Please Heckle Smug Asshole Rahm Emanuel to the Ends of the Earth
Welcome to WHAT NOW, a morning round-up of the news/fresh horrors that await you today.
Students at UCLA interrupted a speech on Monday night from Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel by chanting “16 shots and a cover up”—a reference to the 16 Chicago police gunshots that killed black teenager Laquan McDonald in 2014—before walking out.
Emanuel, ever the smug, calculating asshole, calmly waited for the disruptions to end before joking, “I didn’t realize there were so many direct flights from Chicago.”
The crowd at the school’s Lecture for Thought Leadership didn’t seem to know what to do with that repellent comment. Emanuel went on say that “these are serious issues” he hoped to take on in the question and answer portion of the evening.
It’s worth remembering that although he repeatedly insisted otherwise, Emanuel knew about the circumstances surrounding McDonald’s death and did everything in his power to push back the release of the horrific dashcam video of the teenager’s killing until after his tight race for re-election was over. For this reason alone—though there are many other good ones—Emanuel should be vocally criticized wherever he goes.
To date, Chicago’s mayor has been heckled by children, booed at a Blackhawks championship celebration and an event for the city’s 177th birthday, and, most recently, by students at the University of Michigan over his plans to build a nearly $100 million police training academy on Chicago’s West Side. To all the people making Emanuel’s life harder: Keep up the good work.
WHAT ELSE?
- Sea levels are rising at faster rates because of melting ice sheets, the AP reports.
- Omarosa Manigault Newman, a very reliable source, said Monday night on Celebrity Big Brother that Mike Pence “thinks Jesus tells him to say things.”