Eric Zorn

There's no evidence Chicago Tribune columnist Eric Zorn ever worked for the Illinois Department of Weights and Measures, which is a bit ironic because Zorn's writing is both weighty and measured. 

His is the clear-eyed voice of reason in a time where the beating of the partisan drum is what typically passes for fact-based thought.

I finish his pieces feeling they should be mandatory reading for Democrat and Republican alike.

He has powerfully advocated for ranked choice voting, answered the critics who oppose the repeal of Illinois' ludicrous flat tax and landed a solid body blow to Trump's somnambulant response to the Coronavirus and the misanthropes who refuse to don a face mask amidst a pandemic.

Unlike the blog you're reading now, Zorn refrains from name-calling and profanity, perhaps enjoying the advantage of writing for a newspaper expected to observe a certain level of decorum.

Whether he's writing from rage or anger or merely possesses a different point of view, he calmly and purposefully builds his argument and arrives at conclusions that don't routinely skew to one side of the aisle or the other.

But they always make sense. They always add up. And sometimes, they even provoke the admission that yes, my party/candidate/agenda doesn't always provide the best answer.

Sadly, paper media is an endangered species. The Tribune itself is now owned by Alden Global Capital, a concern Vanity Fair lovingly described as “The hedge fund vampire that bleeds newspapers dry.”

Ask yourself: what's a newspaper compared to some Wall Street fuck becoming wealthier?

Point being, read Eric Zorn and “Change of Subject” while you can. As we should all understand so very, very well by now, nothing is promised.