I scored 95% on the Chicago local news quiz 2025, (which probably means I spend too much screen time on BSKY).

This guy is selling Fireball Whiskey shots on the red line and turning the redline train into an unofficial Christkindlmarket.

I count 10 cities in 2025 that are on track to have the fewest murders since at least 1970. Newark is on pace to have the fewest murders since 1956 (though only have data through Oct this year) and San Francisco is on pace to have the fewest murders since 1942.

Henceforth this shall be known as the Shut the Fuck Up About Chicago decision. @harebrained.bsky.social

Now that I've seen multiple New Orleanians post about their high temp today, I can dust off this old holiday greeting:

"The project—[Bari Weiss's] and that of her backers—is to establish herself and her cohort not as new-right media, but as the new liberal media, staking out the leftmost acceptable position within the new right-wing paradigm." (This is a gift link, from October) defector.com/bari-weiss-s...

CBS News may not want you to see its CECOT reporting, but I'm happy to share this powerful video that our team produced this year.

I sat in awe in my Methodist Sunday school class today and watched a bunch of 70ish and 80ish (mostly white women) almost cry about the cruelty of immigration raids, and I’m here to tell you that this is not a normal liberal reaction to a reckless GOP policy. This is deeper and more visceral.

Some real Christmas spirit just dropped:

Good thread 👍🏼

the way people talk about AI is like it's a stalker you ought to be nicer to

If you've ever wondered about the power of sports, hang out for a week after the long suffering local franchise wins an important game against an archival in legendary fashion and see how many more people are in a good mood.

Just wild to see a whole "Red State" looking budget come out of the Chicago City Council.

Not just any researcher. Rob Lempert!

one thing that is important to know is that BIRTH OF A NATION is so racist that people at the *time*, in 1915, were like, “holy shit this is racist”

Does this to adults too

I've got a lot of family & friends who live in & around Atlanta and

There are too many legal ways to steal people's homes.

Looks like I'll be running out of filament in about a week. Every gram turns into whistles. CBP redirected agents to Chicago, but they'll be back and these are going into kits with literature from Baton Rouge to Mississippi Gulf Coast. www.amazon.com/registries/g...

A large CBP presence is back in Chicago this morning, with sightings and arrests reported across the southwest side and Cicero. Bovino is also here.

Grading and googling hallucinated citations, as one does nowadays, and now that LLMs have been around for a while, I've discovered new horrors: hallucinated journals are now appearing in Google Scholar with dozens of citations bc so many people are citing these fake things

Oh, just on track for the lowest it’s ever been in the 21st Century… No big deal or anything, definitely wouldn’t want that in the headline or anything…

The people of New Orleans have created an incredible grassroots community intelligence service to track the feds as they hunt the city's immigrants. A real good cops vs. bad cops dynamic being replicated across the country right now. www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/new-orlean...

As was clear during Trump 1, roughly 37% of Americans are committed to white supremacy &/or Christian nationalism, no matter the cost. Very much reminds me of the Reconstruction South, which doubled down on the plantation regime that had destroyed the country in the aftermath of emancipation.

Just watched a trailer for the video game "Drain Sim," and it looks basically like "Your New Orleans Neighborhood in a Downpour, The Game."

Y'all, *Watkinsville, Georgia* just sent a Democratic representative to the General Assembly.

Blair Witch Project I grew up tromping around in the woods so the soundscape, especially in the night scenes, is too familiar.

You will be visited by three spirits

I'm here at the 20th District Council meeting in Edgewater. District Councils have a petition going to ask CCPSA to hold a public hearing with CPD brass to investigate police support for ICE activity during Midway Blitz.

My friend is being booted out of her childhood home. Help her out if you can, and please reskeet. www.gofundme.com/f/franklinan...

The Underground Railroad. Mississippi Freedom Summer. And now, the ICE resistance I went to New Orleans to witness the next American Revolution - everyday folk blowing whistles, chasing cars, and impeding the masked agents of a tyrannical regime. My special report www.inquirer.com/opinion/immi...

Good morning Chicago! Interesting how the snow cover changes the pre-dawn ambient light.

Local politics & elections directly impact your quality of life:

This is important & true. Just don't forget to do your power dynamics map to figure out who can make a phone call & wreck your shit.

Snow looks so good when the backdrop is big brick buildings. Makes you feel like you’re living in Muppets Christmas Carol

"He thinks with the winter His troubles are gone; Ten acres unplanted To raise dreams on. The lean months are done with. The fat to come. His dreams, Winter wanderers, Hasten home." - After Winter, Sterling A. Brown

Now this is what real journalism looks like:

If you think mitigating climate change is going to be expensive, just wait till you hear how much "doing nothing" is going to cost:

This has nothing to do with the law, crime or illegal immigration. It is about racism and ethnic cleansing.

if you're going somewhere Metra goes at a time that Metra goes there, Metra is incredible

Imagine how much that money could do if people didn't have to subsidize the uberrich

Back in 2006, there were t-shirts that said "Defend New Orleans." Today there's a whole online resource about #FreeTheSwamp.

OK, this story is kinda nuts. - Very R Mayor in a MAGA county - He's not a citizen though - He has voted in many elections - Somehow the KA Atty General (Kobach; very MAGA) found out - Decided to prosecute for voter fraud - He faces deportation

No-strings-attached, zero-means-testing, no-questions-asked cash payouts have been proven, over and over again, to be the most effective form of charity/aid going. It gets people in housing, and it saves the state money. We know this. It's fact, not theory.

Every legislative election is a story about gerrymandering, but it is always a much bigger story in the South:

JUST IN: Democrats have flipped the mayor's office in Roswell, Georgia, in tonight's runoff. GOP Mayor Kurt Wilson conceded earlier tonight to Mary Robichaux, the Dem challenging him. (This is a city in the Atlanta suburbs, the 9th most populous city in Georgia.)

Possums are nature’s labubu

One thing I didn't expect from a Chicago winter was being kept awake by some guy excitedly drifting his car in circles around a small snow & ice covered parking lot off Lawrence Ave.

Still trying to reconcile the mundane normalcy of snow in Chicago against a lifetime of Southern civic panic at the first hint of a light dusting.

The GOP won't worry a bit by a close result in Tennessee, that's just proof they've built their gerrymandering firewall correctly.