Next summer, if things go well, I will become an historian, to the extent that the published author of a book-length history of mid-Illinois can be called an historian. In truth, I am untrained in the arts of the rigors of scholarship and don’t write history so much as I write about history. But I […]
James Krohe Jr.
Posted inOpinion
A little knowledge . . . . No. 9 in a series
The Paul Simon Public Policy Institute down Carbondale way continues to bravely explore the treacherous pathways of public opinion in Illinois. Among the 1,000 Illinois registered voters surveyed in a recent poll, 57 percent said they have at least a somewhat favorable view of labor unions. Those same people said they favored anti-union right-to-work or […]
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Where the redbuds are always in bloom
If its citizens struggle to see anything new in a landscape with which they have become too familiar, what is the poor landscape photographer to do? In Larry Kanfer’s case, he does nothing much at all, to judge from the evidence of his new collection of Midwestern landscape photographs, A Prairie State of Mind, from […]
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Who’s rigging elections?
“You cheated!” is the lament of sore losers everywhere. Donald Trump warns – ominously, ludicrously – that the November election will be rigged too, presumably because the Democrats will flood the polls with phony voters. This is a nightmare from the Chicago of the 1950s that Republicans can’t get out of their heads. Things aren’t […]
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The youth vote
In this week’s Dyspepsiana, I take up the question of election-rigging. Which got me to thinking . . . . The principle—that those subject to the state’s laws ought to be able to shape those laws through the vote—applies even more compellingly to citizens under 18. Among other sins the over-18s commit against the next […]
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Men in power
Donald Trump has run for the presidency before. He ran in 1968 disguised as George Wallace and again in 1996 as Patrick Buchanan. He also ran in 1992, as my excerpted column from Oct. 29 of that year recalls. Perot’s defeat – by a Clinton – did not still the authoritarian impulse among our countrymen, […]
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None of your business
How embarrassing. The City of Springfield finds itself in the same bind as the young swain who, wooing a sophisticated lovely, invites her to a posh dinner only to realize at the end of the meal that he doesn’t have the money to pay the tab. Attentive readers will know of the hoped-for redevelopment of […]
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How’ve you been?
The “I go to my reunion” essay is a staple of the genre. By now there is nothing new that can be said, but readers read them anyway, fearful that other people’s reunions were better than theirs. Which is a very high school reason. The most the reader can hope for from such an essay […]
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Springfield High’s one-hundredth
I graduated from Springfield High School in 1966. My classmates organized a 50th reunion for the same weekend that the Springfield High School building turned 100. District 186 staged a ceremony Friday evening to mark the centennial of Springfield High School. (There are other events planned; let’s hope they do better than this; the featured […]
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Centennial Building continued
In “Refined, delicate and urban,” I talked about the Centennial Building on the statehouse grounds, which was built to honor the first centenary of the founding of the State of Illinois. I, argued, not very persuasively, for its restoration to honor the second centenary in 2018. Curious readers might want to also consult this entry about […]
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Fair deal
PHOTO BY DAVID HINE When the Illinois State Fair was first staged in 1853, country people went there to see other country people. Later, city people went to see country people. These days – well, I’m not sure what people go to see at the fair. For decades, managers have tried to stage a one-size-fits-all […]
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Fool me once . . . .
There’s a sucker born every minute, they say, which might explain why state legislatures and city councils count so many of them among their members. As I noted here and here, spending the public’s good money to entice large corporations to do business in one’s home state or city is folly. From a recent report […]
