Bad day in the Tippecanoe County region — in White County, north of Monticello, a 25 year old woman was killed in what was apparently a one car accident that left her car in a pond.

Meanwhile, near Boswell, there was a semi-collision that left one of the semis leaking sulfuric acid. Sulfuric acid is nasty stuff. They’re evacuating the area.

The Vanderburgh County Commissioners were sort of apologetic about passing an anti-abortion ordinance in secret. The ordinance purports to prohibit doctors without hospital privileges from conducting an abortion. They said maybe it would have been better to have let people know the ordinance was about abortion and take public comments before passing the ordinance. But, they weren’t going to change it.

I think they just bought themselves a bunch of legal bills. The practice of medicine is heavily regulated by the State, and, where there is state regulation, it is not uncommon for local government to be preempted from attempting to regulate in the same area. (Greater elaboration on the principle is here in this commentary on Morgan and Perry Counties’ attempts to create “certificate of need” requirements before permitting construction of medical facilities.)

Strange Maps has a map showing what term the various regions of the U.S. tend to use to refer to soft drinks: pop, soda, coke, or other. As it turns out, for the most part, Blue States say “soda;” Red States say “coke;” and Swing States say “pop.” Hell, compared to some of the demographics the pundits have been reaching for in talking about the political horse race, this makes as much sense as anything else.

“How can Obama reach out to the crucial ‘pop’ demographic if he’s drinking orange juice?!?!”

University Presidents are asking for a debate about whether to lower the drinking age from 21 to 18. They suggest that legalizing drinking at a younger age will allow young adults to be introduced to drinking in a more responsible way, as part of the social fabric. As it is, adults can’t really participate in this sort of education because it’s illegal for 18, 19, and 20 year olds to drink and, therefore, when they do drink — and they do — it’s with people their age, behind closed doors, and to excess.

I don’t know if 18 is the magic age. But, there is something odd about saying that 18 year olds are mature enough to make the life and death decision about whether to enlist in the military, mature enough to cast a vote for our leaders, and enter into any number of binding contracts; but aren’t old enough to drink a drop of alcohol.

There seems to be a slingshot effect where the longer you forbid alcohol, the harder young people will hit it once they have access. But legalization at a younger age isn’t the entire answer. When I went off to college and had access to beer at age 18, I hit it hard, and it’s not because the stuff was forbidden fruit. My folks were strict in prohibiting me from drinking with others, but they weren’t opposed to letting me have a beer or two in their presence. In Ohio at the time, if you were 18, your parents could order you a beer in a restaurant, and my folks would do that for me. Even so, I drank – a lot – throughout my college years.

I drank because it was fun. The conversations were better, the music was better, and the odds of hooking up were (ever so slightly) better. And this is something I don’t think we can lose sight of. If we view drinking as purely a problem and a vice, we’re not going to regulate it very well. Drinking is fun, and it serves a social function. It’s not accident that we’ve been brewing beer since the dawn of civilization. Alcohol has an intrinsic place in human culture.

Opponents of lowering the drinking age cite drunken driving and drinking related deaths among young people, and those are legitimate concerns. But, drunk driving concerns all too often are merely proxies for Prohibitionist tendencies. When I see adamant stances against drinking and no concerns about improving public transportation, I begin suspecting that it’s the drinking that concerns these people, whether driving is involved or not.

I think the approach to this problem should involve a mix of recognizing and teaching the value of responsible drinking; tough measures and extensive public education with respect to driving while drunk; and improvement of public transportation options for those who have been drinking.

It seems to me — based on the incomplete sample of 2 or 3 races I watched last night and numerous swims I watched last week — that there are significant differences in how swimmers and runners express their joy or disappointment at winning or losing. (A Political Season has a good post on the Agony of Defeat in one race last night.) The runners last night seemed to be running around yelling to the crowd when they won and generally proclaiming the greatness of their feat or, alternatively, pounding the ground and generally acting out their misery when they lost.

Not so much of either for the swimmers, I didn’t think. Obviously there was some, but the expressions of joy or disappointment seemed much more subdued.

Also: there seemed to be lots more down time between runs than swims.

Pandora: The Music Genome Project is in trouble.

Pandora, the internet radio station built around your tastes, will probably be going out of business soon. After getting slapped by the CRB with exorbitantly high royalty rates to continue playing music, founder Tim Westergren says the company is facing a “pull-the-plug” situation. There’s one congressman trying to help Pandora and it’s million plus users, but the service is bleeding money in the meantime and its future looks grim. I’ll be very sad to see it go, since being reintroduced to it recently through their excellent iPhone app. What great idea do you have for us next, RIAA?

That’s too bad. I’m not sure how Pandora makes money in the first place, but I’ve really enjoyed its service over the years. For those of you not familiar, the general idea is that you set up a play list and Pandora purports to identify traits of the music or artists you select and plays other music with those traits. I love having it on in the office when I have a lot of writing to do.

More from Slashdot:

Internet radio stations apparently have to pay higher royalties than other radio stations.

“We’re funded by venture capital. They’re not going to chase a company whose business model has been broken.” The article estimates that XM Satellite Radio will pay “about 1.6 cents per hour per listener when the new rates are fully adapted in 2010. By contrast, Web radio outlets will pay 2.91 cents per hour per listener.”

I know that, to those who have food allergies, proper labeling information is critical. Still, this recall notice by Kroger amused me:

The Kroger Co. is recalling packages of Kroger Hulless Corn Puff Poppers — Extreme Butter (artificially flavored) because the product may contain milk not listed on the label.

As it happens, I really love the artificially butter flavored corn puff food products. Still, it can’t be good for a person, and there’s some irony that the reason for a recall is a relatively healthy ingredient like milk. (Here is where my sister, if she read my blog, would go on at length about serious concerns raised by our current dairy practices.)