J.B. Pritzker may not even know that he isn’t well known in the capital city. What most of us know is that he’s a rich, heavyset Chicago guy who isn’t Bruce Rauner. It would be nice – when the time is right, but before the inauguration – if he’d come down and shake some hands […]
Editor’s Note
Posted inOpinion
Beware of the real gremlins
Here come the real spine-chilling horrors of the season: office-seeking politicians of the extreme right demanding votes on Election Day. With devilish signals to their base, they promise to be more Trumpian than Trump, offering a Mephistophelian agenda ranging from the harsher treatment of the poor to the more plutocratic alchemy enthroning the rich over […]
Posted inOpinion
Editor’s note 11/8/18
Aside from the defeat of Gov. Bruce Rauner, the most exciting election result here was approval – by a wide margin – of a one-cent countywide sales tax increase for school buildings. The tax is expected to generate $10 million annually for Springfield’s District 186 public schools. That will allow implementation of the Springfield district’s […]
Posted inOpinion
A bawdy house of bad right-wing ideas
Ideally, elections are about ideas. In our dark times of money-soaked and bitterly negative campaigns, however, policy discussions are being shoved aside by raw partisanship and vitriol. This not only means that good ideas are ignored, but also that downright bad ideas can become public policy without the public knowing it. For example, one idea […]
Posted inOpinion
Editor’s note 11/1/18
The only campaign excitement we’ve seen around here is generated by Betsy Dirksen Londrigan, who is smart, energetic, practical and new. In her uphill battle to unseat Republican Congressman Rodney Davis, she has stuck to the issues and stayed out of the mud. Davis, a go-along-to-get-along moderate, is burdened by his support for repeal of […]
Posted inOpinion
Front-porch politics
If you despair that a mysterious plague of incurable political knuckleheadism has swept our country, turning previously progressive white working-class people into mindless Trump worshippers, check out “The Promise of a Progressive Populist Movement” (http://PeoplesAction.org/the-promise-of-a-progressive-populist-movement). This report is the work of People’s Action, a multiracial grassroots coalition. This year, its volunteers knocked on more than […]
Posted inOpinion
What if we made voting fun?
A consortium of national, state and local officials of Republican persuasion have mounted a tawdry campaign over the past decade to slam the ballot box shut on entire segments of America’s electorate. In a concerted effort, these rabidly partisan officials have targeted African-Americans, students, Latinos, the elderly, union households, the poor, immigrants and other communities […]
Posted inOpinion
Editor’s Note 10/18/18
Last week we said farewell to Scott Faingold, Illinois Times staff writer who has been with us full time for the past five years, covering arts, culture and business. He has accepted a full-time teaching position at University of Illinois Springfield. Scott had been a frequent freelance contributor here before he joined the staff, first […]
Posted inOpinion
Poverty is over!
Listen to the eerie “sound of silence” from the Trumpeteers and congressional Republicans who so loudly cheered themselves just a year ago for bestowing a trillion-dollar tax giveaway on corporate elites. “Trickle-down Economics 101,” said Trump & Company, explaining that giving more money to elites would spark “an immediate jump in wage growth” because CEOs […]
Posted inOpinion
Trump’s immigration policy
One of America’s great strengths is our highly diversified population, continually fueled by generations of immigrants who come here as refugees or who simply seek opportunity. Consider the example of Fredrich, a 16-year-old boy who fled his tiny German village where he faced a dreary future of poverty. He arrived in Manhattan in 1885 with […]
Posted inOpinion
Editor’s Note 10/04/18
This needs to be a country that does not go crazy over editorial cartoons. That happens elsewhere, where free speech is not so well understood, or so deeply ingrained as a defining value. Chris Britt, whose work appears weekly in Illinois Times, has been the target of an over-the-top hate mail campaign after a cartoon […]
Posted inOpinion
How far-out is Trump’s war policy?
America is now militarily involved in 76 countries. Yet, the war machine -– including a massive army of profiteering corporate contractors and the politicians they buy – keeps demanding more: more troops, more money, more profits … more war. Finally, We the People need to awaken to another stark reality: War is stupid. The place […]
