This sounds silly to the extreme:
- Did you hear the MacStupid on 102.7 this morning? He was asked outright by the radio host exactly what led to the shutdown of the beach on Memorial Day. Before he answered the host played interviews from individuals at the beach. Each one mentioned gangs, fights, rowdy crowds, etc and then a police presence shutting the beach down. When it was his turn to respond, I bullshit you not, he said, "I've been trying to set the record straight for a week now. That's not what happened. It was extremely hot and the water was cold. People were trying to stay cool but weren't going in the water and they passed out. Emergency personnel had a difficult time getting to them with all the crowds so the decision to shut the beach down was made."
Seriously? The Chicago Fire Department has been responding to beach emergencies for over 100 years now. We think they can manage quite well. And if CFD was even a little slow, we'd either (A) be hearing about it from some aggrieved party looking for a payout or (B) be hearing about how half-a-dozen good Samaritans carried the "victim" to the bike path, parking lot or street for the ambulance to treat. Neither of those things has happened and the DJ played interviews from people on the scene! We'd really like to see a transcript to see if this actually got broadcast.
And this part is looking like "The Return of J-Fled:"
And this part is looking like "The Return of J-Fled:"
- Second statement regarding gangs. He wants to have a meeting with them and let them know they need to change their behaviour. He is going to tell them, "We aren't going to arrest you, but we will if we have to? Now what can we do to help you change?"
Another meeting to tell them to "knock it off"? That worked so well last year with J-Fled. We think the gang involved only killed eight people the following week. God help us.