As the Chicago News Cooperative enters 2010, we are dedicated to reporting news of substance that resonates with Chicago’s diverse and vibrant communities. In Friday’s Chicago section of The New York Times, and our Web site chicagonewscoop.org, you will find an opinion column about the state’s hot gubernatorial race, an immigration snafu involving an interpreter for military forces in Iraq, and a revealing profile of the grizzled mustache behind the bench of the peachfuzz-heavy Chicago Blackhawks.
Reporter Katie Fretland unravels the tangled U.S. immigration bureaucracy through the case of Ahmed Alrais. An Iraqi refugee who left his family behind on Chicago’s Northwest Side to return to Iraq as a translator for the American military, Mr. Alrais has been refused the “green card” that for immigrants is the first step toward U.S. citizenship. The reason: He has not spent enough time within this country’s borders.
Columnist Jim Warren takes us inside the clash of personalities and power politics in the Illinois governor’s race. He focuses on the difficulties faced by Patrick Quinn, the gadfly-turned-governor, as the scion of a prominent Illinois political family, Dan Hynes, seeks to take his job. On the Republican side, Warren offers a provocative forecast: Bloomington state senator Bill Brady could take the primary in an upset.
As the Chicago Blackhawks have skated to the strongest start in professional hockey, the man behind the bench has garnered little attention. Sports reporter Dan McGrath followed Joel Quenneville, a Windsor, Ontario native who nevertheless grew up rooting for the Hawks—and now is shaping them into a Stanley Cup contender.
Good reading to you.
