Flexing their muscle? Or separating selves when it comes to gay marriage?

Cardinal Francis George turned to some muscle to bolster the Catholic Church’s stance with regards to the legalization of marriage for gay couples – the clergy of African-American oriented churches.

GEORGE: Looking for support

For it was the Catholic Conference of Illinois that arranged for the head of the Catholic Archdiocese to meet Friday with several black clergy members. Those include James Meeks – the one-time state senator who gave up his political post last year to return to being merely the head of one of the largest congregations in Chicago.

IT IS AN impressive figure that Meeks can offer up – his Salem Baptist Church in the Roseland neighborhood can claim 10,000 members and often get that many people packed into their church for Sunday services.

Yet there are times when I wonder if the real truth is that he has about 10,000 people willing to listen to him – out of the many billions of people who live on Planet Earth!

A part of me has that thought reinforced by the notion that Meeks originally thought he was going to be a political powerbroker on the Springfield scene who would be able to offer his orders to other politicians.

Perhaps he thought he had the word of God within him?

HIS STINT IN the Illinois Senate wound up being more forgettable than anything else. Even though he always talked about himself as being the next governor or next mayor or whatever. Instead, he’s just a neighborhood preacher.

And no, it wouldn’t have made any difference if Meeks were still in the state Senate. For the legislator who replaced Meeks (state Sen. Napoleon Harris, D-Flossmoor) didn’t vote for the bill – but it still passed there back on Valentine’s Day.

MEEKS: Ego bigger than influence?

In fact, George met with several neighborhood preachers from across the South Side on Friday. I don’t doubt they have sway within their congregations. And that piecing those congregations could create a sizable group.

Yet this is an issue where I seriously wonder if the black-oriented churches are going to wind up cutting themselves off from the mainstream of thought – that is now seeing that this whole issue of who can marry and who cannot is really nothing more than a matter of letting all people have the same opportunity within life.

WHEN I HEAR of people making sayings that somehow imply their religion forbids this, it makes me think that they’re the types who want to use people’s religious faith to turn against others who aren’t exactly like them.

That thought bothers me more than anything. It almost seems like self-segregation – although I realize how “loaded” that phrase can be in this particular context.

Earlier this week while on duty for a suburban newspaper for which I write, I covered an event in which a political candidate who was African-American kept saying the only reason that people were paying so much attention to the concept of gay marriage these days was because of the gay rights lobby. (I’m not naming him because he’s a fringe candidate with no chance of Election Day success come Tuesday).

He said they’re simply better organized than the network of clergy and civil rights activists have become in the 21^st Century. As though there’s no way the issue could have any merits on its own.

THESE ARE THE same clergy, by the way, who are going about calling up Illinois General Assembly members to try to sway/pressure/intimidate them into not backing a gay marriage measure when it comes up for a vote this spring in the Illinois House of Representatives.

Now, we get the sight of the black clergy pairing up with the head of the Catholic church in Chicago – all to ratchet up the political pressure to get House members to vote “no.”

Back in the days of old, we used to get the sight of civil rights activists in protest marches, with a few white, Catholic priests at their side to show solidarity.

 

The modern-day pairing takes on a different ideological lean these days

 

It’s a shame that pairing has become so ideologically twisted that the two are now on the side of exclusion.

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And on this corner, we see a couple of crackheads selling drugs to your kids…

How many people would think to use the 45^th anniversary of the date of the shooting death of Martin Luther King, Jr., to take a bus tour of some fairly decrepit neighborhoods in Chicago to point out all the things that are wrong?

EMANUEL: Is he really all-powerful?

That actually was the tactic of the Chicago Teachers Union, which on Thursday put together a bus tour meant to take unsuspecting people to the neighborhoods that will be impacted by the Chicago Public Schools plan to close some 60 facilities.

AS THOUGH IF people see for themselves the street gang-infested neighborhoods that some children would now have to walk through or attend schools in due to the closures, officials will suddenly feel sympathy.

Somehow, I doubt it worked. Largely because the Chicago schools officials already are putting on their “game” face that they’ve acted, and they’re not in a reconsideration mood.

That’s how I take schools CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett’s comments earlier this week about how she’s insulted that people are describing the schools closure plan as “racist” because so many of the schools that will be closed down are in African-American neighborhoods.

Somehow, I don’t think taking people on a bus tour of black-oriented neighborhoods will sway that many people, because too many Chicagoans already are oriented to ignoring such neighborhoods.

PERHAPS THEY MIGHT think, “It’s not my neighborhood,” so they don’t concern themselves with it. One only has to look at recent activity along Michigan Avenue involving robberies to realize that there are no barricades between neighborhoods, and we really are tied together as one city.

One’s problems ought to be considered as all of our problems.

Now I have stated before that I think the real tragedy concerning the fight about closing schools is that it puts people living in substandard neighborhoods into fighting to maintain schools that are substandard themselves.

We ought to be thinking about how to improve the opportunities for those people – rather than encouraging this particular fight that has the ability to make everybody look seriously stupid.

OR ARROGANT, WHICH is how the Emanuels are now coming across in this particular political fight.

Take Mayor Rahm’s brother, Ezekiel, the one who is getting attention these days for the book he recently wrote about the lives of himself, Rahm and third brother Ari. He also is the guy who went on the Huffington Post to “advise” the Chicago Teachers Union to, “give in now. Give in now. Rahm will win. He always does win.”

He also elaborated that the unions, by putting up any fight to Emanuel and the Chicago Public Schools (who are merely following Rahm’s dictates on this issue) are merely “banging their heads against the wall.”

That’s tough talk! It seems that Rahm Emanuel (if his brother’s talk is at all true) thinks he’s already as mighty and powerful a municipal executive as anyone named Daley!

AS ONE WHO remembers the mayoral terms of people like Eugene Sawyer, Mike Bilandic and Jane Byrne, I’m well aware that it isn’t the position itself that gives people the power to treat Chicago like their personal fiefdom. Particularly in the case of Byrne, this city has a way of snapping back at people who try to push too hard!

It makes me wonder if the final outcome of all of this is going to be the bloody political showdown that will make the racially-tinged hostility of “Council Wars” seem like a political tea party!

All I know for sure is that we have a teachers union that is angry enough to charter a bus to drive around some neighborhoods that many of us try to pretend do not exist. That is, if we have ever even bothered to set foot in those neighborhoods (which may be the real problem).

It could end in a hard-fought victory for the mayor, if certain circumstances work in his favor.

THEN AGAIN, IT could also turn out to be a case where Emanuel (as in the mayor) gets hung out to dry.

Could this someday become the sight of a bloody mess? Photograph by Gregory Tejeda

 

Because that kind of arrogance (“He always does win!”) is usually the type of attitude that causes people to desire the equivalent of a severed head put on a pike just in front of the Picasso statue!

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Reagan plaque the equivalent of Lincoln’s blown nose? Or just ideology at work?

I still recall a cartoon once published by the State Journal-Register newspaper of Springfield, Ill. – one meant to mock the historic preservation aspects of certain groups in the capital city who get worked up at the thought of Abraham Lincoln doing just about anything.

Too bad Thompson never brought talent to Chicago

In that cartoon, a plaque was erected on a downtown Springfield street corner informing passersby that on a distant date in the past, Lincoln had pulled out a handkerchief and blown his nose on that very spot.

THAT’S AN EDITORIAL cartoon (by Mike Thompson, who later took his talents to the Detroit Free Press). It is not meant to be taken literally.

Yet the thought of it is what popped into my mind on Wednesday when I read a DNAinfo.com report about the demolition of an apartment building in the Hyde Park neighborhood where Ronald Reagan lived briefly as a young child.

For the news-oriented website says that the apartment at 832 E. 57^th St. is being demolished, but University of Chicago officials plan to compensate for the potential loss of history by erecting a plaque at the site.

REAGAN: Not really a Chicagoan

Ronald Reagan once rode a tricycle along this very sidewalk. Perhaps that is what the plaque could read? Or we could always revert to the standard Ronald Reagan slept here.

FOR THE PERIOD in which Reagan’s father lived with his family in Chicago was literally around the time that the future U.S. president was about 2 years old. The actual structure isn’t likely to give us any real insight into Reagan’s life.

The idea of a plaque here strikes me as silly. If there were legitimate history to preserve, then the structure itself should have been maintained. If not, then why bother?

Reagan, of course, is an Illinois native – although the bulk of his life was tied to central Illinois. The home where he lived in Dixon and Eureka College where he was educated are legitimate sites of interest to anyone intrigued by the former president.

But he’s not exactly anyone with Chicago ties – which is all good and fine. I just think it cheapens real history to try to claim that this aging structure is somehow all that significant.

PERHAPS THE UNIVERSITY’S desire to turn the land into a strip of green space next to a parking lot that will be needed as the University of Chicago hospitals continue to expand is a practical use of the land.

It’s just that the idea of a plaque strikes me as an attempt to reach a cheap compromise with ideologically-inclined people who would like to have Reagan-named or Reagan-tied things in every single community in the nation.

They would like him to become an all-encompassing presence in our society as he never was in life! Which strikes me as being more about trying to re-write history, than preserving it.

Personally, I chuckle at the thought of that apartment building being “historic” largely because historians were never able to determine which of the six units of the three-story structure the Reagan family lived in. Which means the plaque would have to read Reagan slept somewhere near here.

AND AS FAR as Reagan himself is concerned, he did reminisce once about seeing horse-drawn fire engines going by the building, or going out for a walk once and getting lost – winding up on the Midway Plaisance just a couple of blocks to the south.

For a 2-year-old, I’m sure that was an adventure. To the rest of us, it would be much-needed exercise. We all should walk around a bit more than we do now.

Does this mean we should now put our historians to work to try to figure out which exact spot along the Midway that a youthful Reagan wound up at? We could erect the plaque saying Ronald Reagan once got lost here.

Ronald Reagan once got lost near here. Image provided by Chuckman Collection.

 

To try to equate Hyde Park with Dixon as a significant site in comprehending Reagan is a distortion that we shouldn’t support. One-time first lady Nancy Reagan had stronger ties to Chicago than husband Ronald, and she largely went out of her way to downplay that part of her life.

BESIDES, SOMEHOW I suspect that the real motivation for having a Reagan-related site in Hyde Park is for the ideologues to somehow try to undermine the speculation that a future Barack Obama presidential museum and library will be built in conjunction with the university where Obama was once an instructor at the law school.

Maybe the ideologues will try to pass it off as an alternate site for people to visit. Ditch the Obama presidency, they’ll say. Knowing them, they probably will get all worked up to travel to the site where they’ll get to see a batch of parked cars nearby.

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Our very own Kirk is Number Two GOPer in Senate to back gay marriage

I’m sure there are some Illinoisans who feel “sold out” on Tuesday, what with Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., stating that he supports the concept of gay couples being able to marry like everybody else.

KIRK: Taking a stance

Let’s not forget that a lot of the conservative types who live in our state held their noses at the thought of casting a ballot for the Congressman from the North Shore to serve in the Senate because he wasn’t really one of them.

AS IN A hard-liner who was more than willing to use his authority to impose his alleged morals on everybody else.

These people voted for Kirk because they were absolutely convinced that picking his opponent (former state Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias) would merely add to the strength of the Democratic caucus in the U.S. Senate.

Perhaps these ideologues thought they could put pressure on a Republican in the Senate from Illinois to “go along” and do things their way.

Not that I sympathize with these people who feel betrayed. If anything, I gain a bit of respect for Kirk for not letting himself get bullied by his caucus leadership when it comes to this particular issue.

BECAUSE, BY AND large, it is the Republican faction in Congress that will fight this issue to the death – although I am aware that some Democrats also will chime in for various reasons.

I don’t doubt that those black preachers and Catholic priests who are taking up this cause and trying to sway politicians from supporting marriage for all people will have some effect. (It wouldn’t be the first time that something abhorrent was done in the name of God and religious dogma).

All of which is to say that I don’t doubt that Kirk will feel some backlash in coming weeks and months (and probably, to some degree, for the rest of his political life) – all because he felt compelled to use his website to post a two-paragraph statement saying that, “same-sex couples should have the right to civil marriage.”

Kirk, of course, is the member of the Senate who missed the bulk of 2012 after suffering a stroke. He cited that experience as part of his reason for deciding to go against the bulk of his GOP Senate colleagues. Kirk and Ron Portman of Ohio are the only two who have publicly spoken out in favor of the gay marriage issue.

“I PROMISED MYSELF that I would return to the Senate with an open mind and greater respect for others,” Kirk said, adding later, “Our time on this Earth is limited, I know that better than most.”

A nice sentiment, albeit one that will be ignored by the ideologically-inclined.

Personally, I already have stumbled across several nasty (and many anonymous) comments about Kirk on the Internet. Losing their votes in future elections is the least of it.

One crackpot has gone so far as to publicly proclaim that Kirk will “rot in Hell” for becoming a “liberal.” I’d like to think THAT person is the one who will really rot.

ALTHOUGH THE MISERY they’re putting themselves through over this issue by persisting with attitudes that reek of the Dark Ages is sufficient punishment for now!

Personally, I suspect this is an issue whose time has come (although it can be argued that waiting for “the right time” allows some awful things to happen up to that point). Although I’d rather see it get done at the state level than the federal.

Because if it occurs state-by-state, eventually those backwards places of our nation will be so isolated that they will be shamed into doing the right thing. If it gets imposed from up high in Washington, you just know that some crackpots are going to take that as some sort of justification that their backward thought is proper and worthy of an ongoing fight!

Just like the cowardly types who are now going to be dinging Kirk for having a sense of compassion.

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EXTRA: Gov. Quinn's Mexico venture

Roughly one of every six Chicago residents is of Mexican ethnic origin.

QUINN: Busy for the week

So perhaps it shouldn’t be the least bit surprising that Gov. Pat Quinn will leave Wednesday for a four-day journey to Mexico. It will be the fifth trade mission – the others were to Brazil and Canada, along with China and Japan – taken by the Mighty Quinn since the day he succeeded the now-impeached Gov. Rod Blagojevich.

IF ANYTHING, IT might be worth saying, “It’s about time,” since an Illinois governor hasn’t gone to Mexico since 2000 – although I remember both George Ryan and Jim Edgar before him making the trip.

Admittedly, this will be a ritual whose purpose is to give Illinois-based companies a chance to make more contacts so that they can do more business with Mexican-based business interests.

If it works properly, it can bolster our local economy. Such as when Quinn meets with officials of Bimbo bakeries, whose U.S. subsidiary, Grupo Bimbo USA owns such product brands found often in our supermarkets such as Entenmann’s donuts and cakes and may well wind up buying a portion of the Hostess product names (even if they didn’t get the “Twinkie” brand).

Illinois exports to Mexico totaled $6.4 million in 2012 – making it the second-largest largest trading partner for our home state.

IF IT DOESN’T, then Quinn will get to say he escaped the 30-degree-type temperatures we’re going to face this week. Since the weather is expected to warm up to more spring-like temperatures by Saturday (the day he’s scheduled to return).

Of course, Quinn will try to make his trip seem like more of a cultural event. Hence, there will be the rituals paying tribute to one-time Mexico President Benito Juarez, along with his political contemporary Abraham Lincoln.

Both men are amongst the most honored leaders of their respective countries – even if height-wise, they were about as far apart as one could envision.

MONARCHS: Regular visitors to Mexico

Reading through the material released by Quinn’s staff, I also couldn’t help but notice an event meant to promote Monarch butterflies, which migrate between the Midwestern U.S. and Michoacãn in Mexico.

THE MONARCH BUTTERFLY is, of course, the official insect of Illinois. Although I’m now wondering if we’ll get some nitwit ideologues who will call for the butterfly’s deportation and removal from such an honor because of its Mexican ties.

But as already stated, the purpose of this trip is meant to be to promote joint business efforts – which is why a lot of CEOs will be accompanying the governor.

Although in looking over the list of corporations making the trip, I couldn’t help but be amused by the inclusion of Geno’s East on the list.

Maybe it is in everybody’s interests to promote the idea of a decent pan pizza in Mexico. I’m just wondering how much of an outburst will we hear from officials with Lou Malnati’s – ranting and raging that they were dissed even though they offer up a superior pizza pie!

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Appeals Court rejects Burge’s claim people lied about his lies about torture

It would have been a real sick April Fool’s joke if the Court of Appeals based in Chicago had actually granted the appeal filed by one-time police Commander Jon Burge.

Burge, of course, is the one-time head of the police at the Pullman Area police headquarters whose detectives engaged in behavior that most of us think of as torture.

HECK, THE REASON that Far South Side-based headquarters is now called the Calumet Area is because Burge’s behavior left such a nasty taint on the “Pullman” label.

Not that Burge was ever prosecuted for such behavior. What ultimately got him under the attention of the U.S. attorney’s office for prosecution was the fact that he repeatedly denied that his officers did anything wrong, which constituted perjury when he said it in opposition to lawsuits that were filed against the city.

It is because of that perjury conviction that Burge now lives at a federal correctional center in North Carolina – from which he is scheduled to be released Feb. 14, 2015.

That will be a miserable Valentine’s Day for the people who have to live with the memory of what Burge’s officers did in their attempts to preserve law and order within Chicago.

MAYBE THAT’S WHAT old-man Richard J. Daley was talking about when he had his slip of the tongue and said the police were here to “preserve disorder.”

Of course, I’m all for the rights of the inmates to be preserved. It is what makes our justice system superior to those of many others (Amanda Knox having to fear Italy is ridiculous) in the world.

Burge disgust was not limited

Even in cases such as Burge. So I have no problem with the idea that he appealed his conviction. I’m just glad to see that there wasn’t somebody on the Seventh Circuit that is based in Chicago and oversees appeals filed in the Midwestern U.S. who actually took it seriously.

Because Burge’s appeal basically says that the people who are accusing him of wrongdoing are lying. As though the word of a police officer should always be taken above others.

THE PROBLEM WITH that line of logic is why the Burge case is so offensive to begin with. It attempts to use the badge as a shield to cover one’s inappropriate behavior – when in reality we ought to be expecting our law enforcement-types to conduct themselves at a higher level than we do other individuals in our society!

His appeal literally argues that since his testimony in those lawsuits did not prevent a judge from ruling in their favor, it means that he didn’t affect the outcome of any case.

As though he thinks he is above prosecution.

It is embarrassing to think that we have people like this thinking of themselves as legitimate sources of law and order. It is the reason that we have people who just don’t trust the police, and are skeptical to cooperate.

WHICH IS WHY it would have been a sick joke if the appeals court had actually ruled in Burge’s behavior in an opinion that was released on Monday. It was reassuring to see that the appellate panel that ruled in Burge’s case was unanimously opposed.

Now I know there are certain types of people who are prepared to disagree with me. They’re the ones who proclaim themselves to be all about “law and order” and “respect” in our society who say that these officers are merely doing what is necessary to deal with criminals.

They’re the ones who saw the high total of slayings in Chicago earlier this year who probably want to say that justifies some brutal behavior against defendants.

Sorry, but I just don’t buy it – particularly since the places on this planet that do permit such behavior legally are usually ones we wouldn’t want to live in.

BESIDES, IT JUST isn’t necessary. Take the high level of attacks that occurred this weekend in the downtown area. Police were able to respond to many of them almost immediately, with nearly 30 arrests made.

It would be a shame if the Police Department behaving professionally had been overshadowed by a Burge-related reminder of when it conducted itself badly.

  -30-

It’s a beautiful day for a ballgame

No, I won’t be at U.S. Cellular Field on Monday. As much as I wouldn’t mind actually attending a ballgame, I have to work for a living and will be engaging in activities meant to bring in some income.

Starting the season on an upbeat note?

But in spirit, I’ll wish I could see for myself if the Kansas City Royals are really so improved that many of the baseball pundits aren’t being ridiculous for predicting that they will be the Second Place team behind the Detroit Tigers for 2013 – with the Chicago White Sox expected to wither away into irrelevance.

ALL THOSE MONTHS they spent in First Place in 2012? It might as well have not happened. They might well be as bad as the Chicago Cubs will be this season.

The day I have been looking forward to for the past couple of months has finally arrived. It’s Opening Day. Which means the latest version of the 162-game schedule is up and running.

It actually kicked off last night with the likely worst-in-baseball Houston Astros marking their shift to the American League with a season-beginning game against their brand-new arch-rival Texas Rangers.

For everybody else, it begins Monday.

THE ROYALS ARE in Chicago, while the Cubs will be in Pittsburgh to begin the season against the Pirates.

I’m already braced for the concept that there won’t likely be a serious pennant race involving Chicago. ’13 will be an unlucky number for those of us in the Second City.

But when it comes to the beauty of the ballgame itself, it won’t really matter. The so-called “head game” involving a pitcher confronting a hitter – with its constant back-and-forth – is something that only a simpleton could find dull.

Cubs fans hope Monday isn't career highlight

It is what makes watching baseball live a unique, and intriguing experience.

I'LL STILL WANT to get out to a few ballgames this season – and I’ll have my pick of many. Because one of the things that makes baseball so much more intriguing than any other professional sport is its daily nature.

Make a mess of a ballgame? Redemption has the potential to be only one day away!

I should point out one factor. I once wrote a commentary here mocking the Chicago Cubs for rushing along prospect Jeff Samardzija, a pitcher who once played football at Notre Dame. I was convinced that he would turn out to be as mediocre as Joe Borchard, the one-time Stanford football star who may well be one of the greatest players in the history of the Charlotte Knights – but never produced consistently for the White Sox.

I’m sure some will argue the fact that Samardzija will be the Cubs’ starting pitcher Monday against Pittsburgh is a sign that he has succeeded. Yet I can’t help but point out the Yahoo! Sports weblog Big League Stew – which rates Samardzija as the 19^th best pitcher to get an Opening Day start.

THIS START COULD be the highlight of the Samardzija career – just as the 504-foot home run Borchard hit in 2004 remains the longest-hit shot ever at U.S. Cellular Field!

It seems like so long ago!


We’ll have to find the beauty of baseball this year in its small moments – and not in anticipation of any World Series celebration come early November.

Although I have to admit that this season is a little unique, since I made a point of watching much of the Caribbean Series back in February, then the World Baseball Classic in March. Which means I have been watching competitive games (albeit on television) for a couple of months. It makes Opening Day this year feel more like a sensation of, “It’s about time!”

It also makes me wish that we could have broadcaster Ernesto Jerez as a part of the scene for one of our city’s ball clubs. His enthusiasm for the game, along with that home run call, would definitely add some joy!

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