Surprising and Not Surprising News

I was surprised to hear that Rahm Emanuel won't be running for a third term as Mayor of Chicago. I thought for sure he'd go for another term. When Rahm ran for and became Mayor, I always thought he was trying to be Chicago's version of Mike Bloomberg. I figured he saw himself as Bloomberg's Midwestern doppelganger and that he'd be praised in the same way Bloomy was as a transformative big-city mayor. But that didn't happen. With the constant drumbeat of violence in Chicago along with a host of other problems (school closings, police shootings, etc.), there wasn't much to praise him for. Whenever people compare New York and Chicago in my presence, I'm always quick to note that the situations in both cities are very different. New York is largely gentrified and it has a great economic base unlike Chicago. Yes, New York has violence, but it's a lot more concentrated than what you see in Chicago. Businesses and people want to move to New York. Chicago, not so much. You can't attract people and businesses to Chicago when double-digit numbers of people are being shot on any given weekend. The gun violence has to get under control before the city can move forward. Maybe the next mayor will be able to get things under control and start to get Chicago back on the road to prosperity.

In non-surprising news, how many more books do we need to read to understand that Donny T. is a dope. How many times do we need to hear the same adjectives used to describe Donny? Idiot, moron, imbecile, stupid, petty, unhinged, dumb...and the list goes on. Every time a new book publishes with "insider" information that tells most of us what we already know (that Donny is a dope), the denials start up again. This person didn't say that. This person was misquoted. This book isn't true. It's a work of fiction by people out to get Donny. Blah, blah, blah. All of these books have a common theme: again, that Donny is a dope. They're written by different people, but they all say the same thing. And they're all wrong??? I don't think so.