“John Kass makes me sad. He like to pretend he’s just a common sense South Side guy, who used ta play da stickball over by dere. Kass is the consummate phony tough guy, a name-calling hit-and-run artist who traffics in innuendos and sloppy arguments.”Ramsin Canon hatin’ on John Kass for Gapers Block. I couldn’t agree more!
I don’t love every column John Kass writes. Hell, I don’t know if I could say I particularly like a majority of them, but where does Canon get off calling Kass a “phony tough guy” when he is one of the only writers in the city who will stand up to the Outfit?
In 2005, Kass was nominated for the Ethics in Journlism award by the Chicago Headline Club for writing about threats against Anna Davlantes of NBC5 by alleged mobsters. She went on to win the award, but Kass, too, had threats made against his children in the past for the way he devotes column space to anything mob-related and connects the dots to politicians. Did he stick his tail between his legs and cower? No, he stood his ground and wrote about the incident.
Call him a hack or call him Royko wannabe, but I don’t think anyone has the right to call John Kass’ toughness phony.
