Fare enough? CTA hearing tonight

Also: Cops and technology, Gun ownership trends, SNL and other funny stuff and a news quiz recap.

CTA PRICE CHANGES. A public hearing tonight gives you a chance to say your piece about higher fees that could accompany new fare card options for CTA and Pace riders. For one thing, the Tribune's Jon Hilkevitch reports, those Ventra cards that for months have been "coming soon" come with a "dormancy fee" that'll drain away your money if you don't use 'em enough.
* Purple and Brown Line service returning to normal after bridge work.
* Customer accused of attacking CTA driver taking bathroom break.

LONG ARM, BIG DATA. Increasingly cheap technology and easy access to social-network profiles stands to make police work easier and more productive. But that makes civil libertarians nervous.
* U. of C. law prof: "If we really care about rights, we should mandate DNA testing ... of everyone."
* ACLU: Drones make possible new forms of privacy-invasion.
* Twitter knows bushels about you before you even sign up.

DISARMING NEWS. The percentage of U.S. homes with guns is down over the last 40 years -- in all regions of the country -- according to a new national survey.
* NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg says he aims to "level the playing field" against the National Rifle Association.
* Neil Steinberg on gun-rights advocates' opposition to drones: "On the one hand: The government cannot be trusted to identify a person as being so much of a threat he should be killed. On the other: Any random citizen can."
* President Nixon considered a ban on all handguns.

FUNNY THINGS YOU MAY HAVE MISSED OVER THE WEEKEND.
* The return of about everyone who's ever hosted "Saturday Night Live." (Or so it felt.)
* President Obama, his "joke writers ... placed on furlough," joking about Bob Woodward and Nate Silver.
* Silver revealing whom he'd like to see as himself in a movie.

2 QUESTIONS MOST OFTEN ANSWERED INCORRECTLY IN THIS BLOG'S LATEST NEWS QUIZ.

* The New York Times shuttered its blog about _____.
* Chicago's murder total for February was _____.

Take the quiz now and improve those averages, won't you?

---

ANNOUNCEMENTS.
* Suggestions for this blog? Email anytime.
* Get this blog by email, free. Sign up here.
* Follow us on Twitter: @WBEZ and @Meyerson.