Jail for JJJ?

Also: Storm warning / CTA upgrades / Chicago toilets fixed? / Jon Stewart mocks Obama / Netflix windfall / New planets

JAIL FOR JJJ? A plea deal on the table for ex-Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. would include "significant jail time," a source tells the Sun-Times. Another source tells the paper Jackson's wife, Sandi, "feels like she was thrown under the bus" by Jackson Jr.

STORM WARNING. As a fresh round of winter weather menaces Chicago and points east, airlines are offering flexible rebooking waivers to passengers for the next few days, USA Today reports.

CTA UPGRADES. The Chicago Transit Authority's planning to buy up to 846 new rail cars for up to $2 billion. And the plan includes a request for new seating designs, which could improve on the widely criticized "scoop seat" benches in the batch of cars the CTA's deploying this year.
* The increase in the CTA's one-day fare hurts the poor (NBC Chicago's Carol Marin and Don Moseley).

FLUSH WITH SUCCESS. The City of Chicago says those supposedly hygienic O'Hare International Airport toilets that weren't hygienic are hygienic now, the Sun-Times reports.

TESTS PROTESTED. Chicago parents -- inspired by Seattle teachers' boycott of a standardized test -- are demanding Chicago schools cut their reliance on tests and reveal just how much the 22 tests the district administers now cost.

'WE DON'T MIND YOU KNOWING ABOUT SHIT WE DO ONCE WE DON'T DO IT ANY MORE.' On "The Daily Show," Jon Stewart mocks President Obama over drone attack policy secrecy.
* Journ prof: U.S. news organizations' failure to reveal drone base location in Saudi Arabia was "shameful" and "craven."

'CONGRESS IS FULL OF COWARDS.' And that, Salon's John Tierney says, is what's behind the U.S. Postal Service's meltdown.
* Netflix's DVD business could benefit from elimination of Saturday mail.
* How to lower your cable TV bill: A phone call every six months.

'SO MUCH FOR GOOD/TALENTED GUY WITH A GUN BEING ABLE TO STOP MENTALLY ILL GUY WITH A GUN.' That tweet about the killing of "American Sniper" Chris Kyle triggered death threats for a Mother Jones co-editor.

JOB ONE: BOOST U.S. STRATEGIC CARABINER RESERVES. President Obama's pick to head the Interior Department: REI chief Sally Jewell.
* Chicago TV news veteran promoted to White House beat.

IF WE RUIN THIS PLANET, REPLACEMENTS MAY BE SURPRISINGLY NEAR. New findings from the Kepler space telescope suggest billions of Earth-like planets may be as close as 13 light years -- "practically next door," an astronomer tells The Huffington Post.
* Possible "comet of the century" -- to pass the sun in November -- photographed by NASA probe.

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