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The University of Chicago’s Independent Student Newspaper since 1892

Chicago Maroon
The University of Chicago’s Independent Student Newspaper since 1892

Chicago Maroon
AWS Website Banner 11/4 – 12/4
The University of Chicago’s Independent Student Newspaper since 1892

Chicago Maroon
Stories and content by Andrew Hammond

The family cap is ineffective and immoral

By Andrew Hammond / April 13, 2007
Last summer, federal welfare reform written by the Republican Congress and signed into law by then–President Clinton celebrated its 10th anniversary. With that anniversary came a rehashing of the tempestuous debate waged 10 years earlier in Washington, replete with editorials and panel discussions by wonks and hacks from all shades of the political spectrum. Conservatives...

The impact of Dems’ newfound populism

By Andrew Hammond / February 23, 2007
In hopes of explaining the Democratic takeover of Congress last fall, many pundits looked for some common ingredient in the new members’ ideologies. What they found was economic populism. Take Democrats Jim Webb and Jon Tester, without whom the Senate would still be in Republican hands. Webb is a Virginian who served as Secretary of...

Commanding performances rule in Court’s rendition of Chekhov masterpiece

By Andrew Hammond / January 26, 2007
American playwrights such as Tennessee Williams, Arthur Miller, and Eugene O’Neill often evade the issue of mortality. Suffering and death rarely trump the American playwrights’ preoccupations with alcoholism and father-son relations. Anton Chekhov, on the other hand, never avoids the issue. He wrestles it to the ground, and that struggle is on full display in...

Reentry program does not reflect U.S. values

By Andrew Hammond / January 23, 2007
Every year, 650,000 Americans are released from prison. After having served their time, they hope to reenter society, trying to reconnect with their families, find jobs, and return to a safe and healthy life. Yet that hope is too often dashed by laws that prevent these former prisoners from voting and finding employment. They find...

Liberaltarians?

By Andrew Hammond / December 4, 2006
Sebastian Mallaby of the Washington Post is about as good at deconstructing the American right as E.J

George Will on Jim Webb

By Andrew Hammond / November 30, 2006

So George Will does his best to skewer Senator-elect Jim Webb in the Post today. While I admire Will as a writer, I can't stand him as a pundit. The collapse of his beloved conservative revolution has...

A view of the election results from the left

By Andrew Hammond / November 10, 2006
Things are looking up. As of today, the Democrats have won a majority in both the House, with at least 27 seats, and the Senate. The midterm elections amounted to a resounding rebuttal of the Bush administration. So much can be said about why the Democrats did as well as they did, what they will...

On chemical plant security

By Andrew Hammond / October 20, 2006
In the five years following September 11, our Congress has not passed a single piece of legislation to protect the 15,000 chemical plants in the United States. More than 100 of these plants could, if attacked, endanger the lives of more than a million people. Investigative reporting by Carl Prine at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review has...

Who can lay claim to American history?

By Andrew Hammond / October 13, 2006
My girlfriend is smarter than me. So you can imagine why it can sometimes be frustrating to debate her. But this summer as we sat in front of Mount Rushmore, someone made my argument for me. I had insisted on stopping by that great monument to some of our greatest citizens, and beneath the four...

Too soon for Obama ’08? Think again.

By Andrew Hammond / October 6, 2006
A common response when someone says that Barack Obama should run for President in 2008 is, “it’s too soon.” I’ve heard this from professors, political operatives, and pundits. To respond, I need to separate the complaint into two components: first, that Obama’s inexperience would damage his chances of winning the presidency; and second, that Obama’s...

Failures of the past and ideas for the future

By Andrew Hammond / October 2, 2006
This is the fourth and last year I will write a column for the Chicago Maroon, and I feel more idealistic than when I started writing. But before I spend the year reveling in the realm of distant possibility, let me begin with frustration. For this is also the fourth year, but unfortunately not the...

In praise of self-assigned reading

By Andrew Hammond / September 14, 2006
Hello! My name is Andrew Hammond and I represent a portion of the left side of the opinion spectrum formally known as the Viewpoints Section. During the year, my writing will anger those of you who don’t agree with me and disappoint those of you who do. But before we usher in a new year...

The Pale Hose

By Andrew Hammond / July 11, 2006
A combination of interstate highways, yellowstone bison, and softball heroics have conspired to keep

The use of force against Iran is only futile

By Andrew Hammond / May 5, 2006
Editor’s Note: This is the second of a two-part series on the prospects of democracy and American action in Iran. When Americans talk about Iran these days, the discussion does not focus so much on whether bombing Iran would be a bad idea, but whether or not it could actually happen. Sadly, the answer to...

Iranian students will revolt, just not soon

By Andrew Hammond / May 2, 2006
Editor’s Note: This is the first of a two-part series on the prospects of democracy and American action in Iran. A question that has been repeatedly asked since the overthrow of the shah and the establishment of Iran’s theocratic regime in 1979 is: When will the regime fall and democracy rise? Notice that didn’t say...

More on Darfur

By Andrew Hammond / April 30, 2006
George is right to point out that the genocide in Darfur is making for some strange political bedfell

Chicago Weekly: Ethical journalism needed

By Andrew Hammond / April 18, 2006
The next time you pick up the Chicago Weekly (CW), do me a favor. Grab the first two sheets, and let go of the rest. You will have, in your hand, all of the content for that week’s issue. At your feet will be a copy of New City, a free citywide publication that better...

U.S. needs engagement not partisanship

By Andrew Hammond / April 6, 2006
In 1798, the Alien and Sedition Acts were passed by the Federalist-controlled Congress and signed by President John Adams to, among other things, suppress the political activities of the opposition Republican Party. The Sedition Act, which made it illegal to criticize the government, was used to imprison a few editors and politicians and scare more...

Building walls will not lead to progress

By Andrew Hammond / March 31, 2006
The issue of immigration has consumed the month of March with a ferocity no one expected. One hundred thousand people marched in Chicago. Five times that marched in Los Angeles. In states as dissimilar as Iowa and Mississippi, there have been demonstrations and counterdemonstrations. The United States Senate has stopped all other business in order...

Claypool is just what Cook County needs

By Andrew Hammond / February 7, 2006
On March 21, Illinois Democrats will nominate their candidates for the 2006 election. In that election, the nomination for Cook County Board President will be decided—a position that commands the second largest county in the U.S., a three-billion- dollar government, and services that affect five million people. John Stroger, the current Cook County Board President,...

Secrets of an American family are laid bare in Fences

By Andrew Hammond / January 24, 2006
The story is simple. Or at least, it seems to be. The year is 1957, and Troy Maxon is a former Negro Leagues baseball star who is building a fence around his yard. Over several years, as he completes this domestic task, we meet his wife, his two sons, his brother, and his best friend....

Balancing the past to change the present

By Andrew Hammond / January 12, 2006
Often, when we want to make sweeping conclusions about the past, history affords us a much more complex picture than we would like. In biography, when we think we have finally found the man, a new fact dashes the portrait we’ve painted. Indeed, part of the present is always spent retelling the past. For years,...

Fighting the idea of comparative comfort

By Andrew Hammond / January 5, 2006
This is the first article in a series that will focus on the rhetorical framework of poverty as a political issue in the United States. In its Christmas issue, the formidable British weekly The Economist published an article on poverty in America and Africa. The article used the stories of two men, one, an unemployed...

The federal poverty line must be reformed

By Andrew Hammond / November 14, 2005
The story of the federal poverty line (FPL) is a story of an arcane, bureaucratic exercise that was transformed into a nationwide standard—a standard that has gone untouched for over 40 years. More accurately described as the poverty threshold, the FPL is terribly inaccurate. This bizarre story causes one to be bemused at how something...

Ishiguro discusses Hollywood, flirts with spoilers at Seminary Co-Op

By Andrew Hammond / April 25, 2005
With his clipped accent and sincere demeanor, Kazuo Ishiguro endeared himself to an eager audience at the Seminary Co-Op last Friday. Ishiguro, acclaimed author of A Pale View of Hills and The Remains of the Day, read from his new novel Never Let Me Go and then fielded questions from the audience. There has been...

Haiti is a disaster that is always ignored

By Andrew Hammond / April 25, 2005
William Tecumseh Sherman once said, “You cannot refine it. War is hell.” If General Sherman were alive today, he would say the same thing about Haiti. The poorest country in the Americas is a disaster. The statistics are as numerous as they are appalling. So let’s look at the greatest hits. The average Haitian has...

American kids need a longer school year

By Andrew Hammond / March 4, 2005
American children go to school only 180 days a year. While this period may have seemed more than enough for us when we were kids, it is far too short. The brevity of the American school year is obstructing our children’s opportunity to learn more and ensuring our future demise in the global economy. For...

We must stop the spread of meth in U.S.

By Andrew Hammond / February 14, 2005
The war on drugs was never won. We have incarcerated non-violent drug offenders, who are disproportionately black, despite drug users being overwhelmingly white. We have not stopped the steady flow of narcotics into this country from other nations. And dealers continue to push drugs near schools and to prey on kids. And now, there is...

Religious rhetoric isn’t bad; hypocrisy is

By Andrew Hammond / January 20, 2005
President Bush’s inaugural speech was like all of his other presidential speeches: It was filled with religious rhetoric. Bush’s speechwriter, Michael Gerson, has unabashedly admitted to intentionally employing that tradition in presidential addresses. Many liberals believe that this practice is disrespectful to those Americans who are not part of a particular religious affiliation. They believe...

Bush’s awful plan to privatize social security

By Andrew Hammond / January 11, 2005
Two-term Republican president Dwight D. Eisenhower once wrote, “Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again…There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes you can do these things. Their number is negligible and they are...

National Treasure : If Jerry Bruckheimer taught your AP history class

By Andrew Hammond / November 21, 2004
National Treasure is everything you would expect from a Jerry Bruckheimer production: a movie that groans and inevitably collapses under the weight of a heavy score, even heavier action sequences, and heavier-still sentimentality. I assume that, conceptually, National Treasure was supposed to conflate The Da Vinci Code and the Indiana Jones trilogy. Yet, what we...

Is Harry Reid the leader the Democrats need?

By Andrew Hammond / November 15, 2004
As we recover from the shock that was November 2, Democrats all across the country prepare for the onslaught of an extreme, right-wing agenda. Clinging to hopes of success in the midterms or even retaking the White House in ‘08 might be soothing conjectures for the meantime, but the most important time for the Democrats...

Lost souls, classic Holmes come to vivid life at UT

By Andrew Hammond / November 7, 2004
Danny and the Deep Blue Sea, presented this Friday and Saturday by University Theater, is a furious sprint by two desperate and isolated people who, in a night of need, reach out and find solace in the misery they share. The one-act play is at once an intimate portrait of two lost souls and a...

In praise of Kerry and the Democrats

By Andrew Hammond / November 2, 2004
I am so fortunate to get a chance to talk to you about this election and present my thoughts on what is always an intensely personal and collectively powerful decision. It is a right that we Americans are entitled to by law, but one that others all around the world still fight and die for....

Child poverty: A modern American tragedy

By Andrew Hammond / October 27, 2004
Hubert Humphrey once said that “the moral test of a government is how that government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; and those who are in the shadows of life: the sick, the needy, and the handicapped.” Our government has...

VP debate: A golden opportunity for Edwards

By Andrew Hammond / October 6, 2004
Tonight, John Edwards and Dick Cheney will debate for the first and last time. The vice presidential debate in Cleveland will give both candidates a chance to make a case for their presidential running mates. But the debate offers Edwards an even greater opportunity. The vice presidential debate will allow John Edwards to hold up...

Secretary Rumsfeld must resign

By Andrew Hammond / May 7, 2004
If you have not emerged from the academic bubble of this University recently, I urge you to come out and look at the photographs that are consuming Washington, D.C. and enraging the world. They show a U.S. soldier dragging a naked Iraqi prisoner across the floor with a leather leash. They show American soldiers posing...

Specter and the death of the GOP moderate

By Andrew Hammond / April 27, 2004
Arlen Specter, senator of Pennsylvania, is in a tough spot this spring. The four-term moderate is facing a serious challenge in the Republican primary from the right-wing Representative Pat Toomey. Only a few months ago, Specter’s challenger had poor name recognition, little money, and apparently no chance to take the nomination away from Specter. Yet...

Studs Terkel’s national diagnosis

By Andrew Hammond / March 12, 2004
On Wednesday night, I was lucky enough to hear a great American speak: Studs Terkel. An alumnus of our law school, Terkel is a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian who has written eleven books on various topics of 20th-century America, including the Great Depression, World War II, and the civil rights movement. Terkel is unique in his...

Democrat Barack Obama

By Andrew Hammond / March 5, 2004
On March 16, Democrats all over the city of Chicago and the state of Illinois will flock to the ballot box to vote in their party’s primary. Although Illinois Democrats will have little effect on the presidential primary, they will presumably pick the state’s next U. S. Senator. The incumbent Republican, Peter Fitzgerald, has announced...

The Nader effect will be minimal in ’04

By Andrew Hammond / March 2, 2004
So Ralph Nader is going to run again. In an interview on “Meet the Press” this weekend, the consumer advocate and perennial presidential candidate announced that he would run for the White House as an independent. With the Democratic Party livid over Nader’s entry into the race, political analysts are trying to determine how much...

Bush’s national guard scandal is nothing new

By Andrew Hammond / February 17, 2004
Recently, opponents have called into question President Bush’s National Guard service (or lack thereof) during the war in Vietnam. As the son of a Congressman, President Bush was able to fulfill his service in Texas, not Vietnam, as a member of the state Air Guard (I guess in case the Viet Cong crossed the Rio...

Wisconsin: An important crossroads for Democrats seeking the nomination

By Andrew Hammond / February 6, 2004
As the remaining presidential hopefuls campaign across the country, both strategists and journalists alike are looking for the next state that will have the most impact in the Democratic nominating process. For this writer that state is Wisconsin. The past three primary dates (in Iowa, New Hampshire, and the seven states this week) have accomplished...

Candidates fail to address economic gap

By Andrew Hammond / January 27, 2004
Despite my obsession with Democratic Party politics, I have yet to find my candidate for the 2004 presidential election. Perhaps I’m just too picky, or perhaps in the reality of politics it is nearly impossible to find a candidate that can be supported without reservation or qualification. Maybe these reservations stem from my love for...

Democrats need Daschle victory in 2004

By Andrew Hammond / January 20, 2004
These days, any self-respecting Democrat has to feel sorry for Tom Daschle. Once the leader of Democratic opposition to the Bush administration, Daschle has now dropped off the political radar screen. He has become the subject of that Washington adage: If you are not in the presidential news cycle, you are simply not in the...

The Iowa caucus will be both close and crucial

By Andrew Hammond / January 13, 2004
On Monday, January 19, Democrats from all over the state of Iowa will convrge in each of its 2,131 different precincts to debate and show support for their respective candidates, giving to ordinary citizens the first opportunity to pick their President. The caucus in Iowa has just recently become two separate races: one between Dick...

Marriage evolves in America

By Andrew Hammond / December 2, 2003
One in every two marriages ends in divorce. This well known fact is spouted by everyone from our parents to our friends to the Christian Coalition. Recently, conservatives have pointed to this statistic as a sign of the supposed decline of morality in America. They say we are entering a crisis that will destroy the...

Democrats need new Southern strategy

By Andrew Hammond / November 11, 2003
Republicans won two gubernatorial seats in the South this week. Haley Barbour, a former chairman of the Republican National Committee and a Washington insider, beat the incumbent Democrat Ronnie Musgrove in Mississippi, and Kentucky will have a GOP governor, Ernie Flecther, for the first time in more than 30 years. These two defeats for the...

Dean is the democratic front-runner

By Andrew Hammond / November 3, 2003
Tonya Southard’s article (“Howard Dean Has What It Takes To Be President,” 10/31/03) highlighted many important issues that will confront the American people in 2004, but she was not able to answer any of my questions about Dean’s weaknesses as a candidate. First, her premise was fallacious. I am incredibly optimistic about the coming presidential...
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