SUBSCRIPT: As Rahm and CPS meltdown in front of the world a history lesson. How did that foul-mouthed little punk get this much power? A lesson in the results of a "low dishonest decade..."
The following was originally posted to my Facebook page, too, but wasn't allowed up. It's time for the historical retrospective on Rahm Emanuel and the 20 years since Rahm first began weaseling into power at Chicago's City Hall. We can learn a lot if we pay attention, and remember never to trust a guy who insists he's proving he had gonads by using the "F" word like a 13-year-old who just lost his first street fight.
Today (July 18, 2012) the big news will be around six p.m. when the CTU leadership announces the results of our vote at the House of Delegates meeting at Plumbers Hall (1340 W. Washington St. in Chicago; the meeting begins at 4:00; see you there).
There will be an amazing amount of static and spin before the CTU meeting. Rahm Emanuel is already in meltdown now that all his lies and spinning have caught up with him. His remarks yesterday about the fact finding on the union negotiations indicate he can't take being caught in a year of lies and spin, so he's going to be even more fun to watch in the coming weeks.
At the same time, the pathetic group of overpaid and undercompetents Rahm put into power at CPS over the nation's third largest school system are showing off just how bad they are. Last night's "Webinar" with CPS officials was just one latest example of Out of Touch and Overpaid.
Today's side shows begin at the Board of Education, which is holding an emergency meeting beginning around 3:00.
It's a flashback (for me) to the special meeting they hald on June 15, 2011, when they launched the Year of the Big Lie by voting to endorse Tim Cawley's first Power Point, the one that "proved" the CPS fiscal emergency was so huge (HUGE! DO YOU HEAR ME! THIS TIME IT'S FOR REAL!!! HONEST!!!!). That's when what we might call "The Year of Power Point" began, with the lie that said CPS couldn't afford to honor a contract with the majority of its workers (all those in unions, including Sharon Schmidt, working at the time for CPS) while silently and secretly sending more than $70 million more to Rahm over at City Hall based on another "contract" — the one dealing with Cop Costs.
Since then, the year has been reporting on the lies of Rahm and the Board (and, more and more pathetically except that we're paying him a quarter million a year to stumble over his scripted talking points) and Brizard.
In August it was LONGER SCHOOL DAY and Rahm at Sox Park with the CPS people sigging up the Preacher Patronage Crowd. In September it was the "pioneer" schools (another pathetic example) and the Rent A Protesters (reported at that time exclusively by me in Substance) at City Hall during that sad vote of the alderguys and gals to support Rahm's Longest School Day garbage.
Of course, throughout it all was Rahm's arrogance and crudedity (most famously, "F___ you Lewis..." to Karen Lewis, our friend and CTU President).
Rahm's a punk, and those who kiss his, er, ring, are just punks who need to wash their lips and teeth more often. For years, I taught students the best book about the Vietnam War (my friend John DelVecchio's "The 13th Valley") but only after their parents gave permission because the language was authentic dialogue of American young men in war. (Hence, the widespread but not universal use of the "F" word).
But during my teaching of that book, I always reminded my kids that the use of the "F" word was a sign of macho immaturity, fear, and stupidity. The men and women (like my father and mother, both of whom were in the Army) taught that those who spoke the most crudely usually were the least courageous when the terrors got real.
The question isn't how such a lightweight punk at Rahm Emanuel gets away with all that childish crudeness, but how the USA in the 1990s and 2000s let a guy like that get so much power. And I think an understandding of this "low dishonest decade", with a focus on Rahm's silliness and the people who subsidized him and it, will be worth a generation's study as we begin, with the Chicago teachers strike of 2012, to bring America back to our roots and away from guys like him and the seven dwarfs at the Chicago Board of Education. It's sad we have to learn these lessons as a people over and over and over again, but OK with that.
Today, in a way, it continues, but stronger still.
By: Anthony Smith
And Don't forget that Rahm...
And please don't forget that Rahm came up with Rod Blagojevich and that he made more than $18 million with the investment-banking firm Wasserstein, Perella, & Co. between the time he left President Clinton's administration in late 1998 and was sworn in as congressman in January 2003. Wasserstein, Perella, & Co. has since been sold. How convenient!
From the Sun Times 2/7/11 and New York Times.
Emanuel has invested his income from his banking career in several investment funds, some of which are held in the Rahm Emanuel Blind Trust
(sounds a bit like Presidential hopeful Mitt Romney to me/ see the commercial add that is currently running on cable from our President clobbering Mitt for not being patriotic/American enough=implied)
managed by JP Morgan Chase & Co. (can we say Lost $2 Billion, no make that $4 Billion, no wait, make that $6 Billion, oh whose counting anymore, certainly not JP Morgan Chase!)
Emanuel reported $57,946 in "ordinary dividends" from the trust in 2009. From the Sun Times February 7, 2011 edition.
This should cement our Mayors status as the leader of the 1% here in Chicago!
But don't worry, our Nations Democratic Leader will come to the rescue of his 99% in his adopted hometown of Chicago!! Yeah for President Obama, he will do what is right and what is fair, what is just and what is helping to save the middle class he keeps stating that he is trying to save!
Best wishes everyone.
Yours in solidarity,
Anthony