Checking out of Chicago's cynical Obama presidential library politics.

They're basically clubhouses for the families and friends of the presidents. And in the case of the Reagan library, they're federal facilities, they shouldn't be used for partisan activities, but of course the Republican presidential debate, in front of Air Force One is a partisan activity.

Writer Rick Perlstein explains how the future Obama presidential library found its home in the warm, imperial embrace of the University of Chicago, where plutocrats gobble public space (and funds) for private interest, Potempkin boutiques dot the landscape of neoliberalism's cultural command economy, and democracy's best hope is with the people standing up to elected elites.

Rick wrote the There Goes the Neighborhood: The Obama Library Lands on Chicago for The Baffler.

Rick will also be part of a panel discussion Chicago—Their City and Ours: A Forum on Developmental Disorder on Saturday, October 17th.