I knew Gary was making a name for himself, but I didn’t know he had his own damn town.

Nope, I don’t have any defense for the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, a breakaway Mormon sect that still practices polygamy. But, I’ve seen links to two such defenses. (One at Dispatches from the Culture Wars and one at Opening Arguments.) In the former, Ed Brayton at Culture Wars does a pretty good take down of an entry “by Butler Shaffer at Lew Rockwell that discusses “interesting parallels” between this situation and…military bases.” Brayton responds:

Allow me to point out what is, indeed, obvious: if military bases were used for raping (no, the “spiritual marriage” does not transform the rape of a 13 year old girl into anything other than rape) barely pubescent girls, he might have a point. Yes, military bases are well guarded and have on-base housing. And therefore….what? Shaffer doesn’t say, of course, I suspect because he knows his insinuations are utterly moronic.

I’ve mentioned it before, but Jon Krakauer’s book “Under the Banner of Heaven” is an excellent book, primarily focused on the FLDS and the history of the Mormons.

In a couple of places today, I heard about folks protesting the running of the torch for the Olympics as a way of protesting China and its actions. There was also some talk about boycotting the Olympics to protest China’s treatment of Tibet.

As a matter of principle (based upon admittedly limited knowledge of the situation), I suppose I’m against Chinese occupation of Tibet. But, in my mind, this has a very tenuous relationship to the Olympics. China hasn’t changed much from when we started trading heavily with them; and hasn’t changed much from when the Olympic committee decided to hold an Olympics there. It’s not like anyone woke up in the past couple of months and discovered, “OH MY GOD! China commits human rights abuses! Did *you* know about this?” So, trying to punish abuses with a boycott of the opening ceremonies or the games generally doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me.

Oh, and interesting tidbit: The running of the torch from Greece to the host stadium was initially done for a Leni Riefenstahl propaganda film promoting the 1936 Olympic games in Germany. A much less interesting tidbit: when I was 5 and my Grandma and Grandpa were telling me about the torch coming from Greece, I asked them why they didn’t just use Greek matches.

Dateline Muncie. Democratic hopeful, Barry Welsh, took a punch to the head from a Muncie GOP leader by the name of Will Statom. Welsh is seeking the nomination in the hopes of unseating Mike Pence in the fall.

Statom is described by the Muncie Star Press as the “GOP registration deputy and secretary of the local Republican Party.” The altercation apparently started as Statom was whining about media coverage. A Star Press reporter was interviewing a citizen about the flood of new registrations apparently generated by the Obama campaign. As Statom walked passed the reporter, he shoved Werner. Candidate Welsh stepped in to break it up and took a swing at Welsh. Statom was arrested for battery.

Perhaps related is the fact that the Delaware County voter registration office is understaffed because the local GOP has filled only 2 of its 3 slots. This may cause tensions as the office is called upon to process a large volume of new registrations; registrations about which the local GOP might not be thrilled if they were generated through the efforts of the Obama campaign.

The reporter, Nick Werner had written a story about the staffing shortage. Statom had refused comment. The position had been vacant since 2006.

[U]nder the worst circumstances, [Democratic Delaware County Election Board Member Phil] Nichols said, some registration applications may not be processed in time for voting in the May 6 primary.

While Indiana voters are not required to register with a party, the majority of applications came from the Barack Obama campaign and other Democratic sources.

“In that sense, it’s no skin off their nose that these don’t get processed,” Nichols said.

Update The Star Press has an update. Apparently the Star Press reporter wasn’t entirely blameless. After Statom whined sarcastically about Werner’s reporting, Werner said “shut up.” Statom practically had to resort to violence after that kind of verbal provocation.

Why I started focusing on the financial crisis in Carroll County, I don’t know. But, it’s like a car wreck, and I can’t turn away. The Journal & Courier has a new article indicating that the Carroll County judges are indicating a refusal to abide by the County Council’s budget cuts unless the state Supreme Court relieves them of constitutionally mandated cases and services.

County commissioners approved two funding requests by the county council that could bring the 2008 budget below the $5 million state-mandated level. The slashing of $1.8 million was achieved through deep reductions in emergency services and reallocation of funds.

But Superior and Circuit Court judges have issued a letter refusing $90,000 of the cuts unless the council can persuade the state Supreme Court to relieve them of constitutionally mandated cases and services.

“It would become impossible for us to do the job of the court if our staff is reduced,” Superior Court Judge Jeffrey R. Smith said, who added his court staffing has not increased since 1975.

Smith declined to speculate if the council would challenge its stance.

County Courts are in a different position than other areas of county government. Though the Council has the authority and duty to make funding decisions for the courts, judges have the authority to mandate funds from the county. The County Sheriff, for example, can’t issue a legally enforceable mandate if the funding for his department gets slashed below a level necessary to carry out the duties imposed on him by state law.

Now that the voter registration phase of Indiana’s primary has closed, a kind reader from the Tippecanoe County area suggested that I remind folks of their options and some logistics with respect to casting their vote.

STEPS:

1) To Vote in Indiana — bring your state approved photo ID (Drivers License or ID) or a US Passport with an expiration date. Student ID does not work. (IF you need a photo ID — go to the BMV and get one for $10.)

2) If your IN Drivers License does not have your current address you must ALSO bring a copy of a bank statement, utility bill, government document, paycheck — with your name and current address. Official institutional documents are needed, not random mail.

3) You can vote early. In particular, the reader noted that Purdue students can vote in Stewart Center on April 17-18th — even before the Pennsylvania primary, then “sit back and study for those finals!”

Just a reminder, today is the LAST DAY to register to vote in Indiana’s primary. If you want to vote — and you ought to want to vote because you’re a citizen, dammit — make sure to register. There are probably many ways to do it, but if nothing else, go to your county’s voter registration office; Tippecanoe County’s is in the court house; and get it done. I believe you can register at any BMV branch as well. (Years ago, while in Marion County, there was some sort of screw up when I tried to register through the BMV and I have gone through the county voter registration office since then.)

Think you’re registered, but aren’t sure. You can check online.

It’s a little amazing that we still haven’t figured out a way to vote without substantial problems. But, in any case, Todd Rokita’s office has filed to collect civil penalties against MicroVote for that company’s sale of uncertified voting equipment to up to 47 counties in 2005 and 2006. An administrative ruling held that the company owes the state $360,000 for its violations.

Mainly, I’m flagging this entry at the Indiana Law Blog for potential future use in one of my cases. It concerns tough times for pork producers due to an oversupply of pork and increasing prices for feed.

I have a case where I represent a secondary player in suit filed by a pork producer who feels he didn’t get the pigs he was promised, forcing him to stop producing his own hogs. If it gets that far and if pork prices tank as much as predicted (some are saying it’s going to be worse than the dismal years of ’98-’99), maybe I can argue that he owes us money.

There is a great article this morning in the New York Times Magazine focusing on the development of Maricopa, Arizona. Primarily, it highlights the short-sightedness of using adjustable rate mortgages and interest only loans and the like. Such financial tools have their uses, but it seems that too many home buyers, particularly in hot markets like Arizona, used those tools in conjunction with an assumption that the boom-times would last forever. I had a history teacher who told us that, whenever someone tells you that the good times are here to stay, you should check your wallet and head for cover. (He told the class this in October of 1987; made a little gesture as if sniffing the air; and said, “in fact, it smells like we’re in for another downturn.” A week or so later, Black Monday took place on Wall Street. He had my attention for the rest of the year.) Home values were inflated, people would come in and buy the houses with interest-only loans, ARMs, and the like; anticipating that the home values would continue to rise; at which time, they could refinance or sell the house. When home prices started drifting back down to earth, the house of cards started collapsing. People find themselves struggling to pay their interest-only mortgages in a market where they could rent a property twice the size at half the price. It reminds me of some of my collections where the bank has repossessed the car and the debtor thinks that should be the end of it. I have to advise them, that this isn’t the case where they struck a crappy bargain, agreeing to pay more for the car than it was probably worth (not to mention depreciation, etc.) Now they don’t have a car, *and* they’re stuck paying an extra few thousand bucks. This home market problem is like that with dollar amounts that are an order of magnitude greater.

But there was a side-theme to the article that caught my attention as well. There is real value to local government restrictions on development. Obviously this runs contrary to libertarian notions of a mostly unrestricted right to use one’s property as one sees fit. But, with almost no zoning laws or area planning in effect in Maricopa, each developer was acting in a way to maximize its profits, but this lead to a town that didn’t work especially well. For example, there was only one road to Phoenix, with no overpass over the train tracks, turning the busy roads into a parking lot when a train came by. Apparently there was no space for a high school. High schools lowered property values. One developer said he’d rather build a jail on his property than a high school. In the evenings, since the area was little more than subdivisions, there was nowhere to go and nothing to do. Apparently you were looking at a 45 minute drive to find anything interesting to do. Typically local government will have community development regulations in place to promote the orderly growth of a community, mitigating some of the negative consequences of developers acting purely to maximize their personal self-interest. However, Maricopa wasn’t much of a community before the developers came in to take advantage of the expansion of the Phoenix metropolitan area.