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Politics and other nightmares

Hicks in Harlan

Hundreds of less-than-progressive Harlan residents show up at a meeting on incorporation and say no thank you to the idea of becoming a town:

Opponents feel the costs would outweigh the benefits.

They say incorporation would mean higher property taxes but services, like fire and police protection, wouldn't improve much.

Exit help

When it comes to assisted suicide, most jurisdictions in this country still make it a crime (34 states, including Indiana,  explicitly by aw, and nine through common law).  Three staters (North Carolina, Utah and Wyoming) have abolished the common law of crimes and have no statutes criminalizing assisted suicide. In Ohio, the state Supreme Court has ruled that assisted suicide is not a crime. In Virginia, there is no clear case law, but there are civil sanctions against assisted suicide.

Gropers

The Wall Street Journal's James Taranto on Scott Brown:

If Scott Brown is a RINO, any conservative with a semblance of sanity should drop to his knees and say a prayer of thanks for the creation of RINOs. If the species didn't exist, Sen. Martha Coakley would be the 60th vote in favor of ObamaCare. No, scratch that. She'd be the 62nd vote for ObamaCare, the 60th and 61st coming from the Maine Democrats who would have soundly defeated whatever "real" Republicans ran in place of Snowe and Collins.

A package deal

The message here seems to be somewhere between "no thanks, mind your own business" and "we're mad as hell and we aren't going to take it anymore":

Within hours of Sen. Evan Bayh's (D-Ind.) retirement announcement last week, establishment Democrats in Indiana and Washington were signaling that Rep. Brad Ellsworth (D-Ind.) was their preferred favorite to succeed him. And by Friday, the last day to file for office, Ellsworth had announced his intention to run for the Senate seat.

Table stakes

Looks like no land-based casinos in Indiana, at least for now. The argument for letting "riverboat" casinos move to dry land was that it would protect the revenue stream we already have, projected to decline by about 35 percent from increased competition in adjacent states. But the argument that won the day was that allowing the moves would amount to continuing the "slippery slope of gaming expansion."

Mixed signals

I'll just do the juxtaposing, and you can come up with your own comments. Story 1:

In a sign of possible differences among top military officials, Army and Air Force chiefs voiced concern Tuesday about ending a ban on gays serving openly in the armed forces while the country is in the middle of two wars.

And story 2:

Hearts and minds

So sad. But once they've matured a little and started using their minds as well as their hearts, they'll come around:

Younger adults, who turned out in unprecedented numbers to help elect Barack Obama to the presidency, say liberalism helps define their generation, a poll found.

A cure for Co

Evan Bayh says maybe what Washington needs are more lawmakers like Scott Brown:

Brown's upset victory over a Democrat who held a double-digit lead a week before Massachusetts' special Senate election last month signaled that voters wanted “more practical problem solving,” Bayh said in an interview Monday on ABC-TV's “The View.”

Salt shaker

Further proof that we should take what "the experts" say with, well, a grain of salt:

For all the talk about the growing menace of sodium in packaged foods, experts aren't even sure that Americans today are eating more salt than they used to.

[. . .]

Guns galore

These are heady days for 2nd Amendment fans. Under a new federal law that took effect yesterday, when you're packing for a trip to a national park, you can include heat:

Visitors now can pack heat in any national park from Gates of the Arctic to Everglades, provided they comply with the firearms laws of the park's home state, according to the new law that was passed as an amendment to credit-card legislation.

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