A bunch of us went to Rockit – a gastropub in Wrigleyville – last night. It was my idea, and I was pretty psyched about it. Sadly, the verdict was mixed, and even though I enjoyed my meal, it is not high on the list for a return trip.
The location is great, on Clark Street just north of Addison. That’s an easy walk for me, even in cold weather. Six of us had an 8:00p.m. reservation after cocktails. The inside of the place is dark, warm and pub-like, but there wasn’t anything that really stood out. It’s a young crowd that is loud.
The service was efficient and ample. Nothing mind-bending but, hey, it is a pub.
The food was what had me excited. More specifically, the menu looked great. This was pub food a level or two above your typical joint. Things like a lobster burger, truffle oil fries and lobster gnocchi catch your eye on the menu. The table ordered a variety, all the previously mentioned dishes and a side of mac & cheese to share. Like I said previously, the verdict was mixed.
My Rockit Burger – a Kobe beef patty with melted bried and medjool date aioli – was delicious. As it should have been for $19. It came with truffle oil fries. I found them full of flavor, although others at the table felt they were overpowering. My complaint is that, if you’re going to make truffle oil fries, you should use a Belgian frite – something that is crispy outside and very tender inside – instead of the straight-cut fries on my plate. The red onion brioche bun was delicious but a bit too buttery.
Laura had the lobster gnocchi and found it had a substantial portion of lobster meat. Unfortunately it was oily, and she didn’t finish it. Actually, Tom didn’t finish his, either.
Next up was the lobster burger. Lobster meat and shrimp paste. It sounded great but came out from the kitchen with a strong flavor (probably the shrimp paste.) Two at the table were wrapped to go.
So, the long and short of it is that Rockit failed to light our fuses despite the high prices. Great idea, great location, but the execution is not up to snuff.
Last night on Countdown with Keith Olbermann, Chris Hayes – the Washington editor of The Nation magazine – scored a great point about the hypocrisy of James O’Keefe’s trespass in Senator Mary Landrieu’s New Orleans office. Still haven’t heard of O’Keefe? He made the pimp and ho films in ACORN offices last year that led to conservative outrage, and just got arrested with three of his buddies trying to do something in Senator Landrieu’s office. Anyway, the video gives a good summary, and Hayes cuts to the chase towards the end.
The latest buzz is deficit reduction, and the new black in politics is the Conrad-Gregg Commission. I’m not going to spend any space arguing about public vs. private spending during down-cycles in the economy, or asserting the ineffectiveness of supply-side economics. Instead, I would rather talk about the mechanics of this commission (known formally as The Bipartisan Task Force for Responsible Fiscal Action Act of 2009) and whether or not elected Senators think that the rest of us are uninformed fools. Because that’s what it looks like from where I stand.
Before I write any more, let me point out the irony of convening such as commission, which will spend money without actually accomplishing anything. How can I make such a claim? Because, according to the rules of the task force, 14 of the 18 members of the group must vote the recommendations out of the committee, and then the House and Senate must pass those recommendations with super-majorities before December 23, 2010. Despite the fact that they’ve packed the roster with Blue-Dogs, the idea of getting something through both chambers with a 3/5ths majority is folly.
But who actually thinks that such a commission is needed at all? There are only a couple of choices when it comes to reducing the Federal deficit: cut entitlements or military spending. The right has been chomping at the bit to gut Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security for decades, despite the pledges of Republicans to protect Medicare during the latest healthcare debate. Considering the temerity of Democrats to challenge Republicans on anything security-related, and the number of fiscal Democrats on the commission, there is only one outcome worth betting on.
The shame of it all is that our military spending is like a vein of gold, ready to be mined. Deficit reduction objectives as well as critical domestic spending could all be financed comfortably from the largest portion of our Federal budget. Consider the following:
That’s right, last year we spent over six times the amount of money as our nearest adversary, China. And those numbers don’t reflect the costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, since the Bush administration paid for them through off-line supplemental bills.
Now, I ask you: does the United States really need 800 military bases spread across the planet? Are we safer than if we had 400? Would it be smarter to emulate China’s strategy of working trade and resource exchanges in unsavory parts of the world, instead of setting up military theaters? While George W. Bush was organizing AFRICOM (and having great trouble finding a headquarters on the continent), China was arranging contracts for palladium and molybdenum, raw materials which will insure their manufacturing dominance in the future.
The truth of the matter is that the United States could maintain dramatic military superiority by spending half of what it does on its military. That leaves over $350 billion per year to strengthen Medicare and Social Security, and reduce the budget deficit. Sounds like an easy target.
So the next time someone mentions the Conrad-Gregg commission on deficit reduction, and it sounds like a reasonable idea, ask yourself and those around you: do you want to eliminate Medicare and Social Security in exchange for a global, imperial military? Because that is the true choice.
I had lunch at Feed last Friday with my friend Paul. For those who aren’t interested in reading further, it totally rocked my world.
Feed is located in Humboldt Park, on the west side of Chicago, at the corner of California and Chicago Avenue. It’s not much more than a shack, with a counter between the short-order kitchen and a dining room of about twelve tables. The entire place reeks of 1958, right down to the jukebox and Formica-covered chrome tables. In addition to a few daily specials, a number of standards provide excellent munching.
Even though Feed specializes in chicken plates, I opted for the 1/3-pound burger. It’s served with fries and vinegar slaw, and I added bleu cheese. Not being able to control myself, I also ordered some collard greens. Big juicy burger on a Kaiser roll: check. Tender fries with a crispy exterior: check. Cole slaw with tart, light dressing: check. Southern-style collard greens: check. Oh, and the local root beer was creamy and flavorful.
Sadly, I skipped the one thing that I was excited about – red velvet cake. Feed makes it in-house, so I’m planning a return trip very soon. Watch this blog for a follow-up review.
I’m not one for name calling, but if the shoe fits…
We had three wonderful nominees this week, so I’ll just lay them out in order. First is Rush Limbaugh – the shock jock from my home state of Missouri (that’s right, born and bred in the Bootheel) – who commented about America’s response to the devastating earthquake in Haiti, “They’ll use this to burnish their, shall we say, “credibility” with the black community — in the both light-skinned and dark-skinned black community in this country. It’s made-to-order for them. That’s why he [Obama] couldn’t wait to get out there, could not wait to get out there.” Absolutely brilliant.
But wait, there’s more! Liz Cheney, the woman who has absolutely no reason to garner any attention from the media, yet seems to be on every Sunday talk show, has been raging about President Obama’s softness on terror, and conveniently forgetting important facts that make her the worst sort of hypocrite. We’re less safe, Obama doesn’t use the word “terror”, we should be torturing people around the globe, there were no terrorist attacks under the Bush administration. I guess she thinks that I spent the last eight years making love to my bong and living in mom’s basement. Still not convinced? Check this bullshit out.
Finally, we come to Rudy “A noun, a verb, and 9-11″ Giuliani. First he said there were no terror attacks under Bush (how can you forget the big one, Rudy? It’s how you made your name.) Then, after being called out, he qualified it as no attacks after 9-11. When that didn’t work, he talked about attacks by Muslims. Still being called out, he had to further limit the statement to attacks by Muslims on domestic soil. Oh, and let’s not forget how he claimed that the Shoe Bomber was before 9-11. Shit, it’s just embarrassing.
So let me know who your pick is. And credit for the term “douche-tastic” goes to Marco Randazza of The Legal Satyricon.
Okay, so Mark McGwire (who broke Roger Maris’ home run record while I lived in St. Louis) finally comes clean and admits to being juiced during the time frame when his home run average increased by over 20% and he briefly held the title of home run king. This really isn’t news, since everyone knew what was happening in baseball at the time, and as a mea culpa it sucks. He wanted the record, so he cheated. Now we’re supposed to sympathize about his regrets? Wow.
There certainly is one positive consequence of the admission. Now MLB has to confront the issue of the “asterisk” – that the records of McGwire, Sosa and Bonds are compromised, and Maris is still the king. The reason a record is significant is that it is hard to acquire, which is not evidenced by the 30+ year record falling several times in almost as many years. What these guys did is no more exceptional than getting a perfect score on a multiple-choice take-home exam.
Cheating screws everybody: the guy who wasn’t juiced but hit 55 home runs (I’m making up that number), the record holder, the fans who want legitimate sport, and the player who breaks the record only to be eclipsed the following year by another cheater. It removes risk in the sense that cheaters don’t operate by the same rules. Like playing rugby with body armor.
Ownership should take a share of the blame, much more so than they have. After all, they are the ones to promote the gladiator-entertainment model, substituting the thrill of action for the appreciation of craft and physical prowess. Breaking Maris’ record was good for business, probably got several stadiums publicly financed, and definitely sold a bunch of corporate boxes (and catered pizzas at $45 a pop.) Don’t we already have that with WWF? Is America destined to take up Rollerball? Unfortunately, John Houseman is dead, but maybe Bud Selig could play the role.
In the meantime, McGwire is a hitting coach. Apparently, Mr. DeWitt is okay rewarding cheaters. But I’ve never known an organization that built integrity and good product on screwing its customers. I’ll stop my rant, but highly recommend Dave Zirin’s post at thenation.com.
UPDATE:
McGwire sat down with Bob Costas the other day to discuss the reasons behind his steroid use. Get this! He claims that he didn’t take steroids to enhance his performance, but instead took them to recover from injury. But if he was injured, he wouldn’t be able to play and hit home runs. You can watch the video while trying to untangle that logic. But beware, you might taste some bile in the back of your throat.
