The Friday Rant

  It’s been a long week so with your permission, I’m going to rant a bit.  First, to all of the Paula Dean supporters out there.  Listen, stop badgering Giada DeLaurentis to step in and speak up on old Paula’s behalf.  Let’s be real here.  Paula Dean stepped on a tripwire and blew herself up.  It happens in the world of a celebrity or whatever Paula Dean is or was.  To expect Giada DeLaurentis to step into the breach and blow up her own career is just plain asinine.  Why would expect you ANYONE to step up and come to the defense of someone who is as radioactive as Paula Dean is right now.   Now then, onto all of the liberals in Hollywood who are celebrating DOMA’S defeat.  DOMA, FYI, is the Defense of Marriage Act that essentially outlaws gay marriage.  Everyone is tweeting like this was a clear cut decision for equality and it’s a snow job.  The Supreme Court spoke out of both sides of its mouth and didn’t strike a blow for anything.  What they did was cast themselves as do-gooders for equality.  What they did was position themselves, politically, to be seen as striking a blow for progressiveness.  In reality, they cast each state that opposes gay marriage as the heavy.  See, DOMA is dead but each state has the option of not recognizing same sex couples or gay marriage as a whole.  Here’s how it will go.  Someone with clout and money will start clucking about how the earth will split in half ala Caligula if gays and lesbians are allowed to marry.  And suddenly the political winds will change yet again and the Supreme Court will surrender what autonomy it has left in the name of saving face.  Think I’m off base?  Maybe.  In my world, politics is politics and nobody plays politics like the Supreme Court.  Moving on.  The next item on my radar… Oh yes, a local nugget about an aldermanic demi gog who continues to turn a simple negotiation with my favorite North Side baseball team into a Seinfeld episode.    Yesterday, Tom Tunney aka the godfather of the 44^th ward decided that the Chicago Cubs and their plans to renovate Wrigley Field was a bit to audacious to see the light of day.  This was after a compromise between Tunney and Cubs owner Tom Ricketts and the roof top owners was essentially hammered out in principle.   Only in Chicago can you have an Alderman of a given ward sabotage a project in which the ownership group, the Ricketts family, has agreed to foot the bill for their own renovation project.  The very things that Tom Tunney wants to scrap from the renovation project are the very things that the Ricketts family needs to pay for the renovation.  But of course Tunney was the one who stood on his soapbox and screamed bloody murder when the idea of a publicly funded renovation package was floated.  So which is it Mister Tunney?  You didn’t want the Ricketts family to use public funds to pay to for the renovation.  Yet, you won’t get out of the way so the Ricketts family can pay for it on their own dime?  And if you’re one of those people complaining about big business crushing the little guy roof top owners, you can stop right there.  The roof top owners aren’t under dogs; this isn’t Mister Smith Goes to Washington.  What it is is Tom Tunney protecting a potential voting bloc aka the roof top owners by giving them carte blanche to profit off of someone else’s business.  Citizens of Chicago, heed the words of DJ Love in “Do the Right Thing.”  V-O-T-E.  Vote out Pat Quinn and vote out every democrat who has run this state into the ground.  But don’t stop there.  No no.  Vote out Tom Tunney while you’re at it my fellow Chicagoans.  If you care about baseball on the North Side and you’re as angry about Tom Tunney’s abuse of power and his general sense of being obtuse….. V-O-T-E.   Resist Tyranny!!!  Toot!!!  Toot!!!