Milt Rosenberg

When we absolutely have to remove ourselves from the news of the day, we turn on the record player. Well, cds, streaming, etc. Milt delved into his collection to sample music from Verdi to Jerry Lee Lewis and dozens of genres in between. Joining him with headphones on was producer Dan French, who also gave us a few tracks to enjoy.

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Many have written about it, some have even penned songs. But how is a revolution properly executed? When is it necessary? When is it effective and what is the aftermath?

To answer this question, we checked in with two esteemed historians, both well-versed in revolution. John Bushnell is a historian at Northwestern, and has studied the Russian Revolution extensively. We wanted to compare that revolution with our own, American Revolution, and to study that we were joined by professor Robert Elder of Valparaiso.

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Its nearing the time that we must check in with the political world on a regular basis. As of this writing, Donald Trump still leads the GOP race, seemingly to the chagrin and exasperation of top pollsters and major news networks. Hillary Clinton is embroiled in an email scandal, and Joe Biden may challenge her.

For these and many, many other topics, we turn to Richard Baehr, Chief Political Correspondent for American Thinker (one of our regular stops on the internet), Richard Ciccone, former editor of the Chicago Tribune and now adjunct professor of American Studies and Journalism at Notre Dame, and Scott Stantis, the immensely talented and highly-decorated cartoonist at the Chicago Tribune

Even if youre not a gambler youve heard the name Binion. Benny Binion started a gambling dynasty and took his uniquely Texan approach to gambling and poker to Vegas, where his World Series of Poker took the nation by storm.

But there was (and is) a lot more to Benny Binion than just savvy and business acumen and a penchant for cards. Douglas Swanson has just written a fine biography of Binion that is full of exactly what youd expect from someone involved in the gambling world, plus a lot, lot more. Theres violence and mayhem, threats and action, and glitz. Lots of glitz. And, of course, the games. Binions legacy is larger than life, and Doug Swanson has done that image justice.

The drinks are not free while you read.

Baseball is hot again in Chicago as the Cubs are off to their best season in decades and look to be positioning themselves for postseason ball for the first time in several years. So we thought wed check in with Barry Svrluga of the Washington Post to talk about the ins and outs of a Major League club, from peanut vendor all the way to the front office.

Barry was with the Washington Nationals day in and day out for their first season in the bigs and has written a great entry into the sports-literary genre with The Grind. How do baseball teams make certain they never approach their job with malaise? How do clubs manage multi-million dollar talent? What do pitchers do so that they are always ready, even when it looks like theyll have the day off?

With the number of kids seeming to shun football, baseball has reemerged as a popular sport again with American youth. And to be sure, if the Cubs make a run deep into the playoffs, there will be no shortage of Chicago youth signing up at your local diamond.

After a sharp decline in the various indices on Monday, we thought it wise to reach out to our friends at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. Joining us from the academic world to determine whether this is the beginning of the end (its not!) or just a blip on the radar (most likely) were Daniel Spulber, Professor of International Business and Professor of Strategy and Ravi Jagannathan, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange/John F. Sandner Professor of Finance. Also weighing in was the brilliant Martin Hutchinson, who gave us the view fromt he commercial side.

We nearly titled this show The Greatest American Novels before realizing, quite rightly, that that is a show that would be faulted by name. Its impossible to classify, say, the Top Ten greatest American novels. Better to have a discussion on many of the Great American Novel and novelists as a concept and see if we might quantify what makes them....great.

Joining us in studio for this delightful task was Professor Robin Grey of the University of Illinois at Chicago, Professor David Michael Kaplan and Professor Keith Mikos from DePaul.

Pop Quiz: Who said, You never let a serious crisis go to waste? Times up. Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel is the correct answer.

While not everyone may see a crisis as an opportunity, those in the business of managing image and rehabbing public opinion--pr experts--are an essential component of getting back in the good graces of the public when the politician or corporation makes a big mistake. Whether its an extramarital affair, a product liability, or the wrong thing said at the wrong time, theres a legion of brilliant, media-savvy minds who scramble to work to repair the damage done.

We bring to you today three such experts, namely Mary Patrick of the highly regarded firm Jasculca Terman Strategic Communications, Jeff Leshay of Leshay Communications, and Michael Dockterman of Steptoe and Johnson, who is one of the nations leading attorneys and a counselor that you would very much like in your corner if your reputation and way of life were on the line.

Before the show we started naming scandals that came to mind and were quickly up to several pages worth of incidents. Many of those are discussed here. This is an intriguing study into the art and science of a public relations master, courtesy of three professionals in that field.

Most Chicago natives will know the name Conrad Black well, and those beyond Chicago will most certainly have heard the name. In addition to being a publisher of major newspapers, hes also a fine journalist and historian. Among the many matters discussed on this recent program was his great historical entry, Flight of the Eagle.

Mark Steyn is no stranger to lovers of talk radio. As a regular substitute for Rush Limbaugh, he is a remarkable journalist. He has recently turned his attentions to The Hockey Stick, and has just published an excoriating criticism of much of the faulty science perpetrated to support Global Warming/Climate Change entitled A Disgrace to the Profession.

Both Canadians, Black and Steyn have keen eyes for political analysis. Along with Milt they covered a tremendous amount of ground in many fields beyond politics. Science, history, geography, energy, publishing and media, etc.

Something is rotten in the state of Illinois. More people are leaving than coming and, despite the many qualities of life in the Chicagoland area, people are choosing to work and live in other states where they can, frankly, keep more of their money.

What would a healthier economy in our state entail? What can be done in Springfield to spur business? How can we cut the red tape of government to attract workers and industry and dissuade them from choosing Texas, Indiana, or a host of other states whose star is on the rise? How can we turn around schools in Chicago?

To discuss such matters, we turned to the Illinois Policy Institute--a remarkable organization that aims to present solutions to these very problems and much, much more.

Michael Lucci always has fantastic research into this, and we never miss it. Ted Dabrowski is also one of the top minds at IPI. They both joined Milt in studio to examine how to reverse the fortunes of our fine state.