Obama school address debate is driven by mix of politics and racism and demagoguery

Orland Park School District 135 is giving parents the option to remove their children from participating in a nationwide address that President Barack Obama will be making via the Internet and C-SPAN on Tuesday morning during class.

Obama wants to encourage children to "work hard, set educational goals, and take responsibility for their learning" The President will also call on students, parents and educators to work together to ensure "every child in every school receives the best education possible so they can compete in the global economy for good jobs and live rewarding and productive lives as American citizens."

Right wing fanatics, conservative extremists and the demagogue himself, former Vice President and war criminal Dick Cheney says that the President's goals represent "socialism," you know, the kind that we Americans fought against during World War II and the Cold War and throughout Europe.

Cheney and his ilk say that doing good in school is "socialism?" What a moron. he should be charged with war crimes. The U.S. Attorney's office is slowly winding its way through the criminal actions taken before and during the illegal invasion of Iraq -- which distracted this country from the real enemy in Afghanistan and is forcing our soldiers to face stepped up terrorist threats there today because Bush and Cheney didn't commit enough forces to that country eight years ago.

I remember when Republicans used to say we have to respect Bush whether we like him or not because he is the President of the United States. It's the office and when the president acts, we need to stand by him as a nation. We did that, of course, and over the past five years, we've seen more than 4,000 American soldiers come home in body bags with no real progress against the war on terrorism in Iraq.

Now, of course, the president is a Democrat and an African American, and we are told that he is a "socialist" because he wants to encourage school students to do better in school and to help others to do better.

My son will be listening to President Obama's speech Tuesday. Proudly. I feel sorry for those students who parents will remove their children and don't seem to like a president because a) he's a Democrat, b) because he is Black or c) he wants all students to do well in school. Tragic but symptomatic of the challenge that we face in America where racism, hatred and extremism lingers on from the Bush administration.

The idea was promoted by U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan, who was the Chicago Schools CEO before being appointed to the national post.

If you are interested, you can watch the speech live via the Internet at

http://www.WhiteHouse.gov/live Tuesday Sept. 8 at 11 AM CENTRAL Time.

I know many children and students will be watching because many of their parents care about improving education for ALL children, regardless of race, color, religion or national origin.

Of course, the debate reminds us that not all share that benefit for our nation.

-- Ray Hanania

www.RadioChicagoland.com

Orland Mayor Dan McLaughlin details village Greening Initiative and Open Lands strategies

Interview this morning (Friday August 28, 2009) with Orland Park Mayor Dan McLaughlin on WJJG 1530 AM Radio.

Click here to listen to the Podcast or download it from iTunes.com or RadioChicagoland.com.

McLaughlin details the Village of Orland Park's Greening Initiative and discusses how residents can participate and help not only improve the environment but also save money by reducing costs on energy and more.

The mayor also said that he uses a Push mower to cut his lawn, like I do, most of the time. Sometimes you have to still use a lawnmower if it gets too high and can't be cut with the push lawn mower but it is an energy-saving environment saving option that he says will be included in the village Greening Initiative if it is already not on the list.

Go to the Village's Web site at

www.orland-park.il.us

or the special Greening Initiative web site at

www.SmartLivingOP.com

-- Ray Hanania

www.RadioChicagoland.com

Thank you Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett

Thank you Michael Jackson and thank you Farrah Fawcett. I am as trouble by both your deaths as I am that they fell within the same few days. Michael Jackson, your music inspired me as a young person and was the theme of much of my suburban life. Your death eclipsed the attention that I think Farrah Fawcett also deserved as a pop icon who influenced my late Baby Boomer generation.

One of the first things I did in organizing my desk at the Chicago City Hall Press room in late 1978 was to take the poster of Farrah Fawcett off the wall in my home office, above the Coleco Adam Computer, and put it on the wall above my news desk. It stayed there through the administration of Harold Washington, another great inspiration in life. So many people fought the placement of the poster on the wall, Farrah Fawcett's curly blond mane garnishing a beautiful model's body and captivating eyes.

Everyone knows you from Charley's Angels, but my memories further back. My dad's generation during World War II had posters of famous "pinup girls" like the beautiful Jane Russell. Farrah Fawcett was my generation's pinup girl at a time when being a pinup girls was still something that did not create conflict. But by the time Jane Byrne became Chicago's first woman mayor, aldermen and rights activists from the Gay and women's rights community always challenged me to take it down and I refused.

How could anyone use Byrne's election as Chicago's first female chief executive officer of one of the largest cities in the nation when she was so disrespected by politicians across the board, and still is today? It was just hypocrisy and maybe jealousy that pushed people to confront me at my City hall desk and not ask but insist that I remove the poster of Farrah Fawcett.

It stayed on the wall for a long time. I am not sure when exactly and why it came down but I can say, no one forced me to remove it. Maybe, I just outgrew the era Farrah Fawcett represented as I outgrew the fun of dancing to disco music at the Cattle Company in Chicago Ridge on Southwest Highway.

You came back in my life with your courageous story of your battle against cancer. Yet I was still surprised when word came that you had died. How noble was your close friend Ryan O'Neal, who I remember from my first favorite serious move, "Love Story," with Ali McGraw, and also the TV weekly drama "Peyton Place."

What a great man O'Neal is. How dedicated, kind and generous. What a terrible loss for him and family.

And then came the death of Michael Jackson whose music frames many of the great memories I have of my daughter Caroline growing up in Chicago's Southwest Suburbs. I have images of Caroline with famous political celebrities like Ed Vrdolyak, Jane Byrne, Mike Bilandic, Rich Daley and Harold Washington. But the memories of roller skating with her at the Oak lawn roller rink to Michael Jackson's music still hangs at the front of my closet of great memories.

How tragic that Michael Jackson's death would overshadow the death of Farrah Fawcett, who deserved so much more recognition. How tragic both their deaths.

Some radio hosts have been hammering Michael Jackson and trivializing Farrah Fawcett. One on my former station at WLS AM compared Jackson to Adolph Hitler. Don Wade's remarks are the cruelest I have ever heard and many cruel comments have come from right wing radio fanatics. Wade, I know, deep down is a good person. But the comments were sad and undeserved. Farrah Fawcett was brushed aside by others as a shallow pop icon of little consequence. But I have to only wonder what were their childhood's really like. Were they that pained to produce such anger and hatred and ugliness?

I will remember both of you as giants of my life time. Everyone has conflict in their lives, including those who judge. But it's the greatness and the kindness you brought to others, Jackson through music that remains phenomenal, and Fawcett through sheer power of attraction and a truly wholesome American life, that will be remembered by me.

Thanks Michael. Thanks Farrah.

-- Ray Hanania

www.RadioChicagoland.com

Chicago area Palestinians and Israelis come together on local radio show for peace

I have invited two guests on my show this morning, Fadi Zanayed, president of the Chicago Chapter of the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, and David Steiner, president of the Chicago Chapter of the American Friends of Peace Now. Zanayed is Palestinian and Steiner is Israeli.

Over the past few weeks, it has been disheartening to watch and listen as some leaders in the Arab community and also in the mainstream Jewish American community, spew hatred and vicious rhetoric blaming others for the unspeakable crimes against women, children and innocent people in the Gaza Strip and in the Israeli towns near Gaza. Instead of leadership, some of these organizations have been denouncing fiercely the crimes committed against their people, but have either remained silent or have justified the carnage and immoral conduct committed against the others.

Both sides are committing crimes, and the worst crime is when the people on either side pretend their side is not committing a crime but scream and cry about the crimes committed only against their people.

That is complicity in the carnage and that needs to stop.

Today on my Radio Chicagoland program (WJJG 1530 AM Radio) I am asking callers, especially Arab and Jewish listeners, to call in and say something nice about the "other side." To show not that the other side is right but that their side has a remaining sense of morality in a conflict filled with a vicious war of words of "moral equivalency."

Innocent people are dying in a conflict that has raged on for more than 100 years. No one incident started anything. The facts so the claims on both sides are untrue. And when people lie or they close their eyes to the truth, they are also participating in the inhumanity that is taking place today.

Our government leaders are failing and are also playing politics on the spilled blood of innocent people. It's up to us, the people, to take the lead and say and do something to force them to do the right thing.

If you are not in the Chicagoland area to hear the show live on the radio this morning between 8 and 9:30 am, you can go to the web site and listen online, including on the live video streaming option,

-- Ray Hanania
http://www.radiochicagoland.com/

PRESS RELEASE: Green Party Presidential Candidate Cynthia McKinney in Chicago

MONDAY, OCTOBER 27

For Immediate Release:

GREEN PARTY PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE CYNTHIA McKINNEY CAMPAIGNS IN ILLINOIS

Appearances set for Chicago, Naperville, Springfield and Alton

Contact:

Rich Whitney
Event Organizer
618-924-4308

Phil Huckelberry
IL Green Party Chair
309-268-9974

Patrick Kelly
IL Green Party Media Coordinator
773-203-9631

Green Party Presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney brings her "Power to the People" campaign to the nation's heartland of Illinois on Tuesday, October 28 and Wednesday, October 29. Highlights include appearances in downtown Chicago, a meet-the-candidate breakfast in Naperville, a press conference in Springfield at the State Capitol and a candidates' forum in Alton, Illinois, in the St. Louis Metro East area.

At many of her appearances, Cynthia will be joined by some of the record 54 Green Party candidates running for office throughout the State of Illinois, including 11 congressional candidates.

"The Green Party is making waves running competitive races for public office throughout much of the State," commented Rich Whitney, who won over 10 percent of the vote as the Green candidate for Governor in 2006. "And McKinney's appearance here comes at an opportune time.

While the two corporate-sponsored candidates have exposed themselves as being tools of Wall Street, with no real answers to the collapse of the economy, McKinney has shown real leadership on economic issues.
She is the only candidate who talks about dismantling the military-industrial-prison complex, winning a job-creating peace-and-justice dividend to rebuild our nation's energy, housing and transportation infrastructure on a green foundation; ending corporate welfare, and putting an end to the biggest act of predatory lending of all -- the control of the nation's money supply by a private consortium of banks, the Federal Reserve."

"And while the twin corporate-sponsored candidates try to outdo each other in saber-rattling against Pakistan, Iran and Russia, while supporting the continued occupation of Iraq and escalation in Afghanistan," Whitney added, "Cynthia McKinney has distinguished herself as being the principled advocate for peace and the peace movement, calling for a complete and fast end to U.S. military deployments worldwide. She and the other Green candidates are standing up for the principle of national self-determination and standing against our government's strategy of serving corporate interests through military domination -- a strategy that breeds more hatred of the U.S. and more terrorism." Whitney will be accompanying McKinney on her campaign swing through Illinois.

The following is an itinerary of McKinney's campaigning in Illinois:


Tuesday, October 28

7 p.m. Reception at Black Independent Political Convention, Ms. Sis Place, 1401 E. 75th St., Chicago.

8:15 p.m. (approx.): Speak at Green Party candidates' reception and forum, YWCA*, 360 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago (at Wacker). $15 admission includes refreshments. This event begins at 7:00 p.m. and continues until 10:00, and will feature talks by other Chicago-area Green Party candidates, including Senatorial candidate Kathy Cummings and congressional candidates Omar Lopez (4th Dist.) and Jeremy Pohlen (3rd Dist.).

Wednesday, October 29th

8 - 9:30 a.m.: Breakfast meet and greet, at Egg Harbor restaurant, 175 W. Jackson, in Naperville, with Senate candidate Cummings, Congressional candidate Steve Alesch (13th Dist.) and DuPage and Kane County Green candidates, members and supporters, including State Rep candidates Dan Kairis and Kevin O'Connor.

1:30 p.m: Springfield. (Time probable but not yet confirmed) Press conference at the State Capitol "Blue Room." Radio interview at WMAY, 970 AM news-talk radio, time not yet confirmed.

4:00 - 6:30 p.m.: Green Party candidate Meet-and-Greet/forum, Holiday Inn, 3800 Homer Adams Pkwy, Alton, with Rodger Jennings, 12th Dist.
Congressional candidate, and Troy Dennis, 19th Dist. Congressional candidate.


The Illinois Green Party is one of three established political parties in Illinois. The Illinois Green Party held its first statewide primary in February 2008 and hosted the 2008 Green Party National Convention in Chicago in July. More than 50 candidates across the state will compete in the 2008 General Election on Nov. 4.

FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT THE ILLINOIS GREEN PARTY, VISIT WWW.ILGP.ORG

Hanania named morning talk show host at WJJG

Hanania to host weekday morning radio talk show on WJJG

(Orland Park/Sept. 5, 2008) – Orland Park resident and journalist Ray Hanania was named this week as the morning talk show host on WJJG AM 1530.

An award winning journalist who covered Chicago City Hall from 1977 until 1992, and hosted a radio show on WLS AM radio, Hanania will host the show weekday mornings, Monday through Friday, beginning every morning at 8 AM.

Hanania said he expects the show to expand in the near future.

“Mornings with Ray Hanania” will feature interviews and discussions with listeners on every topic in the news. Hanania will also emphasize local Southwest suburban news and issues in the show along with regional, national and international guests.

“I am a big believer in community news, community newspapers and community reporting and one important aspect of the show will be inclusion of community perspectives and news in our discussion,” Hanania said.

“I want people in Bollingbrook to learn about some of the events in Orland Park, for example, and for the people in Orland Park to engage people in other communities on issues that are local but that cross suburban boundaries. Suburban communities face common challenges and even though the details might be different, they are the same and sharing and discussing is important.”

Hanania is the winner of three Society of Professional Journalism Lisagor awards and was named “Best Ethnic American Columnist in America” by the New America Media in November 2006. He also has awards from UPI and two Stick-o-Type awards from the Chicago Newspaper Guild.

The radio show will be broadcast live on the internet off his web page at www.RadioChicagoland.com. Hanania is also a columnist with the Southwest News-Herald newspaper, and with the HuffingtonPost.com. His columns also appear in news blogs and newspaper around the world.

“People love me. People hate me. People read my columns. Now you can listen to me and engage in a discussion about today’s top issues and topics. It won’t be me talking down to people like on most other radio shows. I want people to call and share their views on issues and topics,” Hanania said.

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