Is Illinois heading towards legalized medical marijuana? State Senator John Cullerton (pretty website!) hopes so. He's sponsoring a bill that the Senate Public Health Committee approved 6-4 yesterday. A similar measure failed in the Senate last year, but try, try again. The Alternative Treatment for Serious Diseases Causing Chronic Pain and Debilitating Conditions bill would allow some patients to possess "no more than 8 plants and two and one-half ounces of usable marijuana." The bill......

Delilah's held their annual vintage strong ale fest Saturday afternoon. As a beer lover, we could ask for nothing more. We had the opportunity to sample vintage barrel-aged selections from over 20 breweries. Many of the breweries represented brought different vintages of the same ales, which made for some interesting vertical tastings. Sierra Nevada came correct, with selections of their Bigfoot Barley Wine ranging from 1998 to present-day. Unfortunately the event was marred by......

Miss Michigan Kristen Haglund from Farmington Hills, Michigan, was crowned the 87th Miss America last night during the live pageant telecast, and First Runner-Up was Miss Indiana Nicole Elizabeth Rash. Haglund, a musical theatre major at the University of Cincinnati, hopes to raise awareness of eating disorders during her reign as Miss America. She sang “Over the Rainbow” for the talent competition. Rash also sang for her talent, and said her platform was Get on......

With lots of delegates and potential momentum going into Super-Duper Tuesday, Nevada's primary has been both contentious and significant this year. Earlier this week a federal judge settled a lawsuit brought by the Nevada Teachers Union that should have helped Obama. Instead, with more than half of the precincts reporting, CBS, CNN and other major news outlets are projecting Clinton the winner today. Mitt Romney was the big winner in the GOP caucuses, taking his......

Now that the Michigan primary is safely behind us, all eyes are focused on Nevada and South Carolina. For Democrats, who need at least 2,025 delegates to win the presidential nomination, Nevada's caucuses this Saturday offer 33 delegates. Not only is the nation looking at the Silver State, where early voting is a new experience for a mix of Latino, rural and urban voters, but so are the federal courts. Hillary Clinton has been polling......

Michigan defied the conventional wisdom yesterday, giving Mitt Romney 30 delegates to the national convention and his second primary win. After a short night that saw swift winner projections and prompt concession speeches, analysis turned to exit polls and voter turnout. Without much incentive to turnout and vote, Democrats handed Hillary Clinton a hollow victory, giving her about two-thirds of the vote and zero convention delegates. Dennis Kucinich earned about 4 percent of the vote,......

For Michigan Democrats, the choices in today's primary are pretty stark. Late last year, Michigan Senator Carl Levin supported moving Michigan's primary up to January 15 in an attempt to make the state more relevant in this year's race. That move backfired, however, when the Democratic National Committee punished the state party by stripping it of all its delegates at the convention. Party rules mandate that Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina hold the......

Barack Obama took the first step in cooling off the war of words between his campaign and Hillary Clinton's. "I've been a little concerned about the tenor of the campaign," Obama said in a press conference called yesterday evening in Nevada. "We've got too much at stake at this time in our history to be engaging in this kind of silliness," Obama said. "I suspect that other candidates may feel the same way." Acknowledging the......

In what could quite possibly be the nail biter of the season, Hillary Clinton pulled it out last night, winning the New Hampshire Democratic primary by a two to three point lead over Iowa front-runner Barack Obama. While most of the media was writing Hillary's political obituary, she was winning New Hampshire. With the Nevada caucuses next, and the black vote potentially split between the Clintons and Barack Obama, South Carolina may be back in......

The big news from the campaign trail yesterday evening was an emotional moment with Hillary Clinton and a group of sympathetic, yet undecided, New Hampshire voters. When asked "how do you do it? How do you keep up ... and who does your hair?", Hillary Clinton choked up as she responded, tears welling up in her eyes. Less widely reported, however, was an incident of two men who heckled her in Salem, NH, holding signs......

The cold weather - and holiday festivities - descended upon Gothamist. The Rockefeller Christmas tree was lit, Broadway stagehand finally ended their strike, and NASCAR decided to run their victory lap through Times Square. There were disturbing photographs revealing the working conditions in which many city manholes are produced and ninjas were also a hot topic, either robbing homes or entering into alibis. But the city was really rocked by how Rudy Giuliani's visits......

The search continues today for extreme sporting adventurer and former Chicago options trader Steve Fossett, who has been missing since Monday. Fossett was visiting the Flying M Ranch near Yerington, Nev., scouting for dry lake beds that could be used for breaking a land-speed record. He was piloting a Single Engine Bellanca Citabria Super Decathlon, a two-seat aerobatic plane, for his reconnaissance flight. The aircraft had over five hours of fuel on board when it......

Northern Illinois traveled to Soldier Field this weekend for the "Geico Soldier Field Showdown" where a sell-out crowd saw them fall to the Iowa Hawkeyes 16-3. Former Huskie standout running back Garret Wolfe signed with the Bears for the 2007 season, but unfortunately for Northern Illinois he was not in pads on Saturday for the Huskies. The Northern Illinois offense only netted 21 rushing yards compared to the Hawkeyes, who had two 100-yard rushers and......

In just ten years, Holland, Michigan-based New Holland Brewing Company has established itself as a craft brewer to be reckoned with, fashioning high quality beers and even delving into flavored brandies and liqueurs available at their brewpub. Along with Sundog, Mad Hatter IPA is their most notable brew. If you aren't a "hop head", you might take a while getting acquainted with this overly heady ale worthy of being named after a deranged genius......

If you notice a reduced presence of Bell's beer on the shelves and in bars in the coming weeks, there's a reason. Bell's delivered their last shipment of beer to Illinois last week. Here is some of what Bell's founder Larry Bell wrote last week regarding the situation on a forum thread at the Beer Advocate website (post number 32): "I'm very tired and sad tonight, but I will share thoughts with this group soon.......

The Chicago Rush defeated the Orlando Predators 69-61 to win ArenaBowl XX in Las Vegas, Nevada. The Rush tamed the Predators in front of a crowd of over 13,000 at the Thomas & Mack Center. The game started slowly with the Rush taking a 10-0 lead into the first quarter break. After that, the pace increased leading to what would become the second highest score in ArenaBowl history. Quarterback Matt D'Orazio played a great game,......

Yesterday US Congressman Mark Kirk held a hearing at the Shedd Aquarium to discuss the results of a study done by the National Oceanic and Atmosphere Administration, which determined Lake Michigan has more mercury pollution than all of the other Great Lakes. Toxic levels of mercury in the lake can accumulate in fish and, when ingested, lead to a myriad of health concerns, such as damage to the nervous system and heart disease. The......