This sounds like a good idea:
Do you have a stack of old parking tickets lying around your home? Perhaps collecting dust and overdue fines.
How would you like to pay those tickets without paying any of the late penalties that come with them?
That's what Fort Wayne City Clerk Sandy Kennedy is proposing.
I'm not sure what to make of the new poll of Hoosiers by Ball State University. It found that we would support higher state taxes -- by margins ranging from 58 percent to 70 percent -- to fund public schools, colleges and universities, health care and environmental protection. On the down side (if you're a public official):
It's amazing how such a little thing can please us so much:
After missing several days last week, National Serv-All said it is now caught up in trash pick-ups.
Icy weather and the Christmas holiday last week put a large portion of Fort Wayne's trash pickup to a halt as garbage began to pile up at street corners throughout the city. A number of complaints were also called in to The News-Sentinel about the situation.
I have a new favorite Hoosier public official:
Discussions regarding traffic-watching cameras at stoplights might creep back into the state legislature this year, but two local officials are dubious as to their potential.
Terre Haute Mayor Duke Bennett said he's not surprised the idea is being brought up again as the state begins its Jan. 7 legislative session, noting that he's not in favor of it.
That sound that keeps getting louder and louder is from the different drummer Indiana likes to march to. From Vincennes, we have:
A big crowd gathered to ring in the New Year by watching a glowing 550-pound steel and foam watermelon rise into the sky and drop real watermelons to the ground, delighting organizers of the unique event.
When our immediate reaction goes against our philosophic inclinations, we have to ask ourselves if we've encountered the exception that proves the rule or whether we're judging by different standards because the issue hits too close to home. I'm actually talking about my reaction to this:
The Indiana Veterans' Home has a new full-time superintendent, and he already has his hands full.
I guess the message here is that if no actual children were in danger of being harmed, the perverts get a break:
We who write columns and editorials sometimes slip into the easy habit of telling people what to do instead of merely laying out the evidence and letting people draw their own conclusions. Slash that budget, Mr. Governor! Leave that adult bookstore alone so the First Amendment doesn't die a horrible death, Ms. Prosecutor! Tote that barge and lift that bale! Even so, this guy sounds a little presumptuous:
"OK, Natasha, here is plan. First, you hide all acorns..."
"...ALL acorns, Boris?"
"Yes, Natasha, ALL acorns. Then squirrel will come out in open to look for food in cornfields and garbage cans, and we grab him. Then, moose will come looking for squirrel, and we grab HIM, too. Then we ship moose and squirrel to Pottsylvania, and Fearless Leader will give us big bonus."
At some point, a president's contemporaneous critics have to let go so the history books can start having their say. What can be said about a president who: 1) lied to get us into a war in which our soldiers died pointlessly, 2) left what had been a promising economy in an absolute wreck, 3) talked a good conservative game but governed more like a liberal and 4) took the world stage with a naivete that took us to the scary brink? But enough about LBJ, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and JFK. What about George Bush?
Bob Steele worries about bloggers' standards:
"I'm very worried about the significant erosion of ethical standards across our profession and the resulting corrosion of the quality of the journalism," writes Bob Steele in Nieman Reports. "The blogs, Tweets, social networking, citizen-submitted content, and multimedia storytelling that are the tools and techniques of the digital era offer great promise. They also, when misused, present considerable peril."
"I believe the death penalty is a just punishment for four counts of murder." That's not the police or prosecution calling for the execution of the murderer Joseph Corcoran. That's Joseph Corcoran speaking, being quoted by the appeals court that just put the death penalty back on the table in his case (pdf of the court's decision).
This is just sick:
While thousands of dogs and cats are being given up by pet owners across the U.S. as times become harder, chickens are gaining popularity as household pets in some U.S. cities.
The rising popularity of the feathered creature is due to the chicken's ability to provide eggs, pest control, fertilizer and eventually meat. To address zoning regulations, homeowners are working to amend local laws in areas like Fort Collins, CO, Bloomington, IN and Brainerd, MN.
Lake Superior State University continues to do God's work with its annual list of words so overused they should be banned forever:
A movie about a "maverick," his journey "from Wall Street to Main Street," his "desperate search" for a "monkey" and a "game-changing" revelation about his "carbon footprint" probably would make the nation's word-watchers physically ill.
Especially if it were the "winner of five nominations."
Like many people, I wondered why it was there was such international silence at Hamas constantly lobbing rockets into civilian areas of Israel but such loud international outrage when Israel finally retaliated. Alan Dershowitz puts it much better:
(Author's note: Several years ago, I had fun writing a serious of columns called "Remembered truths" that examined the wisdom (or lack of it) in familiar proverbs. Following is the one I wrote for New Year's 2001 that took off from "Time and Tide wait for no man." Sometimes, I read my stuff years later and wonder, "What in the world was I thinking?" But sometimes, as with this piece, I find I still like it.)
Nothing is quite as entertaining as Chicago politics:
Rep. Bobby Rush says he doesn't think any U.S. senator would be caught turning a black man away from serving alongside them.
[. . .]
Darn, just when I was thinking about investing in Soylent Green:
Citing the impact of the recession, Indiana's environmental agency has halted funding for state grant and loan programs that support recycling and pollution prevention -- a cutoff that will persist through at least through summer 2010.
[. . .]
This is a minor irritation, really, but if I hear about one more "self-titled" album, I'll scream.
