Why Lovie Smith got fired by the Chicago Bears -GRIM facts & trends that were increasingly hard to swallow for loyal Bears fans: the Bears have made the watered-down NFL playoffs only ONCE in the past 6 years despite much talent on the team, including failing 3 seasons in a row AFTER making the Super Bowl. If anything, it was an overdue decision; Bears should strongly consider hiring Brian Billick as head coach and REALLY helping Jay Cutler's progress

ESPN YouTube Channel video: ESPN correspondent Ed Werder on the Chicago Bears firing of head coach Lovie Smith on Monday, and what he may do. Uploaded January 1, 2013. http://youtu.be/mUOnaPIMPD4

While there clearly are a lot of people who like Lovie Smith's personality and experience, including some current players, consider how the players have actually played for HIM, since it seems to be something that ESPN and a lot of social media types keep ignoring.

The Bears have made the watered-down NFL playoffs only ONCE in the past 6 years despite the talent on that team, including failing 3 seasons in a row AFTER making the Super Bowl. 

That's more than embarrassing and is NOT something that fans of an NFL team in the third-largest city in the country are going to be satisfied with. 
Nor should they be.

View more videos at: http://nbcchicago.com.

http://abclocal.go.com/wls/video?id=8938166&pid=null

The one year the Bears made the playoffs in the past six seasons, 2010, they promptly lost the NFC Championship game -at home- in large part because they were so grossly unprepared for an injury to QB Jay Cutler.
Whose responsibility is it to ensure that you have competent back-ups if not the head coach?

As has been noted here many times before, I lived in Chicago in the mid-1980's and that coincided with their 1985-86 Super Bowl run and win, and I still usually root for the Bears.
But these CHRONIC weaknesses with the Bears, like not being able to assemble a good staff or a competent offensive line to keep Cutler upright, can be laid squarely upon Lovie Smith as head coach.

In the end, the facts didn't lie -one playoff appearance in the past six years is NOT satisfactory.
If anything, his firing was an overdue decision for fans of the team.

Just like the one the Eagles and Chargers made to finally be rid of Andy Reid and Norv Turner.
Both need to stay away from the NFL for a year for their own good -and ours.
We can't stand the utter predictability of their problems every year and their chronic inability to adequately resolve them. 

If the Bears were smart, and that's not a given, obviously, they'd hire former Ravens head coach  and Vikings OC Brian Billick, someone who knows something about offense when he has some talent to work with, like he did with those Vikings teams of the late '90's when they were one of the most-exciting teams of the past 25 years.
Give Jay Cutler some help from someone who knows what they're talking about.

Chicago Trib readers screw w/Trib execs: "The board for this story has been closed because of excessive violations of the Tribune's comment policies"

WBBM-TV, Chicago video

WBBM-TV, Chicago video: Walter Jacobson: Time to be upfront about mob violence

Story at

http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2011/06/08/walter-time-to-be-upfront-about-mob-violence/

Upset Chicago Tribune readers are continuing to screw with Trib execs over the paper's fact-free reporting on the rash of mob attacks that have struck the Chicagoland area, prompting the execs to have to shut down their own comment forums.

That these forums, like their blogs, are among the best in the country, and light-years ahead of anything in South Florida goes without saying.

See Chicagoist on "mobs", including this headline, Did Gang Bangers Force Cops to Close North Avenue Beach?, at

http://chicagoist.com/mt/mt-search.fcgi?IncludeBlogs=7&limit=30&search=mob&x=0&y=0

This sort of politically correct writing has provoked the counter-force you could expect and that criticism of the Tribune policies and execs has led to the following embarrassing disclaimer being placed at the bottom of news articles:

"The board for this story has been closed because of excessive violations of the Tribune's comment policies. Details of those policies are described below."

Yes, on account of the Trib's self-serving, heavy-handed, condescending and parochial, not-to-mention Politically Correct polices, readers all over Chicagoland are saying f-em and 'shut 'em down!'

Chicago Tribune

3 teens held in downtown attack

By Jeremy Gorner and Dawn Rhodes

Tribune reporters

8:20 a.m. CDT, June 8, 2011

Two teens have told police they were attacked by a group of at least five youths downtown Tuesday evening just west of North Michigan Avenue.

A witness described the incident as similar to last weekend’s downtown attacks when 20 youths were arrested, including five who allegedly robbed and beat several people inStreeterville and on the Magnificent Mile.

Read the rest of the story at:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/chibrknews-new-mob-attack-reported-in-downtown-area-20110607,0,3724492.story

(Reminder for late arrivals to the blog -I lived in Chicago, Evanston and Wilmette in the mid-80's, including the Bears Super Bowl season.)

Later in the day, under the headline Rahm on the spot over youth mobs this appeared:

The most disturbing feature of the mob crimes is that they seem largely recreational. As early as February, police were warning merchants and residents in the Water Tower neighborhood about "flash mob offenders" — groups of teens who arrived via mass transit to stage shoplifting raids sometimes organized on social media networks. One unruly crowd took over the dining room of a McDonald's in April, forcing it to remain closed for hours after police broke things up.

http://www.chicagobreakingnews.com/search/ct-edit-mob-20110608,0,2417685.story

That led to this eye-roller of a headline on Friday:

Teens feel they're being watched downtown

Most youths don't want to cause trouble, many students say in wake of mob attacks

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-teens-downtown-0612-20110610,0,20599.story

Well at least the Trib didn't call them "youths" in the story.

Sure, because when you're a news reporter, when something happens, rather than trying to get some answers as to why someone or some group is or was engaged in a particular behavior, you interview a group of people that are NOT doing that, and tell how they feel victimized.

OH, PLEASE!

They still won't interview anyone who was actually involved in any of this because that would involve some work and enterprise, so instead they interview the United Colors of Benneton kids who attend the school for wannabe social activists.

How precious.

Oh, sorry, I mean the Urban Outfitter Crew.

This was all the perfect predicate for the following piece by the Editor of the newspaper which ran in Saturday's Trib.

It tells you almost everything you need to know about the state of American journalism in the year 2011.

Or, put another way, I could've headlined this post "When the PC Police run a newspaper: Chicago Tribune editor writes "When race is relevant in news coverage" Still waiting for Miami Herald's own take on illegal aliens? Good luck!"

Chicago Tribune

When race is relevant in news coverage

By Gerould W. Kern

4:52 p.m. CDT, June 10, 2011

This week the Chicago Tribune published several news stories and related columns about assaults by groups of youths in the Streeterville area of downtown Chicago. More coverage appears Sunday.

A number of readers have asked why we have not included racial descriptions of the assailants and the victims in these incidents.

Read the rest of the editorial at:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/tribnation/chi-when-race-is-mentioned-in-the-chicago-tribune-20110610,0,136289.story

See also: Chicago Incapable of Combatting Flash Mobs

http://www.chicagonow.com/blogs/chicago-political-commentary/2011/06/chicago-incapable-of-combating-flash-mobs.html

WBBM-TV's report on the growing "Anybody But Rahm" coalition in Chicago of odd bedfellows - Political Heavyweights May Be Forming Anti-Rahm Alliance

Meanwhile, in the City of Big Shoulders, Chicago, where I lived for a few years, and where unlike Miami's local TV stations, the News divisions often make their news stories fully embeddable for blogs and websites... the growing anti-Rahm Emanuel for Mayor coalition continues to grow in some rather unexpected ways. GOOD!

If Rep. Danny Davis and Rep. Luis Gutierrez and some friends want to talk about things at a diner, like I often do with friends or local civic activists or elected officials, what's the harm?
Jay Levine of WBBM-TV connects-the-dots on the latest developments.


WBBM-TV - Political Heavyweights May Be Forming Anti-Rahm Alliance



http://video.chicago.cbslocal.com/global/video/flash/popupplayer.asp?ClipID1=5215717&h1=Political%20Heavyweights%20May%20Be%20Forming%20Anti-Rahm%20Alliance&vt1=v&at1=News&d1=156067&LaunchPageAdTag=Homepage&activePane=info&rnd=65438093

My previous posts on Rahm Emanuel are here:
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/search?q=Rahm+Emanuel

See also: http://www.dickipedia.org/dick.php?title=Rahm_Emanuel

The latest news on Emanuel is here:
http://news.google.com/news/search?aq=f&cf=all&ned=us&hl=en&q=%22Rahm+Emanuel%22


One of the many great videos that I featured here on the blog in the past in conjunction with the Chicago 2016 Olympic bid was this one, which gives you a really clear overview of some of the things that make it such an interesting place to live and work.

Chicago surprises!



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BlTcFaAs8Sk