A Citizen's Guide to Indiana

Kyle Stokes has a good post on some investigatory work being done to determine whether “For-Profit” colleges are doing their students any good or just saddling them with a large amount of debt.

I think some of the debate in that area is going to turn on what the primary value of college is supposed to be for young adults. In some ways, just having a diploma is the end result. The diploma gets you in the door for certain kinds of jobs; allowing you more and better opportunities for employment. A law degree can be like this in a lot of ways. There have been a number of stories out recently pointing out that law school is deficient in teaching students how to actually practice law. For example, unless you take a clinic of some sort (by no means mandatory) you’re unlikely to ever actually see how a court room works or get any tips on how to talk to a client; and you certainly are not getting information on how to run a small business. You might not even be asked to write a contract while you’re there. After getting out of law school; you are probably most qualified to be an appellate court judge since most of your time is focused on reading appellate court decisions.

But I digress. These days you can’t a license to practice law or find a law firm willing to hire you without a law degree. So, in that sense, the fact of the diploma itself is valuable. And, in the same sense, I think for-profit colleges serve that purpose.

But, the diploma is supposed to signify something. Another way of looking at colleges is that they actually improve your mind in some way that is merely denoted by the diploma — the diploma itself is an unimportant piece of paper. That seems to be where for-profit colleges fall short; but, I’m not sure how closely traditional college diplomas are correlated with turning out individuals whose mind has been improved in any particular fashion. Employers, I think, have some notion that this is what they are trying to screen for when requiring a diploma; but maybe they’re just screening out the riff-raff.

Don’t get me wrong; I fully intend my kids to go to college. I’m not sure they have any notion that stopping at high school is an option (and, in our house, it’s really not.) But, they have a Dad who is a nerd that is constantly evangelizing how cool it is to know stuff; so, hopefully, they’ll get the diploma that is useful in and of itself, but also one that will denote a great deal of learning.

The Indiana Law Blog has been doing a great job of covering the David Camm murder trial. Today, the ILB has a post on the subject of paying for these trials. Because of problems the first two go rounds, they’re headed for a third trial; this time with a special prosecutor.

So far, the trials have cost $3 million and the next one probably is not going to cost any less than $1 million. Floyd County says it’s keeping its head above water; but the County might have to dig into its Rainy Day Fund and/or Economic Development Income Tax.

I would think this kind of spending is particularly tough for county decision makers. It is easy, and mostly popular, to take a “let justice be done; though the heavens may fall” approach to prosecution, but at the end of the day, $4 million could do a county a lot of good if it were available for other purposes. If, just pulling numbers out of thin air, the guy was willing to plead to a 30 year sentence at a cost to the county of $100,000; is the extra benefit of a life sentence worth $3,900,000?

Charlie White’s handling of his voter registration, candidate eligibility case just gets stupider and stupider.

White won at the administrative level after the Indiana Recount Commission conducted a hearing. He then undertook to represent himself with unfortunate results. Today, the hits keep coming. Jim Shella reported that White did not appear for today’s hearing – the trial court has been asked to review the decision of the Recount Commission. A hearing was set for today. White apparently told Shella at one point that he planned to attend but thought the hearing was at 1 p.m. Now a spokesman for White is saying that White didn’t think his presence was required and that he didn’t plan to attend.

Back in June, I suggested that White was offering a choice that he’s fairly dishonest or fairly incompetent. Jury’s still out.

Judge Posner has some interesting and, I think, accurate thoughts on the Occupy Wall Street movement.

Briefly, he suggests that the movement was sparked by imitation of the “Arab Spring” movements facilitated by the advent of low cost organization tools provided by social media and fueled by economic anxiety arising out of the 2008 depression. He figures the police made a tactical mistake by busting heads; without that, the encampments would have died on the vine as winter set in and conditions deteriorated.

The grievances he identifies as income inequality, lack of jobs, and (perceived anyway) baleful influence of financiers. He concludes:

Railing against income inequality, job loss, and banking abuses is thus understandable, but it doesn’t do any good. The “Occupiers” are anarchic and disruptive, and the solid middle of American society, which rejects the Tea Party because of its goofy ideas, is likely to reject the Occupy movement because of its style, while broadly sympathetic to its antipathies. But if the movement attracts charismatic leaders amidst a stagnant or worsening economy, it may become a force in American politics.

I think I disagree with Judge Posner in the sense that OWS shifts the parameters of the “national conversation.” If you don’t have a left edge (even a disagreeable one) talking loudly about economic inequality, the centrist “common wisdom” will fall ever further to the right on such issues.

Just a little self-promotion here. I have a guest column running in today’s Fort Wayne Journal Gazette – sort of a “dispelling myths about the General Assembly” premise. Not exactly hard hitting, but it was fun to do.

The “new” Chrysler, which Richard Mourdock spent $2 million of Indiana’s money opposing, is adding 1,100 new jobs.

No real point to this post other than it’s an opportunity for me to reiterate how bad I think Mourdock’s decision to challenge the bankruptcy work out was.

Not trusting themselves to make responsible decisions about priorities concerning taxes and expenditures, the U.S. House of Representatives took a crack at a “balanced budget amendment” to the U.S. Constitution. And, one can’t be too critical of the self-assessment of some in Congress that they can’t be trusted with these priorities. I don’t know how many played the game Civilization, but there was a screen where you could devote the Civilization’s resources to science, luxuries, and taxes. As one went up, the other two would move. You could lock one in place at a certain rate so that the remaining balancing took place between the remaining two. Most of the House Republicans have taken a pledge to, in essence, play the game with the taxes locked somewhere between 10 and 20 percent (you have to pick between 10% increments).

Anyway, “balanced budget amendment” doesn’t really tell you anything. It’s one of those things that sounds good as a general proposition, but the devil is in the details. Here is the text of H.J. Res 2 which the House voted on:

`Section 1. Total outlays for any fiscal year shall not exceed total receipts for that fiscal year, unless three-fifths of the whole number of each House of Congress shall provide by law for a specific excess of outlays over receipts by a rollcall vote.

`Section 2. The limit on the debt of the United States held by the public shall not be increased, unless three-fifths of the whole number of each House shall provide by law for such an increase by a rollcall vote.

`Section 3. Prior to each fiscal year, the President shall transmit to the Congress a proposed budget for the United States Government for that fiscal year in which total outlays do not exceed total receipts.

`Section 4. No bill to increase revenue shall become law unless approved by a majority of the whole number of each House by a rollcall vote.

`Section 5. The Congress may waive the provisions of this article for any fiscal year in which a declaration of war is in effect. The provisions of this article may be waived for any fiscal year in which the United States is engaged in military conflict which causes an imminent and serious military threat to national security and is so declared by a joint resolution, adopted by a majority of the whole number of each House, which becomes law.

`Section 6. The Congress shall enforce and implement this article by appropriate legislation, which may rely on estimates of outlays and receipts.

`Section 7. Total receipts shall include all receipts of the United States Government except those derived from borrowing. Total outlays shall include all outlays of the United States Government except for those for repayment of debt principal.

`Section 8. This article shall take effect beginning with the later of the second fiscal year beginning after its ratification or the first fiscal year beginning after December 31, 2016.’.

Not exactly as concise as, say, “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” — and we still haven’t entirely ironed out what *that* means. Can you imagine how long we’ll be fighting over what constitutes an “outlay”? And yet 261 of your duly elected representatives voted for this hot screaming mess. As an addition to the Constitution.

They want an amendment to our Constitution that includes an incentive to go to and continue war as a budgetary tool. Rep. Donnelly crossed party lines to vote for that? The six Indiana Republican Congressmen also voted for it. Reps. Carson and Visclosky voted against.

One of the pervasive problems in America these days (yup, I’m doing one of *those* posts) is that we don’t trust each other.

Conservatives don’t trust that poor people are actually trying very hard. Liberals don’t trust that financiers are actually doing anything other than skimming off the top. Labor doesn’t trust that wage concessions are necessary to stay competitive – they think Management is just trying to up its take. Republicans don’t trust Democrats and vice versa. Young people don’t trust that working hard and playing by the rules is anything more than a formula for chumps. Old people don’t trust the young to be grateful for the opportunities they’re given. Insureds don’t trust insurance companies to act in good faith; insurance companies don’t trust doctors and patients to make reasonable choices. Public employees don’t trust that their pensions will be available when promised. The public doesn’t trust that public employees worked sufficiently hard for the pensions they were promised as compensation. Etc.

How do we fix this? I don’t know. Consistently reward good behavior and penalize bad behavior and do so publicly. Easier said than done, I suppose.