Hoosier lore

Cool:

Legislative leaders say all Indiana General Assembly committee meetings will be shown live online in the 2011 session for the first time.

In previous legislative sessions, House and Senate sessions and certain committee meetings were broadcast online. But House Speaker Brian Bosma says cameras and microphones have been installed in all Statehouse committee meeting rooms so that all meetings can be shown online.

Man, that's a lot of White Castles

The Indiana State Board of Accounts says East Chicago Police Chief Augusto Flores and Human Resources Director Hector Rivera must repay $1,340 to the police department's petty cash for disallowed expenses -- including a run to White Castle, known for its hamburgers called "sliders."

I'm not sure I quite understand the hysteria over Four Loko. Four states have banned the caffeinated malt beverage, and the Chicago-based manufacturer has bowed to pressure and agreed to stop shipping it to New York. And in Indiana, beverage retailers are trying to get out in front of lawmakers:

Taking big steps on important issues for the wrong reasons. A statewide smoking ban, for example:

Even the lobbyist who represents some of the principal opponents of a statewide ban said it's just a matter of time before smoking is prohibited across Indiana.

Every game has a risk:

Democratic Rep. Brad Ellsworth has portrayed himself as a friendly moderate who would work with those on both sides of the aisle in the U.S. Senate. But he's trailing in polls and fundraising, which has forced the cornered underdog to bare his teeth, though Republicans don't seem intimidated.

Steven R. Farrell, standing trial in Benton County on an accusation that he murdered his fiancee on the day they were to have been married, could have chosen his words just a bit more carefully:

The prosecution submitted as evidence a letter that Farrell wrote to a friend. In this letter, Farrell wrote that a second friend had given him a lot of ways "to do away with Christine."

When given the opportunity to respond to this letter, Farrell said, "I never wanted to kill her. I loved that woman to death."

It's almost Halloween. Are you afraid? Do you have the lab standing by to check your kids' candy? Time for the annual debunking of an urban myth:

Halloween is the day when America market-tests parental paranoia. If a new fear flies on Halloween, it's probably going to catch on the rest of the year, too.

I miss Larry Hayes. When he was editorial page editor of The Journal Gazette, he had a way of pouring out liberal diatribes that gave my day a fist-through-the-wall, spittle-on-the-chin, howl-in-the-soul start. He could always help me get to work wide awake and ready. And I certainly tried to return the favor for him from time to time, to make sure he was teeth-grindingly alert on his drive home. Since his departure, the JG editorial page seems somehow diminished to me. Oh, they're just as wrong just as often as they always were, but the fires seem banked a little.

I'm not sure how much stock we should put in this speculation about Mike Pence's plans, since it is attributed only to "a source familiar with his deliberations," but it's not too early to start talking about which conservative candidate to put up against President Obama (and Pence clearly qualifies since, as the article notes, he is "a darling of the conservative movement").

Hey, a clash with the wellness fascists in which the plebes win:

Indiana University, the fourth-largest employer in the state, is backing off a key part of its new wellness program after a backlash from employees.