For some reason, I’m getting annoyed at the way the news is describing Speaker Bosma’s litigation efforts against the District Court’s ruling that he was violating the First Amendment rights of the citizens of Indiana by permitting sectarian prayer as part of the official business of Indiana’s House of Representatives.

A legal battle over the content of Statehouse prayer continues to escalate, as Speaker Brian C. Bosma has appealed a federal court ruling that restricts the content of prayers offered during Indiana House proceedings.

The thing is, he appealed the ruling back in December. No escalation has “continued.” He merely filed a court brief in the litigation he initiated when he filed the appeal. It’s entirely appropriate to describe the content of his brief, but it strikes me as vaguely sensationalist to describe the activity as somehow unusual or an elevation of the conflict. (Marcia Oddi at the Indiana Law Blog had a similar reaction.)

I haven’t read the brief, but from reading the news reports, Speaker Bosma’s central point seems to be unchanged. By ignoring the critical fact that the prayers at issue are government speech, he continues to insist that the First Amendment limits the rights of citizens against their government instead of vice versa.

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.

You can listen to Neil Young’s album “Living with War” here. I’ve only listened to a bit of it, but almost all of Neil’s stuff is worth listening to.

Just in case anyone was wondering, the briefing schedule has been set in Speaker Bosma’s appeal of the prayer decision. Bosma’s brief is due May 10, the appellee’s brief of Hinrichs, Herold, Quigley, and Gerner is due June 12, 2006. The reply brief, if any, is due June 26, 2006.

Congressmen are like diapers; they need to be changed, and for the same reason.

—Pete McCloskey, Republican primary challenger to Rep. Richard Pombo in California’s 11th Congressional District.  (Seen here.)

This is old and only tangentially related to the immigration debate, but it involves my alma mater, Miami University, so I’ll go ahead an post it.

Back on April 10, a group of white supremacist protesters showed up on the wrong place. The ACLU was conducting a panel discussion on immigration reform at the Miami University – Hamilton campus. The KKK and Aryan Nation members showed up at Miami’s main campus in Oxford carrying signs proclaiming “White people unite” and shouting “White power” but with no immigration discussion to protest.

Maybe things have changed, but back when I went to Miami, it was one of the whitest places on earth. So, other than the odd overly tanned sorority girl, I’ll bet those mouth breathing white supremacist yahoos even had trouble finding an impromptu brown person to harass.

Not at all relevant to Indiana politics, but here is a picture of me reading to my son and two nieces. So despite all my grousing about the road trip to and from North Carolina, I had a lot of fun.

More pictures here.

WSBT reported that the Citizens Action Coalition filed a lawsuit challenging the Toll Road privatization. I’m away from my normal resources, so I’ll keep it brief. Basically they challenge its Constitutionality. There is an Indiana Constitutional provision stemming from the days of the canal debacle that makes it illegal to use proceeds from the sale of infrastructure on anything other than paying down the “public debt.” A lot of privatization proceeds were used as pork to grease the skids on the deal.

Specifically, Article 10 section 2 of Indiana’s Constitution says:

All the revenues derived from the sale of any of the public works belonging to the State, and from the net annual income thereof, and any surplus that may, at any time, remain in the Treasury, derived from taxation for general State purposes, after the payment of the ordinary expenses of the government, and of the interest on bonds of the State, other than Bank bonds; shall be annually applied, under the direction of the General Assembly, to the payment of the principal of the Public Debt.

So, the State will presumably argue that Toll Road privatization wasn’t a “sale,” notwithstanding the fact that the agreement refers to the deal as a sale for federal tax purposes and the reality that the State will have sold a portion of their rights in the property — specifically the property rights to charge and collect tolls for the next 75 years.

I have an unresearched opinion that nanotech will be the source of our major technological advances in the next generation or two. That’s why you’ll occasionally see nanotech related items here.

Slashdot has an entry entitled “Nanotech Gone Awry.” It has a link to a Chemical and Engineering news report about a recall of a nanotech based product used to make glass and ceramic surfaces repel dirt and water. The product is suspected to have caused illness in at least 77 people in Germany after they used the product.

The Slashdot entry also references a Washington Post story about the unknown dangers facing employees of nanotech firms and a CDC strategic plan on nanotech.