How enamored ought we be of pseudo-celebs who set foot in Chicagoland

Every time I think that Chicago has the potential to be one of the most sophisticated cities on the face of Planet Earth, I stumble across something that reminds me of a St. Louis native I once knew who described Chicagoans as “hicks in nice suits.”

WINFREY: Sold her home she never lived in

As much as I’d like to punch him in the mouth for suggesting such a thought, I have to admit there are times he may well have hit our Midwestern populace right on the mark!

FOR I COULDN’T help but notice the names of Oprah Winfrey and Kanye West popping up in the news Friday, just one day after I saw the moniker of Michael Jordan pop up as a Chicagoan

Which anybody who has been paying attention knows really isn’t the case anymore. The one-time Chicago Bulls star has long ago broken his ties to the Second City.

As has Winfrey, the queen of daytime talk show television programming – who long ago stopped producing her show at a studio on the near West Side. She’s now a California girl – as in a part of the entertainment industry that views “the world” as not extending much beyond the greater Los Angeles area.

Any ties she had to our city streets are nothing more than history.

SO IT WASN’T a surprise to read a Chicago Tribune report about how Winfrey sold off what it calls her “final piece of Chicago-area real estate” – as in a house in suburban Elmwood Park.

WEST: Finding dining in suburban Naperville

Which she bought for $298,000 back in 2001, never actually lived in herself, and managed to sell off for a $72,000 profit over what she paid for it all those years ago.

The downtown condo where Winfrey actually lived, along with a high-rise apartment she had in the Gold Coast for awhile, were long-ago sold off. As the Tribune reports, Winfrey still has a house in Merrillville, Ind.; which technically could be regarded as a part of the greater Chicago area.

But the one-time “World’s Greatest” newspaper apparently wants to view State Line Road and the Cook/Lake, Ind. County line as an impenetrable barrier. So Oprah is history as a Chicagoan.

JORDAN: Still trying to sell suburban home

AS IS, ONE could argue, Michael Jordan, whose one-time home in suburban Highland Park was included in a story I recently saw about luxury homes that celebrities own – which clearly identified Jordan as a Chicago resident.

Even though he has been trying to sell that mini-mansion of his for more than five years now. It seems the kind of people who could afford such a garish structure want something built to custom for their own desires – not something that was meant to cater to the whims of Jordan when he was the world’s biggest celebrity professional athlete.

Yet there are those who continue to cling to the images of Winfrey and Jordan as though they’re ordinary people who we run into every time we go to the neighborhood supermarket, or pump gas into our cars.

Perhaps we fantasize that Oprah came up a couple of bucks short while grocery shopping, and we just happened to be the ones who were there who could give her some cash to fulfill her tab.

OR MAYBE WE want to think of Kanye West, who was in the news last week to meet with President Donald Trump about public policy issues, then managed to catch the attention of the Naperville Sun newspaper when they found out he was at a Pepe’s Mexican restaurant in suburban Naperville on Thursday.

TRUMP: Thank goodness he doesn't come here

For the record, Kanye ordered chicken tacos for dinner, then went to the pool table set up in the restaurant, and shot some billiards, while also signing autographs and generally playing the role of celebrity for the restaurant patrons.

It’s good that there are people out there who had a pleasant time. But really, I would think interrupting someone when they’re trying to dine is boorish behavior. It’s downright rude.

It’s the kind of thing I’d expect in Indianapolis. Then again, perhaps even people in “Nap-town” would conduct themselves better than that. After all, if West really thinks Pepe’s is decent Mexican food, he has bigger issues in life than his nonsensical babbling with the president in the Oval Office.

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Could Kanye West be the clue to resolving Chicago violence? Or is it merely evidence of Trump’s inanity!

Anybody who has read me for any length of time likely realizes I don’t think much of the overall skills level of President Donald J. Trump.

WEST: An Oval Office session?

But learning of the fact that Trump intends to have a meeting Thursday with a Chicagoan of some popular renown to gain his input into urban violence, prison reform and street gang violence is nothing more than laughable.

FOR THAT MEETING will be with the entertainer Kanye West. Who is a Chicago native and may well have opinions on all the issues that confront the city where he was raised.

TRUMP: He'll listen to anyone with material

But somehow, I just can’t see that “Mr. Kim Kardashian” has much of anything relevant to say. In fact, I think I take more seriously the thoughts of Chance the Rapper when it comes to finding solutions to Chicago’s problems.

He, at least, has been willing to put money into finding solutions for problems confronting the Chicago school system – which may be more of a real solution than anything I’m sure West will have to say to Trump when the two of them meet at the White House later this week.

CHANCE: Puts some money where his mouth is

By comparison, I expect West will mouth out lots of platitudes that Trump will be able to riff off of in terms of taking pot shots at Chicago – whose real problem, as far as Trump is concerned, is that it prevents Illinois from being like other Great Lakes states that were deluded enough to support Trump’s 2016 presidential bid with their Electoral College votes.

THEREBY MAKING IT a place he will go out of his way to ridicule, no matter how illogical or impractical his thoughts would be to actually implement. Then again, Trump once met with Kid Rock and Ted Nugent at the White House.

Anybody who doubts me ought merely to listen to Trump’s rant from earlier this week, when he told a gathering of law enforcement officials in Orlando, Fla., that the solution to Chicago’s crime problems is to give our police more authority to “stop and frisk.”

CEDRIC: What would he tell Donald?

A policy that specifically is prohibited under an agreement that police department reached with the American Civil Liberties Union – which regards such police policies as giving our cops far too much authority to harass people for no real reason.

If anything, the fact that Trump would make such a suggestion for Chicago shows he doesn’t have a clue as to what our city’s situation is and our problems are!

FOR THE MINDSET of those people who applauded the verdict of a jury in Cook County court with regards to police officer Jason Van Dyke is that it was a step towards limiting police authority in dealing with the public.

If we were to really start giving police the power to pat people down for any little suspicion the cops might have, it would go counter to the mindset of those individuals who are hopeful that a jury finally put aside their prejudices and issued a just verdict.

The only people who will think that “stop and frisk” makes any sense are the kind who were hoping for a Van Dyke acquittal on all those criminal charges a jury found him guilty of.

I don’t doubt West will come up with outrageous things to say come Thursday, and Trump will find a way to come up with what he thinks is a comical riff off of it. Which some may find entertaining, but which contributes next to nothing toward finding a solution to the problems that confront so many of our nation’s large cities.

Trump's idea of presidential 'advisers' -- Nugent and Rock, w/ Sarah Palin in the mix

SO EXCUSE ME (envision Steve Martin with the arrow through his head of some four decades ago) for viewing the thoughts of West (or just about any other entertainment personality) as being not all that relevant toward coming up with the answers to the great questions confronting our public policy issues.

Either that, or perhaps we ought to turn to Cedric the Entertainer.

Somehow, I suspect I’d take more seriously the thoughts of the actor who has both said Trump has a skin tone the color of Cheetos, but also has said it is wrong to think we can “boycott” the incumbent president.

And anybody who ever saw the 2002 film “Barbershop” still remembers what his “Eddie the barber” character said about civil rights activist Jesse Jackson.

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“Chicago” West?

Should we, the people of the world’s greatest city (in my opinion, and I don’t care if you disagree) feel complimented, or offended, that entertainer Kanye West and his celebrity wife, Kim Kardashian, chose to name their newest daughter after our municipality?

Announcement Kardashian posted of daughter's name

Or should we just count down the years and days until the newly-named Chicago West becomes old enough to go to court and have her moniker changed to something less likely to draw attention?

THE NEWS REPORTS spilled out Friday about the fact that Kanye West, who grew up in Chicago and is often regarded as one of our city’s celebrities, picked his home for his daughter’s name.

Although I wonder how the girl will feel about her name when she learns that our city was named for the wild leek (a type of onion) that grew along the shores of what is now the Chicago River.

Supposedly, the whole area stank from the onions, with the smell reminding those of that of skunks. At least according to those of the Miami tribe that were once native to the shores of Lake Michigan.

When you think of the name in this context, it makes me wonder if we should consider the naming of this child some form of abuse? Are they pre-punishing her for any mischievous behavior she may commit later in life?

THEN AGAIN, CHICAGO West wouldn’t be the only pseudo-celeb to carry a burg’s name as their own.

Let’s not forget the international soccer star David Beckham and his Spice Girl bride Victoria (a.k.a., Posh Spice) who named their son Brooklyn. Supposedly, they were in the New York borough when he was conceived.

Should we take this to mean that Kanye brought his bride to visit his home town when they made their third child, and second daughter? Or is it just a quirk of Kanye that he’d think Chicago could be a proper name?

Perhaps it’s a way of showing spite toward the mentality that now shouts its way into the public discourse in this Age of Trump every time the president feels compelled to say something stupid about our beloved home city.

KANYE WEST IS showing that “Chicago” can be something beautiful, no matter how trashy Trump tries to depict it as being.

Or maybe it’s just a recognition that Atlanta, the city in which Kanye West was actually born, doesn’t have as nice a ring.

Really, “Atlanta West” just wouldn’t work. It would be too likely to rile up the natives into a revolt. Although there are times I suspect that southerners are looking for any excuse to revolt about anything possible.

Anyway, it appears that Chicago West was born Monday, and came in at 7 pounds, 6 ounces. Does this mean we can now start thinking of “Chicago” as having a new birthday? And speculate about how the girl will be 19 when her namesake city turns 200 (come the year 2037)?

The original namesake of 'Chicago'

OF COURSE, WE could all realize this is far too much speculation about the creation of a new girl who probably deserves a degree of privacy – but certainly won’t ever get it on account of who her parents are.

I can’t envision anyone with a Kardashian connection wanting to be low-profile about anything in life.

As for anybody who feels compelled to want to mock this family for their moniker choice, I can only speculate – as I have for just over 600 words.

That what really has their undershorts all bunched up is the fact that THEIR city name wasn’t picked. Because something like “St. Louis West” or “Indianapolis West” would just be too ridiculous to contemplate.

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Rahm win, inner-city Chicago both get pot shots aimed at Second City image

I couldn’t help but notice a pair of Chicago Tribune stories about entertainment industry personalities taking their shots at the public image of our fair Second City.

Jon Stewart, the actor and soon-to-be former person who anchors the “fake news” Daily Show on Comedy Central, did a commentary this week denouncing the people of Chicago.

OR AT LEAST the 56 percent of those who bothered to vote for mayor who cast their ballots for the re-election of Rahm Emanuel for another four-year term.

Does this mean the 44 percent who wanted Chuy Garcia as mayor, along with the roughly 60 percent of registered voters who didn’t bother to vote and the just over half of Chicago who aren’t even registered to vote are somehow forgiven for what was done to them in the name of Democracy?

Stewart, who in the past has mocked the idea that his entertainment-oriented program is viewed as serious news programming by anybody, said on Wednesday that Emanuel has “a terrible record and a universally recognized abrasive personality.”

Which is all true enough. Although I don’t think that, in and of itself, makes for a compelling argument of condemning Chicago as a whole for his re-election – which just about anyone with sense saw happening.

THE ONLY REAL question is with the opposition being unable to garner enough support to win the run-off election held Tuesday, why couldn’t Emanuel just get enough voter support back in the original municipal election on Feb. 24?

If it was going to be nothing more than a repeat of Rahm for “four more years,” why go through the hassle of the second election? At the very least, I’m sure the past few weeks aggravated the ulcers of a few politically-oriented Chicagoans.

Although I don’t think Chicago was really being lambasted all that much. Stewart plays his material for laughs – even if it is at the expense of public officials. Whom quite frankly are often people who are worthy of our public derision!

If anything, Stewart’s funniest line might have been at Garcia’s expense – pointing out that had he won, he’d be the fourth-most prominent Chuy in the United States. Behind the Chewbacca character, chewy granola bars and the dwarf that third-rate entertainer Chelsea Handler often uses as a punch line for her own material.

BUT I’M NOT concerned about Stewart’s blow as much as I am about the announcement that film director Spike Lee has a new Chicago-oriented project he’s making – one that will feature actor Samuel L. Jackson, along with area natives Jeremy Piven and Kanye West.

It’s going to be called “Chiraq,” as in the name that many inner-city residents have taken to using to refer to Chicago. It plays off the name “Iraq” and is meant to imply that our city’s level of street violence is comparable to the Middle East war zones where U.S. troops have died.

It may just be a movie. It may just be a work of fiction.

But Lee is invariably going to be turning public attention to the segment of Chicago that many of us like to pretend either doesn’t exist or is somehow isolated enough from the rest of us that we don’t have to think about it.

THE REV. MICHAEL Pfleger has pointed out that Lee was in Chicago at his Auburn/Gresham neighborhood parish church back in January and spent a day interviewing local residents who have to cope with street violence every day of their lives.

Regardless of how over-the-top the Spike Lee film may wind up being, there’s going to be a touch of reality reflected in the project – some of which was noted in Stewart’s denunciation of Emanuel voters.

That reality may wind up hurting us far more than any rant from Stewart; who is, after all, the clown who thinks there’s anything particularly special about pizza in New York.

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