Chicago Daily Observer

As a Chicago organizer of the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, I was standing in a sweaty but ebullient crowd in front of the Lincoln Memorial that torrid August day when Martin Luther King Jr. gave his epic “I Have a Dream” speech.

I was in front of my TV set nearly 45 years later, on a comfortable couch, teacup in hand, watching Barack Obama deliver what is certain to be viewed as the most important single statement on race in America since King. That statement was profound, confronting racism at many levels and explaining anger, frustration and hostility on both sides of the sadly remaining color divide. Not even King took that on.

Yes, it was a political speech, but unlike any heard in my lifetime, including John F. Kennedy’s asking us to ask what we can do for our country. The only speeches that came ... Read More...

The Chicago Tribune and the Archdiocese of Chicago presented a truly enlightening session with Cardinal Francis George and the Tribune’s Manya Brachear via a Blog format.

As The Chicago Daily Observer is a publication that is (an occasionally harsh) critic of the Tribune and more than an interested bystander within the Archdiocese of Chicago, it is refreshing to see both institutions addressing the public in such an innovative format, in the story “You asked the Cardinal answered”.

In my considered judgment as a race and civil rights specialist, I would say that Barack Obama’s “momentous” speech on race settled on merely “explaining” so-called racial differences between blacks and whites—and in so doing amplified deep-seated racial tensions and divisions. Instead of giving us a polarizing treatise on the “black experience,” Obama should have reiterated the theme that has brought so many to his campaign: That race ain’t what it used to be in America.

We learned a little bit more about Barack Obama’s meetings with the city’s editorial boards to discuss Tony Rezko on Chicago Tonight Monday night. Carol Marin moderated. The panel: Investigative reporter David Jackson and deputy editorial page editor John McCormick from the Tribune and reporter Chris Fusco and editorial writer Deborah Douglas from the Sun-Times. Let’s take a look.

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(Direct quotes will be in quote marks; the rest is from my notes but pretty close to verbatim.)

MARIN: Why did Obama do this now?

JACKSON: The Tribune “was preparing to run a story in Sunday’s paper that listed the unanswered questions.”

Will retailer fight city’s denial of Chatham Market plan? Residents, local alderman stand ready to back big store.

On a windy Wednesday morning in March, a steady stream of shoppers bustle in and out of the Lowe’s at 83rd Street just west of the Dan Ryan Expressway on Chicago’s South Side.

The parking lot, decorated with a black wrought iron fence and rows of freshly planted trees, is filled with more than 100 cars ready to transport a range of purchases: windshield wiper fluid, toilet seat covers, Easter lilies and sheets of drywall.

Steps away sits a vacant swath of dirt occupied by only a few birds standing in puddles. It is here that Wal-Mart Stores Inc. wants to build its second city store. Late last week, the City of Chicago declined a request to allow Wal-Mart to build a store at the 50-acre Chatham Market, a shopping center being ... Read More...