Well, I've read all the gushing from the right and all the bashing from the left on Sarah Palin, and it was all more or less predictable stuff. But, finally, an incisive insight:
Yes, Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin has a lot on her plate: a pregnant teen daughter, a son on his way to Iraq, an infant with Down syndrome and a looming national election.
A distinction without a difference:
Despite many using the words interchangeably, mopeds and scooters are not the same thing, and do not have the same set of laws applied to them.
We Hoosiers seem to be a bloodthirsty lot. Saw this story from the Muncie newspaper (via the Indianapolis Star) -- a homeowner had confronted a burglar and held him at gunpoint until police arrived and hauled him off. Seemed like a routine story, so I wondered why there were so many comments. Many of them were in this vein:
Romance goes awry in southern Indiana:
Events did not go as planned for a Linton man and a woman from Vincennes who agreed to have sex with him in exchange for vodka, cigarettes and $10 cash.
Corey Breneman, 36 of Linton, faces a charge of patronizing a prostitute. And 40-year-old Eydan Brown of Vincennes is charged with prostitution.
Nobody can beat Republicans for being clueless about how some of the actions lookand sound:
My first impression of Sarah Palin was that she is the most libertarian-leaning of all four major-party candidates. Others are starting to weigh in with the same impression, noting that, for example, she vetoed 300 pork projects in her first year in office. She is also, of course, a social conservative. However:
Well, by God, how can Jude Law calling for Afghan peace NOT turn things around?
KABUL (Reuters) - Militants, foreign forces and the government in Afghanistan should give up their arms for one day as the first step towards peace, Hollywood superstar Jude Law said on Monday.
Do children really need this instruction -- have they been stuck in front of the TV and computer and gaming consoles that long?
Bureaucratic crazy councils are to issue school children with instructions of how to play in the playground.
OK, I went to the new Harrison Square Web site and took the virtual tours. The place as conceived looks nice, but the prices are still ridiculous. $150,000 for barely over 600 square feet? And all the downtown amenities are just promised -- no guarantee of delivery. This seems like an attempt to promote the sizzle when people aren't buying the steak.
I've talked to Mark Souder a lot. He's at his most attractive as a politician when he gets caught up in some complicated and controversial issue like illegal immigration or Bill Clinton's impeachment. He has a policy wonk's fascination with details, and he really does consider all the sides and angles, which is why he was one of the few congressmen to think Clinton was guilty on some of his impeached behaviors but not on others.
Several reform groups will call for the repeal of property taxes when a legislative committee holds a hearing later this month.
The interim study committee will hear testimony on the issue at the Statehouse on September 10th.
Indiana Property Tax Repeal Alliance chairman John Price says property tax restructuring passed last year will have only a cosmetic approach.
Symbolic patriotism taken just a tad too far for me:
FISHERS, Ind. — Fishers High School students Wednesday will apologize for singing a faster version of the national anthem than the Hamilton Southeastern choir at Friday's football game between the schools.
The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger's beloved novel, once banned and full of frank four-letter words, will continue to be assigned to high school reading lists this year.
But Anne Trubek, a professor of English at Oberlin College, argues that it's time to update Salinger's coming-of-age tale.
I admire a student journalist who tries to punch up the lede on a routine story:
The first week of school introduced several students to a law enforcement agency devoted to preventing their underage debauchery.
Indiana State Excise Police Cpl. Brian Lang said excise officers have issued about 25 citations since move-in weekend. The majority of them were issued to students, he said.
Oh, no! Global warming is letting us down:
Santa can rest easy.
It's looking like the ice at the North Pole won't melt to water next month, as had been feared. It would have been the first time in thousands of years that the most northerly place on the planet would have been ice-free.
"We can't afford on-the-job training for our next president." That was Hillary Clinton, way back in November, speaking of Barack Obama, though not mentioning him by name. This was my reaction:
Being president is a unique challenge, and in an election when there is no incumbent, there is no candidate who has any relevant experience.
[. . .]
VALPARAISO -- By most accounts, it's disgusting -- a mixture of decaying fruit, sugar and bread that Porter County Sheriff David Lain said "literally smelled like a garbage disposal."
However, guards doing a kitchen sweep recently at Porter County Jail found a batch.
Mayor Ballard apparently reconsiders a plan to de-green Indianapolis:
Indianapolis Mayor Greg Ballard appears to be backing away from the idea of selling the city's so-called pocket parks, though he is not ruling out the option.
Yikes! After Barack Obama's safe and predictable pick of Joe Biden, everyone's been expecting John McCain to do the same with Mitt Romney or Tim Whatshisname. Give the old man credit for being bold and unpredictable:
