have as ample a cash flow as possible to pay for their many efforts to counter the activities likely to occur in coming weeks, months and years.

FOR IT WILL be a busy time of political people trying to undermine everything that has occurred in recent years of the now-departed Barack Obama presidency. After spending eight years of obstruction, now the Republican partisans are going to try to erase the actions they weren’t able to stop from occurring in the first place.

Personally, I’m less bothered by the election of Trump himself. I think the man has the intellectual heft of a Glad bag, with most of his “policies” worthy of being stuffed in such a bag and left in the alley for weekly collection.

It is the Republican caucuses in both chambers of Congress who will gain power for their members of a conservative ideological bent because they now will no longer have a chief executive capable of standing in their way.

Of course, it could turn out that Trump becomes capable of standing up to people. At which time, I have no doubt that the GOP types will be more than capable of turning on Trump and depositing his political aspirations into the aforementioned Glad bag. They're backing him because they expect him to be their political lap-dog.

TRUMP IS GOING to learn the hard way that he is a business-oriented guy trying to play politics – and showing thus far that he has no real knack for it. He is the kind of guy who seems to think he can become a real life version of that clownish character he played on television.

 

PENCE: Would presidency be ideologue dream

The executive who goes about bellowing “You’re Fired!!!” at everyone who offends him.

The baseball fan in me wonders if Trump is the equivalent of the late New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner – who may have put together a few championship ballclubs but also had a string of teams in the late 1980s and early 1990s where the Yankees (a franchise of baseball tradition and glory) turned to garbage.

Garbage that could easily have been stuffed into the aforementioned Glad bag.

IS THE UNITED States of America in the late 2010s about to become the equivalent of the 1990 New York Yankees – who were a 7^th Place (a.k.a., last place) team with a dreadful 67-95 record.

Newly-inaugurated President Donald J. Trump watching a ballgame with New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner. I wonder if hard-core Yankees fans have the best idea of what the nation faces, considering how low the Yankees sank in the early 1990s back when Trump was a regular Yankee Stadium presence

Ironic, since back in that era Steinbrenner used to like to draw pseudo-celebrities to show up at his ballpark, and those people often included Trump himself. Since with all his gaudiness, he was capable of drawing some sense of flash to himself.

That is what we’re now headed for in these coming years. As for those who call for the impeachment of Trump, keep in mind that putting an ideologue like former Indiana Gov. Mike Pence into the top post might well be the fantasy come true of the hard-core conservatives who are celebrating Friday the departure of Barack Obama from the White House.

Now I don’t doubt there will be an opposition portion of our society that will try to reduce the amount of damage being done to our nation due to the politicking being celebrated today by that segment of our society who thinks it interesting that singer Jackie Evancho is performing at the Inaugural balls taking place in D.C.

WHILE MANY OTHERS are making a point of not going (Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., has been sending me and many others her partisan e-mail messages explaining her lack of a presence in Washington), and many may even be preparing for the marches to take place across the United States on Saturday – including Chicago.

I won’t be there, and not just

Should we buy stock for all the trash we'll generate?

because the management of the newspapers I do some work for sent us all a note informing us that such activity is considered inconsistent with a so-called objective news reporter.

Although I could say that the Dem political operatives already are aware of my absence, since just a couple of days ago I received an e-mail informing me their records showed I had never contributed a dime to their cause.

Should I feel guilt that my vote wasn’t enough – even though I’d argue the ballot is the ultimate political expression one can make to respond to the many Glad bags we’re going to fill up in coming years with all the nonsense our federal government is going to produce.

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EDITOR'S NOTE: I happened to be on the Internet at 10:59 a.m. (CST) looking at the whitehouse.gov website, filled with the Obama administration information. When my clock turned to 11 a.m. (Noon, in D.C.), I hit "refresh." The screen turned solid white. Another quick refresh, and I got to see the official website pronouncing "President Donald J. Trump" (and a campaign photograph of a crowd all excited about making America great again) take its place.

Who in their right mind wants to be the police superintendent in Chicago?

Rahm (left), the tyrant mayor?

I have to wonder about anyone who winds up being in charge of the Chicago Police Department in the near future.

It is a thankless job for which everything that goes wrong will be blamed on you. And there likely won’t be anything that goes right that you can take credit for.

YOU’D BE WALKING into a situation in which there is the potential for record levels of violent activity to take place this year.

George, the baseball equivalent to Rahm?

What will make it worse is that the violent activity will be contained to select neighborhoods – making it extremely easy for much of Chicago to ignore its existence altogether.

And as for those poor souls who live in those violent neighborhoods, they’re going to be the base of people who will be watching your every move and are already preparing themselves for the vocal campaign to denounce you as Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s puppet cop and to demand your ouster from office.

You also have as a boss a man who’s the political equivalent of George M. Steinbrenner – the late owner of the New York Yankees known for his erratic temperament that would fire people at a moment’s notice; which resulted in the iconic baseball team going through a decade of mediocrity-to-suckiness. Is that Chicago’s fate?

Martin became Steinbrenner's whipping boy as manager

THE ONLY REAL question is if Emanuel is Steinbrenner, who is the political equivalent of Billy Martin – the Yankees manager whom Steinbrenner hired and fired five times; and probably would have hired and fired yet again had he not been killed in a Christmas Day auto accident.

In short, I don’t envy the situation now faced by Eddie Johnson, the man who is now interim superintendent of the Chicago Police Department.

The man whom the Chicago Police Board will have to figure out a way to recommend to Emanuel so that he can officially give him the top cop job on a permanent basis.

The question, of course, is what kind of sucker would allow themselves to be used by the Chicago Police Department as a possible superintendent, just so the police board can offer up three names to allow Emanuel to pick Johnson and reject the other two.

Would Johnson let Emanuel treat him similarly?

OF COURSE, WE shouldn’t presume that Johnson would be a lock on getting the permanent post.

Let’s not forget that when the police board originally came up with three candidates for the superintendent’s post, Emanuel favored among them Cedric Alexander of Cobb County, Ga. – as in suburban Atlanta.

Depending on whose report one wants to believe, Emanuel either offered the job to Alexander or was on the verge of doing so when he rescinded the offer. It seems that Alexander talked too much before the appointment could formally be announced.

Who’s to say that Johnson won’t somehow find a way to peeve Emanuel during his time as interim superintendent – thereby ensuring a need to find yet someone else? Could it turn out that the Chicago police superintendent position becomes one that no self-respecting law enforcement official would think of taking?
 

Truly independent? Or absurd like Billy & George?

BESIDES, IT WILL come back to the rate of violence. I have often pointed out the fact that back in the late 1980s Chicago had a homicide rate that approached nearly 1,000 dead people per year. We’re at about half that rate now.

Although I’m sure to the 500 or so people who are killed and to their families, that is high enough to be intolerable.

As it is, the DNAInfo.com site for Chicago reported Tuesday about the 775 people shot thus far in 2016 – 80 percent more than the number of people shot (although not necessarily killed) during the first three months of 2015. Will the summer heat we’ll soon be receiving wind up giving that figure a record-setting jolt?
 

It only makes me wonder what kind of perks the police superintendent post provides in order to make it worth anyone seriously considering.

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