The Elkhart Truth has a strong and well written editorial defending its decision to print a wedding announcement for the son of an Elkhart family and another man who were getting married in Iowa. Bilerico documents some of the ensuing batshittery (Mr. Browning’s term) from right wing groups generally, and Rep. Jackie Walroski specifically.

From the Truth editorial:

We published an announcement Sunday that two men, one a former Elkhart resident, plan to marry this month in Iowa. For more than 48 hours, readers barely uttered a word. We received four e-mails — two against, one for and one that misspelled “disgusting” — two phone calls, and no letters to the editor and roughly 10 comments on eTruth.com.

Readers either didn’t notice the announcement among the other engagements Sunday or they made their peace with it. No big deal. That is, until a pair of family advocacy groups, abetted by a local AM radio station, organized a protest against The Truth.

People wrote and called from throughout Indiana. Many expressed their sincere belief that homosexuality is a sin and that marriage is between a man and a woman. Others quoted straight from the Fred Phelps playbook, excoriating “fags” and “perverts.”

The truth seems to be that there isn’t a large group of people who actually oppose gay marriage strongly enough to do anything about it. Plenty of folks have opinions, but, by and large, if their day-to-day lives aren’t affected, it’s not keeping them up at nights. There is, however, a loud and well-organized subset of the population who will raise holy hell over reporting the news of this marriage. After being dormant for a period of time, the machine kicked into gear. I’m happy the Truth didn’t feel the need to buckle under the barrage.

I’ve mentioned it before, but it seems worth repeating. Growing up, I believed myself to be anti-gay. This was nothing more than ignorant bigotry on my part. I hadn’t met anyone I knew to be gay. (I have come to learn that I knew several gay people, as it turns out.) In college, I finally met someone who was openly gay. He seemed like a good guy, and I realized I had no good reason to treat him any differently than anyone else, so my opinions quickly changed.

Similarly, not too long ago, I was uncomfortable with the notion of same-sex marriage for no particularly good reasons. The more it got discussed, the more I recognized that refusing to legalize same-sex marriage is unjustified discrimination.

Unexamined, opposition to same-sex marriage seems reasonable, but as soon as purported justifications are advanced, they seem to fall pretty quickly. “Because the Bible says so” doesn’t carry a lot of water — we eat a lot of shell fish and no longer require menstruating women to go to the edge of the village, among other things. Following any injunctions against homosexuality while rejecting the injunction against shell fish, for example, requires further explanation. The “we want to promote human reproduction” relied upon by the Indiana Supreme Court when upholding the local variation of the “Defense of Marriage Act,” also seems disingenuous. There is no effort at all to limit marriage to fertile heterosexual couples. Etcetera.

To me, therefore, opposition to same-sex marriage seems like an emotional, largely unreasoned, position. I’d be happy to examine any other rationales that are out there, but the two I mentioned are the ones I see most often. Anyway, good on the Elkhart Truth for its stance on wedding announcements.

John Tuohy, writing for the Indy Star, has an article about Lawrence Township Schoolboard member Adam Goldstein’s adventures in law enforcement. Allegations are that, when his wife was being ticketed on the 4th of July for something to do with operation of their boat at Geist Reservoir, he repeatedly told them he was a Fortville police officer.

He told them the same thing at 2:20 a.m. in the morning in the Geist Marina parking lot. He had gone back home, gotten a Fortville uniform and a Crown Vic cruiser. Trouble is, he’s a reserve officer in training. Or at least was. Now, instead of a ticket, he has been fired from whatever status he had with the police force, has the potential to be removed as a school board member, and is being charged with impersonating a public servant, a felony; two counts of drunken driving; misleading a police officer; and public intoxication. Whoops.

The Court of Appeals has issued a decision affirming a trial court’s dismissal of a township assessor’s challenge to the General Assembly’s decision to transfer township assessor duties to the county assessor. I haven’t read the whole thing and most likely won’t unless some paying work requires it, but the meat of the case seems to be the township assessor’s contention that the Indiana Constitution prohibits the elimination of the township assessor position during the assessor’s elected term of office.

Article 6, section 3 provides:

Section 3. Such other county and township officers as may be necessary, shall be elected, or appointed, in such manner as may be prescribed by law.

Article 15, sections 2 and 3 provide:

Section 2. When the duration of any office is not provided for by this Constitution, it may be declared by law; and, if not so declared, such office shall be held during the pleasure of the authority making the appointment. But the General Assembly shall not create any office, the tenure of which shall be longer than four years.

Section 3. Whenever it is provided in this Constitution, or in any law which may be hereafter passed, that any officer, other than a member of the General Assembly, shall hold his office for any given term, the same shall be construed to mean, that such officer shall hold his office for such term, and until his successor shall have been elected and qualified.

The assessor’s argument seems to be that, because township officers are mentioned in the Constitution under Art 6, sec. 3, the General Assembly is prohibited from terminating the position in the middle of an elected term. The Court of Appeals disagreed, stating that because there was no Constitutional obligation to have a township assessor and because the existence of the position was entirely dependent on statutory creation of that office, the General Assembly necessarily had the authority to terminate the position at its discretion.

I’m back in Indiana after a nice week in South Dakota. I highly recommend the Black Hills as a vacation spot – particularly if you have little kids. There is just a ridiculous amount to do. I will, however, have to make better arrangements for the traveling. My natural inclination is just to keep driving and driving and driving until the job is done. But, that takes a toll after 1,000 miles or so. It just seems wrong, somehow, to pay a hotel $100 or so to skip the best driving time of the day – then start driving again during the day when you have to stop every couple of hours for meals and whatnot. But, with the kids to look after, the following day is kind of tough – they are reasonably well rested, and I am not.

On July 7th, I capped off the day ditching the kids and going fishing with my buddy. I have little to no experience fishing, but after this week, I can certainly see the attraction. The nature of the activity has an addictive quality. And, I mean that literally. It gives you variable positive reinforcement which is generally a pretty effective way of inducing behavior.

The beers we were catching were bigger than the fish. We released the fish. The beers weren’t so lucky.

Yesterday, we started the long drive home. We took I-90 from Rapid City to Albert Lea, MN, stopping at Wall Drug, Al’s Oasis, and the Corn Palace along the way.

Wall Drug

Mitchell Corn Palace

By dinner time, in Jackson, Minnesota, we had not quite reached the half way point in the drive.

The kids caught some sleep on the road.

I was not as well rested.

Not sure how much I’ll be posting this week. The family is on a trip to South Dakota. I made them hang around Crawfordsville as I took care of some court hearings and then we made a 17 hour trip from there to Rapid City, South Dakota. Unfortunately, the logistics caused me — once again — to pass by the Corn Palace in Mitchell, SD and Wall Drug in the middle of the night. This is about the 3rd time that’s happened. One of these days, I’ll drive South Dakota in the daylight. Maybe on the way home.

But, on the upside, this effectively gives me an extra day of vacation. Because stopping at a hotel in the middle of the trip isn’t just 6 – 8 hours of sleep; it’s also winding down and getting up and getting packed again. Then it’s getting breakfast. Then, it’s getting lunch a few hours later. That probably would have been pleasant except that, as it turns out, Mount Rushmore does its fireworks on July 3, which is one of our goals. So, maybe I can dawdle a little bit on the way back. I’m not sure how many of those all-night road trips I have left in the tank.

The Indiana Barrister has the text of furlough letters sent to state employees by Gov. Daniels. The man just can’t help himself.

According to the letters, he is blameless. In fact, if anything, he went too far in trying to assist the General Assembly in passing a budget. His magnanimous concessions in this regard were “foolhardy.” State employees should make clear in their voice mails and e-mail responses that it is the General Assembly’s failure (not the Governor’s) that the government shut down. Rather than simply advising that the state employee’s office is closed until a budget is passed, the employees are directed to specify that the offices are closed “due to the failure of The Indiana General Assembly.” This seems like kind of a dick move. So, does this tie his hands on a veto – since that would mean the General Assembly did, in fact, pass a budget?

I don’t think my last attempt at fixing my rss feeds worked. The problem is that, since a recent WordPress update, my feeds are providing only excerpts instead of the full text. I know some folks like excerpts because, theoretically, it could drive traffic to their actual sites – and potentially increase ad revenue. In my case, that’s not what has happened. It’s merely a case of technical illiteracy. I’ll get this fixed eventually.

Something about my last upgrade for WordPress seems to have broken my full feeds to feed readers, sending only excerpts. Changing the options didn’t have any effect. So, I’m trying the fix listed here.

I’m not sure this amount of text is enough to test the full v. excerpt, so enjoy a little poetry:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand;
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

Today is the deadline for passing a budget. News reports indicate that legislators might have a deal that could pass. It’s “Republican flavored” and resembles the Senate version more than the House version. The budget will almost certainly pass the Senate, but it is reportedly questionable in the House. Whether the uncertainty is real or mostly posturing on the part of Speaker Bauer is hard to tell. In any case, it looks like Minority Leader Bosma will have to deliver some votes instead of the House Republicans’ customary bellyaching.

Mainly the individual representatives need to check the final numbers to see how their particular school districts are affected. The budget will probably need bipartisan support in the House, primarily because no one wants to be holding the political bag on this decision.