Quotes from Mike Royko

The subject of criminal rehabilitation was debated recently in City Hall. It's an appropriate place for this kind of discussion because the city has always employed so many ex-cons and future cons.

Show me somebody who is always smiling, always cheerful, always optimistic, and I will show you somebody who hasn't the faintest idea what the heck is really going on.

In attacking the young, the liberal, and the black, Daley was in the mainstream of America's mass prejudices. The Democratic party may have suffered by his actions, but Daley came out...even more popular than before because "bust their heads" was the mood of the land and Daley had swung the biggest club.

A Pessimist sees the glass as half empty; A Cub Fan wonders when it's gonna spill." ? Mike Royko

The neighborhood-towns were part of larger ethnic states. To the north of the Loop was Germany. To the northwest was Poland. To the west were Italy and Israel. To the southwest were Bohemia and Lithuania. And to the south was ireland... you could always tell, even with your eyes closed, which state you were in by the odors of the food stores and the open kitchen windows, the sound of the foreign or familiar language, and by whether a stranger hit you in the head with a rock.

Go that way, past the viaduct, and the wops will jump you, or chase you into Jew town...Polacks would stomp on you...Micks will shower you with Irish confetti from the brickyards.

It's no coincidence that female interest in the sport of baseball has increased greatly since the ballplay- ers swapped those wonderful old-time baggy flannel uniforms for leotards.

That is the greatest sin of all. You can make money under the table and move ahead, but you are forbidden to make secretaries under the sheets. He has dumped several party members for violating his personal moral standards. If something is leaked to the press, the bigmouth will be tracked down and punished. Scandals aren't public scandals if you get there before you enemies do.

So, for a variety of reasons, ranging from convenience to fear to economics, people stayed in their own neighborhood, loving it, enjoying the closeness, the friendliness, the familiarity, and trying to save enough money to move out.

If the regular pay was important to him, the opportunity to learn was of even greater long-range significance.

As the car goes its way, some people seek escape from the necks by staring at the progress-meter above the door—the light that hops from one number to the next. A glance is all that is necessary, but some riders follow the progress, floor by floor, trying to guess where it will stop next. A few—probably habitual readers—spend the time reading the city inspection permit above the control panel.

the ingredients for the best political donnybrook

Fats Boylermaker, 22, who once leaned against a corner light pole from 2 A.M. Sunday until noon Sunday, when the tavern opened again.

The funeral home might be McInerney's, which has matchbooks that bear a poem beginning, "Bring out the lace curtains and call McInerney, I'm nearing the end of life's pleasant journey.

When a new dictator takes over a country, one of the first things he does is seize or close the newspapers. Apathy isn't as heavy-handed as a dictator. But it can get the same job done.

It is sad, in a way, that the exploding auto is going the way of the old red streetcar, the horse-drawn milk wagon, the ice truck and other traditional and practical forms of transportation. A shotgun blast from a clump of bushes is nice in its own way, but for drama there is nothing like instant depreciation of a car with a gangster at the wheel.

He runs City Hall like a small family business and keeps everybody on a short rein. They do only that which they know is safe and that which he tells them to do. So many things that should logically be solved several rungs below finally come to him.

Challenge in hand, and all stuck together, State Fire Marshal William Cowhey observed: "There's enough brains and good will in this room to overcome this problem that has hit Chicagoland." (Results have indicated that it wasn't a very big room.)

It is a foreign economy car, and while I won't mention its brand name, I will say that it is made by a people renowned for their craftsmanship, philosophers, musicians and bratwurst.

This would provide a fitting message, answer and explanation for the busybodies of America who currently are wallowing in indignation, their favorite puddle.