A Citizen's Guide to Indiana

Masson's Blog

Congressional Races

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Some of the races are very preliminary still, but here are how the Congressional races are shaping up:

IN-01: Mark Leyva leads the GOP pack to take on Pete Visclosky. But it’s a 4 way race, his lead is slim, and only 17% of the vote is in.

IN-02: Joe Donnelly will be challenging Chris Chocola in November. Encouraging for the Democrats is that, with 80% of the vote counted, there have been 28,000 Democratic ballots in the 2nd District versus about 25,000 Republican ballots.

IN-03: Tom Hayhurst will be challenging Mark Souder. Using the previous ballot analysis, things might be fairly grim for Dr. Hayhurst in November. In the 3rd District, there have been about 11,000 Democratic ballots versus 37,000 Republican ballots with about 50% of the vote in.

IN-04: It’s not a lock at the moment, but with 60% of precincts reporting, David Sanders has just under 50% of the vote, while his opponents in the Democratic primary, Darin Kinser and Rick Cornstuble have about 25% apiece. The winner of that will challenge Steve Buyer. Again, the Republican advantage in terms of ballots is daunting — about 40,000 R versus 10,000 D.

IN-05: Still a toss up for the Democrats, but at the moment Katherine Carr is leading. The winner will take on Dan Burton.

IN-06: Barry Welsh will be taking on Mike Pence. Congratulations Barry. The ballots in the 6th District are breaking 20,000 D versus 40,000 R.

IN-07: Eric Dickerson will be taking on Julia Carson.

IN-08: Brad Ellsworth will be taking on John Hostettler. There were no primary challengers to either of these candidates.

IN-09: Baron Hill will be taking on Mike Sodrel. This one should be encouraging to the Dems with about 31,000 D ballots versus 19,000 R ballots having been cast with 57% of the precincts reporting.

Bad news for Lafayette area prosecutorial incumbents

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Looking at the WLFI election returns for the Lafayette area primaries, there seems to be a “throw the bums out” mentality in the Prosecutor races, at least in the areas I know anything about: Carroll County, Benton County, and Tippecanoe County. In Carroll County, Tricia Thompson is leading incumbent Rob Ives 63% to 37%. Tricia was a deputy prosecutor in Tippecanoe County until not too long ago. I don’t believe she was a deputy prosecutor in Carroll County for all that long before she announced as a challenger to Rob Ives.

In Benton County, Bill Weist has defeated incumbent Jud Barce 64% to 36%. The Barce family has a strong prosecutorial history. Jud has been the prosecutor in Benton County for quite some time. His brother Ed Barce is prosecutor in Newton County. And his father, John Barce, was prosecutor in Newton County years ago. Some may recall that John was in the news in 2001 when he was kidnapped and murdered by Lloyd Lichti.

And, in Tippecanoe County, Pat Harrington is beating incumbent Jerry Bean 58% to 42%. I’m not going to comment on that race because I know both Pat and Jerry. I’ll just say that Tippecanoe County will be well served with either of those gentlemen.

Bush: historically unpopular

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Chris Bowers at MyDD has some analysis of Bush’s latest poll numbers. Gallup has Bush’s disapproval rating of 63% — which is the same as Nixon’s disapproval rating at the height of Watergate (July 15, 1974.) Though I believe Bush’s approval rating of 34% is a bit higher than Nixon’s was. The gap between approval and disapproval (-29%) is within spitting distance of the all time worst held by Carter and Bush Sr (-31%).

Just, for what it’s worth, I’d happily replace George W. with Bush Sr., Carter, or Nixon. Incompetence *and* bad policy is a toxic brew. Dubya’s predecessors mostly seemed to suffer from one or the other but not both.

Government small enough to fit into your bedroom

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From the “government small enough to fit into your bedroom” department, we have the American Family Association of Indiana’s Micah Clark trying to breed hate against gays by trotting out the false assertion that homosexuality is somehow linked to child molestation. He provides no explanation for all of the molestations committed by heterosexuals. Advance Indiana takes him to task.

Immigration rallies

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Taking Down Words requested feedback on the immigration rallies. I left a comment there that seemed like the good basis for a post. In particular, TDW asked whether it seemed like a good political move or whether it would simply “motivate the right-wing conservative base that wants to build a wall around our country.” A couple of commenters noted that illegal immigrants had, by definition, broken the law and that appeared to end the discussion. One noted the political ineptness of the folks who flew foreign flags during the rally.

I responded:

I’m impressed that these other commenters have enough faith in our lawmakers to regard technical compliance with the law as the end-all-be-all of decision making. As for myself, I do not know enough about immigration law to know whether I should regard noncompliance with that law as more like raping a nun or more like straying over the speed limit.

As for the flags — I suppose it was politically foolish. But there is certainly a double standard going on. When right-wingers fly the Confederate flag, while we question whether they’re racist, they usually get off the hook by claiming that it’s a sign of their support for their heritage. We don’t question their patriotism. But we should. After all, the Confederate Flag is the flag of traitors. The flag of Americans who took up arms of against their government. The same can’t be said of the foreign flags at the rallies.

As for whether it will serve to motivate the right-wing Republican base, I think that’s something we have to stop caring about. Some emotional wedge issue will always be found to get those folks into a lather. Democrats have to resist the impulse to be quiet because they’re afraid Republicans might complain. The Democratic Party has become like a battered wife, walking on egg shells for fear of setting off her drunken lout of a husband.

Personally, I don’t know whether the rallies were a good move politically or not. In my opinion, the main immigration reform we need is with respect to wages and conditions of employment. I don’t have any real problem with the immigrants who come here seeking a better life. I think ultimately they give more than they get resource wise. They pay sales tax. Many of them overpay income tax and can’t claim a return. However, their inability to enforce legal rights mean that employers can underpay them with impunity. Absent employers’ ability to underpay illegal immigrants without fear of consequence, perhaps we would not have seen the steady decline of median wages over the past 25 years. But, in that debate, immigration is but one of many issues.

Primaries on Tuesday

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I can’t think of any particular insights to offer, but the primaries are tomorrow. For a good number of races, this is the most choice voters are likely to get in that all too often one political party dominates the region, meaning that the primary winner will skate through the general election. So, go vote.

Also, my philosophy on choosing between a Democratic or Republican ballot is simply to choose the one with the most races that matter to you. In other words, don’t feel constrained by your party affiliation. Rather you should take the ballot that represents the better tool with which to express your governmental preferences.

I suppose that was marginally insightful.

“Death” tax con job

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Public Citizen has generated a report (pdf) showing that 18 of America’s super wealthy families are primarily responsible for a lobbying effort to repeal America’s estate tax or “death tax” as Republican PR gurus and their devotees like to call it.

According to the press release by Public Citizen:

[The report] reveals how 18 families worth a total of $185.5 billion have financed and coordinated a 10-year effort to repeal the estate tax, a move that would collectively net them a windfall of $71.6 billion.

The report profiles the families and their businesses, which include the families behind Wal-Mart, Gallo wine, Campbell’s soup, and Mars Inc., maker of M&Ms. Collectively, the list includes the first- and third-largest privately held companies in the United States, the richest family in Alabama and the world’s largest retailer.

These families have sought to keep their activities anonymous by using associations to represent them and by forming a massive coalition of business and trade associations dedicated to pushing for estate tax repeal.

. . .

In a massive public relations campaign, the families have also misled the country by giving the mistaken impression that the estate tax affects most Americans. In particular, they have used small businesses and family farms as poster children for repeal, saying that the estate tax destroys both of these groups. But just more than 0.25% of all estates will owe any estate taxes in 2006. And the American Farm Bureau, a member of the anti-estate tax coalition, was unable when asked by The New York Times to cite a single example of a family being forced to sell its farm because of estate tax liability.

. . .

While they extol the hard work of individual farmers and small businesses, most of the 18 families have been wealthy for generations; only five still include the people who first earned the family fortune. Members of the families are far less likely than most Americans to have paid taxes on their wealth; to a large extent, that wealth lies in assets that have appreciated but, unlike paychecks, have never been taxed.

I have written about the estate tax in the past. Nobody likes paying taxes, and every tax contains elements that are unfair or particularly undesirable. But, I have never had anyone adequately provide a justification for eliminating the estate tax before eliminating the income tax. Whatever moral claim an heir has on the state of his father at the end of his life, it pales in comparison to the claim a worker has to his paycheck at the end of the week. So, whatever problems the estate tax has, there is little or no reason to address them while we still tax the paychecks of working people. Furthermore, extreme concentrations of wealth have pernicious effects on our democracy. I don’t have any serious problems with allowing individuals to amass ridiculous amounts of wealth based on their own luck and skill. But I don’t see any particular public good served by extreme levels of wealth in the hands of the children and grandchildren of those people. How many generations since John D. Rockefeller made his first billion? And we still have his progeny directly affecting our lives through their various prominent roles in our government. Skilled as those individuals may be, I would hazard a guess that they would not have attained their positions absence a pile of inherited wealth.

Daylight Saving Time votes draw primary challenges

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There are several incumbents who face primary challenges based on the incumbent’s supporting votes for Daylight Saving Time, including two in my area: House District 15 – Art Anderson challenging Don Lehe, and House District 24 – Richard Eller challenging Rich McClain. According to this letter writer, McClain promised that he would not vote for Daylight Saving Time, and yet he did.

Lehe has the classic, “I voted against it after I voted for it” defense to DST. The two votes he cast in favor of DST on April 11, 2005, are the times he had the power to kill it, so hopefully voters will recognize his later opposition was too little, too late.

From the Pharos Tribune article:

But the Daylight-saving time vote Lehe cast is one that drew much attention. His face was on the front page of the Lafayette Journal & Courier when he cast a swing vote that forwarded DST to the Indiana Senate. Lehe says people forget that he later voted against DST when the bill was sent back from the Senate, but by then, the issue was moot.

Now, the election will be held just weeks into the first period of DST in over 30 years. The decision sparked a series of issues, including a request by his own White County officials to be moved to the Central Time Zone. That request was eventually denied by the U.S. Department of Transportation. District 15 is a rarity in Indiana politics. It is a state House district in two different time zones.

“When you elect these people, you expect them to mess with their money, but they don’t expect them to mess with their lives,” says Anderson, who has served two terms on the county council and run several times for the Indiana General Assembly.

Old Media v. New

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I just came across a couple of paragraphs in a Pal-Item editorial that struck me as a bit self-serving and perhaps a bit wishful:

There are today millions of Web sites, many if not most of them started by individuals.

There is also a reason why, when it comes to the most reliable, credible information, Web sites operated by established media remain, especially for news, the most credible and therefore most popular. By and large, the media seek robust debate and discussion, but have in place standards for what they will allow to be posted on their Web sites or printed in their newspapers or aired on their broadcast outlets.

That is not to say that errors of omission do not occur. Mistakes get through, as sure as they do in print or on the air. But there is in place a better filtering process by editors trained in facilitating and fact-checking the flow of information.

I’m willing to bet that more people get their information from Daily Kos than from the Palladium-Item.

On the whole, I think resources to do the hard work of news gathering is the first reason people go to established news sources for their information. The second reason is credibility — new voices on the Internet have not, for the most part, had an opportunity to establish their credibility with the public. Credibility will come for some online sources. I’m not so sure about the news gathering — though Josh Marshall is taking a stab at it with his TPM Muckraker.

What many established news sources suffer from are a need to sell to the lowest common denominator and biases that are hidden rather than public. I know exactly where Kos and Marshall and Powerline, for that matter, are coming from and can calibrate accordingly. While a news source such as the Palladium-Item tries to be objective, I cannot be sure that it is succeeding and I cannot know what biases its writers, editors, and owners have but are trying to suppress. From reading its editorial pages, I would assume something of a right-wing slant, but it’s impossible for me to know how much its editorial sensibilities slip over into its news gathering and reporting operation.