Category: News
Aurora committee to consider design contract for Orchard Round sound wall
A committee of the Aurora City Council is set to consider hiring a company to design a new sound wall for Orchard Road, which is a project that has been in the works for many years.
At a meeting on Monday, the Information and Technology Committee will discuss and vote on a nearly $169,000 contract with Thomas Engineering Group, LLC, of Aurora, for the design of the sound wall, according to the meeting’s agenda. If recommended for approval by the committee, the contract would still need to go to the Committee of the Whole and then before the Aurora City Council for final approval.
The sound wall would shield residents living near the busy road on the far West Side of Aurora between Prairie Street and Indian Trail from the well-documented vehicle noise. The plan has been to replace the existing wooden fence along the road with a concrete wall that would be something between the current fence and the full Illinois Department of Transportation sound walls used along expressways and interstate roadways.
Once built, the city would be responsible for basic maintenance of the wall while Kane County would do any capital maintenance needed, per an agreement between the two governments that was approved by the Aurora City Council in 2024. The approval of that contract was a major step towards construction, which officials hoped would take place last year but hit delays.
Ald. Carl Franco, 5th Ward, who represents the part of Aurora where the sound wall is set to go and has been involved in the project for many years, said he is happy to see the design contract come forward for approval. But, under Mayor John Laesch, he said he hasn’t been kept in the loop on the project like he was in the past.
“I was in every single phone conversation, every meeting. I knew everything that was going on,” Franco said. “Now, I’m going to have to find out about it through a committee.”
Aurora Chief Operating Officer Brian Caputo said that the proposal set to go before the Infrastructure and Technology Committee on Monday is “just the next step in what has been a methodical process.” Proposals for engineering services were received in October, and since then staff have been confirming funding sources, evaluating the proposals and selecting the most qualified vendor, he said.
The project is expected to now cost $6 million, according to the city’s 2026 budget.
A portion of the new sound wall’s construction cost, around $100,000 of the previously-estimated $4 million price tag, was set to be paid for by residents through a special service area property tax, similar to how many other capital projects within the city have been funded. The property owners in the affected area would have gotten the chance to vote on the 25-year tax, and if a majority agreed, the special service area would have been established.
However, the city found out last year that it would have needed to establish multiple different special service areas to help fund the project. While that situation was being worked out, the city also learned it had lost $500,000 in state funds previously committed to the project, Franco previously said.
Now, the project is expected to get $800,000 in grants from the state, the 2026 city budget shows. Plus, the 2024 intergovernmental agreement between Aurora and Kane County has the county contributing just over $1 million.
Franco is contributing around $600,000 of his own aldermanic ward funds to the project. The rest of the cost, roughly $3.6 million, will be paid from the city’s capital improvement fund, according to the city’s 2026 budget.
While Franco has been in favor of using a special service area to pay some of the sound wall’s cost, Laesch has been against the idea.
In 2024, when the intergovernmental agreement was before City Council for approval, Laesch suggested the city look into using gaming taxes rather than a special service area to cover the gap. As an alderman at-large at the time, he introduced an amendment to the agreement that said the city would look into other ways to fund the wall in the future, but it was voted down.
When talking about the topic with The Beacon-News last year, Laesch mentioned that the city would hopefully be seeing a “sizable” increase to its gaming tax after the opening of the under-construction Hollywood Casino-Aurora resort.
The sound wall project is on track to break ground before the end of 2026, according to Caputo.
rsmith@chicagotribune.com
Photos: The 2026 Chicago Auto Show
Photos from the media preview at the 118th edition of the Chicago Auto Show which opens to the public on Feb. 7, 2025 and runs through Feb. 16 at McCormick Place.
Public relations representative Lynn Seely, right, of Detroit, shows a person the 2026 Honda Prelude Hybrid during the media preview day at the 2026 Chicago Auto Show at McCormick Place on Feb. 6, 2026. (Josh Boland/Chicago Tribune)
People walk through the main concourse during the media preview day at the 2026 Chicago Auto Show at McCormick Place on Feb. 6, 2026. (Josh Boland/Chicago Tribune)
Zach Morehouse, left, and his husband Christopher Beale, of Georgia, look at the 2026 Jeep Cherokee Hybrid during the media preview day at the 2026 Chicago Auto Show at McCormick Place Friday, Feb. 6, 2026, in Chicago. (Josh Boland/Chicago Tribune)
Kenta Shinohara, left, and Asae Nakagawa, both of Chicago, look at the 2026 Toyota Camry XSE during the media preview day at the 2026 Chicago Auto Show at McCormick Place on Feb. 6, 2026. Shinohara and Nakagawa work for UGN Inc., which manufacturers acoustic components for vehicles. (Josh Boland/Chicago Tribune)
A person directs as people ride in a 2026 Jeep Wrangler during the media preview day at the 2026 Chicago Auto Show at McCormick Place on Feb. 6, 2026. (Josh Boland/Chicago Tribune)
Jazmine Wintour, left, takes a photo of Matt Conger’s 1991 Toyota MR2 Turbo, as her friend Andrew Wrobel, observes the car during the media preview day at the 2026 Chicago Auto Show at McCormick Place on Feb. 6, 2026. (Josh Boland/Chicago Tribune)
Epaphras Lamptey, of Chicago drives in a racing simulator during the media preview day at the 2026 Chicago Auto Show at McCormick Place on Feb. 6, 2026. Chevrolet set up a Gran Turismo racing simulator for attendees to use at the auto show. (Josh Boland/Chicago Tribune)
People ride in a 2026 Jeep Gladiator over a bridge as people walk beneath during the media preview day at the 2026 Chicago Auto Show at McCormick Place on Feb. 6, 2026. (Josh Boland/Chicago Tribune)
Jazmine Wintour, left, takes a photo of Matt Conger’s 1991 Toyota MR2 Turbo, as her friend Andrew Wrobel, observes the car during the media preview day at the 2026 Chicago Auto Show at McCormick Place Friday, Feb. 6, 2026, in Chicago. (Josh Boland/Chicago Tribune)
A custom plushie of Matt Conger’s 1991 Toyota MR2 Turbo sits on top of his car during the media preview day at the 2026 Chicago Auto Show at McCormick Place on Feb. 6, 2026. (Josh Boland/Chicago Tribune)
A person walks past the 2026 Ram 1500 Range-Extended EV during the media preview day at the 2026 Chicago Auto Show at McCormick Place on Feb. 6, 2026. (Josh Boland/Chicago Tribune)
Antonio Estaba, of Florida, takes a photo of the 2026 Ford Mustang Dark Horse SC during the media preview day at the 2026 Chicago Auto Show at McCormick Place on Feb. 6, 2026. (Josh Boland/Chicago Tribune)
The interior of the 2026 Honda Prelude during the media preview day at the 2026 Chicago Auto Show at McCormick Place on Feb. 6, 2026. (Josh Boland/Chicago Tribune)
https://www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/06/photos-the-2026-chicago-auto-show/
If You’re Free To Complain about Fascism, You Don’t Live In A Fascist Country
If You’re Free To Complain about Fascism, You Don’t Live In A Fascist Country
Authored by Jenna McCarthy via Jenna’s Side,
Many, many years ago—we’re talking decades—I got into a fight with a boy I’d been dating for (thankfully) not very long. I can’t even recall what the argument was about, but I’ll never forget his very last words to me:
“God, you’re so stupid.”
“There are plenty of insults you could fling at me that would be accurate,” I informed him by way of a breakup. “Hot-headed, demanding, defensive, defiant, opinionated, unfiltered, gets hangry if not fed every four hours—let me help you out—but make no mistake, stupid isn’t one of them.”
I think of that moment every once in a while, for instance when I hear celebrities, Facebook “friends,” or the coven of professional scolds over at The View whining about the “fascist dictator” in the White House. And not because my reaction is “God, you’re so stupid”—although it one hundred percent is—but because they’re obviously just reaching for the nastiest insult in the bag and hoping it sticks. It’s basically the “your mom is so ugly, she made an onion cry” of political attacks.
Trump is arguably bombastic. He is egomaniacal. He can be rude and misogynistic and childish. He fires off 3 A.M. Twitter tantrums like a drunk raccoon, insults world leaders to their faces, and was busted bragging about grabbing women by the… lady parts. If he were your uncle, no one would blame you for not inviting him to your wedding.
But a dictator he is not.
Let me prove it: In America, the worst thing that happens when you stream a boy band is that Spotify recommends more boy bands. Do you know what happens in North Korea? If you’re lucky, you’re sent to a labor camp. If you’re not so lucky, you could face the death penalty. That is not hyperbole.
According to a new Amnesty International report, North Koreans—including children—are being publicly executed for watching South Korean dramas or listening to music by groups like BTS. (Rich families can sometimes bribe officials to escape elimination, so apparently corruption is universal—although the price tag is often too high for many.) Thanks to Kim Jong Un’s 2020 Law on Rejecting Reactionary Thought and Culture, consequences for consuming or distributing unapproved entertainment range from five to fifteen years of forced labor and a public shaming to being brutally unalived in front of an audience as a gruesome cautionary tale.
But please, Joy Behar, tell me again how you’re living under a fascist regime.
North Korean escapees describe being lined up and marched to public executions as part of their “ideological education,” designed expressly to terrorize citizens into compliance. Tens of thousands of people dragged to a field to watch someone die for enjoying an unapproved TV show. Meanwhile, over here, “ideological education” means attending a corporate DEI seminar with lukewarm coffee, sitting through a required HR video about tone in the workplace, or getting lectured by a celebrity who listened to one podcast and now identifies as a constitutional scholar.
You poor, tortured souls. Please reward yourselves with a matcha latte; your activism must be exhausting.
Here’s a little reality check: if your fascist dictator allows you to tweet “FASCIST DICTATOR!!!” in all caps directly from your couch while wearing pajama pants you bought from the TikTok shop, you are not, in fact, living under a fascist dictator. If your most humiliating public moment is the time you accidentally replied-all to an office-wide email and called your boss an insufferable twatwaffle, you are not a victim of political oppression. And if the most hazardous consequence of your entertainment consumption is Hulu finding out you’re logged into your ex’s account and booting you off the platform, you do not live in an authoritarian state. You live in America, where the biggest threats to your freedoms are TSA confiscating your tweezers or Trader Joe’s discontinuing your favorite spicy peanut salad dressing.
“This country is an authoritarian hellscape,” the liberal left loves to lament. I know, it feels cool to say. It’s dramatic. It gets likes and comments and retweets. But if your alleged authoritarian hellscape permits you to organize protests against it, pen songs decrying it, record podcasts objecting to it, and sell merch mocking it, then maybe “authoritarian hellscape” isn’t the right term. Maybe it’s more like “stable, open society with Wi-Fi and too many microphones.” (Also, if it’s so dystopian, feel free to expatriate yourself. No, really. Flights leave hourly.)
These are the same Defenders of Democracy™, I’ll remind the class, who cheered when the unvaccinated were barred from restaurants, fired from their jobs, and banished from polite society altogether. The same hall-monitor brigade that applauded mask mandates, school closures, travel bans, curfews, capacity limits, and the glorious era of “Show Me Your Papers” vaccine passports. And now they want to style themselves as freedom fighters living under an iron-fisted despot? Please. These people didn’t just tolerate tyranny—they demanded it. They celebrated it. They literally couldn’t get enough of it.
When Barack Obama was droning American citizens overseas without trial, the left went mute. When Bill Clinton endorsed the assault on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, no celebrity declared we were living under a dictatorship. When Joe Biden tried to impose sweeping vaccine mandates through OSHA and attempted a massive student-loan bribery “forgiveness” plan via emergency powers—both slapped down as unconstitutional—the same people now screaming “authoritarian takeover!” were too busy knitting vagina beanies to notice. Funny how the outrage only kicks in when authoritarianism strolls in wearing a red hat.
So when the likes of Cher and Jim Carrey and John Legend and Bette Midler and George Clooney and Kathy Griffin and Bruce Springsteen use their public platforms to call out Trump’s fascist takeover of America, their claims collapse under their own weight. Because real authoritarianism doesn’t let you complain about authoritarianism. That’s sort of the whole point.
It would almost be funny if it weren’t so… stupid.
A dictatorship, for the record, is somewhere people cannot complain. Where they cannot consume outside media. Where the government can kill you for pressing play on the wrong USB drive. Where state power and fear control every aspect of life—not where a disliked political figure exercises lawful constitutional authority and triggers a tantrum.
And it’s not just North Korea. Zooming out even slightly reveals an entire planet of governments behaving in ways that make America’s “fascism” discourse look like a middle-school slam contest. (“Your mom’s so dumb, she studied for her Covid test!”). In China, people are disappeared for practicing the wrong religion, posting the wrong sentence, or attending the wrong protest; an entire ethnic minority has been shoved into “re-education” camps large enough to be visible from space. In Iran, teenagers are executed for chanting slogans, women are beaten for a strand of visible hair, and the government turns off the internet whenever it gets even a faint whiff of protest. In Russia, critics are jailed, poisoned, or randomly “fall out of windows.” In Afghanistan, girls are banned from school and public executions are a weekly event. These are governments that don’t merely dislike dissent—they annihilate it.
We, on the other hand, live in a country where we can march in the streets chanting “No Kings!” and not a single king will try to stop us.
Seeing the internet teeming with rants about America being one executive order away from total collapse feels like watching a Babylon Bee meme come to life. Because when people are free to say what they think, vocally dislike who they please, and watch anything they want without fear of a firing squad and somehow label that fascism, they’re not oppressed—they’re just spelling freedom wrong.
The next time a celebrity relaunches their “We are literally living under Mussolini” monologue while sipping an $8 iced coffee and documenting themselves flipping off their president, feel free to drop a reminder in the comments that there are places where people are dying because they downloaded the TV show those same celebrities binge-watched on their way to the Save Democracy Brunch.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 02/06/2026 – 17:00
France urges Iran-backed groups to show restraint if US-Iran tensions escalate
BEIRUT — Iran-backed groups in the Middle East should exercise the “greatest restraint” if there is regional escalation between Iran and the United States to avoid destabilizing the region, France’s foreign minister said Friday.
Jean-Noël Barrot made his comments in Beirut, where he arrived earlier in the day after visiting Syria and Iraq. His visit also comes as the U.S. and Iran held indirect talks in Oman on how to approach discussions over Tehran’s nuclear program.
There have been concerns in the region that if the United States attacks Iran, Iran-backed groups in Iraq, Yemen and Lebanon could join the war, worsening the situation.
“If, however, we witness a regional escalation, it would be appropriate for groups supported by Iran to exercise the greatest restraint in the whole region so as not to worsen a situation,” Barrot said after holding talks with Lebanese leaders. “That would profoundly destabilize the Near and Middle East,” he warned.
He added that a military escalation in the region is a risk that must be avoided at all cost, adding that it is neither in the interest of the countries in the region, nor in the interests of France.
The French official discussed the ongoing process to disarm Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah group and a conference that is scheduled to be held next month in France to support the Lebanese army that has been expanding its presence in southern Lebanon along the border with Israel after the 14-month Israel-Hezbollah war.
Barrot said France is working in close coordination with the United States, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Egypt, who will co-organize the conference “with us to a targeted collective contribution, built with the Lebanese authorities.”
Lebanon’s army has been badly affected by the country’s historic economic meltdown that broke out in late 2019. The country’s political class has done little since then to get the small nation out of the crisis that is rooted in decades of corruption and mismanagement.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/06/france-us-iran-tensions/
FEMA will resume staff reductions that were paused during winter storm, managers say
The Federal Emergency Management Agency will resume staff cuts that were briefly paused during January’s severe winter storm, according to two FEMA managers, stoking concern across the agency over its ability to address disasters with fewer workers.
FEMA at the start of January abruptly stopped renewing employment contracts for a group of staffers known as Cadre of On-Call Response/Recovery, or CORE employees, term-limited hires who can hold senior roles and play an important role in emergency response.
But FEMA then paused the cuts in late January as the nation braced for the gigantic winter storm that was set to impact half the country’s population. FEMA did not say whether that decision was linked to the storm.
The two FEMA team managers, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the staffing changes with the media, were told this week that dismissals were going to resume soon but were not given a specific date. It was not clear how many people would be impacted.
FEMA staff told The Associated Press that the policy indiscriminately terminates employees without taking into account the importance of their role or their years of experience. The hundreds of CORE dismissals have wiped out entire teams, or left groups without managers, they said.
“It’s a big impact to our ability to implement and carry out the programs entrusted to us to carry out,” one FEMA manager told the AP.
The officials said it was unclear who at the Department of Homeland Security or FEMA was driving the decision. Managers used to make the case to extend a contract months in advance, they said, but now leaders were often finding out about terminations at the same time as their employees.
In an emailed statement, FEMA spokesperson Daniel Llargues did not confirm or deny the planned staffing cuts but said the CORE program was meant to fluctuate based on operational need and available funding.
“We are confident that our staffing decisions are consistent with both the mission and the intended structure of the CORE program,” Llargues said.
There are over 10,000 CORE workers, making up nearly half of FEMA’s workforce. While they are employed on two- and four-year contracts, those terms are “routinely renewed,” one manager said, calling CORE the “primary backbone” for FEMA’s response and recovery work. Many CORE are supervisors and it’s not uncommon for them to have worked at the agency for many years, if not decades.
CORE employees are paid out of FEMA’s Disaster Relief Fund and are not subject to as long a hiring process as permanent full-time federal employees. That allows the agency to be more nimble in its hiring and onboard employees more quickly as needs arise. With DHS funded only temporarily because of a battle in Congress over immigration tactics, CORE employees can work and be paid during a government shutdown, so long as the disaster fund still has money.
The administration’s efforts to reduce the workforce come as the Trump administration has been promising reforms for FEMA that it says will reduce waste and shift emergency management responsibilities over to states.
It also comes as DHS faces increasing criticism over how it manages FEMA, including delays in getting disaster funding to states and workforce reductions.
FEMA lost nearly 10% of its workforce between January and June 2025, according to the Government Accountability Office. Concern has grown in recent months among FEMA staff and disaster experts that larger cuts are coming.
A draft report from the Trump-appointed FEMA Review Council included a recommendation to cut the agency’s workforce in half, according to a person familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the report with media. The council’s final report, due last November, has not been published.
“Based on past disasters, we know that slashing FEMA’s workforce will put Americans at risk, plain and simple,” Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, ranking member of the House Homeland Security Committee, said after introducing a resolution Wednesday condemning FEMA staff cuts.
Last week, a coalition of unions and nonprofits led by the American Federation of Government Employees filed a legal complaint against the Trump Administration over the FEMA reductions.
A CORE employee at FEMA headquarters who asked not to be named for fear of losing their job said that even though FEMA was able to support states during Winter Storm Fern, a year of staff losses could already be felt. There were fewer people available for backup, they said, and staff were burned out from ongoing uncertainty.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/06/fema-staff-reductions/
“Are We A Nation… Or A Market?” Heritage And Cato Square-Off In Right-Wing Think-Tank Infighting
“Are We A Nation… Or A Market?” Heritage And Cato Square-Off In Right-Wing Think-Tank Infighting
In last night’s ZeroHedge immigration debate, Simon Hankinson of the Heritage Foundation and David Bier of the Cato Institute offered sharply different policy prescriptions on the border, ICE, and H1B visas.
A proponent of net subzero immigration, Hankinson emphasized national cohesion and first-world culture while warning against treating people as interchangeable labor inputs. Bier, by contrast, defended the increasingly unpopular position of loosening immigration restrictions to allow a freer flow of individuals across the border.
To Bier, who penned the above NYT op-ed late in Biden’s term, immigration is a question of individual liberty and voluntary association. Taking the pure libertarian perspective, he believes the government ought not have a role in job protectionism nor prohibiting an individual’s movement.
Below were the key exchanges for those short on time and listen to the full think tank v. think tank debate here:
“Humans are not just labor units”
Hankinson rejected the idea that immigration can be evaluated purely through economic efficiency or aggregate fiscal outcomes, arguing that such an approach strips the concept of nationhood of any substantive meaning.
As he put it, “humans are not just work units…. If we don’t care if it’s, you know, Gustav or Jerry or Carlos or Charlie or Mohammed or Melvin, it’s just how many widgets can you make in a day? How many cars can you make in a week?” and instead emphasized that immigrants ought to “know the language, the culture, the history, if you love the country, if you fight for it, if you’d send your kids to fight for it, or if you’d volunteer for the fire department.”
“If none of that matters, if we’re just labor units, then we should have unlimited immigration and there should be a free market.”
— ZeroHedge Debates (@zerohedgeDebate) February 6, 2026
Immigrants are not assaulting the Constitution; government is
Bier pointed the finger inwards, at the U.S. government, as the greatest threat to the liberties of Americans.
Referencing the high-profile visa revocations for anti-Israel opinions, Bier said, “It’s not immigrants who are arresting people for writing op-eds in student newspapers.” Bier went on to say immigrants are not behind the assault on the Bill of Rights:
“The repudiation of the First Amendment, with the Second Amendment’s under assault by this administration, the Fourth Amendment, the Fifth Amendment—you go down the list,” Bier said. In his view, “this administration is the most hostile to constitutional democracy in my lifetime,” and “it has nothing to do with immigrants.”
— ZeroHedge Debates (@zerohedgeDebate) February 6, 2026
Watch the full debate below (or on YouTube) or listen on Spotify.
— zerohedge (@zerohedge) February 5, 2026
Tyler Durden
Fri, 02/06/2026 – 16:40
Aubrey Lamberti, Oswego East’s all-time leading scorer, delivers again on senior night. ‘It went by so fast.’
Every senior night is special regardless of the team, but in the case of Oswego East’s Aubrey Lamberti, it was something she realized was going to hold a little extra meaning.
The 5-foot-9 senior forward recently became the all-time leading scorer in school history, and Thursday night against Yorkville would be her last home game.
A four-year varsity journey led Lamberti to this point.
“It went by so fast,” she said. “It was just so exciting, feeling the love and the support from teammates and fans. It was really fun.”
Lamberti was her usual gutsy self, scoring 10 points with five rebounds, two assists and two steals to help the host Wolves escape with a 45-37 Southwest Prairie West win over Yorkville.
Senior point guard Desiree Merritt, who sits third all-time in scoring for the Wolves, ended up leading all scorers with 14 points for Oswego East (14-10, 9-4).
Oswego East’s Aubrey Lamberti (1) shoots a free throw against Yorkville during a Southwest Prairie West game in Oswego on Thursday, Feb. 5, 2026. (Sean King / The Beacon-News)
Sydney McCabe paced Yorkville (11-13, 4-7) with eight points. Hayden Hodges and Ashlyn Peterson added seven points apiece for the Foxes, who finished the game with only six active players due to injuries.
Oswego East coach Abe Carretto has been on board for all four of Lamberti’s seasons. That made seeing her get some recognition even more special.
“It’s nice to see when you’ve witnessed it these four years,” Carretto said.
Carretto also understood the importance of recognizing how Lamberti picked up the majority of those record-setting points.
Oswego East’s Aubrey Lamberti (1) drives the baseline against Yorkville’s Hayden Hodges (12) during a Southwest Prairie West game in Oswego on Thursday, Feb. 5, 2026. (Sean King / The Beacon-News)
“She’s always running the point on the press,” Carretto said. “She logs a lot of miles. She got a lot of her points running the floor and rebounding well and then going to the free-throw line.
“She’s really worked for it. Her outside game got better. She helped herself in that regard. She really embraced getting inside more and getting buckets to keep her average up.”
It’s what made the basket that secured the record so special to Lamberti.
On Jan. 16, in a thrilling 71-67 win over Minooka, Lamberti scored the record-setting basket on a rebound putback off Merritt’s miss. Lamberti later hit the game-clinching free throws.
Oswego East’s Aubrey Lamberti (1) defends the baseline against an inbounds play from Yorkville’s Macie Jones (4) during a Southwest Prairie West game in Oswego on Thursday, Feb. 5, 2026. (Sean King / The Beacon-News)
“It was a rebound and left-handed layup, that’s all it was,” she said. “I think it was pretty appropriate.”
After surpassing 1,000 career points as a junior, she knew the record was a possibility. She just didn’t know when it would happen.
“I didn’t try to pay attention to it too much,” Lamberti said. “I knew it was somewhat close but I didn’t know how far away it was. It means a lot and I was really excited.
“I was kind of in shock because I didn’t know it was happening. You feel the love and the support. It was such a good feeling.”
Lamberti breaking the previous record of 1,304 points that was set by Christine Corpuz was a welcomed sight for Carretto. Lamberti is the leading scorer — boy or girl — in school history.
“It’s nice to see somebody break another record,” Carretto said. “That’s what they’re there for, not to just stand still forever. I hope those things continue to happen.”
Oswego East’s Aubrey Lamberti (1) gets fouled on a layup by Yorkville’s Adi Phillips (10) during a Southwest Prairie West game in Oswego on Thursday, Feb. 5, 2026. (Sean King / The Beacon-News)
Oswego East needed all of Lamberti’s efforts to fend off feisty Yorkville.
The Foxes lost by 39 points to the Wolves the last time they played. They were also down to seven players and lost Aubrey Spychalski to injury four minutes into the game.
Still, the Foxes cut the deficit to 37-33 in the fourth quarter.
“They have so much heart,” Yorkville coach Kim Wensits said. “You hate to see kids go down, you really do, and we’re at four (injuries) right now. It’s interesting what it brings out of the kids.
“They realize, ‘I don’t have a choice. I have to play.’”
Lamberti, meanwhile, is close to a college decision, where she hopes to become an optometrist someday. Maybe then she’ll reflect more on the legacy she left behind at Oswego East.
“It’s something that I’m super proud of,” Lamberti said.
Paul Johnson is a freelance reporter for The Beacon-News.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/06/aubrey-lamberti-oswego-east-basketball/
Organismo regulador niega ‘rumor’ de que saltadores alteran su anatomía para ganar distancia
Por BRIAN MELLEY
PREDAZZO, Italia (AP) — El organismo regulador del esquí desestimó el viernes como un “rumor salvaje” los informes de que los saltadores de esquí están mejorando su área inguinal para ganar distancia al comenzar los Juegos Olímpicos de Invierno.
Un informe del tabloide alemán Bild el mes pasado sugirió que algunos saltadores de esquí estaban inyectándose ácido hialurónico en sus genitales o usando una funda similar a un condón antes de someterse a rigurosas verificaciones del tamaño de los trajes de esquí. El periódico afirmó que la manipulación justificaría el uso de un traje de salto de esquí más grande que podría proporcionar más elevación y un vuelo más largo para capturar medallas.
El informe ganó atención internacional esta semana después de que funcionarios de la Agencia Mundial Antidopaje, en Milán para los Juegos Olímpicos de Invierno de 2026, sugirieron que estaban listos para investigar el asunto, si estaba relacionado con el dopaje.
Sin embargo, la federación internacional de esquí, FIS, el organismo rector del salto de esquí, rechazó el viernes las afirmaciones hechas en el informe.
“Este rumor salvaje comenzó hace unas semanas a partir de meras habladurías. Nunca ha habido ninguna indicación, y mucho menos evidencia, de que algún competidor haya utilizado una inyección de ácido hialurónico para intentar obtener una ventaja competitiva”, dijo a The Associated Press el portavoz de FIS, Bruno Sassi.
El informe de Bild pasó en gran medida desapercibido internacionalmente hasta que el Director General de la Agencia Mundial Antidopaje, Olivier Niggli, fue consultado al respecto en Milán el jueves.
“Si algo saliera a la luz, lo investigaríamos y si está relacionado con el dopaje. No nos ocupamos de otros medios para mejorar el rendimiento”, dijo Niggli a los periodistas.
La sugerencia de tal manipulación rápidamente se convirtió en una sensación mediática, con algunos informes ofreciendo opiniones de expertos médicos sobre el hecho de inyectar el ácido que se crea naturalmente en el cuerpo, que lubrica las articulaciones y se usa en cremas hidratantes.
Al ser consultado para aclarar si la AMA estaba investigando el asunto, el portavoz de la agencia, James Fitzgerald, dijo a AP el viernes que el ácido hialurónico no estaba en su lista de sustancias prohibidas y remitió a FIS para cuestiones relacionadas con los trajes de salto de esquí.
El tema es particularmente sensible para el salto de esquí tras un escándalo de trampas el año pasado en el que los líderes del equipo noruego fueron captados en cámara manipulando trajes de esquí en el Campeonato Mundial en Trondheim, Noruega.
El entrenador en jefe Magnus Brevik, el entrenador asistente Thomas Lobben y el miembro del personal Adrian Livelten fueron recientemente suspendidos del deporte por 18 meses por manipular los trajes antes del evento de gran colina masculina.
Los saltadores de esquí noruegos Marius Lindvik y Johann André Forfang aceptaron suspensiones de tres meses que les permitieron competir en los eventos de esta temporada.
Tras el escándalo, FIS introdujo controles de equipo más rigurosos que incluyen verificaciones antes y después de cada salto y mediciones 3-D mejoradas para evaluar a los atletas en sus uniformes. Los microchips incrustados en los trajes también están diseñados para prevenir la manipulación.
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Deportes en español AP: https://apnews.com/hub/deportes
Photos: Opening ceremony for the 2026 Winter Olympics
Photos from the opening ceremony of the Milan Cortina Olympics on Feb. 6, 2026.
2026 Winter Olympics: What to know about the Milan Cortina Games, including how — and who — to watch
Matilda De Angelis performs with actors dressed as the great masters of Italian Opera, Giuseppe Verdei, Giacomo Puccini, and Gioachino Rossini during the opening ceremony of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics at San Siro Stadium on Feb. 6, 2026 in Milan, Italy. (Sarah Stier/Getty)
Former First Vice President of Norwegian Olympic and Paralympic Committee, Kristin Kloster Aasen and former Norwegian equestrian athlete, Morten Aasen wave at the contingent of Norway during the athletes parade during the opening ceremony of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics at San Siro Stadium on Feb. 6, 2026 in Milan, Italy. (Susana Vera/Getty)
Flagbearer Erin Jackson of Team United States enters the athlete parade with her team during the opening ceremony of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics at San Siro Stadium on Feb. 6, 2026 in Milan, Italy. (Maja Hitij/Getty)
Dancers performs during the Olympic opening ceremony at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Feb. 6, 2026 (Natacha Pisarenko/AP)
An artist performs as the Olympic rings come together during the Olympic opening ceremony at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Feb. 6, 2026. (Francisco Seco/AP)
Italian actor Matilda De Angelis performs during the Olympic opening ceremony at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Friday, Feb. 6, 2026. (Ben Curtis/AP)
Anna Gasser and Benjamin Karl, Flagbearers of Team Austria enter with the team into the stadium during the opening ceremony of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics at Livigno Snow Park on Feb. 6, 2026 in Livigno, Italy. (Cameron Spencer/Getty)
Two aerial actors perform next to the rings representing the city and mountain during the opening ceremony of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics at San Siro Stadium on Feb. 6, 2026 in Milan, Italy. (Matthias Hangst/Getty)
Models wearing creations designed by Giorgio Armani walk during the opening ceremony of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics at San Siro Stadium on Feb. 6, 2026 in Milan, Italy. (Jared C. Tilton/Getty)
Mariah Carey performs during the opening ceremony of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics at San Siro Stadium on Feb. 6, 2026 in Milan, Italy. (Matthias Hangst/Getty)
A general view of a parade of performers dressed as symbols of Italian imagination and creativity during the opening ceremony of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics at San Siro Stadium on Feb. 6, 2026 in Milan, Italy. (Matthias Hangst/Getty)
https://www.chicagotribune.com/2026/02/06/photos-opening-ceremony-winter-olympics/
“This Bread & Circuses Routine Is Looking Pretty Played Out…”
“This Bread & Circuses Routine Is Looking Pretty Played Out…”
Authored by James Howard Kunstler,
Blood In The Water
“Subversion works by importing an inverted moral frame and getting the target population to install it as its own conscience.”
– Yuri Bezmenov’s Ghost on X
Even in the deep-frozen fastness of midwinter, events and tensions surge, and America awaits . . . Bad Bunny!
You perceive that there is some message in the genderfluid Puerto Rican songster’s upcoming Superbowl halftime gig, but what is the message?
A 180-degree counterpoint to the earnest bashing and mashing of giants on the field?
The official annunciation of Reconquesta?
A thumb in the eye of President Donald Trump and the white supremacist horse he rode in on?
This bread and circuses routine is looking pretty played out.
The bread, of course, is pizza, the Soylent Green of these seeming end-times, underwriting the nation’s romance with morbid obesity (and perhaps with degenerate sex).
The circuses – last week’s Grammy Awards, the Winter Olympics tonight, Sunday’s looming Superbowl — give off an odor of utter cultural exhaustion.
What will it finally take for Western Civ, and its avatar, the USA, to stop embarrassing itself before God and history, and find better things to do?
Big Bad Bunnies Toy with Baby Bunny
You have been following the Epstein papers, no doubt.
The sordidness grows like a yeast infection in the body politic, and yet to date hardly one prosecutable crime? What gives with that? Last week’s release of the final super-batch of Epstein papers brought on a harvest of reputations, at least.
The docs revealed Microsoft zillionaire Bill Gates conniving with the late (possibly) Jeffrey Epstein to turn pandemics and vaccines into a profitable enterprise, with a spate of email discussions years before Covid got sprung on the world.
Then, it just happened that Mr. Gates sponsored the Event 201 pandemic exercise in October 2019 (with Johns Hopkins and the World Economic Forum), around the same time that the first outbreaks of Covid-19 occurred in Wuhan China with the World Military Games, a sort of Olympics for soldiers. Many athletes from various countries (including the U.S., France, Germany, and others) fell ill with a respiratory infection.
Naturally, you wonder how long, exactly, was the Covid prank in the works and among whom? If Mr. Gates was involved with Johns Hopkins planning Event 201, wouldn’t you suppose he was also in contact with US NIAID, Dr. Anthony Fauci’s agency, and with Dr. Fauci himself? Dr. Fauci had a special talent for augmenting taxpayer funding of his activities with money from outside government, and Bill Gates certainly had a lot of it, plus an obsessive drive equal to Dr. Fauci’s for messing around with viruses. And 2019 was exactly the time that scientists at the Wuhan Virology Institute happened to be experimenting with corona viruses associated with bats. Whoops.
It happens that Rep. James Comer (R-KY), chair of the House Oversight Committee now looking into the Epstein matter, indicated this week that he was interested in calling Bill Gates to testify about his activities with Jeffrey Epstein. Wouldn’t it be nice to hear from Bill about his adventures in virology? Bill Gates is not a doctor or an accredited medical researcher, by the way. Virology is his hobby.
As a sort of tail on the donkey, an email written by Jeffrey Epstein in 2013 surfaced this week stating that Bill Gates said he caught a sexually transmitted disease from Russian girls and sought help from Epstein getting antibiotics to secretly dose his then-wife Melinda with. It blew up the Internet, but do you detect a whiff of a cockamamie story (no pun intended)? Bill Gates surely had the resources to virtually buy a doctor and have him prescribe whatever Mr. Gates wanted. In any case, Bill Gates’s long-running consort with Jeffrey Epstein has apparently sunk his reputation as a medical philanthropist, so expect him to look for another hobby as he skulks off into the gloaming of ignominy.
Then, there is the case over in the UK of Lord Peter Mandelson (Baron Mandelson of Foy), erstwhile UK ambassador to the USA, lately cashiered out of the job for his relations with Jeffrey Epstein.
Photos emerged of Lord M less than fully clothed with others in Jeffrey Epstein’s troupe, also less than fully clothed. In the notorious 2003 birthday book, he wrote that Epstein was “my best pal.” He received payments from JE over the years and, in return, it appears, Mandelson, then working as a senior minister after the 2008 financial crisis, allegedly forwarded to JE confidential UK government emails, market-sensitive details (e.g., on EU bailouts for Greece, banker bonus taxes, and notes from meetings with US officials in Britain for JE’s investment purposes. Bottom line: Mandelson ruined. Ambassadorship terminated. . .resigned from the House of Lords. . .King Charles III reportedly looking to revoke his title (Baron of Foy), leaving him a mere commoner in ruin.
Lord Peter Mandelson, Baron of Foy, in Briefs, with Epstein Girl
Next up (looks like): Bill and Hillary Clinton are called by subpoena to testify before Mr. Comer’s House Oversight Committee on Feb 26 and 27. They’ve got some ‘splainin’ to do about how Jeffrey Epstein helped them construct the fabulous engine of wealth known as the Clinton Foundation and its various spinoffs such as the Clinton Global Initiative, the Clinton Health Access Initiative, the Clinton Family Foundation, and the Clinton Presidential Library.
This followed a months-long tussle to get the Clinton’s to submit to in-person interviews under oath in closed session. The Clintons wanted to just hand in some written bullshit of their own and leave it at that. They were on the verge of being voted in contempt of Congress — like other political luminaries, Peter Navarro and Steve Bannon recently were, with months of jail time — when they gave in. Hillary got all snippy about it yesterday, demanding the hearing go pubic on TV so she could grandstand. Denied. Curiously, no one is rushing to the Clintons’ defense. You might suspect their many friends and associates smell blood in the water and nobody wants to get wet.
Speaking of things wet and bloody, the final super-batch of Epstein papers has revived rumors of a dastardly Satanic child abuse cult among the anointed… all kinds of horrifying activities, such as those represented in Tony Podesta’s art collection.
Even the cuckoo story of PizzaGate is back up for review. I can’t state that I actually believe any of it, but the chatter is deafening so you are advised to stand by and see what turns up.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 02/06/2026 – 16:20
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/bread-circuses-routine-looking-pretty-played-out
