* I’ve always said that politicians should leave the comedy to comedians. This advice comes from watching decades of “jokes” backfire badly on some of them. I’ve also made it clear that I really don’t like this whole idea of responding to criticism of Chicago crime by going downtown and posting pretty pictures and videos. Yes, it’s a gorgeous city. A great city. But Chicago has problems that can’t be whitewashed with how spectacular downtown is.

You may disagree, but that’s just what I believe.

* Anyway, the two warnings came together last month during the Thanksgiving break…

Ted is being overly dramatic, of course, but that’s the job of a candidate. So don’t get too hung up on him. He’s being used here mainly to illustrate the context.

* From today’s presser…

Isabel: Governor, in early October you appeared downtown for a Jimmy Kimmel show wearing a bulletproof vest to mock Trump’s claims that Chicago is a lawless battle zone. But last month, a teen died and others were injured outside the Chicago Theater on State Street. Do you regret that choice of satire?

Pritzker: People that call Illinois a hell-hole or Chicago a hell-hole, people that denigrate our state deserve to be mocked. And that is what I was trying to do.

The fact is that this is a great city in the greatest state in the nation, and we should be showing it off, and not having a President of the United States denigrating it, by the way, with facts that are old or inaccurate. And so that’s what I was trying to do, and I don’t regret that at all.

I think everybody needs a laugh, even in the midst of, frankly, in the onslaught that comes from The White House every single day

Thoughts?