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Shrinking town
Topic Started: May 26 2017, 02:14 PM (72 Views)
George K
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Finally
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/kass/ct-shrinking-chicago-kass-0526-20170525-column.html

Quote:
 
Shrinking Chicago has always been told: Shut up and take it

John Kass

For decade upon decade, the message from Chicago's royal rulers to the peasantry has always been terribly simple and clear.

"Shut the (bleep) up and take it."

But the city's mottos — both the official and unofficial motto — don't reflect this, leading to a fundamental misunderstanding about why Chicago's population keeps dwindling.

And now that Chicago is shrinking and shrinking, there are some things people must understand before this wonderful city disappears.

"Shrinking Chicago" isn't some dry-aged meat metaphor I plucked out of the air just before deadline. It was the headline on a front-page Chicago Tribune story by reporter Marwa Eltagouri, who clearly explained the news: That, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, Chicago was the only large American city to lose population in 2016, dropping almost double the number of residents as the year before.

You know the reason. People are running away from crime and more taxes and substandard public education, and they're looking for jobs and a future.

I'm sure some quasi-official mouthpieces will make reassuring speeches to tell us that Chicago "will endeavor to persevere." But if you're from Chicago, you know that speeches are doodly-squat when compared to reality.

Yet for all the bad news, my hometown is still the greatest city in the world.

Chicago is one of the finest restaurant cities on the planet, a city of fantastic neighborhoods and great people and a vibrant cultural and sporting life, including polite wagers on federal indictments.

People still say hello to strangers. So Chicago is not a rude city like New York, or a glassy-eyed city like Pot Head Denver.

Chicago is a genuinely polite city, although statistically, in some areas, the neighbors might shoot you off your front porch if you're not careful.

Later, though, when you're dead, rest assured their loved ones will say it was all an accident and their son was not in a gang.

But then there is the motto problem.

Some might think mottos are empty rhetoric, but they're wrong. A motto is like a mission statement, explaining the purpose of a great house, or city or nation.

One famous motto is "Winter is Coming" and if you take a hard look at Illinois and think of your property and income taxes, you'll feel the coming chill even as you plant your backyard tomatoes in the warming dirt.

Another motto that should be famous is, "The Democratic Machine always pays its debts," because revenge is their coin. They're experts at paying revenge both forward and backward.

But what of fiscal debts to taxpayers incurred as political bosses spent eons leveraging taxation and government spending to increase their own vast personal wealth?

There is no official motto, yet, for that one.

"Rise Chumbolone Nation!" would work just fine, and perhaps encourage taxpayers to bring out the torches and pitchforks rather than flee as refugees to Indiana or Arizona.

But no local government in shrinking Illinois, a state ruled by Democratic boss Michael Madigan, would allow it.

Sadly, since its beginning, Chicago's motto has been, officially, quite lame.

It is "Urbs in Horto," which is Latin for city in a garden.

The late, great Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Mike Royko, also a dabbler in Latin, insisted that on account of Chicago's rich history of political corruption, the motto should be "Ubi est Mea?" or "Where's Mine?"

While each is true in its own way, they are incomplete, leading to much confusion as the city and state began shrinking.

Happily, I don't speak Latin. But I do speak Greeklish and Soutwest Side. A few readers keep insisting, with some hostility, that I also can neither write nor speak English.

But today I hope to make myself quite plain.

Because even though my family moved to the suburbs years ago to avoid random street crime and find good public schools for our children, I still speak Chicago.

And I'd say that the true Chicago motto has little to do with cities in a garden or how much politicians take.

We know that they take. That's who they are. The smart ones don't take envelopes of cash. They take it in deals or property tax assessment scams on multi-million dollar mansions, and call it legal and run for governor.

So after years of covering politics here, I think the motto should be taken from the attitude of the Chicago political bosses:

"Shut the (bleep) up and take it."

Because Chicago has always been a shut-up-and-take it town.

For generations, taxpayers are told to shut up and take what the politicians give them. This shut-up-and-take-it attitude has has been set into Chicago's DNA.

City Hall has offered generation after generation of failing schools, corruption, unfunded public pensions and insane borrowing to pay off debt and more insane borrowing to pay down the insane new debt. And City Hall keeps doing it.

All this leads inevitably to dwindling economic and job prospects for everyone but members of the state's ruling class, who have made millions through public service.

But there is not enough money to hire enough Chicago cops, and 4,000 people were shot last year.

So bow your head, say thank you and take it. And shut up.

Hasn't it worked that way for years?

But an odd thing happened. Taxpayers don't want to get stuck with the bill. So they're not taking it anymore, are they?

They're leaving.

And you don't have to speak Latin to know it.


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Mikhailoh
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If you want trouble, find yourself a redhead
We had at one time thought we would move there about now, or earlier had our daughter gone to school in town.

No more. Taxes are going to go through the roof, and clearly law enforcement is a lost cause. I love the town, but won't live there.
Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous redhead - Lucille Ball
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George K
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Finally
Mikhailoh
May 26 2017, 02:23 PM
I love the town, but won't live there.
The burbs are nice, especially mine.

Taxes are reasonable (well, by Illinois standards). Home prices are OK. It's safe, and it's only a 22 minute ride to downtown if you take the Metra Rail.

Kluur's neighborhood is similar, though more cosmopolitan than mine.

If I had to pick a 'burb with the nicest combination of amenities and closeness to downtown:

1) Evanston
2) Oak Park
3) My Town

(not in order of preference, of course)
A guide to GKSR: Click

"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... "
- Mik, 6/14/08


Nothing is as effective as homeopathy.

I'd rather listen to an hour of Abba than an hour of The Beatles.
- Klaus, 4/29/18
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