Not shockingly, many Chicago parents are finding alternatives their children’s education, such charter and private schools, or moving out of Chicago altogether.
The sad irony is that many CPS schools call themselves things like “school of excellence,” or “STEM academy,” or “college prep high school.”
One-third of Chicago’s traditional public schools, Wirepoints reports, are under half of enrollment capacity. One high school, the somewhat modestly named Manley Career Academy, which was built for 1,000 pupils, has just 100 students enrolled there. “Journey to world class” is the school’s motto.
There’s state-enforced moratorium preventing school closings, but that expires next year. But the Chicago Teachers Union, the straw that stirs the drink in city politics, is vehemently opposed to that.
Fewer schools means fewer union jobs.
The CTU and its allies say that Chicago schools are underfunded. However, they never say what the proper amount is. Just more, more, and more.
As I reported here earlier this month, Chicago’s leftist mayor, Brandon Johnson, who prior to his election last year was a CTU organizer, saw his school board resign because, according to media reports, “Branjo” was pressuring them to fire the CEO of CPS.
Johnson appointed that entire board.
CTU was the primary funder of Johnson’s campaign. That union is fond of Alinskyite tactics, particularly creating and demonizing an enemy. Usually that’s the mayor, but Johnson is on the CTU team.
Johnson and CTU–assuming there is a difference between the two–are pushing for high-interest loans to increase spending for schools on things like salaries and pension obligations, rather than for capital projects, which is what fiscally responsible school districts use loans for.
Johnson’s new appointees will be out of office soon. A new 21-member board–10 elected and 11 appointed by the mayor, will take over shortly after Election Day next month. Many of the electoral candidates for the new school board are endorsed by the CTU.
Chicago and CPS appear to be in a death spiral. How both got there goes back decades. As for the misdeeds of the last few years, the Chicago Teachers Union deserves much of the blame.
Getting out of this mess won’t be easy. While Governor J.B. Pritzker is also a Democrat, he and Branjo aren’t close. Pritzker is a liberal, but Johnson is a quasi-socialist. But a state takeover of CPS isn’t likely. Pritzker wants to run for president one day and if the state is in charge of Chicago’s schools, then CPS becomes his problem.
Even if Kamala Harris wins the presidency next month, a federal bailout of CPS is very unlikely, especially because the district squandered COVID funds.
And Chicagoans are stuck with Johnson until at least 2027.
While he’s only 17 months in his first term in office, Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson is on pace to be remembered as one of America’s worst big city mayors. The competition to be inducted into that shameful club includes some real rascals and incompetents, such as New York’s Jimmy Walker, Detroit’s Coleman Young, Cleveland’s Dennis Kucinich, and Chicago’s Big Bill Thompson.
The insufferably incompetent and complicit Chicago media, once among the America’s best, rarely mentions that “Branjo,” prior to his election as mayor, was a longtime paid organizer–that means agitator–for the far-left Chicago Teachers Union. The CTU was the largest donor to his mayoral campaign, and it supplied ground troops to get Johnson elected. Yes, I know, Johnson was also a Cook County commissioner. While in that job he authored no memorable legislation.
Johnson, in short, is in the pocket of the CTU.
Why can’t you say so, Chicago media?
Chicago is essentially broke because of massive unfunded pension obligations, and so is Chicago Public Schools.
On Friday afternoon, all seven members of the Chicago Board of Education resigned because they refuse to fire CPS CEO Pedro Martinez, who was appointed by Johnson’s predecessor, Lori Lightfoot. Johnson has called on Martinez to resign, the mayor supports the fiscally anemic CPS to take out what’s widely being called a “payday loan” to pay for pension obligations and big raises for CTU members.
Martinez opposes that, and clearly, so do the former board members. Unlike Martinez, the board members who just quit aren’t Lightfoot holdovers. Johnson appointed all of them.
Richard Nixon had his Saturday Night Massacre, @ChicagosMayor has his Friday Afternoon Massacre. And once again, Branjo will probably blame Nixon for his problems.
The president of the Chicago Teachers Union is Stacy Davis Gates. She’s an ill-tempered leftist who is possibly crazier than US Rep. Rashida Tlaib. Gates, it’s important to know, sends her son to a private school. Of course she is against school choice for everyone else, as is Johnson.
Besides its money problems, Chicago Public Schools do a horrible job educating students. Even though CPS spending continues to soar, student test scores continue to be quite low. Roughly three-quarters of CPS students are unable to read at grade level—and math scores are even worse.
Can this story get any worse?
In Chicago, getting worse is the normal.
As part of a transition to a fully elected Board of Education, ten seats for a new board are up for election this fall–voting has already begun. Johnson will appoint the remaining 11 seats.
The new members that Johnson will appoint will be out of office in a few months. Branjo will task them to fire Martinez, approve the “payday loan” for those pension obligations, and approve a big raise for Chicago’s unionized teachers.
Good government types in Chicago—amazingly, they really exist–condemned Johnson’s pro-Chicago Teachers Union power play. Surprisingly a large majority–over eighty percent–of the Chicago City Council, including aldermen who are members progressive caucus and two of the six socialists, have expressed opposition to Branjo’s move.
As Barack Obama famously said, elections have consequences. Chicago voters choose poorly.
Crime, despite laughable denials from Crain’s Chicago Business, also known as Crain’s Chicago Anti-Business, is a serious problem Chicago. The office and retail vacancy rate downtown are over 25 percent. For 2025, Chicago faces a $1 billion deficit.
Sadly, there is not recall mechanism in place for Chicago mayors.
This assessment of the situation in England is better than anything else I’ve read
Not since 1066 has a government in my land so hated and despised the people it rules, and been so determined to enslave, reduce, deny, exploit and destroy them. What is happening with mass immigration, with unacknowledged but real Muslim conquest, and with erasure from both the history books and the streets, represents a deliberate attempt to expunge a distinct people from the world, to consign them solely to history. And if you don’t believe that is true, visit the parts of Birmingham or London or Bradford where it has already happened, and find me an Englishman there.
There is also an excellent bit of history about the Norman Conquest and its aftermath well worth your time.
The difference between how DA Allen Bragg treats people who are considered a danger to Democrat re-election efforts vs a danger to police or innocent Jews is illustrated here:
James Carlson, who also goes by Cody, burned an Israeli flag, violently stormed Columbia’s Hamilton Hall, clashed with a facilities worker, and allegedly broke a police camera while detained. He was arrested on April 20 on a misdemeanor arson charge and again on April 30, the day that New York City police swept Columbia and cleared Hamilton Hall, for burglary, a felony in New York.
By the time Carlson and other Hamilton Hall arrestees attended their June court hearings, however, the Manhattan district attorney’s office—led by Alvin Bragg—opted to pursue a reduced charge against Carlson: criminal trespassing, a misdemeanor. As a result, Carlson, a trust fund kid who specializes in animal rights law and lists his $2.3 million Brooklyn townhouse on his active New York attorney registration, faces little risk of losing his license.
Via Hotair. Never forget that if Trump was the pre 2015 Trump who was not consider a threat to Democrats holding power his case would never have seen the light of day.
How Bad was the Walz Pick by Kamala Harris, this bad:
🚨IN THE NEWS: Tim Walz having a *not great* day
ABC – Walz mischaracterized his military service
CNN – Walz lied about his drunk driving arrest
WaPo – Walz lied about Vance's record on pro-worker legislation
The Walz pick was the first decision made by Kamala as the Democrat candidate for president.
This is the same media that has done their level best to raise up and protect Harris from the moment Biden was forced out.
Almost more interesting is the media sudden volte face on Hunter Biden.
A CNN panel reacted on Wednesday to the news that Hunter Biden reportedly sought help from the U.S. government for a possibly financially beneficial energy project in Italy while his father was vice president, and said it felt “very strange.”
“This isn‘t great. Hunter Biden, everybody in the White House has known for a long time, is an issue. The way that his lawyers responded to this disclosure saying, ‘Well, yeah, he sent letters but did nothing wrong.’ This feels very strange to people that the vice president‘s son was sending letters or making requests to other government officials and saying, ‘Hey, would you meet with this company?’,” CNN’s Edward-Isaac Dovere said.
The killer quote however is this:
“One of the other things The New York Times reports here is that this document was suddenly shaken loose from the U.S. bureaucracy of the week that President Biden dropped out of the race,” CNN host Kasie Hunt said. “They claim it’s a coincidence.”
It’s amazing what can happen when an idiot is no longer useful
Math and Logic are important and Stacy McCain notes both with discussing the COVID Vaccines and the death of former Youtube Boss who was in charge when I was kicked off the platform:
My point is that two things can be simultaneously true: (1) the COVID-19 vaccines inflicted no serious harm on the vast majority of patients who got vaccinated against the virus, and (2) there are many thousands of people who suffered serious side effects of the vaccines, including hundreds who died as a result of getting vaccinated. You don’t need any expertise in epidemiology to ujnderstand this; it’s just simple math.
OK, so it is probably just a coincidence that pro-vaccine fanatic Susan Wojcicki died of lung cancer at age 56, a little more than three years after the COVID vaccines became available. For my friend to suggest that it was “turbo cancer” is not justified by any available evidence, and it’s probably impolite even to discuss it.
But is it wrong? Well, I can’t say that for certain, and neither can you. Logic requires that we reserve judgment when encountering the unknown, and mRNA vaccines are so new that potential side effects are definitely in the realm of the unknown.
The math is simple:
If you tell me, for example, that mRNA vaccines have been proven 99.9% safe, what you’re actually telling me is, one in 1,000 patients will suffer serious side effects. And if you’re going to administer such vaccines to many millions of people, simple multiplication tells you that there will be a thousand “bad” cases for every million of patients who get the vaccine.
As far as the death of Ms Wojcicki all I know for sure is she was loved by God and Christ died for her sins along with everyone else’s. I hope and pray that she took advantage of said mercy when offered.
I also know that you should subscribe to Stacy McCain’s substack.
Now that people who only get their news from MSNBC, CNN, the Washington Post, and the New York Times have learned that Joe Biden is suffering from severe cognitive decline, there is an understandable panic among Democrats, as well as calls to replace him on the fall ballot.
Had Biden chosen a running mate in 2020 based on the ability to serve as president, instead of identitarianism, the answer would be easy regarding a replacement at the top of the ticket, the sitting vice president. But Kamala Harris is the veep. This dopey DEI hire, until last week perhaps, polled even worse than Biden. She’s the poster child of a symptom of public sector incompetence: failing upwards.
Harris checked three boxes–Black, Asian, and female. Michigan’s governor, Gretchen Whitmer, Michigan’s governor, who was said to be a finalist to be Biden’s running mate, checked only one.
Harris may still end up on top of the ticket if Biden bails, partly because the money raised so far by the Biden-Harris campaign can only be transferred to one other candidate–the president’s running mate. Also, the Dems may want to avoid a rancorous battle to replace Biden–and stick with Sleepy Joe–then hope for the best in 2028, because Donald J. Trump can only serve one term.
Whitmer is part of the whispering campaign to replace Biden, as are three other governors, California’s Gavin Newsom, Pennsylvania’s Josh Shapiro, and Illinois’ J.B. Pritzker.
Since I live in the Prairie State, I’m going to discuss Pritzker. Two years ago, when he was running for reelection, I covered Pritzker’s shortcomings in this DTG post, Reasons to oppose Pritzker for governor and president. That blog entry is in need of an update. Of course, the problems I listed in 2022 haven’t gone away.
Crime and the SAFE-T Act: Lawlessness was a problem in Illinois two years ago, particularly in Chicago and its inner suburbs. I live in one of those suburbs.
While the murder rate has gone a little bit in Chicago, assaults and thefts, particularly automobile thefts, have gone up. I haven’t been able to locate state statistics on crime, I’m confident they’re also bad.
Over three years ago, Pritzker signed into law the pro-criminal SAFE-T Act, making Illinois the first state to abolish cash bail. Criminality in Illinois was already encouraged by the catch-and-release prosecution policy of Cook County’s George Soros-funded state’s attorney, Kim Foxx.
Pritzker and the Democrats must have had qualms about the SAFE-T Act, because it was set to take effect nearly two years after the governor signed it into law. A court challenge delayed that until last fall–just as violent crime makes it annual seasonal decline.
We are now a month into the first summer of the SAFE-T Act. In June, there were two egregious murders where the accused were free on pre-trial release. Jai’mani Amir Rivera, who was seven years-old, was shot to death on Chicago’s West Side was shot to death by a teen on electronic monitoring. Also on the West Side, a retired Chicago police officer, Larry Neuman, was fatally gunned down by two teens, both of them were on pre-trial release–one of the pair was on electronic monitoring.
To be fair, even without the SAFE-T Act, with Foxx as the so-called prosecutor, these thugs may have walked free. But Chicago’s failures are being replicated statewide.
Pritzker is active on X, he discusses a wide range of topics.
I can’t remember the last time he mentioned the SAFE-T Act.
Obviously, he knows it’s a problem for him. It’s a more deadly problem for Illinois’ 12 million residents.
Health: I’m going to hurt some readers feelings with this segment.
Shortly after his inauguration, Jimmy Carter released his federal tax returns to the public. And since then, Donald Trump being a notable exception, most presidential candidates have followed suit.
Health records are probably next.
Now that the president’s cognitive decline is an established fact for everyone except for the Biden bitter-clingers, look for future presidential candidates to release specific details on their health, perhaps even making their personal physicians available to the media for unrestricted questioning.
Pritzker is morbidly obese. According to the Mayo Clinic, that condition is “associated with many diseases responsible for a high prevalence of morbidity and mortality, such as insulin-resistant diabetes mellitus, hypertension, coronary artery disease, hyperlipidemia [high cholesterol], and sleep apnea.”
Standards and expectations are understandably much higher for president than for a governor. Pritzker’s health will be an issue if he makes a White House run.
How heavy is Pritzker? I don’t know. But he’s weighty enough to likely cause a femur stress fracture by just standing. J.B. doesn’t even know how that bone broke. I had a stress fracture once–it was one of my fibulas. I know how I got mine–it was from running 32 marathons in 20 years.
Not reaching across the aisle: Harris is a predictable result of a bad candidate winning office in a state dominated by one party. Her goofiness–both in demeanor and in political views–is not enough of an impediment for her to lose to a Republican in California. Gavin Newsom is much more seasoned and serious, but he’s another example. In 2004, when he was governor of San Francisco, he announced a 10-year plan to end chronic homelessness. There are more homeless people in San Francisco now than there has ever been twenty years later.
Harris, who was a US senator and the attorney general from California, didn’t have to, metaphorically speaking, reach across the aisle to win statewide. There are not enough Republicans in the Golden State to stop a Harris–or a Newsom.
Pritzker, while enormously popular in the Chicago area and university towns, is generally hated downstate. The Democrats enjoy supermajorities in the General Assembly. Which means Pritzker doesn’t need Republicans to rule.
In the 2022 race, in many downstate counties, Pritzker’s Republican opponent, Darren Bailey, won more than 80 percent of the vote. In rural Edwards County, in southeastern Illinois, Bailey romped with 88 percent of the ballots, while in heavily Democratic Cook County, where Chicago lies, Pritzker collected a more modest 73 percent. About 1.4 million votes were cast in Cook so you can see how Pritzker comfortably won reelection, since the statewide vote total was four million in 2022.
Illinois’ listless media, dominated by leftists, rarely challenges Pritzker.
The governor’s speaking style is condescending. As I’ve remarked before, when he talks, he reminds me of a closer at a timeshare presentation. Yuck.
To win the presidency, no candidate can rely on one party’s votes. To govern effectively, a president needs to work with both parties.
Gerrymandering: With so many Republicans outside of Chicago, why do the Democrats have supermajorities in the General Assembly? It’s because of gerrymandering. As a candidate during his first run for governor, Pritzker vowed to veto gerrymandered legislative maps. He lied. Nationally, the Dems blame gerrymandering for not having a majority in the House of Representatives. While presidents have no power over state remaps, Pritzker’s gerrymandering flip flop certainly betrays a lack of character.
Depopulation: Like California, Illinois is losing residents. High taxes, a high crime rate, and high regulations are the catalyst. And as I mentioned earlier, with little or no political opposition, Illinois government is an echo chamber of liberal failure.
Pritzker has been governor for over five years. If Illinois is so great, why has state’s population gone down every year for the last decade?
Gaza: For the most part, I’ve supported Pritzker’s pro-Israel stance in its war with the Hamas terrorists in Gaza. Although the governor has not condemned the loud anti-Semitic voices within the Democratic Party, such as Rashida Tlaib and Jamaal Bowman. His silence on the Jew-haters in his party is disturbing.
Pritzker is Jewish. But since the Democrats are increasingly the anti-Semitic party–anti-Israel Dems like Bernie Sanders are given a pass from the pro-Hamas activists–his faith could be a problem for him. Sad, but true, in my opinion. Pennsylvania’s Shapiro, who is also Jewish, is pro-Israel too.
But the voters most likely to agree, generally that is, with Pritzker and Shapiro on Gaza are Republicans.
Pensions: Illinois’ public pensions are among the worst funded among the 50 states. The pension crisis–created by both parties–has not been adequately addressed by Pritzker. Great leaders solve difficult problems. Despite new taxes, Pritzker’s latest budget shorts Illinois’ pension plans. Such malfeasance is how Illinois ended up in this mess.
Education: Pritzker did nothing to stop Illinois legislators from letting Illinois’ school choice program expire. Thirty states have some sort of school choice program, Illinois is the first to end one. Just 27 percent of Illinois students perform at grade level in math, and only 35 percent of students read at grade level.
Obviously, Democrats, including Pritzker, are more interested in kowtowing to the teacher unions than educating Illinois’ kids. Who would Pritzker nominate to be Education secretary? A radical along the lines of Chicago Teachers Union president Stacy Davis Gates?
I covered additional negatives in my first post about a potential Pritzker presidential run. Those demerits include his tax scam to lower property taxes on his Chicago mansion by removing toilets from the mansion adjacent to his–which he also owned, as well as his ties, not deep, but ties they are, with Boss Michael Madigan, who faces trial later this year for corruption, as well as a connection with one of Illinois’ ex-con governors, Rod Blagojevich.
Pritzker is in the second tier of possible Biden replacements. His negatives are apparent, but the billionaire governor has contributed millions of his own funds to finance his gubernatorial campaigns, and he’s been a generous donor to other Democrats’ campaigns, so he can call in a lot of favors, which is what he did to bring the Democratic National Convention to Chicago this summer.
Because of his fat wallet, Pritzker can hit the ground running–not literally, of course–if he needs to start a presidential campaign tomorrow. But for now, like Newsom and Whitmer, Pritzker is firmly in Biden’s corner.
Conservatives, we need to keep a wary eye on Pritzker. If not in 2024, then in 2028. We laughed off Biden five years ago.
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