The now-notorious violent youth riot in downtown Chicago during a recent weekend got me to thinking of a press conference way back in 2010. Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley voiced frustration about what he said were large groups of suburban kids causing trouble on Chicago’s lakefront, even though plenty of Chicago kids were also participating, including six teens who brutally attacked an 18-year-old suburban woman. Mayor Daley complained that the youths would text each other to organize their mayhem.

If you’re getting a strong and unpleasant sense of déjà vu about the new U.S. Census Bureau’s population estimates for counties, including Cook County, you’re not alone. Representative Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-8) is feeling it as well. Krishnamoorthi, who sits on the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, has been trying to force the Census Bureau to retool its population estimates because they have been so awfully inaccurate going back years and years.

ComEd has long been a source of political patronage. The company’s Deferred Prosecution Agreement with federal prosecutors even references how former House Speaker Michael Madigan’s “old-fashioned patronage system” obtained ComEd meter-reader jobs for its precinct workers.

Last month, I wrote a tongue-in-cheek headline for my blog: “Poll conducted for IEA finds about 10 percent of Illinoisans are wackos.”