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Steve Hochstadt

Steve Hochstadt is a writer and an emeritus professor of history at Illinois College.

  • Jan 12, 2016

    Teaching Hate, Learning Hate

    by Steve Hochstadt

    Hatred and anger are powerful political emotions. Republican candidates believe they can employ the politics of hate to win elections and then later control the hatred they encourage.
  • Dec 22, 2015

    It's A Bird! It's A Plane! It's Superman!

    by Steve Hochstadt

    Superman was the great savior during my childhood, along with a few other heros with seemingly superhuman abilities to dodge bullets and fight evil, like Wyatt Earp and Matt Dillon. It’s thrilling to know that a real, live Superman now flies among us, fighting evil and saving America. Of course, I mean Donald Trump.
  • Nov 24, 2015

    Cops Out of Control

    by Steve Hochstadt

    If we can watch a new video every month of groups of police brutalizing unarmed citizens, then we have a police problem.
  • Nov 11, 2015

    Science, Large and Small

    by Steve Hochstadt

    My dogs would make poor scientists, because they can be individual learners at best, unable to profit from the knowledge gained by other members of their species. But they are better scientists than Republican know-nothings, because they learn from the world around them without political filters and ideological blinders.
  • Oct 28, 2015

    The Great Myth of the Free Market

    by Steve Hochstadt

    We can joke about the conservative effort to deregulate our economy. “How many conservatives does it take to screw in a light bulb?” Answer: “None. If the government would just leave it alone, it would screw itself in.” But saving lives is no joke.

  • Oct 20, 2015

    A Speaker Who Speaks for a Few

    by Steve Hochstadt

    The so-called House Freedom Caucus, representing the people who made his job so impossible that Speaker John Boehner announced that he was quitting Congress, are demanding a Speaker for themselves.
  • Oct 15, 2015

    It Can Take A Long Time

    by Steve Hochstadt

    Some men want to physically engage every woman they see who fits their image of sexy. They interrupt everything, get too close, use their hands, and won’t take “no” for an answer. When it doesn’t work, they try it again with another woman. Over and over again they manhandle women, because they think about them as the dog thinks of the squirrel, as lesser but attractive beings who must be chased. There used to be lots of guys like that.
  • Oct 7, 2015

    Bugs in the Volkswagen System

    by Steve Hochstadt

    Cheating on an unprecedented scale was a simple business decision. Volkswagen executives had spent billions to develop a new diesel engine, but executives realized it could not meet the pollution standards of many nations, including the US and Germany. They could have scrapped the new model. Instead they put a software “bug” into the cars’ computers.

  • Sep 29, 2015

    Ben Carson’s Religious Tests for Candidates

    by Steve Hochstadt

    Carson applies his tests of religious suitability only to Islam. He does not advocate that a Christian specifically renounce the Biblical passages which violate our Constitution, such as approving discussions of slavery and of stoning women accused of adultery.
  • Sep 22, 2015

    What Do Republican Voters Want?

    by Steve Hochstadt

    Republican voters want a confrontational outsider. Not necessarily a belligerent lover of personal confrontations like Trump. Carly Fiorina and Ben Carson act more decorously, but their policies are belligerent.
  • Sep 16, 2015

    When Religion and Politics Collide

    by Steve Hochstadt

    Conservative Christians claim that they are only defending freedom of religion, but there is no attack on their freedom to worship and believe as they like. They want more. They want laws which apply to all Americans to reflect their religious beliefs. They demand the right to disregard laws they don’t like. They want their religion to be our politics.
  • Sep 2, 2015

    Science, Averages and Hokum

    by Steve Hochstadt

    When you take the claims of global warming deniers, such as the so-called pause in warming, or the number of scientists who are skeptics, or the lack of consensus of the world’s scientists, and investigate the footnotes or check the math, you see that they are not doing science. Their work cannot stand peer review, so it is published on the internet, where they get maximum readership with minimal credibility.

  • Aug 26, 2015

    How Do We See the Poor?

    by Steve Hochstadt

    It doesn’t do Democrats any good to advocate for the poor. They don’t make the giant political contributions that keep the Republican machine going. They don’t vote as often as the people who make those contributions. They don’t staff the offices of lobbyists in Washington. They don’t hobnob with candidates at fancy dinners. There is no quid pro quo for helping “the most vulnerable”, except the feeling that it’s the right thing to do.

  • Jul 25, 2015

    The Meaning of Donald Trump

    by Steve Hochstadt

    Trump is just riding a wave. Soon he'll go down. What matters is what other Republicans do with their most vocal and extreme voters.
  • Jul 16, 2015

    The Myth of Liberal Media

    by Steve Hochstadt

    One of the most significant political myths is about the “liberal media”, the supposed tilt of American public media to the left. This claim by Republicans is nearly as old as I am. It was false when it began, and it still is, although less so.
  • Jul 8, 2015

    Bad Wars and Their Consequences

    by Steve Hochstadt

    The political leaders who now demand that we commit more people and money to these mistaken incursions into other people’s lands are the same ones who say we don’t have enough resources to pay for schools or poverty programs or museums.
  • Jun 30, 2015

    That Was The Week That Was

    by Steve Hochstadt

    June 2015 will be remembered by us and by tomorrow’s historians as a moment of profound cultural and political change.
  • Jun 18, 2015

    Bernie Sanders for President?

    by Steve Hochstadt

    It’s too early to say who will win the Democratic nomination. But it’s never too early to think about how we can win back our country from the billionaires and their political buddies.
  • Apr 29, 2015

    Let's Kill the Unions

    by Steve Hochstadt

    It’s been a bit more than 100 days since Republican Bruce Rauner became Governor of Illinois. Despite the enormous financial problems facing our state, he has yet to propose specific methods of dealing with our deficit and our debt. He has yet to propose any tax reform. But he has been very active on one of his pet projects – killing unions.