In February 2011, in response to my column about the growing acceptance of homosexuality in America, the following was posted on the Journal-Courier’s website, from someone who called me “a doddering old man”: “This is Hochie’s most disgusting level of puke. It’s getting harder and harder to spoon down a breakfast while reading this vile vomit.”
This person named himself “Facebook User”, and went on to offer this warning: “I’ll be back next week and the next and the next. . . . I would love to go a few rounds with him in a boxing ring or a classroom. Something about taking a bite out of an unapologetic gay-loving, Christian-hating conservative-loathing hypocritical libtard just gets my juices flowing.”
Behind the name Facebook User, this someone had been commenting in this manner every week. After a bit of internet sleuthing, I found out Facebook User’s real name, Darrell G. Holmquist. He had been hiding not only his name, but his location. He lives in New Lenox, on I-80 near Joliet, 200 miles north of here.
Many people told me that the proper response to an internet bully is “don’t feed the troll”. Nobody who is capable of a discussion, who wants an exchange, who seeks to learn about ideas or people, begins that way. But I tried. I suggested that Mr. Holmquist “might be friendly, respectful to others, and nice to his pets” at home, so it would be better to also act like an adult in the Journal-Courier’s site for discussion.
No such luck. Apparently preferring my “vile vomit” to his breakfast, he kept going with the following: meathead, hyper-leftie, trash heap, outlandishly stupid, White, hyper-leftist ivory tower socialist, diseased mind, lunatic.
Mr. Holmquist and his colleagues of internet invective are like the guy who comes into a crowded room and farts. He contributes something, but it stinks. Only ten-year-olds think it’s clever.
I stopped reading his comments, and unfortunately, also the comments of local people who had something to say. People have told me that he keeps writing. Here are some recent contributions: moron, clown, dim-witted, sick, insane.
Ranters are frightened of seeing black people everywhere, of the gay people in their extended families, of the idea of women’s equality, of science and education. But they lack the courage to face either their fears or their neighbors. Hiding behind internet anonymity, they try to use their anger to prevent the rest of us from discussing politics like friends, neighbors, and fellow citizens. They want us to shout back at them, instead of talking amongst ourselves. They are diabolical, but they’re not insane.
They hope they can scare people away from being personal, from revealing uncertainty, from being thoughtful and honest. Name-calling, hatred, and vilification can prevent people from expressing what they really believe.
The legions of haters, some in it for the money, some from ignorance, some out of genuine hatred for people who disagree with them, pretend to know something that isn’t true. My town, Jacksonville, and your town and all the other American towns are not like that. Many people in our towns firmly believe in conservative or liberal ideas, and thus also believe many of their neighbors, acquaintances, public figures are profoundly wrong about America.
But we don’t call each other a moron.
It is a genuine puzzle to us that our neighbors, whom we know to be friendly, honorable, intelligent, and public-spirited, don’t share our political beliefs. We live with that puzzle. It proves one thing: those people who deride the other side, who deny them intelligence, compassion, logic, and Americanness, aren’t talking about our neighbors.
I am not hoping to shame Mr. Holmquist here and I certainly don’t believe discussing what he does will stop him. He is having too much fun being exactly himself.
But I think it’s important to see the disruptive influences on our community for who and what they are, to name them, even if they might retaliate. They force us to make a choice, maybe as important as whom we vote for: will we let them stink up our community?
I don’t think so. They’ll never persuade us that our neighbor with the wrong political sign in their yard is an alien invader. What a stupid idea.
Goodbye, Mr. Holmquist.
Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
published in the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, February 28, 2012
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Monday, February 20, 2012
Conservatives and Cars
I thought conservatives liked cars. Not that I can remember any particular moment when I figured out that conservatives liked cars. It’s a feeling born of a lifetime of meeting people and talking with them about their cars and their politics.
But conservatives didn’t like any car. They liked American cars. The early VW owners, who waved at each other on the highway, usually decorated their bugs and vans with flowers and peace signs. Maybe the country club set imported cars from Europe, but the typical American, the Marlboro Man, the NASCAR fan who really cared about cars, bought only from Detroit.
In the 60s, when I first began to care about cars and politics, the guys with the muscle cars, the jacked-up cars, the loud cars, did not usually march with anti-war protesters. They were more likely to be leaning on their cars, staring at them and their funny clothes.
So Detroit is a perfect conservative symbol. A family can put love of country right in its driveway. Buying a car is the biggest investment in American manufacturing that a family can make.
Americans didn’t invent cars, but we invented cars for the masses, a triumphant blend of capitalism and individualism. Millions of vehicles coming out of Detroit were especially suited to the American landscape. Station wagons and pickup trucks made the promise of individual freedom in transportation come true for any American family.
Any white American family, that is. No black family could travel as freely as whites until the 1960s, and it’s still iffy. But white or black, buying an American car was an affirmation that we make what we need, we support each other. As much as flying a flag, a car from Detroit was a symbol of American patriotism.
How natural then for an American car manufacturer to pay millions of dollars for two minutes at halftime on Super Bowl Sunday to herald their triumphal return from the near-dead just three years ago. What a coup to recruit Clint Eastwood, the most famous Republican ex-mayor in the world, who rarely does commercials.
Here is what Detroit asked Eastwood to look us in the eyes and say: “It’s halftime in America, too. People are out of work and they’re hurting. But we all pulled together. Now Motor City is fighting again. Seems that we’ve lost our heart at times. The fog of division, discord and blame made it hard to see what lies ahead. But after those trials, we all rallied around what was right and acted as one. Because that’s what we do. We find a way through tough times, and if we can’t find a way, then we’ll make one.” We’re with you, Clint!
Well, not all of us. Conservative political voices went nuts. The next day Karl Rove appeared on Fox News to say, “I was, frankly, offended by it. I'm a huge fan of Clint Eastwood, I thought it was an extremely well-done ad, but it is a sign of what happens when you have Chicago-style politics, and the president of the United States and his political minions are, in essence, using our tax dollars to buy corporate advertising.”
Maybe I should have seen it coming in January as John Boehner sat in steely silence when President Obama told Congress that General Motors was once again the #1 car manufacturer in the world. It turns out that’s not an American message any more. Conservatives don’t like what happened in Detroit. Rick Santorum and Mitt Romney, today’s front-runners in the Republican presidential race, are running in Michigan on their opposition to the rescue of American cars and trucks.
Republican politicians seem to be attempting the mass hypnosis of the American public. They want us to believe that Silverados and F-250s and Rams are symbols of Obama. If Clint’s Super Bowl words are a Democratic message, what part of it don’t Republicans like?
Karl Rove and John Boehner, visionary and pragmatist, the ideologue and the vote counter, right at the center of Republican politics for the entire 21st century, agree on this: We hate Obama. Obama helped Detroit. A union is involved. The revival of American cars is a Democratic success story. So take your Detroit jobs and shove ‘em.
I think Republican Party leaders have made a big mistake. Hatred for President Obama and anything that Democrats do blinds them to their own constituents. I still believe that conservatives like American cars. It’s only conservative politicians who sneer at them.
Maybe that’s why Eastwood, who last year couldn’t recall ever voting for a Democrat for President, recently said, “there was a Republican philosophy that I liked. And then they lost it.” Looks like conservative Americans will have a tough choice in November. Clint Eastwood won’t be on the ballot.
Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
published in the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, February 21, 2012
But conservatives didn’t like any car. They liked American cars. The early VW owners, who waved at each other on the highway, usually decorated their bugs and vans with flowers and peace signs. Maybe the country club set imported cars from Europe, but the typical American, the Marlboro Man, the NASCAR fan who really cared about cars, bought only from Detroit.
In the 60s, when I first began to care about cars and politics, the guys with the muscle cars, the jacked-up cars, the loud cars, did not usually march with anti-war protesters. They were more likely to be leaning on their cars, staring at them and their funny clothes.
So Detroit is a perfect conservative symbol. A family can put love of country right in its driveway. Buying a car is the biggest investment in American manufacturing that a family can make.
Americans didn’t invent cars, but we invented cars for the masses, a triumphant blend of capitalism and individualism. Millions of vehicles coming out of Detroit were especially suited to the American landscape. Station wagons and pickup trucks made the promise of individual freedom in transportation come true for any American family.
Any white American family, that is. No black family could travel as freely as whites until the 1960s, and it’s still iffy. But white or black, buying an American car was an affirmation that we make what we need, we support each other. As much as flying a flag, a car from Detroit was a symbol of American patriotism.
How natural then for an American car manufacturer to pay millions of dollars for two minutes at halftime on Super Bowl Sunday to herald their triumphal return from the near-dead just three years ago. What a coup to recruit Clint Eastwood, the most famous Republican ex-mayor in the world, who rarely does commercials.
Here is what Detroit asked Eastwood to look us in the eyes and say: “It’s halftime in America, too. People are out of work and they’re hurting. But we all pulled together. Now Motor City is fighting again. Seems that we’ve lost our heart at times. The fog of division, discord and blame made it hard to see what lies ahead. But after those trials, we all rallied around what was right and acted as one. Because that’s what we do. We find a way through tough times, and if we can’t find a way, then we’ll make one.” We’re with you, Clint!
Well, not all of us. Conservative political voices went nuts. The next day Karl Rove appeared on Fox News to say, “I was, frankly, offended by it. I'm a huge fan of Clint Eastwood, I thought it was an extremely well-done ad, but it is a sign of what happens when you have Chicago-style politics, and the president of the United States and his political minions are, in essence, using our tax dollars to buy corporate advertising.”
Maybe I should have seen it coming in January as John Boehner sat in steely silence when President Obama told Congress that General Motors was once again the #1 car manufacturer in the world. It turns out that’s not an American message any more. Conservatives don’t like what happened in Detroit. Rick Santorum and Mitt Romney, today’s front-runners in the Republican presidential race, are running in Michigan on their opposition to the rescue of American cars and trucks.
Republican politicians seem to be attempting the mass hypnosis of the American public. They want us to believe that Silverados and F-250s and Rams are symbols of Obama. If Clint’s Super Bowl words are a Democratic message, what part of it don’t Republicans like?
Karl Rove and John Boehner, visionary and pragmatist, the ideologue and the vote counter, right at the center of Republican politics for the entire 21st century, agree on this: We hate Obama. Obama helped Detroit. A union is involved. The revival of American cars is a Democratic success story. So take your Detroit jobs and shove ‘em.
I think Republican Party leaders have made a big mistake. Hatred for President Obama and anything that Democrats do blinds them to their own constituents. I still believe that conservatives like American cars. It’s only conservative politicians who sneer at them.
Maybe that’s why Eastwood, who last year couldn’t recall ever voting for a Democrat for President, recently said, “there was a Republican philosophy that I liked. And then they lost it.” Looks like conservative Americans will have a tough choice in November. Clint Eastwood won’t be on the ballot.
Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
published in the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, February 21, 2012
Monday, February 13, 2012
The End of the Dog
Everybody I talk to is sad about the closing of the Three-Legged Dog at 27 South Central Park Plaza. That grand space embodies Jacksonville’s history and promise. I offer the consolation of its long history, which demonstrates that the space will continue to be significant to our community.
The Marble Block was built right after the Civil War on the south side of the square. It is one of the oldest buildings in downtown Jacksonville. I don’t know much about the early tenants, but in 1911 the Farmers Bank, owned by the French family, moved into that address, where it stayed for several decades. The built-in safe is still upstairs.
After Farmers Bank took over the former Ayers Bank building at the end of West State St. in 1941, the space was occupied by Hoffman’s Floral Shop. A dropped ceiling was installed.
In the 1990s, Jack Lukeman, from the family which owned Lukeman Clothing Co., located for decades on the east side of the square, took over the space and began extensive renovations. He had the ceiling removed, revealing again the spacious three story-atrium. Lukeman wanted to use this renovated space to bring back another famous Jacksonville institution, Merrigans.
Since the early 20th century, Merrigans had been a confectionery and sandwich shop on West State St. It had a beautiful carved wooden bar back with huge mirrors, and wooden booths in back. The “urban renewal” craze of the 1970s, which did so much damage to American downtowns in the name of progress, led to the tearing down of the building that housed Merrigans. The classic furnishings traveled to Springfield, where they became part of the lunch counter at Famous-Barr, a branch of the St. Louis department store, in the new White Oaks Mall. Eventually the lunch counter closed, Famous-Barr became Macy’s, and the furniture moved on to another city.
Jack Lukeman located the old Merrigans fixtures and installed them at 27 South Central Park Plaza to create Merrigans Old Place, a shop selling sandwiches and sodas in the 1990s. But those years were not kind to downtown shops, here and everywhere else in America. The Achilles’ Café and then Due Gatti (Two Cats) continued to serve food and coffee in that location, until Joe Racey created the Three-Legged Dog, which opened in April 2007.
For Racey, and his downtown collaborators Joy French Becker and Tom Grojean, the Dog and its neighboring buildings were among the early investments in the comeback of downtown Jacksonville. Since 2007, the square has been transformed from an ugly reminder of urban renewal to a potentially beautiful and commercially functional center of a revived community. The square once again provides a calm space at the heart of town. Around it, renovations inside Art Eclectic Gallery reveal the bones of the venerable Hockenhull building, Jacksonville Art Glass creates new beauty in glass and restores the glass history of local churches, Cheryl Kelly develops photographs into art, and Jim and Sally Nurss have brought a bookstore back to Jacksonville.
Like the Dog, these are all risky investments, bets with family resources that the present and future residents of Jacksonville will find a place for art and literature in their versions of a good and affordable life. These enterprises represent the promise of Jacksonville by reviving our history and imagining our future.
There is more to come. The future of Jacksonville lies partly in its past: the well-constructed buildings in the downtown and the well-preserved homes all around it are worth a visit now. In ten years, our little city could be on everyone’s map as a place to see, to learn from, and to pause in. The short life of the Dog is a key step in that journey, back to the past and into the future. It was a great success. Thanks, Joe.
Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
published in the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, February 14, 2012
The Marble Block was built right after the Civil War on the south side of the square. It is one of the oldest buildings in downtown Jacksonville. I don’t know much about the early tenants, but in 1911 the Farmers Bank, owned by the French family, moved into that address, where it stayed for several decades. The built-in safe is still upstairs.
After Farmers Bank took over the former Ayers Bank building at the end of West State St. in 1941, the space was occupied by Hoffman’s Floral Shop. A dropped ceiling was installed.
In the 1990s, Jack Lukeman, from the family which owned Lukeman Clothing Co., located for decades on the east side of the square, took over the space and began extensive renovations. He had the ceiling removed, revealing again the spacious three story-atrium. Lukeman wanted to use this renovated space to bring back another famous Jacksonville institution, Merrigans.
Since the early 20th century, Merrigans had been a confectionery and sandwich shop on West State St. It had a beautiful carved wooden bar back with huge mirrors, and wooden booths in back. The “urban renewal” craze of the 1970s, which did so much damage to American downtowns in the name of progress, led to the tearing down of the building that housed Merrigans. The classic furnishings traveled to Springfield, where they became part of the lunch counter at Famous-Barr, a branch of the St. Louis department store, in the new White Oaks Mall. Eventually the lunch counter closed, Famous-Barr became Macy’s, and the furniture moved on to another city.
Jack Lukeman located the old Merrigans fixtures and installed them at 27 South Central Park Plaza to create Merrigans Old Place, a shop selling sandwiches and sodas in the 1990s. But those years were not kind to downtown shops, here and everywhere else in America. The Achilles’ Café and then Due Gatti (Two Cats) continued to serve food and coffee in that location, until Joe Racey created the Three-Legged Dog, which opened in April 2007.
For Racey, and his downtown collaborators Joy French Becker and Tom Grojean, the Dog and its neighboring buildings were among the early investments in the comeback of downtown Jacksonville. Since 2007, the square has been transformed from an ugly reminder of urban renewal to a potentially beautiful and commercially functional center of a revived community. The square once again provides a calm space at the heart of town. Around it, renovations inside Art Eclectic Gallery reveal the bones of the venerable Hockenhull building, Jacksonville Art Glass creates new beauty in glass and restores the glass history of local churches, Cheryl Kelly develops photographs into art, and Jim and Sally Nurss have brought a bookstore back to Jacksonville.
Like the Dog, these are all risky investments, bets with family resources that the present and future residents of Jacksonville will find a place for art and literature in their versions of a good and affordable life. These enterprises represent the promise of Jacksonville by reviving our history and imagining our future.
There is more to come. The future of Jacksonville lies partly in its past: the well-constructed buildings in the downtown and the well-preserved homes all around it are worth a visit now. In ten years, our little city could be on everyone’s map as a place to see, to learn from, and to pause in. The short life of the Dog is a key step in that journey, back to the past and into the future. It was a great success. Thanks, Joe.
Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
published in the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, February 14, 2012
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Who is an American?
Who is an American?
Throughout American history, from the moment our country was created right into this Presidential campaign, people have argued about who is an American. The great political discussion that resulted in the Constitution resolved that some immigrants to these shores were American and others were only partially human, and thus certainly not American.
The great men who came to political power in the Revolution modeled this exclusive answer: 8 of the first 10 Presidents owned slaves. These beginnings are among the most powerful answers to those who say that we must try to get back to the America of our founders. That America was wonderfully progressive for its time and but would be horribly racist in ours.
For two centuries, the argument about who is an American revolved around race. Slavery was the most contentious social issue over the next half century. Because the existing political parties agreed not to touch slavery, a new party was brought to life by men with a different answer to the question. The Party of Lincoln, the Republican Party, grew out of the idea that slavery should not exist in a democracy. The first Republican to win the Presidency, a Congressman from Illinois, converted that idea into government policy.
At the same time, the deadly expulsion of Native Americans from land that other Americans wanted, and the creation of a special legal category for millions of people who had always been here, was not nearly so divisive. Indians were not recognized as people in the US until the 1879 Standing Bear trial.
The victory of the Union in the Civil War destroyed the institution of slavery, but did not defeat those who continued to enforce a racially exclusive idea of who could be an American. After the failure of Reconstruction to enforce the 14th and 15th Amendments, the federal government just looked the other way as most states redeveloped racial separation and prevented black Americans from being full Americans.
The 14th Amendment still excluded Native Americans from citizenship, which was not granted until 1924. When black and Native American soldiers returned from fighting in World War II, they still could not vote across the US. Only the 1965 Voting Rights Act finally affirmed that race could no longer be used to exclude some Americans from being Americans.
Racism is based on fears about others, nightmarish fantasies about what they will do to us. The irrationality of fear leads to a harshness of behavior that can be itself frightening. Lynching was meant to be frightening to anyone who challenged the conventional racial hierarchy. Lynching depended upon the cooperation of law enforcement; it was the enforcement of racially separatist laws, some written down, some not.
The role of law enforcement in still maintaining the line between “real Americans” and others has made the news recently in East Haven, Connecticut, and New York City. Some police in East Haven systematically persecuted Hispanic residents to enforce the idea that they were unwelcome. The Chief, Leonard Gallo, “cultivated a racist and dishonest police force,” said a local Catholic priest. When the mayor, Joseph Maturo, was asked what his reaction to the Justice Department’s accusation that 4 police officers repeatedly harassed, intimidated, and unlawfully searched Latinos in East Haven, he said he “might have tacos”.
In New York police practice, American Muslims who originated in the Middle East became the official enemy of other Americans after 9-11. After seeing a training film in which the Chief of Police appeared, that argues that American Muslims are potential terrorists, NY police have routinely infiltrated Muslim organizations, spied on Muslim worship, and followed Muslim leaders.
Those who have argued for excluding some Americans from full rights, who have urged some Americans to leave because they weren’t American enough, who wanted to separate and classify and dominate people, have always been wrong. They posed as true Americans by claiming others were not.
The idea that race should determine who is an American has been defeated over the past half century. Another Congressman from Illinois, this time a Democrat, has fulfilled the promise that Lincoln first made by becoming the first black President.
But just as race seemed to lose its potency as a way to divide us, ideology has become the weapon of choice for those who want to exclude other Americans. Following the path forged by Senator Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s, and widened by many conservatives since then, Congressman Allen West of Florida told the guests at the Palm Beach County Republican Party Lincoln Day Dinner that President Obama, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid should take their liberal politics and “get the hell out of the United States of America.”
We can reject the divisive ideas of our founders, still playing out in conservative politics, in favor of another idea they developed. On July 4, 1776, Congress appointed John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson to design a seal for the USA. In August they submitted a design with the motto “e pluribus unum”, “out of many, one.” We still have a long way to go to make this inclusive motto an American reality. We must fight the racial, ethnic, and ideological dividers for the soul of our nation.
Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
published in the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, February 7, 2012
Throughout American history, from the moment our country was created right into this Presidential campaign, people have argued about who is an American. The great political discussion that resulted in the Constitution resolved that some immigrants to these shores were American and others were only partially human, and thus certainly not American.
The great men who came to political power in the Revolution modeled this exclusive answer: 8 of the first 10 Presidents owned slaves. These beginnings are among the most powerful answers to those who say that we must try to get back to the America of our founders. That America was wonderfully progressive for its time and but would be horribly racist in ours.
For two centuries, the argument about who is an American revolved around race. Slavery was the most contentious social issue over the next half century. Because the existing political parties agreed not to touch slavery, a new party was brought to life by men with a different answer to the question. The Party of Lincoln, the Republican Party, grew out of the idea that slavery should not exist in a democracy. The first Republican to win the Presidency, a Congressman from Illinois, converted that idea into government policy.
At the same time, the deadly expulsion of Native Americans from land that other Americans wanted, and the creation of a special legal category for millions of people who had always been here, was not nearly so divisive. Indians were not recognized as people in the US until the 1879 Standing Bear trial.
The victory of the Union in the Civil War destroyed the institution of slavery, but did not defeat those who continued to enforce a racially exclusive idea of who could be an American. After the failure of Reconstruction to enforce the 14th and 15th Amendments, the federal government just looked the other way as most states redeveloped racial separation and prevented black Americans from being full Americans.
The 14th Amendment still excluded Native Americans from citizenship, which was not granted until 1924. When black and Native American soldiers returned from fighting in World War II, they still could not vote across the US. Only the 1965 Voting Rights Act finally affirmed that race could no longer be used to exclude some Americans from being Americans.
Racism is based on fears about others, nightmarish fantasies about what they will do to us. The irrationality of fear leads to a harshness of behavior that can be itself frightening. Lynching was meant to be frightening to anyone who challenged the conventional racial hierarchy. Lynching depended upon the cooperation of law enforcement; it was the enforcement of racially separatist laws, some written down, some not.
The role of law enforcement in still maintaining the line between “real Americans” and others has made the news recently in East Haven, Connecticut, and New York City. Some police in East Haven systematically persecuted Hispanic residents to enforce the idea that they were unwelcome. The Chief, Leonard Gallo, “cultivated a racist and dishonest police force,” said a local Catholic priest. When the mayor, Joseph Maturo, was asked what his reaction to the Justice Department’s accusation that 4 police officers repeatedly harassed, intimidated, and unlawfully searched Latinos in East Haven, he said he “might have tacos”.
In New York police practice, American Muslims who originated in the Middle East became the official enemy of other Americans after 9-11. After seeing a training film in which the Chief of Police appeared, that argues that American Muslims are potential terrorists, NY police have routinely infiltrated Muslim organizations, spied on Muslim worship, and followed Muslim leaders.
Those who have argued for excluding some Americans from full rights, who have urged some Americans to leave because they weren’t American enough, who wanted to separate and classify and dominate people, have always been wrong. They posed as true Americans by claiming others were not.
The idea that race should determine who is an American has been defeated over the past half century. Another Congressman from Illinois, this time a Democrat, has fulfilled the promise that Lincoln first made by becoming the first black President.
But just as race seemed to lose its potency as a way to divide us, ideology has become the weapon of choice for those who want to exclude other Americans. Following the path forged by Senator Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s, and widened by many conservatives since then, Congressman Allen West of Florida told the guests at the Palm Beach County Republican Party Lincoln Day Dinner that President Obama, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid should take their liberal politics and “get the hell out of the United States of America.”
We can reject the divisive ideas of our founders, still playing out in conservative politics, in favor of another idea they developed. On July 4, 1776, Congress appointed John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson to design a seal for the USA. In August they submitted a design with the motto “e pluribus unum”, “out of many, one.” We still have a long way to go to make this inclusive motto an American reality. We must fight the racial, ethnic, and ideological dividers for the soul of our nation.
Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
published in the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, February 7, 2012
Monday, January 30, 2012
When Republican Politicians Hate Jobs
In the middle of his State of the Union speech on January 24, President Obama noted the remarkable comeback of the American auto industry: “Today, General Motors is back on top as the world’s number one automaker. Chrysler has grown faster in the U.S. than any major car company. Ford is investing billions in U.S. plants and factories. And together, the entire industry added nearly 160,000 jobs.”
The workers and management of GM led the world’s automakers in sales for 77 years, until 2007. But their inability to compete in the global market eventually caught up with Detroit’s Big Three. Then came the first depression of the 21st century, and demand for new cars disappeared.
When GM desperately needed capital in 2008, no private financial institution was able to take on the risk. That’s when the federal government implemented its last bipartisan economic venture. In December, President George Bush announced the Automotive Industry Financing Program, a government rescue of the entire industry with funds from the newly created TARP program.
After Obama became President, he refused to simply bail out GM, but demanded that they proceed with an orderly bankruptcy in 2009. The federal government then invested about $50 billion in GM stock, controlling over 60% of the firm.
The use of taxpayers’ money to save giant American corporations was not popular. In two December 2008 polls, 51% and 61% opposed giving financial help to the auto giants; by March 2009, 76% were against it. But economists, both Republican and Democratic, were very worried about the long-term effects of a crashing auto industry. Bush wrote in his memoir, “Decision Points”: “My economic advisers had warned me that the immediate bankruptcy of the Big Three could cost more than a million jobs, decrease tax revenues by $150 billion, and set back America's GDP by hundreds of billions of dollars.”
Public worries that government funds would be wasted turned out to be wrong. In November 2011 the Treasury Department sold $13.5 billion of GM shares, and now owns about one-third of the corporation. Unless GM stock reaches $55 per share before the government sells the rest of hits holdings (share price is $25 now), the government will take a loss, but a much smaller one than most people thought.
There continues to be considerable argument about whether the bipartisan bailout was necessary to save GM. But the return of GM to #1 in the world, the renewed success of Chrysler and Ford, and the saving of hundreds of thousands of jobs in a time of massive unemployment are certainly positive developments. So why did Speaker of the House John Boehner sit stony-faced when President Obama mentioned that GM was again #1? Why did Senate and House Republicans not applaud the recovery of one of our largest manufacturers and the recent gain in automotive jobs?
Mitt Romney offered one clue in the Republican debate on November 9, when he said, “They gave General Motors to the UAW.” He has repeated this line in subsequent debates.
In the first place, that’s a lie. A trust which funds the health care of retired UAW workers bought 17.5% of GM stock at the same time as the federal government bought 60%. The Canadian government bought 12.5%, but nobody would say that we gave GM to the Canadians. Rather than get some special benefits for participating in saving GM, the UAW agreed not to go on strike over wages in contract talks.
The truth, however, is not important to Romney. He and other Republican politicians have been doing everything in their power to destroy unions. Saving union jobs is worse than saving no jobs.
Another reason that Republican politicians disdain the auto industry bailout is that they appear to oppose using taxpayers’ money to interfere in the free market. But the presidential candidates have fallen all over themselves promoting ways to use taxpayers’ money to help American manufacturers. Romney, Gingrich, and Santorum all advocate setting the corporate tax rate lower than the tax rate for individuals, which means that we taxpayers would be subsidizing the corporate profits of the wealthy. Santorum wants to eliminate all corporate taxes for manufacturing companies, so that we would pay their entire share of funding our public obligations.
Their version of the free market would be no freer than the current version, just tilted in a different way, toward wealthy investors, the 1%.
I suspect the real reason that Boehner couldn’t bring himself to clap for GM, or for 22 months of job creation, or for the falling unemployment rate, is that these achievements might help Obama. That would go against the most important Republican goal for 2012, more important than helping unemployed Americans survive, more important than creating new jobs now – make Obama a one-term President.
The level of official Republican hatred for our President was on display this Sunday, when Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus compared President Obama to the man responsible for crashing a cruise ship on the Italian coast, abandoning it and his passengers: “we’re going to talk about our own little Captain Schettino, which is President Obama, who’s abandoning the ship here in the United States.”
Calling our President an incompetent coward, a traitor to his country, is the official Republican Party position. In a land of 139 million jobs, Republican politicians care about only one – his.
Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
published in the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, January 31, 2012
The workers and management of GM led the world’s automakers in sales for 77 years, until 2007. But their inability to compete in the global market eventually caught up with Detroit’s Big Three. Then came the first depression of the 21st century, and demand for new cars disappeared.
When GM desperately needed capital in 2008, no private financial institution was able to take on the risk. That’s when the federal government implemented its last bipartisan economic venture. In December, President George Bush announced the Automotive Industry Financing Program, a government rescue of the entire industry with funds from the newly created TARP program.
After Obama became President, he refused to simply bail out GM, but demanded that they proceed with an orderly bankruptcy in 2009. The federal government then invested about $50 billion in GM stock, controlling over 60% of the firm.
The use of taxpayers’ money to save giant American corporations was not popular. In two December 2008 polls, 51% and 61% opposed giving financial help to the auto giants; by March 2009, 76% were against it. But economists, both Republican and Democratic, were very worried about the long-term effects of a crashing auto industry. Bush wrote in his memoir, “Decision Points”: “My economic advisers had warned me that the immediate bankruptcy of the Big Three could cost more than a million jobs, decrease tax revenues by $150 billion, and set back America's GDP by hundreds of billions of dollars.”
Public worries that government funds would be wasted turned out to be wrong. In November 2011 the Treasury Department sold $13.5 billion of GM shares, and now owns about one-third of the corporation. Unless GM stock reaches $55 per share before the government sells the rest of hits holdings (share price is $25 now), the government will take a loss, but a much smaller one than most people thought.
There continues to be considerable argument about whether the bipartisan bailout was necessary to save GM. But the return of GM to #1 in the world, the renewed success of Chrysler and Ford, and the saving of hundreds of thousands of jobs in a time of massive unemployment are certainly positive developments. So why did Speaker of the House John Boehner sit stony-faced when President Obama mentioned that GM was again #1? Why did Senate and House Republicans not applaud the recovery of one of our largest manufacturers and the recent gain in automotive jobs?
Mitt Romney offered one clue in the Republican debate on November 9, when he said, “They gave General Motors to the UAW.” He has repeated this line in subsequent debates.
In the first place, that’s a lie. A trust which funds the health care of retired UAW workers bought 17.5% of GM stock at the same time as the federal government bought 60%. The Canadian government bought 12.5%, but nobody would say that we gave GM to the Canadians. Rather than get some special benefits for participating in saving GM, the UAW agreed not to go on strike over wages in contract talks.
The truth, however, is not important to Romney. He and other Republican politicians have been doing everything in their power to destroy unions. Saving union jobs is worse than saving no jobs.
Another reason that Republican politicians disdain the auto industry bailout is that they appear to oppose using taxpayers’ money to interfere in the free market. But the presidential candidates have fallen all over themselves promoting ways to use taxpayers’ money to help American manufacturers. Romney, Gingrich, and Santorum all advocate setting the corporate tax rate lower than the tax rate for individuals, which means that we taxpayers would be subsidizing the corporate profits of the wealthy. Santorum wants to eliminate all corporate taxes for manufacturing companies, so that we would pay their entire share of funding our public obligations.
Their version of the free market would be no freer than the current version, just tilted in a different way, toward wealthy investors, the 1%.
I suspect the real reason that Boehner couldn’t bring himself to clap for GM, or for 22 months of job creation, or for the falling unemployment rate, is that these achievements might help Obama. That would go against the most important Republican goal for 2012, more important than helping unemployed Americans survive, more important than creating new jobs now – make Obama a one-term President.
The level of official Republican hatred for our President was on display this Sunday, when Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus compared President Obama to the man responsible for crashing a cruise ship on the Italian coast, abandoning it and his passengers: “we’re going to talk about our own little Captain Schettino, which is President Obama, who’s abandoning the ship here in the United States.”
Calling our President an incompetent coward, a traitor to his country, is the official Republican Party position. In a land of 139 million jobs, Republican politicians care about only one – his.
Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
published in the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, January 31, 2012
Monday, January 23, 2012
Do Republican Candidates Like Most Americans?
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 they talking to us?
They were certainly talking to “Reagan Democrats”. Whoever this group might be now, the candidates offered love and an opportunity to vote for them. Nothing in particular, though, just the claim that if you liked Reagan, you’ll like us.
All four talked especially to veterans. Romney, Santorum and Gingrich asserted that veterans deserved special access when they leave the service to the most prized goods in our society: jobs, education and housing. Ron Paul was more hesitant; he doesn’t like special treatment for any group. The only veteran on stage made a very different offer – to drastically reduce the need for most of them, by ending foreign wars and foreign bases.
I was struck by how many kinds of Americans were ignored in the debate. Rick Santorum pointed out how the others, and the Republican Party generally, ignored working-class Americans. But if you belong to a union, or believe that workers have the right to be unionized, you would not have been happy on Thursday. Mitt Romney equated saving the 70,000 American jobs at General Motors with giving the company away to the UAW. He characterized the members of the National Labor Relations Board, who enforce the laws which protect workers, as “labor stooges”.
If you are gay, you might as well not have listened to the debate. Gay Americans were not mentioned, except to be permanently excluded from real marriages and real families. The candidates thus stuck with their previous negative statements about civil unions and the rights of domestic partners. None of them contradicted Gingrich’s statement in December to a voter who asked about gay issues: “You should be for Obama.”
If you liked the new national health care legislation, because it would cover the 30 million Americans without health insurance or because it allows young adults to stay on their parents’ policy until age 26, there was nothing for you. Romney carefully sketched a plan that would insure only those who already have insurance. Otherwise all four made it clear that it was wrong to change the way those groups of people are treated in the free market.
If you are black, or believe that racial stereotypes should not be the basis of public policy, then you might have hoped that somebody would distance themselves from Newt Gingrich’s insistence in the previous debate that it was conservative and patriotic of him to single out black food stamp recipients for a special scolding about their work ethic. You might still be upset that the audience hooted at the African American Fox News moderator, Juan Williams, when he asked about what Newt had said. The next day Gingrich went further, saying “the idea of work seemed to Juan Williams to be a strange, distant concept.” Apparently true conservatism means being able to criticize African Americans, without fear of being contradicted.
The Republicans were certainly not talking to the millions of poor Americans, without jobs, without proper housing, without insurance. When Gingrich taunted President Obama as the “food-stamp president”, he was also taunting those Americans who need food stamps to feed themselves and their families. All four promised jobs galore, but when? After they are inaugurated a year from now, then many more months until their policies supposedly take effect. Meanwhile, nothing but condescension for becoming dependent, for not having the proper work ethic, for being unsuccessful. Nothing different than their congressional Republican colleagues, who opposed extending unemployment insurance and continuing the payroll tax cut. Nothing at all but a rosy future.
The four would-be Presidents did talk to the 69 million Americans who voted for Barack Obama. We were told that we picked a man who does not share real American values, who is “taking away the rights of our citizens” (Romney), who is “the most dangerous President of our lifetime” (Gingrich). We are obviously stupid or un-American ourselves.
When you add it all up, it seems as if the Republican presidential candidates were talking to a minority of Americans, telling them they were the only true patriots. The rest of us, poor, gay, black, unionized, believers in science, supporters of a fair tax system, we were disdained. If you are happy that our government protects the voting rights of minorities, the environment we live in, and the safety of our products and jobs and food, if you are proud of the changes in American politics over the past 50 years, then the Republicans are not talking to you. So how will any of them be a President to all Americans?
Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
published in the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, January 24, 2012
They were certainly talking to “Reagan Democrats”. Whoever this group might be now, the candidates offered love and an opportunity to vote for them. Nothing in particular, though, just the claim that if you liked Reagan, you’ll like us.
All four talked especially to veterans. Romney, Santorum and Gingrich asserted that veterans deserved special access when they leave the service to the most prized goods in our society: jobs, education and housing. Ron Paul was more hesitant; he doesn’t like special treatment for any group. The only veteran on stage made a very different offer – to drastically reduce the need for most of them, by ending foreign wars and foreign bases.
I was struck by how many kinds of Americans were ignored in the debate. Rick Santorum pointed out how the others, and the Republican Party generally, ignored working-class Americans. But if you belong to a union, or believe that workers have the right to be unionized, you would not have been happy on Thursday. Mitt Romney equated saving the 70,000 American jobs at General Motors with giving the company away to the UAW. He characterized the members of the National Labor Relations Board, who enforce the laws which protect workers, as “labor stooges”.
If you are gay, you might as well not have listened to the debate. Gay Americans were not mentioned, except to be permanently excluded from real marriages and real families. The candidates thus stuck with their previous negative statements about civil unions and the rights of domestic partners. None of them contradicted Gingrich’s statement in December to a voter who asked about gay issues: “You should be for Obama.”
If you liked the new national health care legislation, because it would cover the 30 million Americans without health insurance or because it allows young adults to stay on their parents’ policy until age 26, there was nothing for you. Romney carefully sketched a plan that would insure only those who already have insurance. Otherwise all four made it clear that it was wrong to change the way those groups of people are treated in the free market.
If you are black, or believe that racial stereotypes should not be the basis of public policy, then you might have hoped that somebody would distance themselves from Newt Gingrich’s insistence in the previous debate that it was conservative and patriotic of him to single out black food stamp recipients for a special scolding about their work ethic. You might still be upset that the audience hooted at the African American Fox News moderator, Juan Williams, when he asked about what Newt had said. The next day Gingrich went further, saying “the idea of work seemed to Juan Williams to be a strange, distant concept.” Apparently true conservatism means being able to criticize African Americans, without fear of being contradicted.
The Republicans were certainly not talking to the millions of poor Americans, without jobs, without proper housing, without insurance. When Gingrich taunted President Obama as the “food-stamp president”, he was also taunting those Americans who need food stamps to feed themselves and their families. All four promised jobs galore, but when? After they are inaugurated a year from now, then many more months until their policies supposedly take effect. Meanwhile, nothing but condescension for becoming dependent, for not having the proper work ethic, for being unsuccessful. Nothing different than their congressional Republican colleagues, who opposed extending unemployment insurance and continuing the payroll tax cut. Nothing at all but a rosy future.
The four would-be Presidents did talk to the 69 million Americans who voted for Barack Obama. We were told that we picked a man who does not share real American values, who is “taking away the rights of our citizens” (Romney), who is “the most dangerous President of our lifetime” (Gingrich). We are obviously stupid or un-American ourselves.
When you add it all up, it seems as if the Republican presidential candidates were talking to a minority of Americans, telling them they were the only true patriots. The rest of us, poor, gay, black, unionized, believers in science, supporters of a fair tax system, we were disdained. If you are happy that our government protects the voting rights of minorities, the environment we live in, and the safety of our products and jobs and food, if you are proud of the changes in American politics over the past 50 years, then the Republicans are not talking to you. So how will any of them be a President to all Americans?
Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
published in the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, January 24, 2012
Monday, January 16, 2012
Eat at BJ's
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. Nobody can beat their prices, because their food is prepared in bulk, frozen solid, shipped around the country in big trucks, and served by kids earning minimum wage. Instead of seeing familiar community faces behind downtown counters, people who know your name and your mother’s, whose kids play ball with your kids, Americans sit in cars, order through loudspeakers, and get chemically enhanced, over-salted machine-made “food”.
People talk a lot about the importance of small business, and then get a burger at McDonald’s and go shopping at Wal-Mart. These ugly big box stores and the fatty food purveyors are often blamed for killing local downtown businesses. But it’s not their fault.
Over the past 40 years, the aggregated choices of American consumers have forced thousands of diners, hardware stores, independent pharmacies, and Mom-and-Pop groceries to close up.
Why? Price has something to do with it, but less than most people think. For 2 fresh eggs done the way I want them, 2 pieces of the kind of toast I like with jelly, hash browns, endless coffee, and a piece of pie, I paid $7.42 at BJ’s. At the local McDonald’s a large coffee with no refill, large fries, and a piece of their formerly frozen pie cost $4.47. They don’t serve bread or eggs, but you can get a thin gristly burger on a squishy roll, and come out a bit ahead.
Or so it seems. But the savings we think we get from these giant corporations are illusory. The website of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance offers an eye-popping list of scientific studies over the past decade to show how big box development actually costs American taxpayers and communities billions of dollars (www.newrules.org/retail/key-studies-walmart-and-bigbox-retail#1). The destruction of small businesses by giant chains means reduced property tax revenues. The opening of a new Wal-Mart on Chicago’s west side in 2006 caused about one-fourth of businesses within 4 miles to close, some Loyola University researchers found. Away from big metropolitan areas, big boxes in larger towns cause the loss of businesses in surrounding smaller towns.
Taxpayers often fund the construction of big box stores through tax rebates and provision of infrastructure services. Over the past two decades, communities in the St. Louis region have spent $5 billion to fund the construction of big box stores and shopping malls. But the combination of lost businesses and increased costs for roads and other infrastructure for big box stores can mean that this “commercial development” never pays anything back. In Barnstable, Massachusetts, increased costs to local government were greater than new tax revenues, and fast-food restaurants were the most costly kind of development. Smaller retail stores, in contrast, produced a net plus in tax revenue vs. cost. Because Wal-Mart in California pays 30% less than other retail stores, taxpayers there pay nearly $100 million extra dollars a year to provide various forms of public assistance to Wal-Mart workers, who fall below the poverty line.
In hard times, corporate America has a cold heart. Although their charitable giving may seem impressive because of the size of their firms, small businesses give significantly more to local charities per employee than giant corporations. During the last Depression, American families facing hard times were carried by their local shopowners, their neighbors, sometimes for years. Community solidarity spread the few resources around, so the maximum number of people could survive unprecedented economic hardship. Try getting a meal at Burger King on credit.
We can’t blame politicians, the media, or corporate executives for the decline of American small business. Every time we imagine we’ll save a few cents by driving past our neighbor’s store or restaurant to some big box on the strip, we make a decision about the economic future of our community. We send money out of our communities to distant corporate headquarters. We get inferior service and inferior products. We discourage local entrepreneurs and create more unskilled minimum-wage jobs.
The lesson for all of us is that we do better for ourselves and our communities if we patronize small businesses and use local tax dollars to encourage local entrepreneurs, not big boxes.
Buy local. Eat local. Patronize your neighbors. We’ll have more knowledge and control over what we consume. Our economy and our bodies will be healthier.
In BJ’s or the Three-Legged Dog coffee shop or other local restaurants, I see familiar faces. Instead of convenience and speed, I get friendliness.
So, how about that crazy weather? And Marie, please bring me another piece of your peach pie.
Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
published in the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, January 17, 2012
Further down the street are all the icons of American fast food, with their familiar signs, impersonal service and boring food. Nobody can beat their prices, because their food is prepared in bulk, frozen solid, shipped around the country in big trucks, and served by kids earning minimum wage. Instead of seeing familiar community faces behind downtown counters, people who know your name and your mother’s, whose kids play ball with your kids, Americans sit in cars, order through loudspeakers, and get chemically enhanced, over-salted machine-made “food”.
People talk a lot about the importance of small business, and then get a burger at McDonald’s and go shopping at Wal-Mart. These ugly big box stores and the fatty food purveyors are often blamed for killing local downtown businesses. But it’s not their fault.
Over the past 40 years, the aggregated choices of American consumers have forced thousands of diners, hardware stores, independent pharmacies, and Mom-and-Pop groceries to close up.
Why? Price has something to do with it, but less than most people think. For 2 fresh eggs done the way I want them, 2 pieces of the kind of toast I like with jelly, hash browns, endless coffee, and a piece of pie, I paid $7.42 at BJ’s. At the local McDonald’s a large coffee with no refill, large fries, and a piece of their formerly frozen pie cost $4.47. They don’t serve bread or eggs, but you can get a thin gristly burger on a squishy roll, and come out a bit ahead.
Or so it seems. But the savings we think we get from these giant corporations are illusory. The website of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance offers an eye-popping list of scientific studies over the past decade to show how big box development actually costs American taxpayers and communities billions of dollars (www.newrules.org/retail/key-studies-walmart-and-bigbox-retail#1). The destruction of small businesses by giant chains means reduced property tax revenues. The opening of a new Wal-Mart on Chicago’s west side in 2006 caused about one-fourth of businesses within 4 miles to close, some Loyola University researchers found. Away from big metropolitan areas, big boxes in larger towns cause the loss of businesses in surrounding smaller towns.
Taxpayers often fund the construction of big box stores through tax rebates and provision of infrastructure services. Over the past two decades, communities in the St. Louis region have spent $5 billion to fund the construction of big box stores and shopping malls. But the combination of lost businesses and increased costs for roads and other infrastructure for big box stores can mean that this “commercial development” never pays anything back. In Barnstable, Massachusetts, increased costs to local government were greater than new tax revenues, and fast-food restaurants were the most costly kind of development. Smaller retail stores, in contrast, produced a net plus in tax revenue vs. cost. Because Wal-Mart in California pays 30% less than other retail stores, taxpayers there pay nearly $100 million extra dollars a year to provide various forms of public assistance to Wal-Mart workers, who fall below the poverty line.
In hard times, corporate America has a cold heart. Although their charitable giving may seem impressive because of the size of their firms, small businesses give significantly more to local charities per employee than giant corporations. During the last Depression, American families facing hard times were carried by their local shopowners, their neighbors, sometimes for years. Community solidarity spread the few resources around, so the maximum number of people could survive unprecedented economic hardship. Try getting a meal at Burger King on credit.
We can’t blame politicians, the media, or corporate executives for the decline of American small business. Every time we imagine we’ll save a few cents by driving past our neighbor’s store or restaurant to some big box on the strip, we make a decision about the economic future of our community. We send money out of our communities to distant corporate headquarters. We get inferior service and inferior products. We discourage local entrepreneurs and create more unskilled minimum-wage jobs.
The lesson for all of us is that we do better for ourselves and our communities if we patronize small businesses and use local tax dollars to encourage local entrepreneurs, not big boxes.
Buy local. Eat local. Patronize your neighbors. We’ll have more knowledge and control over what we consume. Our economy and our bodies will be healthier.
In BJ’s or the Three-Legged Dog coffee shop or other local restaurants, I see familiar faces. Instead of convenience and speed, I get friendliness.
So, how about that crazy weather? And Marie, please bring me another piece of your peach pie.
Steve Hochstadt
Jacksonville IL
published in the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, January 17, 2012
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