Events

Sometimes, the Illinois General Assembly reminds us that Molly Ivins had it right: the only state legislature worse at their jobs than Illinois' is Texas'. Yesterday, the only legislature we have adjourned for the summer, after passing the least popular bill on its agenda this year and failing to pass one of the most popular: Illinois had appeared poised to become the 13th state to approve same-sex marriage. Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn promised to sign the bill. Democrats held veto-proof majorities in the...

The Cubs have won the last five complete games, and were ahead when Tuesday got rained out. They swept the White Sox, and just today beat the Diamondbacks 7-2. In fact, in their last six games, the Cubs have gotten 36 runs to their opponents' 12. Here's how the season looks at the end of May: The orange line tracks their position in the division. With their 23-30 record, the Cubs are now 3.5 games ahead of the last-place Brewers (19-33), but fully 9.5 games behind the third-place Reds (33-21). There's...

The city began an experiment at the corner of State and Jackson this morning, turning the intersection into a pedestrian zone during stoplight changes similar to Oxford Circus in London. The Tribune's Jon Hilkevitch has details: The test involves stopping all vehicles — heading east on Jackson and north and south on State — for 35 seconds every third traffic light cycle to let pedestrians cross in all directions, including diagonally. The test got underway at 10:17 a.m., and some pedestrians cheered and...

Oh, my, some doozies today: Via Calculated Risk, Fermanagh, Ireland, has put up a Potemkin village to reassure all the G8 leaders that everything is fine. This includes, for example, putting photos of a thriving butcher shop over the boarded-up windows of a former butcher shop. It's a laugh-and-cry moment. The New York Times Magazine published a story about a near-crash on a commercial airliner that...doesn't make sense. Aside from reading like an undergraduate creative-writing assignment, it's simply...

Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) won't be running next fall: Mrs. Bachmann, defiant as ever as she insisted that she would have won re-election had she tried, also said the legal inquiries had nothing to do with her decision. She vowed to continue to fight for the principles she said she holds dear — religious liberty, traditional marriage, family values and protecting innocent life, she said. “I fully anticipate the mainstream liberal media to put a detrimental spin on my decision not to seek a fifth...

This morning, the Senate Republican caucus, representing a minority of the U.S. Senate, a minority of the States, and a minority of the American people, sent a brief to the U.S. Supreme Court arguing that the President is thwarting the will of the people: All 45 Republican senators co-signed an amicus brief filed Tuesday calling on the Supreme Court to curtail the President’s power to temporarily appoint nominees without the Senate’s approval. “[R]ecess appointments have become a means to sidestep...

Yeah, one of those days: Has the NRA fatally over-reached? Niel deGrasse Tyson examines whether Superman can really fly. How visionary is Eric Schmidt, really? (Could it be instead survivorship bias?) Can we stop worshiping Reagan, please? What happens when a rural town dies? I'll get to these eventually...

I didn't do anything of value of the weekend except continuing to read Before the Deluge. It's making me wonder what would have to happen in the U.S. to have such a stunning collapse of civilization. So the book not only makes me pause every few paragraphs to really absorb what I'm reading, but also I keep going off to Wikipedia to get maps and context. It's taken me years to figure out that I breathe mentally. Inhaling means reading and watching movies; exhaling means writing and coding. (No idea how...

While looking up a map of the Tottenham Court Road area of London just now, I saw...something: Do you see it, just north of the British Museum in the northern corner of Russell Square? Look closely, or click for a full-size capture: Looks like an A320, doesn't it? Can't tell whose. I just hope that it's as high up as I think it is.

Yesterday California rolled out is ACA Exchange, and it looks like a rousing success: An estimated 5.3 million Californians will be eligible for coverage through Covered California, the state agency running the insurance marketplace. The lowest-income people will be referred to public safety net programs, while some 2.6 million middle-income residents will qualify for federal subsidies to help pay their premiums. Covered California provided examples of what a 40-year-old would pay depending on income...