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It wasn't a secret that the FBI had tracked the late Chicago writer and radio host Studs Terkel.

But it is amusing to see how little of apparent interest or note the FBI found, as evidenced in Terkel's FBI file, made public for the first time.

Terkel was engaged in such radical activities as attending a rally for actor and activist Paul Robeson.

He apparently read a Communist newspaper.

And he wrote a column for the Chicago Sun-Times

Radical stuff.

Abortion notice law delayed for good reason

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Teenage girls across Illinois suffered a blow Wednesday morning -- but then got a needed reprieve in the afternoon.

A Cook County judge Wednesday afternoon delayed implementation of a law requiring
doctors to notify a parent when a girl under 18 decides to have an abortion.

That decision came just hours after the state Medical Disciplinary Board had given the state the green light to begin enforcing the 14-year-old law.

The temporary enforcement halt is a victory for girls because Illinois courts -- where girls are supposed to turn if they feel they can't tell their parents about an abortion -- don't appear to be ready to handle this crucial, new responsibility.

The law establishes a confidential judicial bypass procedure, where a girl can try to convince a judge she's mature enough to make the abortion decision for herself.

Some counties are ready, including Cook, but interviews with circuit court employees in 15 counties in September and October show how far Illinois has to go.

In just two of 15 counties contacted by a group set up to help minors through the judicial bypass process did the staff "seem fully informed" about the law and "somewhat prepared" to help, according to an affidavit filed in the suit seeking to stop the law's implementation.

In the rest, employees had never heard of the law, couldn't provide any information or said they would call back but never did.

One court employee even insisted that a minor be accompanied by a guardian.

Illinois can -- and must -- do better than this.


For more information, read Wednesday's editorial on this topic here

Harvard Law professor and good government advocate Lawrence Lessig makes an interesting argument in the New Republic that too much transparency in government could, in some instances, be a bad thing. He's sparked quite a debate.

As government watchdog groups and news organizations get better, for instance, at combining data about campaign contributions with individual politician's votes on legislation, so anyone can see at a glance possible connections, does it unfairly stain the politicians or the system itself? Could it only produce more cynicism?

Or do we just trust readers to have enough sense and let them make up their own minds with whatever information that's available?

"The Chicago Way" has gone national.

It has become the pet phrase of Fox News showmen like Glenn Beck, another way to beat up on President Barack Obama. Just the other night, Beck waved a baseball bat around like a weapon, explaining that this is how the Obama crowd silences dissent -- The Chicago Way.

The next night, a Chicago Tribune columnist who has all but made the phrase his own, John Kass, got on Fox News and agreed -- yeah, the Obama White House fights like a bunch of Chicago thugs -- The Chicago Way.

This is silly stuff, and I'll leave it at that.

But if people are going to start throwing the phrase around, let's at least give proper credit to the author. Kass didn't dream it up, though another Fox talking head claimed Kass "coined" the phrase. In fact, I stole it before Kass did, making it the name of a weekly column I wrote for the Sun-Times for a couple of years.

The phrase, as most of us know -- Beck even showed a clip from the film -- comes from the 1987 movie "The Untouchables." Sean Connery, playing a tough old Chicago cop, tells Kevin Costner, playing Elliot Ness, that if the feds are serious about taking down Al Capone, they'll have to do it "the Chicago way."

"You wanna get Capone?" asks the cop. "Here's how you get him: He pulls a knife, you pull a gun. He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue. That's the Chicago way! That's how you get Capone!"

I explained all this -- how the phrase comes from the movie -- in a column I wrote in 2005. But here's the thing: I failed to mention who actually wrote the screenplay for the movie. And that was a huge oversight because while the movie is terrible, the screenplay is terrific.

So who wrote the screenplay?

One of the greatest of American writers.

David Mamet.

I knew this when I wrote the column but forgot to mention it. I failed to give Mamet credit.

And for this, I caught a little friendly grief the next day from Mamet himself.

He sent me a long email in which he told the story of how the famous Iwo Jima Memorial was unveiled in Arlington National Cemetery in 1954 with a lot of pomp. Everybody was there, including President Eisenhower.

But one man -- Joe Rosenthal -- wasn't there, Mamet told me. Rosenthal was the Associated Press photographer who took the unforgettable World War II photo -- of three soldiers raising the American flag on Iwo Jima -- but he skipped the statue dedication ceremony.

Rosenthal visited the statue later, just him and his wife, once the big shots had gone. He walked all around the statue and decided he liked everything about it. He liked the strong granite base and the cast bronze figures and the noble words: "Uncommon Valor Was a Common Virtue." He liked that the sculptor, Felix de Weldon, got credit on a plaque.

But, Mamet told me, there was one thing missing that made Joe sad. He looked all over the statue but could not find it -- his own name.

Joe Rosenthal, the man who took the iconic photo on which the statue was modeled, had been forgotten.

"Until I read your column this morning," Mamet wrote to me, "I did not know how Joe felt."

I laughed out loud, of course. Perfect. We should all show this much class when registering a complaint.

I quickly wrote back.

"David, I'm sorry I failed to give you credit for writing 'The Untouchables.' But seeing as how my mistake prompted this great note from you, I have no regrets."

A must-read on Afghanistan

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If you're going to read just one set of articles on Afghanistan, this week's New York

Times series by David Rohde is it.


In a gripping, moving and informative set of five articles, Rohde details the seven

months he spent as a captive of the Taliban in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Rohde, a New

York Times reporter, was kidnapped last November.


Getting your head around what's going on in Afghanistan is tough. Rohde's first-person

account makes that far-away, inaccessible place real, explaining in very human terms

what the U.S. is up against as it tries to fight the Taliban.


Check out the series here

Do the Olympics deserve a 49-0 City Council vote?

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Couldn't our aldermen have managed at least one dissenting vote during Wednesday's vote on the Olympics?

Apparently not.

In a unanimous vote, the City Council authorized Mayor Daley to sign a host city contract that puts Chicago taxpayers on the financial hook for Olympic cost overruns.

The vote keeps Chicago in the running for the 2016 games with just three weeks to go before the International Olympic Committee chooses the host city.

The vote also tells the IOC that all of Chicago is behind the bid -- even if it's not true.

An entirely different City Council came to life this summer, pushing hard against the bid after Daley unilaterally agreed to sign the host city contract.

As a result, the Chicago 2016 bid committee added additional insurance to protect taxpayers, listened to residents in every ward of the city and agreed to fairly sweeping -- though incomplete -- oversight by the council.

The bid committee deserves credit for responding. The City Council deserves credit for finding a backbone.

But none of that sweeps aside the very legitimate fears about what the Olympics might
cost taxpayers.

And none of that warrants a unanimous vote.

The Old Guard has spoken.

Bill Wyman, formerly of the Rolling Stones, and Nick Mason, of Pink Floyd, are criticizing the video game "Guitar Hero" and similar games, contending they discourage young people from picking up real instruments.

In the games, youngsters pick up smaller, faux versions of the instruments and "play" them along with rock songs and prompts on the screen. The more accurate they are, they better they do in the game.

"It irritates me having watched my kids do it. If they spend as much time practising the guitar as learning how to press the buttons, they'd be damn good by now," Mason griped to The Guardian.

The games are getting more notice than usual because on Wednesday Rock Band is releasing its Beatles version, where players can play along with the Fab Four, in one of the most anticipated releases of the year.

The esteemed magazine "The Economist" is out with a chart showing how Chicago ranks in an all-important category.

In fact. we're at the very top of the list for our workers being able to work the least amount of time but still be able to buy a Big Mac at McDonald's.

A report examined the price of a Big Mac in 73 cities worldwide, along with the average net wage, and workers in Chicago, Toronto and Toyko fared the best, having to work 12 minutes to score Big Mac.

Mexico City, Jakarta and Nairobi fared the worst.

You can see the graphic here.

Quinn bungles U of I clout clean up

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The good news:

On Wednesday, two of nine University of Illinois trustees got to remain on the board.

Several weeks ago, the Sun-Times editorial board argued it was shortsighted to dump the entire U of I board, despite the admissions clout scandal uncovered this summer. The most culpable board members must go, but throwing away the full board robs the university of their expertise, institional knowledge and experience.

The bad news:

The two members are staying because they forced Quinn into it, not because he chose them.

For weeks, Quinn insisted that all board members should resign, clearing the way for him to decide which resignations to accept. On Wednesday Quinn reversed, leaving himself looking like an indecisive, weak leader. These two trustees are good choices to stay on the board but Quinn should have stood firm in his demand that he pick the board members.

Quinn justified the move by saying he didn't want to put the state through a long legal battle with trustees James Montgomery and Frances Carroll.

But Quinn is the one who boxed himself into this corner. This is just the latest example of Quinn making a proclamation and failing to stick with it.

We like the outcome here. But, once again, we're disappointed in how Quinn got us here.

A Cash for Clunkers/health care nexus?

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Is there any connection between the Cash for Clunkers program and a proposed government-run health insurance option?

Let's hope not.

The hugely popular car allowance rebate program blew through $3 billion in promises of government money in just four weeks, helping to sell an estimated 700,000 cars. But most dealers haven't gotten a cent from the government, threatening dealerships that desperately need cash to stay open.

The Obama Administration last week responded to complaints -- in some ways, a victim of its success -- by tripling the number of workers handling reimbursement claims.

Let's hope the government doesn't make the same mistake when it launches a public insurance option, a plan to which millions of Americans are likely to flock.

It makes you wonder.

Is a clunky government bureaucracy really prepared to run an efficient health care system?

Back Talk

This blog brought to you by the Sun-Times editorial board (click on names to read bios):
  • Tom McNamee

  • Kate N. Grossman

  • Steve Warmbir

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