Events

After four years with a do-nothing governor—seriously, he did absolutely nothing—this weekend almost made up for it. The Illinois legislature passed a ton of bills that we've needed (or wanted) for a long time: Gov. J.B. Pritzker and those who believe state government needs to play a bigger, more expansive role than it has got just about everything they wanted in the session that ran only a couple of days over, from new policies on hot-button social issues such as abortion, marijuana and gambling to...

If you haven't discovered Randy Rainbow, here you go: He was in Chicago last night, at Thalia Hall in Pilsen, and I got a chance to hear him live. And today, he's on the cover of the Washington Post Magazine: In a topsy-turvy era, is it surprising that a political commentator should dress in sequins, feather boas and pink cat-eye glasses? Because that’s Randy Rainbow (yes, it’s his given name). In real life, the 37-year-old leads a solitary existence in an orderly apartment adorned with oversize...

It's the first day of summer, and I had to wait for an air-conditioner repair guy, so I started updating the Inner Drive Technology website. Version 4 of the Inner Drive Framework is what we call a "breaking change." It's totally incompatible, in other words. So this should be fun.

The Illinois legislature has passed a bill legalizing small amounts of recreational marijuana and directing the governor to pardon thousands of low-level drug offenders: Illinois is poised to be the 11th state in the country to legalize recreational marijuana beginning Jan. 1, 2020. The state House of Representatives approved its legalization bill 66-47 on Friday. Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker, who campaigned on legalizing cannabis, quickly released a statement saying he’ll sign the legislation. “It is...

The Tribune reports that today ends Chicago's second-wettest spring ever, the wettest May ever, and the only second month in recorded history (out of 1,770 months) to have 21 days of precipitation. This might become the new normal: 9 of the last 10 Mays have had above-average precipitation. Lake Michigan, the inland sea ten blocks from where I'm sitting, has near-record water levels: Lake Ontario, downstream, has swelled by almost a meter in the last two months to all-time record levels: So not only has...

As Chicago finishes the wettest May in history, Bloomberg points out that all the rain has caused serious problems with Illinois agriculture: Rabobank is predicting an unprecedented number of unplanted acres of corn, the most widely grown American crop. A Bloomberg survey of 10 traders and analysts indicates growers could file insurance claims for about 6 million corn acres they haven’t been able to sow, almost double the record in 2013. Corn futures surged more than 20% to a three-year high over the...

Two made the news this week. First, Lampert has sued Sears (which he owns) for not conveying property that his investment firm bought from the doomed retailer: Lampert's Transform is accusing the Sears estate, a bankrupt shell entity that is winding down under court supervision, of multiple wrongs including breaking the agreement by holding on to the chain's headquarters in Illinois. The estate is also intentionally delaying payments to vendors and trying to shift $166 million in accounts payable costs...