Emanuel, Motorola CEO first talked jobs at Bulls playoff game

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Rahm Emanuel | Sun-Times file photo

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Updated: September 21, 2011 12:33AM

Rahm ’em . . .

Hoop Scoop: Sneed hears Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who announced Tuesday Motorola Solutions will be adding 400 jobs to Chicago by the end of 2012, first talked to Motorola CEO Greg Brown about moving jobs here during Rahm’s transition into office — when they were at a Chicago Bulls playoff game April 26 where the Bulls beat the Pacers.

Rahm II . . .

Ring. Ring. Emanuel, who has more batteries than the Energizer Bunny, called 28 legislators statewide Sunday and Monday thanking them for their work during the legislative session. He’s still dialing.

The Weiner patrol . . .

The expectation: U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner, the center of a major sexting scandal, will resign from office today or tomorrow.

◆ The scenario? Washington wags are whispering pregnant wife Huma Abedin, who works for Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, returns home from Africa with her boss today — in order to publicly stand by her errant hubby’s side when he makes an exit. (If you recall, the humiliated Huma was heading to Africa when Weiner publicly declared his guilt.)

◆ The script: Top Dems may want Weiner’s head on a platter but are apparently giving the digital doofus an opportunity to exit this way — rather than publicly stripping Weiner of his congressional powers for being so obstinate.

$$$$ . . .

Yipes! Tinseltown tittletattle: Did former Schwarzenegger/Shriver housekeeper-from-hell Mildred Baena pocket at least six figures for her exclusive interview with the hot UK celeb mag Hello! (She and the son the muscleman sired even posed for pix, which would have upped the ante for the story.)

The Sudan struggle . . .

From dirt roads to toll roads?

Sneed is told Boutros Magaya, the Republic of South Sudan’s new infrastructure chief, met with Illinois Tollway’s Chief Engineer Paul Kovacs last week to talk about how to build roads in this new African nation.

◆ The skinny: The South Sudan’s current roadways are primarily . . . dirt! Only a handful are paved.

The Quinn Bin . . .

. . . and the Cohen corner: Is former Dem primary gubernatorial hopeful Scott Lee Cohen hoping to share a word or two with Gov. Pat Quinn about job fairs at a fete Thursday for the new Museum of Broadcast Communications? Dat’s the plan.

Trump ’em . . .

Now comes word via the Merry Olde English tabloid press, Donald Trump’s famous ex, first wife Ivana, 62, is missing all the fun of the Brit “season” because she won’t part with her pooch.

◆ Backshot: Brit photogs were always braced for the site of Ivana at Ascot and Wimbledon and Elton John’s annual summer party for the past 20 plus years, but Ivana won’t part with “Tiggy.” (The Brits require a long quarantine for dogs entering the country.)

Hero stuff . . .

World War II hero Louis Zamperini, 94 — the star of author Laura Hillenbrand’s best selling book Unbroken — told Mayor Rahm Emanuel at City Hall Wednesday he may have survived 47 days on a raft adrift in the shark-infested Pacific Ocean after his plane crashed and could handle everything a Japanese prison camp threw at him . . . “But when it came to my wife, I could do nothing.”

◆ Background: Zamperini, who was in town to be inducted into the National Italian American Sports Hall of Fame, also competed in the 1936 Berlin Olympics before the war broke out.

Sneedlings . . .

Condolences to the family of Sun-Times obituary writer Maureen O’Donnell on the death of her mother Margaret O’Donnell . . . Today’s birthdays: Neil Patrick Harris, 38; Ice Cube, 42; Courteney Cox, 47; Helen Hunt, 48; Jim Belushi, 57 and Mario Cuomo, 79.