WEEKEND QUOTABLES

@realamberheard

Karen Lewis

For those of you who may not know, I submitted my retirement papers in Friday. Not only did I retire from CPS after 30 years, I have retired from CTU. Please Google glioblastoma and note, I've already beaten the odds. I'm not done fighting. Good luck to the officers and staff, especially Jesse Sharkey, who's been doing 3 jobs...since my illness. -- Facebook 

Roseanne Barr 

 'I'm not a racist, I'm an idiot' -- CNN

Rahm's City Hall spokesman, Adam Collins

“When he was in the private sector, for a few months, the mayor explored a potential business agreement with Mr. Pecker, but it did not ultimately come to fruition.” -- Sun-Times

“Hammerin’ Hank” Aaron

At a ceremony for the “Hank Aaron Champion for Justice Awards” in Atlanta, Aaron said that he would not visit the White House if an invitation came from the mouth of Donald Trump. “There’s nobody there I want to see." -- Nation

Columnist Neil Steinberg

 I don’t know about you, but I want to look back and say I did all I could and spoke out, loud and clear, again and again. Donald Trump is a racist appealing to our country’s worst instincts. He will lead us over a cliff to disaster unless he’s stopped. -- Sun-Times

Cong. Luis Gutierrez moving to Puerto Rico

With the move, I will in a better position to “connect the experience of the people of Puerto Rico, the devastating effect of the hurricane and the lousy, inhumane response of Donald Trump to the tragedy.” -- Sun-Times

Today would have been #TamirRice’s 16th birthday. He should be alive and celebrating. #BlackLivesMatter pic.twitter.com/ZBLWIJ71dL

— Legal Defense Fund (@NAACP_LDF) June 25, 2018

As long as they're doing background checks for sexual predators at CPS...

A background check on Gary Solomon -- before throwing $20M no-bid contract his way -- might have averted
the biggest corruption scandal in CPS history. 

Speaking of background checks for possible sexual predators at CPS, Rahm Emanuel and his hand-picked school board, probably should have done one on Gary Solomon before throwing that $20M SUPES contract his way. A check might have kept Solomon's partner in crime Barbara Byrd-Bennett out of prison and prevented the biggest corruption scandal in CPS history.

Solomon, a former dean and teacher at suburban Niles West H.S., was accused by that district of sending sexually explicit e-mail messages to female students. Besides those messages, they said he attended a Cubs game with students during a school day when no field trip was planned. They accused him of keeping a journal on a school computer that described several unprofessional relationships with students.

Finally, Solomon was forced out of Niles Township School District 219 under a cloud after he was accused by his bosses of “immoral and unprofessional” conduct, including allegations he kissed a female student, covered up students’ drug and alcohol use,and sent “sexually suggestive, predatory” emails to students, court records show.

While no criminal charges were ever filed, Solomon was barred from ever teaching in the district again. Solomon resigned from his post as part of a settlement back in 2001 and began a consulting business with former Niles West student Thomas Vranas, one that also included a partnership with former Chicago schools CEO and current Chicago mayoral candidate Paul Vallas.

Vallas contracted with Solomon to work at schools in Philadelphia. When he was recruited to revive the schools in hurricane-battered New Orleans, Vallas sent a series of letters to Louisiana officials who oversaw the New Orleans district, vouching for Synesi Associates, the education consulting firm that had been started by Solomon in Chicago.

Synesi landed two no-bid contracts worth nearly $893,000 in New Orleans during Vallas’ time running the Recovery School District from 2007 to 2011. 

But Vallas points out: “I’m not the one who gave Gary Solomon a $20 million, no-bid contract.” He's got a point there. That would be Rahm. 

Last year, Solomon was sentenced to seven years in prison for his role in the bribery scandal. His SUPES consulting group employed Byrd-Bennett before she took her position as chief executive officer of CPS in 2012. Solomon admitted his role in the scheme to bribe Rahm's hand-picked CEO by offering her a percentage of the contracts she helped secure for SUPES. He also pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud.

This is a man who should have never been allowed anywhere near CPS schools, students or staff. So, as long as they're doing background checks on teachers, coaches, parents and CPS staff, they might want to do them on profit-hungry contractors as well. 

Did Chicago cop really say he's entitled to collect from his victim's family? Depends on which paper you read.

LaTarsha Jones, center, a daughter of Bettie Jones, is comforted by family and friends in front of Jones' apartment building in the West Garfield Park neighborhood Dec. 27, 2015. Jones was shot and killed by police the previous day along with 19-year-old Quintonio LeGrier. Now killer-cop Rialmo is suing LeGrier family, saying the incident "changed him".

The Sun-Times and Tribune both had reporters at the second day of the trial over lawsuits stemming from Chicago cop Robert Rialmo's shooting of 19-year-old Quintonio LeGrier and his neighbor, 55-year-old Bettie Jones following a report of a domestic dispute. But each paper reported a crucial part of the testimony differently.

The city’s lawyers this month avoided a trial with Jones’ family by reaching a proposed $16 million settlement, but the city made no such deal with LeGrier’s family.

The shootings were part of a long, recent string of CPD killings of unarmed African-Americans and took place just a month after a judge forced Mayor Rahm Emanuel to release footage of a white officer, Jason Van Dyke, shooting black teen Laquan McDonald 16 times. That trial could have great implications for the upcoming mayor's race.

COULD IMPACT MAYOR'S RACE...The trial of three Chicago Police officers charged with filing false reports on the McDonald shooting to cover for Van Dyke has been pushed back to late November, after the election.

Rialmo, who is on paid desk duty, also remains under investigation for a December 2017 bar fight in which he punched two men in the face in an altercation caught on video.

After killing LeGrier and Jones, Rialmo turned around and with support from the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) filed a counter-suit against the LeGrier estate and a cross-claim against the city, alleging he should collect because he was "poorly trained" and that he was psychologically damaged ("changed") by the event.

If you read each paper's coverage, you wonder if they were covering the same trial or if we're reading the same testimony. See if you can tell the difference.

Sun-Times reporter Sam Charles had it this way in this morning's edition:

“On Dec. 26, 2015, you shot Quintonio LeGrier?” Foutris [LeGrier family lawyer] asked.

Yes,” Rialmo responded.

“You shot him multiple times?”

“Yes.”

“You shot him intentionally?”

“Yes. 

Referencing Rialmo’s cross-claim against the city and countersuit filed against the LeGrier estate, Foutris asked:

“You want this jury to give you money for killing Antonio [LeGrier]’s kid?”Rialmo paused, shrugged and said, “Yes."

But here's the way that last exchange was reported in the Tribune by reporter, Dan Kinkel:

 “You think you’re entitled to money for killing Antonio’s kid?” Foutris asked. Rialmo did not answer as opposing lawyers quickly raised objections.

So, did Rialmo answer, "yes", he thought he was entitled to money for killing Antonio LeGrier's son? Or did he not answer the question?

Depends on which paper you read.

WEEKEND QUOTABLES

Daniel José Camacho

When the US government snatches children, it's biblical to resist the law. -- Guardian

Jacob Soboroff, reporting from McAllen, TX

 "People in here are locked up in cages, essentially what look like animal kennels. I don't know any other way to describe it." -- MSNBC

Antar Davidson

...who quit his job at a nonprofit migrant child detention center in Arizona, says he was instructed to tell siblings not to hug before they were separated: "The three siblings were clutching each other for dear life, tears streaming down their face". -- Democracy Now

Cassie Cresswell, Raise Your Hand

 "We are deeply concerned about yet another improper sharing incident of student data in Chicago Public Schools." -- DataBreaches.net

"Trump is trying to say… 'The Democrats made us do it.' One of his advisers, Stephen Miller, is saying, 'It is our policy to do it' … Kirstjen Nielsen is saying, 'We're not actually doing it,' and then… Jeff Sessions is saying, 'God wants us to do it.'" - @reneefeltz pic.twitter.com/ebNvY5xtGh

— Democracy Now! (@democracynow) June 18, 2018

If anyone knows of a parent that has had their child taken from them at the border and not returned, please have them contact me as I am entering this fight. This outrageous conduct must be brought to an immediate end. #Basta

— Michael Avenatti (@MichaelAvenatti) June 17, 2018

Being as cruel & nasty as possible to immigrant children & families is an election year strategy by Sessions, Trump & GOP. This #FathersDayofAction we are standing up for children all over the US to say NO. #FamiliesBelongTogether #twill #chicago ⁦@HispanicCaucus⁩ pic.twitter.com/yrQry0c0Lu

— Luis V. Gutierrez (@RepGutierrez) June 17, 2018

Korean summit about much more than Kim/Trump wrestling match

It was just a few months ago that Trump was threatening "fire and fury" and boasting, "My button is bigger than yours". He had Pentagon on a nuclear war footing and the U.S. armada sailing into Korean waters.

Big media is looking at the Singapore meeting as if it was a pro-wrestling event. Who will win, Trump or Kim? The talking heads on CNN ponder the question. Should Trump be shaking hands with a dictator? Has he done his prep work? Is Kim just playing him? Many Democrats hope to God that the Summit is a PR flop for DT and that he returns home without a feather in his fascist cap. Trump's base will stay with him come what may.

But the way I see it, once you cut through all the bullshit, the summit offers positive prospects in a dangerous, rapidly changing world order. With an economically self-confident China, now tamping down the trade war threat and working along with South Korea to push diplomacy on the Korean peninsula, both Trump's and Kim's hands have been forced.

With the U.S. declining in global power and stature and the atomic clock edging closer to midnight, these are dangerous times. Trump is playing on American fears of lost privilege and economic ruin.

Cold War with Russia, trade war with Europe, Canada and China, and Bolton itching for pre-emptive nuclear strikes against Iran and North Korea, and all this playing on our growing sense of national insecurity. Building on that fear and insecurity was the cornerstone of Trump's election campaign in 2016. Now it's seen as the only way out (aside from purging the voting rolls) for Trump and the Republicans in the November elections. The Summit changes none of this.

But remember, it was just a few months ago that DT had the Pentagon on a nuclear war footing and sending its lost armada into Korean waters (shadowed by Russian and Chinese war ships). Remember him saber-rattling, threatening "fire and fury", and boasting: "My button is bigger than yours..."?

Kim defied repeated economic sanctions and international pressure over its nuclear regime and vowed a “merciless response” to any US provocation. Hopefully, popular world pressure and current negotiations will put a damper on all that empty, but provocative, chatter.

To the people of the Korean Peninsula, who have suffered from war -- hot and cold -- for the past 68 years and more, with distorted economies and families on both sides of the arbitrary 38th Parallel torn from each other, both captives to superpower rivalry, this is about so much more than a personal rivalry between autocrats. The people on both sides of the line want assurances of peace on a nuclear-free peninsula, trade and normalization of relations, and ultimately national reunification.

None of those things will likely come out of this first round of diplomacy. But I'm glad the Singapore meetings are taking place. If nothing else, they buy time and pull us from the brink. And right now, time is the enemy of Trump and his Republican hangers-on.

Deja vu all over again?

The missing piece is still a powerful anti-war movement here on the ground. It was such a movement 50 years ago that pressured both Democrats and Trump's reactionary, Republican and anti-communist forbearer, Richard Nixon to finally end the war in Vietnam and normalize relations with China.

Deja vu all over again? Could be.

WEEKEND QUOTABLES

Now iconic photo from the G-6 +1 says it all. 

Gary Younge

The political situation in America is many things: it’s exhausting, exasperating, terrifying, volatile, vulgar, unsustainable and unhinged. The one thing it is not, is normal. -- Guardian

Canadian PM Justin Trudeau 

“Canadians, we’re polite, we’re reasonable, but we will also not be pushed around.” -- RCP

Brent Staples

 With black soldiers subjected to segregation even as they offered their lives for freedom, cultural icons of all kinds — including the national anthem — were subject to deconstruction and criticism. -- New York Times

FOX News host Abby Huntsman's Freudian slip

 “This is history. We are living — regardless of what happens in that meeting between the two dictators — what we are seeing right now, this is historic.” -- Fox and Friends

Robert De Niro got a standing O
He introduced Bruce Springsteen’s Tony performance this way.

“I just want to say one thing,” De Niro said. ” F— Trump. It’s no longer down with Trump. It’s f— Trump.” He got a standing ovation from the audience. -- Variety

Anthony Bourdain (1956-2018)

Witness what Henry [Kissinger] did in Cambodia – the fruits of his genius for statesmanship – and you will never understand why he’s not sitting in the dock at The Hague next to Milošević.” -- Slate

Muhammad Ali’s lawyer, Ron Tweel

 “We appreciate President Trump’s sentiment, but a pardon is unnecessary. The US supreme court overturned the conviction of Muhammad Ali in a unanimous decision in 1971. There is no conviction from which a pardon is needed.” --  Guardian

If Rahm intended to run for re-election on CPS progress, his campaign may be over before it's begun

Rahm Emanuel is beginning to look like a politician whose re-election campaign may be on the brink of collapse before it's even officially begun. His political achilles heel surprisingly turns out to be his autocratic control over Chicago Public Schools. Most everyone thought his greatest vulnerability would be his cover-up of the Laquan McDonald police killing.

What should have been his strong suit, running as an "education mayor," is now buried in a volcanic lava flow of school privatization, corruption, inequality, and dysfunction.

His new schools CEO, Janice Jackson, the fifth CEO in six years, has gone from looking like a source of hope for change, to being little more than Rahm's political functionary, in just a few months, even fronting for the mayor in commercials touting the progress at CPS, bankrolled by a nonprofit with close ties to MRE.

Instead of talking about alleged increases in standardized test scores and graduation rates, the mayor could spend the next eight months leading up to the election dodging questions about the mountain of scandals piling up at CPS.

These include hundreds of recently revealed cases of sexual assault and abuse of students over the past decade, cases that were ignored or covered up by CPS' law department and the mayor.

My alderman, Scott Waguespack (32nd), put it bluntly:

“This is about more than politics, it’s a core issue of our humanity. We’re calling for a City Council hearing on what the Tribune found. Every alderman should be demanding to have CPS there and the mayor’s people, too. He’s the boss. Emanuel is the mayor.”

Then there's new reports of mountains of filth and vermin in the schools since custodial services were privatized by Rahm and former CEO Forrest Claypool, who resigned in December after being charged with "ethics violations."

The Sun-Times reports that SodexoMAGIC and Aramark Corporation have received nearly $800 million in contracts to privatize school engineers and custodians and bust their union. Coincidentally, SodexoMAGIC made an extraordinary campaign contribution of $250,000 to Emanuel. And Aramark has charged CPS with over $20 million in cost overruns.

U of C Lab School fired Aramark over mouse droppings

Chicago Public Schools officials have now agreed to give $259 million in additional work to Aramark. They will be handed control of all facilities work at most of Chicago’s schools on July 1, according to its contract, which CPS officials tried to keep under wraps.

The irony of all this is that the University of Chicago Lab School, the expensive private school where elites like the mayor and former Ed Sec. Arne Duncan send their kids, just gave Aramark the boot after finding mice droppings in school food. Looks like mouse poop is only OK for other people's children.

There's more, so much more, including pay-to-play scandals involving Rahm's hand-picked board members like Deborah Quazzo, who colluded with former CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett, now doing time in prison, to enrich herself at the expense of the schools.

If Rahm had any intentions of building his campaign on his running of CPS, it's looking more and more like his campaign is over before it's begun.

WEEKEND QUOTABLES

CPS student, Tamara Reed

“I dreaded going to school. I cried every night." -- Chicago Tribune

Lori Lightfoot

 “This tragedy happened because of incompetency at the highest levels. Who are we as a city if we accept this as just another scandal du jour at CPS?” -- Politico

Study

This household-based survey suggests that the number of excess deaths related to Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico is more than 70 times the official estimate. -- New England Journal of Medicine

John Boehner

“There is no Republican Party. There’s a Trump party." -- Politico

Rudy Giuliani

Trump could have shot Comey and still couldn't be indicted. “If he shot James Comey, he’d be impeached the next day. "Impeach him, and then you can do whatever you want to do to him.” -- Huffington

Natasha Korecki on cost of IL gov's race

"How many Hulu ads can you buy?" -- Illinois Playbook

Chicago Public Schools has failed to protect students from sexual abuse and assault, a Tribune investigation has found. Reporters identified hundreds of cases in the last decade, attacks that left students feeling betrayed and wounded. https://t.co/396Q42bApm https://t.co/NDiwoWVtip

— Juan Perez Jr. (@PerezJr) June 1, 2018