More original blog reporting. If his prediction, based on talking to GOP insiders, holds up, Nathan Gotsch scored an exclusive on Gov. Daniels' plans to back Richard Mourdock as state treasurer.
More original blog reporting. If his prediction, based on talking to GOP insiders, holds up, Nathan Gotsch scored an exclusive on Gov. Daniels' plans to back Richard Mourdock as state treasurer.
I think most of us would agree that this loss has not been good for us, and it's nice to think that bringing it back could cure so many of our ills. But as the columnist himself hints at near the end of the piece, it's a lot more complicated than that. The diappearance of the dinner hour isn't the cause of the loss of family cohesion but the result of it.
Remember, there is no such thing as a stupid question. There are, however, plenty of stupid people who ask questions.
Today's quiz; What do Indiana U.S. Sen. Richard Lugar and Sting have in common? Funny old world, huh?
Well, Gov. Daniels might be making controversial decisions and keeping Hoosiers on the edge of their seats wondering what's coming next, but at least he's staying on top of his most important duty: "From a pure entertainment standpoint, you must admit the guy makes for good copy." Heaven forbid that columnists get bored; because, then, we all suffer.
This column about Gov. Daniels' plan to increase logging in state forests is no more or less hysterical than most of the opposition, and about as factual. What critics of the plan leave out is that, even with the increase, harvesting will be less than growth: no net decrease in trees, in other words.
Prudes on the West Coast. Who'da thunk it? "It's wiping out an entire industry in Seattle." So sad.
So, it's Harriet Miers for the O'Connor seat. Bush managed to select someone whose views on major issues are even less-known than those of John Roberts. Everyone is likely to be focused on what the Democrats will make of this, but the early response from Bush's conservative base doesn't seem so good.
Mitch Harper has kicked off what could be a hot topic of discussion -- corporate ownership of newspapers. I have no particular interest in defending the corporation except for the comment I left on Mitch's post and for this observation: As Harper and one of the commenters pointed out, this is still a two-newspaper town, a rarity these days.
Here is a photo of my cat Maggie -- not a very good one, granted, shot hastily with my new cell-phone camera. But it shows how the reporting capabilities of bloggers are advancing. I also carry around a 5-megapixel camera, which takes much better pictures. But it's complicated to post them on the blog.
Former State Rep. Mitch Harper has started a blog, Indiana Parley, and he's joined the discussion we've been having about who is a "real" journalist.
For all you political geeks who want to start getting ready for next year's elections, here's a site to bookmark. It's opensecrets.org, where you can find out who is donating how much to politicians, political parties and political action committees.
I just got an e-mail alert that the mastodons are leaving downtown, so you'd better seem 'em soon if you haven't already. But the online auction for those who want to bid on a mastodon is ready and will continue until Oct. 20:
Place your highest, most comfortable bid now. The mastodons are going to be auctioned October 21, 2005, at the Grand Wayne Center. If you are without a ticket, a special web address will be made available for you to bid LIVE while the auction is occurring on 16 mastodons of the heard.
You know, of course, about the top three major disasters predicted by the federal government -- we've now had the terrorist attack on New York City and the New Orleans hurricane, so that means only the San Francisco earthquake is left. But what about the 10 most likely disasters now seen in our future?
Pay special attention to No. 5, the Midwest earthquake:
Welcome to the Roberts Court, America. This is, of course, good news for the new chief justice's Hoosier friends. Not that every Hoosier is his friend.
A lot of people think the current president's bioethics council is concerned a little too much about the ethics and not enough about the bio, although the way they usually put it is "religion trumps science" or some such. That's a fair assessment; I think the administration is less science-friendly than it should be. But some people don't worry enough about the opposite extreme, our scientific enthusiasms running way ahead of our ethical and moral sensibilities.
I think this is just so sad. Elian Gonzales, another little Castroite. It's no surprise at all that the report would be on "60 Minutes." Any bets on how sympathetic the program will be to Elian's Miami relatives? They're reactionary conservatives, you know. Just never got Castro's perfect society.
I thoroughly enjoyed the two-part Bob Dylan documentary on PBS Monday and Tuesday nights, although it seems odd that all the recent Dylanmania focuses on his first few years when he's had a career lasting more than 40 years. There's a reason for such '60s wallowing, as post-boomer critic David Greenberg points out in a Slate article:
Let's keep up the pressure on eminent-domain abuse, from all quarters. And here's the view from the lowly little bean company itself.
It's going to keep getting harder to get away from it all when it's much easier to take it all with us. This study from my alma mater shows that the communications revolution goes even deeper than we've realized. It turns out that everybody -- not just the young or the technically savvy -- multi-tasks. This is creating quite a buzz in the news business, as you might imagine.
