Social Justice Magazine
I did not watch Thursday’s Republican debate as a liberal, an intellectual, a historian. I am all those things. But as I watched TV in my mother’s hospital room, I kept wondering, “What are these men saying to her?” Instead of seeing Republicans or politicians or media stars, I saw four men, some around my age, some younger, talking to Americans, but not to all Americans. I wondered, are … [Read more...]
I like to eat at BJ’s. At the counter, old men gather every morning to drink coffee and talk about the weather. The waitresses know my name, what I order, and how I like my hash browns. Sometimes the owner stops by my table to say hello. Their pies are homemade.Further down the street are all the icons of American fast food, with their familiar signs, impersonal service and boring food. … [Read more...]
Rick Santorum has been running for President for a year now, but most Americans don’t know much about him, except that he is a Christian conservative. He put enormous energy into Iowa, speaking before hundreds of small audiences, but languishing in the polls. When Iowans and the rest of America discovered what better known and better funded Republican candidates were offering, Santorum suddenly … [Read more...]
Tuesday Iowa Republicans go to caucuses to select the first winner of the 2012 Presidential campaign. I wish you well.I also wish you reason. Americans lend to Iowans an outsized voice in our electoral process. Your choices today will help shape 10 months of constant campaigning and then possibly 4 years of American life. This is an awesome responsibility for slightly more than 100,000 likely … [Read more...]
We sit in a circle, thirteen of us, pulling little gifts out of stockings on Christmas morning. Every few moments, someone screams with delight about a wonderful, or wonderfully silly, present. A jar of homemade jam, an Adlai Stevenson campaign pin, a necklace of sparkling lights, a bag of Twizzlers. I get a pen made from spalted sycamore and a pair of gardening gloves. My daughter gives a … [Read more...]
People say that Santa knows who’s been naughty or nice. I’m not so sure.I don’t think there’s any rhyme or reason to the goodies that Santa gives out. Lately it seems that the least deserving people, the people who already had a lot and then made a lot more while screwing up the economy for the rest of us, have been getting the biggest Christmas bonuses.Maybe it’s best that Santa … [Read more...]
I have two friends whose families are going through hard times. Unemployment, illness, and new babies are individually a challenge to any family. Together they can strain a family’s financial and psychological resources past the breaking point.My friends take their work seriously and consistently put in their best efforts. They do not need lessons in how to work. They need some real help. … [Read more...]
Herman Cain is no longer a candidate for President. First accusations of serial harassment of women. Then a 13-year affair, involving travel and money and midnight phone calls concealed from his wife. Cain’s claims that people are out to get him, from the left or from the right, convinced nobody. He got himself.But Herman Cain was never a viable candidate. Even if he had been a model … [Read more...]
I want to be sure that everyone who reads my column understands that here I write and speak for myself. I don’t speak for any institution I am associated with, not for the Sino-Judaic Institute, a small faraway educational organization, nor for Illinois College, our own educational institution as old as Jacksonville, nor for Jacksonville itself, from my seat on the Historical Preservation … [Read more...]
Republicans Hate Social Gains of the 1960s Washington is a mess. The barriers separating bureaucracy, commercial lobbying, and elected officials are gone, and the same small elite of the rich and well-connected trade jobs and favors and money.Overpaid and coddled federal bureaucrats pretend to manage expensive programs which don’t work. They tell ordinary Americans what to do and how to do … [Read more...]
Herman Cain said most blacks are dumb. He should know. He’s talking about his own people.Cain actually used the word “brainwashed”. That makes me think of Frank Sinatra tracking a robotic Laurence Harvey in the “Manchurian Candidate”. We all know that brainwashers are our enemy. In the film, Russian and Chinese intelligence agents and a Commie-loving traitor, Laurence Harvey’s … [Read more...]
This Thursday the Illinois Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability will decide whether to appropriate sufficient funds to keep the Jacksonville Development Center open, or to close it down in a matter of months.That decision will have major implications for the city, but it also represents one case out of hundreds across the country in which reduced government budgets conflict … [Read more...]
Kyoto is a splendid city, a tourist’s dream. During the thousand years that Kyoto was the capital of Japan, hundreds of Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines were built. Kyoto contains one-fifth of the national treasures of Japan and its historic monuments have been named a UNESCO World Heritage site.In 1945, Kyoto was selected as a possible target for an atomic bomb. A special Targeting … [Read more...]
The water level in Galveston Bay, off the Texas coast, is rising, faster than ever recorded. That’s what the five scientists who wrote the most recent “State of Galveston Bay” report, commissioned by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, discovered. But the TCEQ commissioners, appointed by Governor Rick Perry, don’t want Texans to know that, so they censored the scientists’ … [Read more...]
I just spent a week in Japan, as my college intensifies its exchange program with two Japanese universities.While it is dangerous to make generalizations about a country and its people after a first short visit, such comparisons seem an inevitable human occupation.The Japanese are very polite. Repetitive bowing, waiting for others to go through doors, and saying “thank you” are … [Read more...]
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