A Citizen's Guide to Indiana

Masson's Blog

Evansville Courier Press Against Marriage Inequality Amendment

by 6 Comments

The Evansville Courier Press has an editorial entitled “Constitutional ban on gay marriage bad for state, its economy.” You pretty automatically expect the liberal position out of, say, the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette. Seems like the Evansville Courier Press is more of a crap shoot. So, it seems to be one more bit of evidence that public opinion is shifting in this area.

The editorial gives a few reasons for opposition:

1. We already have a “defense of marriage act”. All this does with respect to the possibility of gay marriage in Indiana is make it harder for hypothetical future majorities in the General Assembly to pass legislation in favor of marriage equality.

2. The second part, invalidating a legal status “substantially similar” (whatever that means) to marriage for unmarried individuals has a high potential for unintended consequences. A group of law students has apparently identified something like 600 legal provisions that could be affected.

3. It sends the wrong message. It tells gays that Indiana regards them as second class citizens; likely encouraging those with talent and skills to go elsewhere. Also, it potentially hamstrings the ability of companies and organizations that would like to offer benefits to same sex couples.

Automatic Deductions for Teacher’s Unions Targeted by Chamber

by 8 Comments

Mary Beth Schneider, writing for the Indy Star, has an interesting article about a legislative priority of the Indiana Chamber of Commerce to prohibit allowing voluntary deductions from teacher paychecks for payment of union dues. They don’t particularly want to apply this prohibition to other public sector unions like firefighters or police.

No principled reason for this hangs together if you single out a particular kind of public sector union. But, principle doesn’t have a lot to do with this aside from the principle that “unions are political opponents and we’d like them to be weaker.”

The article suggests that, with the wide availability of automatic withdrawals or payments from bank accounts, the elimination of deductions from paychecks might not be as big a deal for the unions as it once was. Still, it’s fairly clear that this initiative is little more than union bashing.

The Castration of Google Reader

by 4 Comments

Rob Fishman, writing for Buzzfeed, has a long article on how Google killed Google Reader. The reader itself is still there, but it’s sharing functionality was taken away in October 2011 as part of Google’s disastrous Google Plus plan.

Readers of this site might remember that I used to have a “News of Interest” widget on the sidebar. Judging from the click throughs, this was a fairly popular feature. I have a bunch of news feeds aggregated through Google Reader. Back before Google disabled it, I could click a share button when I saw a news story I found more or less interesting, and the link would show up in the widget. This was an easy way for me to say “you might like this” for stories that didn’t really merit an independent blog post or about which I didn’t have a lot to say. Apparently there were related Google communities surrounding these sharing functions. (I didn’t know much about those).

In any event, it all went away with Google’s ham-fisted effort to move everyone on to a new Facebook. This was, apparently, part of a new philosophy at Google where they were trying to consolidate their products and focus their efforts. The company got huge in a fairly simple way: by having a good search engine and allowing you to use it without having to endure a bunch of screaming bells and whistles while you did. Remember the idea of a web portal? You would go to a site, maybe set it as your browser’s start page, because it had search functionality. But it would also throw out news stories, stock prices, maybe an e-mail service.

For me, these were awful because they usually took forever to load. I tended to use Altavista because it was a little lighter; then I caught wind of Google with a search box and not much else. Sooner or later everyone else in the world caught wind of it too and bailed in favor of Google as well. Meanwhile, Google kept rolling out great products you could use in addition to the search page if you wanted – maps, reader, scholar, earth. None of them seemed to get in the way of the other, so you could take a sort of a la carte approach.

The Google Reader – Google Plus stunt, however, showed a more humorless side of the company and a darker approach to things. Instead of continuing with its organic approach to product development, the company broke a product people liked in order to impose its will that they move to Google Plus.

District Court Rejects Constitutional Challenge to Marriage Solemnization Statute

by 9 Comments

A case brought by the Center for Inquiry challenged Indiana’s marriage solemnization statute on the grounds that it does not permit secular celebrants to solemnize marriages. The United States District Court for the Southern District of Indiana rejected that challenge.(pdf)

The solemnization statute is IC 31-11-6-1:

Sec. 1. Marriages may be solemnized by any of the following:
(1) A member of the clergy of a religious organization (even if the cleric does not perform religious functions for an individual congregation), such as a minister of the gospel, a priest, a bishop, an archbishop, or a rabbi.
(2) A judge.
(3) A mayor, within the mayor’s county.
(4) A clerk or a clerk-treasurer of a city or town, within a county in which the city or town is located.
(5) A clerk of the circuit court.
(6) The Friends Church, in accordance with the rules of the Friends Church.
(7) The German Baptists, in accordance with the rules of their society.
(8) The Bahai faith, in accordance with the rules of the Bahai faith.
(9) The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, in accordance with the rules of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
(10) An imam of a masjid (mosque), in accordance with the rules of the religion of Islam.

A secular celebrant is someone who has some background in performing weddings, memorials, and other “milestones of life” ceremonies but who is not affiliated with any religion.

I think the District Court was probably correct, particularly under existing precedent, that this statute does not violate the establishment or free exercise clauses. It is maybe slightly more burdensome for an atheist to get married than a religious adherent. But, the fact is, the secular celebrant can still preside at your ceremony. You just might have to do a little extra paperwork at the Clerk’s office to have your marriage recognized by the State whereas the Muslim can just have the imam solemnize the marriage.

That said, the Center for Inquiry should lobby the General Assembly to amend the solemnization statute to allow for secular celebrants to solemnize marriages.

War on Christmas Escalates: Christ Himself Now Targeted

by 12 Comments

Ed Brayton brings us news from the front.

Bryan Fischer says he’s not going to refer to the war on Christmas anymore. Is he finding rationality? Of course not. He’s just decided that the non-existent war on Christmas is really a non-existent war on Christ.

I would have let this pass without comment, but I also then heard a discussion of the “War on Christ” on our local American Family Radio affiliate (WQSG). (I’ve always had a habit of listening to right wing radio, but as Axl put it, “I used to do a little but a little wouldn’t do. So the little got more and more.”)

Before I got out of the car, whoever was talking explained how wrong it was that stores like the Gap wanted to profit off of Christmas but didn’t want to call it Christmas. Translation: commercialization of Christmas may be an abomination, but it’s our abomination.

Like so many of these other public square Christianity discussions – like Ten Commandments displays at public facilities or prayers at public functions – I don’t think the conflict is really about keeping or losing faith. Do many people really believe that public displays of piety really improve the moral fiber of the polity? I could be wrong, but I don’t think so. Rather, this is once again about marking territory; an expression of cultural dominance. And, I guess when small things like what a retail clerk says to you at check out suggest that the cultural dominance is slipping, it can be disconcerting.

Everybody’s Favorite Economist Explains the Fiscal Cliff

by 14 Comments

I have long been neglectful of Prof. Larry DeBoer’s (Everybody’s Favorite Economist ™) Capital Comments. November’s installment explains the “fiscal cliff” and why going over it is a bad idea.

Come Jan. 1, the Bush-era tax cuts expire, so everyone’s tax rates will increase. The two-year cut in the Social Security payroll tax will expire, raising taxes some more. The Alternative Minimum Tax won’t be adjusted for inflation, so millions of people will see their taxes rise still more. Automatic spending cuts will kick in, reducing both defense and entitlement spending. Extended unemployment insurance will expire; so two million people will lose benefits. And Medicare payment rates to doctors will be cut.

All told, it yanks about $500 billion out of the economy. That’s bad. But it cuts the deficit, that’s good, right? Well, yes, but it’s a matter of competing priorities. Pick you poison – slow or receding economy on the one hand or large deficits on the other. Right now, the deficits are the lesser poison because there is a lot of idle capacity in the economy. Demand created by the government isn’t pushing out or competing much with private sector demand so, at the moment, printed money isn’t driving inflation. In fact, interest rates are very low.

Yank the deficit money out of the economy, and businesses will have less reason to produce goods and services, will cut production, and you probably end up in vicious circle territory.

It’s a nasty choice: recession and unemployment now, or high interest rates, inflation and slower growth later.

DeBoer recommends coming up with a plan now that tackles deficits when the economy has recovered, not while it’s in the process of recovery.

Opposition to Abortion Increasingly Means Opposition to Contraception

by 29 Comments

In the past, I had the sense that, politically at least, there was quite a lot of talk about opposition to abortion, but contraception was by-and-large acceptable. When I noticed more anti-contraception talk, I had a vaguely formed notion that this was caused by drift having to do with the difficulty of opposing the legal underpinnings of Roe v. Wade (concerning abortion) without also opposing the underpinnings of Connecticut v. Griswold (concerning contraception.)

But, the Slacktivist has another theory.

White evangelicals have begun adopting Catholic language and Catholic teaching regarding contraception. This change has not occurred due to any new theological or biblical understanding, but due to a political change — due to white evangelical opposition to President Barack Obama.

Whether that’s true or not, I think there is a largely unstated desire among both groups that, as Libby Anne suggests, sex have consequences. If true, I don’t know whether that desire comes from Augustine or Paul or God or what.

Politically, I think that highlighting the overlap between those opposed to abortion rights and those opposed to pro-contraception measures is ultimately a losing proposition for the pro-life movement. Broad support for contraception isn’t going anywhere. And, to the extent arguments against legalized abortion also apply to contraception, those arguments will become less appealing to the voting public.

Eight Years of Masson’s Blog

by 13 Comments

I kind of spaced the anniversary, but it occurs to me that my humble blog has crossed the eight year mark. Reviewing those early entries, it occurs to me that I have only a dim memory of the beginning. I had sort of noodled around with a blogger site, mainly bellyaching about national politics. About the time of the 2004 election, I was disappointed and took a break from politics and really national news in general. My first entry was a memorial to my dog who passed away just after the 2004 election. Then it was dribs and drabs for a couple of weeks as I figured out the Movable Type platform I used for awhile.

It doesn’t look like I found my niche until the second week of December, 2004, when I started blogging about state government generally and the legislative session specifically.

I know the quality and the quantity of my work has ebbed and flowed with my interest level and available time. The community of people with whom my hobby has brought me into contact has been unbelievably rewarding. There really are a lot of smart, interesting folks out there. So, I’ll keep on plugging along. Because it’s fun.

Mark Small Takes Paul Ogden to Task on the Tea Party’s Role in Romney’s Defeat

by 24 Comments

Sometimes the Indiana blogosphere seems way too lethargic. Maybe I’m just not reading the write right blogs. But, in any case, here I am like a schoolyard gawker yelling “fight! fight!” Mark Small of Civil Discourse Now wrote a blog post entitled Yes, Paul Ogden, the “tea party” played a big part in Romney’s loss. This is a response to Ogden’s post entitled the Future of the Tea Party Movement.

In a lot of ways, the Tea Party has been to political observers as words were to Humpty Dumpty.

“I don’t know what you mean by ‘glory,’?” Alice said.
Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. “Of course you don’t—till I tell you. I meant ‘there’s a nice knock-down argument for you!’?”
“But ‘glory’ doesn’t mean ‘a nice knock-down argument’,” Alice objected.
“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.”
“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”
“The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master that’s all.”
Alice was too much puzzled to say anything, so after a minute Humpty Dumpty began again. “They’ve a temper, some of them—particularly verbs, they’re the proudest—adjectives you can do anything with, but not verbs—however, I can manage the whole lot! Impenetrability! That’s what I say!”

Small does a good job of describing the Tea Party as it was observed in the wild. I think Ogden’s concept of the Tea Party is more of a vision he’d see in Plato’s cave.

Taxpayer Refunds, Grim Budget Picture, or Both?

by 12 Comments

I am getting mixed messages out of Indianapolis with respect to the state’s budget outlook. Last week, there was happy news from the Governor about a budget surplus and a $110 per taxpayer refund. Today, Tom LoBianco, writing for the Associated Press, has an article entitled Capitol Crossroads: Grim budget picture shapes up for Indiana lawmakers.

Last week, because the state’s budget surplus exceeded 10% of its budget, taxpayers get a hundred bucks. This week, Speaker Bosma is quoted as saying “the fiscal fog is thick,” because state tax collections are stagnant and because gambling revenues are falling as adjacent states get into the gambling game, because of cuts to corporate income taxes, because of a phase out of the state inheritance tax, and because of Gov-elect Pence’s call for a 10% cut in personal income taxes.

As a result:

Even though lawmakers and governor-elect Mike Pence come into 2013 with a state flush with cash reserves worth an estimated $2 billion, they’re facing programs starved for support — including the Department of Child Services, which told lawmakers it has trouble holding caseworkers because of low salaries — and a continued economic drag.

When you get down to it, lawmakers who want to reduce government services probably ought to be more forthright and replace the explanation of “we can’t afford it” with the more accurate explanation of “we don’t want to.”