I have written before (here, here, here and here) about health care – an important topic in a town like Springfield in which the health racket industry in all its manifestations is the top employer. I take it up again here to vent about the now-famous (among wonks) study of Medicaid outcomes in Oregon – […]
James Krohe Jr.
Posted inOpinion
The new Know Nothings, continued
Readers with long memories might recall my rant in 2010 about voter ignorance. (“The new Know Nothings,” Nov. 18, 2010.) Apparently the public has not taken my criticism to heart. After years during which Republican Party candidates and Fox News repeatedly, even obsessively talked about little else, after the more recent (and well-reported) wrangles […]
Posted inOpinion
Mostly educated
A while back, in “Teaching idiots,” I ventured the view that it has never been easier than it is today to give oneself an education. I did not however settle the question of whether is might be wise to do so. The self-taught tend to have patchy educations. This can be bad, it can be […]
Posted inOpinion
Teaching requirements
James Krohe Jr. Remember the news, announced by District 186 in March, that 68 of Springfield’s 1,329 public school teachers did not have the required paperwork in their personnel files showing them to be fit for the classroom? This except from A New Guide for Emigrants to the West, written by the American Baptist missionary […]
Posted inOpinion
Cakes on a plate
In a recent column (“Keeping Springfield weird,” April 25, 2013) I tried to explain why Springfield’s built environment strikes so many visitors as off-putting. I mentioned as likely causes parking lots and incoherent zoning practices and tawdry construction. I also mentioned ill-defined streetscapes, which can induce confusion and unease in the first-time visitor. So much […]
Posted inOpinion
Iffy prognosis
In “Midlevel Health Jobs Shrink,” Wall Street Journal reporter Ben Casselman analyzes a trend I noted back in 2011. In “Living too high off the hog” (March 3, 2011) I warned that while Springfield’s booming health care economy was sound enough over the short term, its longer-term prognosis is not so positive. The boom relies […]
Posted inOpinion
Superfast road to the future
James Krohe Jr. In “Unplugged” (March 28, 2013) I wondered aloud about why Illinois’ internet service is so backward. Certainly one of the factors is the near-monopoly of such service enjoyed by the big telecommunications firms. It’s an interesting topic about which more might be said. Is the solution more competition to bring down prices […]
Posted inOpinion
Keeping Springfield weird
No parent ever has an ugly baby. Even if the little darling has a head that looks like a cantaloupe from the bottom of the pile, parents don’t like strangers stating the obvious. People are the same way about their hometowns. Back in March, the SJ-R’s Dave Bakke gallantly strode forward to defend Springfield against […]
Posted inOpinion
Ten years after
We fought, we were told, to avenge an act of terrorism against our nation that was made up, after a campaign whipped up by the U.S. media. In fact, the real powers in America wanted the war to protect their own economic interests in the region. An initial victory led to stalemate in a faraway […]
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The way they weren’t
In noting the recent death of Rich Shereikis, I neglected to note what was perhaps his best work as a critic. In his review of Alan Ehrenhalt’s The Lost City, Rich exposed the nostalgia that so often masquerades as retrospective sociology. That book espoused what the author called “Forgotten Virtues of Community in the Chicago […]
Posted inOpinion
The right combination of sensibilities
Richard Shereikis died in Evanston on March 29. He was 75. A spot on the staff of Illinois Times in its very early years was an entry-level position – anyone who walked up the steps and through the front door had a chance to become a contributor. One of the many people who took that […]
Posted inOpinion
Faulty deductions
It’s tax time, and the hunt for deductions is on. Back in 2009, I griped about the folly of the federal tax subsidy to home owners in my column, “Just extra money.” The deduction for home mortgage interest favors families spending more money on more house, because the more they pay in interest, the more […]
