George Walker Bush, apparently a mild-mannered frat boy from the elite reaches of New England society is really COMMANDER GUY: THE DECIDER, fighting a never-ending battle against Truth! (The Department of) Justice! And the American Way!

Monticello Mayor, Bob Fox, was arrested in his house on Friday. He allegedly submitted mileage claims on 39 occasions for events he either did not attend or for which he did not provide his own transportation resulting in reimbursements of $2,482.83.

I’ll be watching this one since I lived in Monticello for about 7 years. Bob always seemed like a nice guy, but I can’t provide any better character references than that. Seems like a 71 year old mayor isn’t going to intentionally commit crimes for a couple thousand bucks, but who knows.

Actually, the Monticello Herald Journal has more in depth coverage

An interesting article by Michael Pollan in the New York Times Magazine entitled You are What You Grow.

The article responds to the hypothesis that the people with the least amount of money to spend on food are the ones most likely to be overweight:

Drewnowski gave himself a hypothetical dollar to spend, using it to purchase as many calories as he possibly could. He discovered that he could buy the most calories per dollar in the middle aisles of the supermarket, among the towering canyons of processed food and soft drink. (In the typical American supermarket, the fresh foods — dairy, meat, fish and produce — line the perimeter walls, while the imperishable packaged goods dominate the center.) Drewnowski found that a dollar could buy 1,200 calories of cookies or potato chips but only 250 calories of carrots. Looking for something to wash down those chips, he discovered that his dollar bought 875 calories of soda but only 170 calories of orange juice.

. . .

This perverse state of affairs is not, as you might think, the inevitable result of the free market. Compared with a bunch of carrots, a package of Twinkies, to take one iconic processed foodlike substance as an example, is a highly complicated, high-tech piece of manufacture, involving no fewer than 39 ingredients, many themselves elaborately manufactured, as well as the packaging and a hefty marketing budget. So how can the supermarket possibly sell a pair of these synthetic cream-filled pseudocakes for less than a bunch of roots?

The answer is farm subsidies. Corn (sugars), soy (fats), meat, and milk are heavily subsidized while fresh produce receive almost nothing in the way of subsidies. “The reason the least healthful calories in the supermarket are the cheapest is that those are the ones the farm bill encourages farmers to grow.” The logic of these subsidies finds its way into our school lunch programs where chicken nuggets and tater tots are reimbursable but healthier fare is not.

Interesting article. The author definitely has an agenda, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he’s wrong.

I just happened across this passage from Bolt’s A Man for All Seasons. It’s one of my favorites, so I thought I’d post it. The background is that Sir Thomas More, then Lord Chancellor of England, is arguing with his daughter’s suiter, Roper, as to whether to apprehend a government agent who is about to falsely inform on him.

More There is no law against that. (being false and evil)

Roper There is! God’s law!

More Then God can arrest him.

Roper Sophistication upon sophistication.

More No, sheer simplicity. The law, Roper, the law. I know what’s
legal not what’s right. And I’ll stick to what’s legal.

Roper Then you set man’s law above God’s!

More No, far below; but let me draw your attention to a fact – I’m not
God. The currents and eddies of right and wrong, which you find such
plain sailing, I can’t navigate. I’m no voyager. But in the thickets of
the law, oh, there I’m a forrester. I doubt if there’s a man alive who
could follow me there, thank God….

Alice While you talk, he’s gone!

More And go he should, if he was the Devil himself, until he broke the
law!

Roper So now you’d give the Devil benefit of law!

More Yes. What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get
after the Devil?

Roper I’d cut down every law in England to do that!

More Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round
on you – where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This
country’s planted thick with laws from coast to coast – man’s laws, not
God’s – and if you cut them down – and you’re just the man to do it –
d’you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow
then? Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake.

“A Man for All Seasons” — Robert Bolt

This really gets at the issue of why it’s necessary to abide by and preserve the rule of law even where, in particular cases, it is unpopular or inexpedient or ineffective.

Niki Kelly, writing for the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette, has an article on the truck seat belt bill, HB 1237, entitled Deal requiring truck seat belts goes to House. As I understood it, the major hang up between the House and Senate was whether to alter the local road funding formula. Should the money be doled out based on a county’s ratio of cars to the state’s total cars, or should it be doled out based on a county’s ratio of cars & trucks to the state’s total cars & trucks. The Senate version left it at the former while the House version contained the latter. So, just really, really generally – Senate version favors urban areas whereas the House version favors rural areas.

However, according to Ms. Kelly’s article the four conferees (conferees usually being made up representatives of both parties from each chamber) agreed on the Senate version with a small change. The change involves the extra federal money Indiana would receive if it finally eliminates the truck seat belt loophole. The conference committee version of the bill would prohibit using that extra money on safety checkpoints set up to catch Hoosiers without seat belts. The local road fund formula would remain cars only.

Strikes me as odd that the checkpoint language would be enough to get the thing passed. The legislators representing areas with more trucks seem likely to take the most heat from this legislation. Consequently, it seems like they would really like to bring home more money to their counties in return.

[tags]HB1237-2007, seat belts[/tags]

Bill No.: HB 1019 Digest: Criminal law matters.
Authors/Coauthors: Duncan, Summers
04/25/2007 H House reconsidered and concurred in Senate amendments; Roll Call 576: Yeas 91, Nays 0
This bill primarily has to do with the elements involved in deprivation of child custody crimes.
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Bill No.: HB 1092 Digest: Military service benefits.
Authors/Coauthors: Avery, Hinkle, Stilwell, Reske
04/25/2007 H House reconsidered and concurred in Senate amendments; Roll Call 577: Yeas 92, Nays 0
Mostly this bill imposes a requirement that employers allow family members of military personnel called to active duty up to 10 days of unpaid leave. However, there is also an interesting provision that forbids hotel and motel owners from refusing to rent a room to a person solely because the person is under 21 if that person is on active duty. I’m not so sure about that last one. I’m all for making sure military personnel aren’t denied lodging, but I think the reasons that make hotel owners reluctant to rent their property to young people between 18 and 21 are probably still equally valid concerns if we’re talking about a young soldier on leave from the Army. In my experience, those guys drink harder than just about anybody when given the opportunity.

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Bill No.: HB 1220 Digest: Adult protective services.
Authors/Coauthors: Hoy, Dickinson
04/25/2007 H House reconsidered and concurred in Senate amendments; Roll Call 579: Yeas 93, Nays 0
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Bill No.: HB 1278 Digest: Local government investment pool.
Authors/Coauthors: Austin, V. Smith
04/25/2007 H House concurred in Senate amendments; >
This bill allows local governments to deposit money with the State Treasurer for investment. Seems to maintain liquidity and conservative investments but presumably reduce administrative costs by pooling resources.
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Bill No.: HB 1287 Digest: Jury selection.
Authors/Coauthors: Richardson, Dvorak, Grubb, Koch
04/25/2007 H House concurred in Senate amendments; Roll Call 581: Yeas 89, Nays 2
Primarily appears to be a house keeping bill, re-organizing the jury selection codification. Also allows a county to use unencumbered money in its jury pay fund to improve the county’s jury system.
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Bill No.: HB 1348 Digest: Medicaid reimbursement for umbilical cord blood.
Authors/Coauthors: Welch, Koch, Battles, Turner
04/25/2007 H House reconsidered and concurred in Senate amendments; Roll Call 578: Yeas 89, Nays 0
Requires the office of Medicaid policy and planning to apply to the federal government for authorization to reimburse a health care provider under Medicaid for the collection of cord blood from a pregnant Medicaid recipient upon the birth of a newborn.
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Bill No.: HB 1557 Digest: Various financial institutions matters.
Authors/Coauthors: Burton, Bardon
04/25/2007 H House concurred in Senate amendments; Roll Call 583: Yeas 91, Nays 0
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Bill No.: HB 1739 Digest: Sale of handguns.
Authors/Coauthors: Pelath, Denbo, Murphy, Reske
04/25/2007 H House concurred in Senate amendments; Roll Call 582: Yeas 83, Nays 9
I tend to think of this as the Wolverines! bill. It eliminates the requirement that a handgun dealer, after selling a handgun to a purchaser, forward to the state police department a copy of Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives Form 4473 completed and signed by the purchaser. I believe it was the 4473 registry that the Cubans used to figure out which Coloradans had firearms. I suppose it’s beside the point to question why the heck you’re sending the Cubans to Colorado? Seems like some Siberian-trained, Afghanistan-hardened Soviets would be more appropriate.

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Bill No.: SB 286 Digest: Environmental crimes and infractions.
Authors/Coauthors: Kenley, Bray, Broden, Gard
04/25/2007 S Senate concurred in House amendments; Roll Call 465: Yeas 43, Nays 0
Among other things: Makes violations of certain environmental statutes or permits Class D felonies. Makes certain environmental crimes Class C felonies if the crimes result in the death of a person. Requires a court to consider any improper economic benefit received by a defendant, including unjust enrichment, in determining the level of fine to impose. Provides that a person who makes a material misstatement in an application for a permit or for certain forms of financial assistance commits a Class D felony. Makes poisoning a water supply or tampering with a water supply with intent to cause serious bodily injury a Class B felony.

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Bill No.: SB 506 Digest: Private investigator and security guard licensing.
Authors/Coauthors: Merritt, Wyss, Rogers
04/25/2007 S Senate concurred in House amendments; Roll Call 466: Yeas 40, Nays 0
Changes the detective license law to the private investigator firm license law and the security guard agency license law and also establishes: (1) the private investigator and security guard licensing board; and (2) requirements for security guard agency licensing.

I really enjoyed Matt Tully’s column on his interview of Ken Falk, director of the ACLU – Indiana entitled Surprisingly, my interview with evil went well.

Tully asks the hard questions, like:

• Why do you hate God?
• What’s the ACLU’s problem? All you folks ever do is complain.
• Instead of suing over this, shouldn’t you just get a life?
• Clearly you and everyone else at the ACLU are evil and will settle for nothing less than destroying the fabric of this great country. Right?
• Are you a communist?

Apparently these questions were taken from the comment section of the Indy Star’s bulletin board discussion of the license plate lawsuit.