Sneed on Sunday …
It’s a wrap!
Or was it a rap?
Final flotsam and jetsam from the 2024 Chicago Democratic National Convention. But first some clean-up on that 1968 affair.
Remember that Mike Wallace episode?
After Sneed revisited it two weeks ago, retired Chicago Fire Captain Paul McLaughlin called to add a final chapter to the sensational 56-year nationally headlined story of the CBS-TV correspondent’s dramatic arrest during the 1968 Democratic Convention at the old International Amphitheatre.
It’s true Wallace’s arrest was ordered by Mayor Richard J. Daley while Wallace was muscling his way off the congested DNC floor and was escorted outside by two Chicago police officers, including Chicago plainclothes detective Joe DiLeonardi as Sneed recounted.
However, McLaughlin tells Sneed the trouble really started “when Wallace threw a punch at my father, Fifth District Police Commander Paul McLaughlin,” when the TV correspondent became agitated after he was refused entry to a restricted area and restrained.
“My father was then summoned to the CBS trailer where he met with the president of CBS,” said McLaughlin, who claims his dad “was then threatened with a lawsuit and the loss of his job by the CBS executives.
“Mayor Daley arrived at the trailer and demanded an apology from Wallace,” said McLaughlin, adding Wallace refused to apologize.
“With that Mayor Daley grabbed my father by the arm and stormed out of the trailer exclaiming, ‘We don’t answer to these New Yorkers!’”
(There was speculation at the time that Wallace was pointing his fingers so angrily in Commander McLaughlin’s face that one may have made contact.)
Only in Chicago, folks!
No ‘Om’ arrests this time
Now, about this year’s convention.
Powerful former U.S. Attorney Dan K. Webb also called Sneed with a special message of congrats to the Chicago Police Department and top cop Larry Snelling.
“There is no question the police did a great job during the Democratic National Convention controlling the crowds, not using unnecessary force, and breaking things up before it got out of control,” he added.
“The police were terrific,” added Webb, comparing it to his experiences in 1968.
Webb had just moved to Chicago back then as a law student at Loyola University and saw police arresting anti-war protestors during Chicago’s National Democratic Convention.
“It was a bloody nightmare,” said Webb, who then lived in the Lincoln Park area, where police were rounding up kids and arresting them. “I had just moved from southern Illinois farm country, but if I hadn’t been going to law school at night, I would have joined them,” he said of the protesters.
“Back then, I watched poet/anti-Vietnam war protestor Allen Ginsberg chant peace in Lincoln Park by repeating and repeating the [ritualistic] sound ‘Om,’ and it was like anyone saying ‘Om’ was carted off and arrested,” said Webb.
“Beat” poet Allen Ginsberg with hippies in Lincoln Park during Democratic National Convention in Aug 1968.
Chicago Daily News photo
“I mean heads were bounced off police squad cars, and I can still hear the thud of it,” added Webb, 78, who is still in the game as one the nation’s top civil lawyers.
Contrast that with 2024.
“Bravo,” said Webb. “Nothing is perfect, but a job incredibly well done.”
How to tell if Trump is lying
New Yawk squawk: Michael Cohen, Donald Trump’s former New York attorney who has become notorious for spewing venom on his former “client,” is now suggesting America closely watch Trump’s hands when the Republlican presidential nominee is talking or being interviewed.
Quoth Cohen: “If he [Trump] starts going into his ‘accordion’ hands [pumping hands back and forth like he’s playing an accordion], then you know he [Trump] is lying,” he told newsies this week following his attendance at the 2024 DNC in Chicago.
No check, please!
Oh, boy. News of the recent death of the “reputed organized Chicago crime figure years ago,” Joe “Joe A” Andriacchi, 91, prompted a personal reflection cum re-think.
I was reminded of a request from him I did not accept. It was an invitation to lunch … or was it dinner? I was told he wanted to talk. I never responded. I let it go. That was approximately 10 years ago.
The person who delivered the request from Andriacchi, who had served time for burglary when he was young and was never charged in subsequent mob trials, was a close friend of mine.
“I can’t remember exactly why he wanted to talk,” I told my friend, who had delivered the request. “Do you?” I asked him. “I often wondered why and then … I just let it go.”
“Well,’ he chuckled. “If I remember correctly, he wanted to invite you to dine with him … and talk about his side of things.”
Imagine.
Sneedlings …
Hillary Clinton heads back to Chicago mid-month to pitch her new book: Something Lost, Something Gained: Reflections on Life, Love, and Liberty … Saturday birthdays: Singer Van Morrison, 79; violinist Itzhak Perlman,79; Actor Richard Gere, 75 … Sunday birthdays: comedian Lily Tomlin, 85; singer Barry Gibb, 78; singer Gloria Estefan, 67.