Last night we were watching Anderson Cooper’s 360 and the identified Indiana as one of the five states they’re watching as “battleground” states. No kidding — we were not red, but “pink” on their chart.
Given the massive number of Obama signs and bumperstickers around town for the past several months, we’ve been expressing wonderment at the disparity between polls and visual evidence. I chalked it up to urban living, but I wonder if there’s not just a bit more to it.
In addition to said swear words, it also contains inspirational stories of how inner city kids from very poor circumstances were inspired by their teacher’s introducing them to first-person journals from Anne Frank and others to write journals of the poverty and suffering around them, achieve in school, and go on to college. A very worthy book, it seems to me.
I guess not to the Perry Township school board.
Heermann attempted to get permission to teach the book as a textbook in her class, and the school board dithered at length on whether or not to allow it, because it contained the aforementioned swear words. While she waited on an answer, she sent home permission slips to the students parents, and 149 of 150 parents approved the book. So she passed it out in class, and stuff hit the fan.
The Perry Township School Board has taken refuge in the idea that they suspended her for “her disregard for policy and procedures and not working within the confines of the system she’s agreed to work in and support” claiming that they’re not “banning a book” but disciplining a teacher for not following the rules.
I’d also like you to take note that I used absolutely no swear words in writing this post, owing mostly to the fact that the CNN reporter said “blank” as he read the offending passages aloud, and the only word I could figure out was mother-fucker. Oops. Damn.
I’m sorry. Archery, fencing. Even bowling. But not a sport who’s acronym is “WAKA.” It’s not like I’m a huge soccer -excuse me- “football” fan or anything, but even I would have to make fun of adult kickball.
There’s a video clip circulated by notorious nutjob Michelle Malkin making the rounds; it’s of Democratic advisor Mickey Kantor, who is currently advising on the Clinton campaign.
The scene is an edited clip from the 1993 movie “The War Room” about the 1992 Bill Clinton campaign. The movie followed Kantor, Stephanapoulos and Carville as they worked to get Clinton elected. In the clip, Kantor is discussing a memo of poll numbers put out by the Republican party, where the numbers had been faked one explanation says faked, other say talking about Ross Perot’s poll numbers. In it, Kantor appears to be saying about the Republicans putting out fake data “These people are shit. How would you like to be {inaudible}?”
The circulating video clip from the movie has been edited to make it sound as though Kantor was talking about the people of Indiana, who’s poll numbers he mentions right before he makes the derogatory remarks. The filmmaker says the inaudible section was dubbed or manipulated to say “a worthless white n**ger?” In the original movie, this section is not clear, according to the Huffington Post.
It also leaves out the origin – suggesting that the video is recent and from the current Clinton campaign, not from 1992.
UPDATE: According to the filmmaker, the sound was edited from the original, and everyone in the room including the filmmaker agrees that he never used the N-word. Other people claim they hear it even on the original DVD. Until I hear the DVD for myself, I can’t tell. I doesn’t sound like this on other clips posted on YouTube.
The edited version appears on YouTube with comments and ratings turned off, and is being circulated around Indiana now. You can see it here:
I saw part of the movie back in 1993, but I didn’t remember this scene; just lots of video of Carville and Stephanapoulos with their heads together, so I recognized what I was seeing pretty quickly as being from the 1992 clinton campaign.
If Kantor had actually said this about Indiana, it wouldn’t just be coming out now. It’s getting dugg and heavily circulated, so I’m blogging about it in hopes that people watch the actual movie and see what it’s saying before leaping to conclusions about it.
Also — the fact that Malkin is pushing it obscures where it’s coming from, but I can’t see something this hacked up coming from Obama’s campaign. Smells like McCain to me.
NOTE: The reason I’m blaming Malkin for this one is because the story about it first “broken” on her blog and on the Drudge Report, with other discussion following pretty widely after that in the blogosphere. But she’s definitely one of the primary voices pushing this out there. That’s also the reason I think McCain is behind it rather than Obama.
Also, I got a couple of nasty right-wing comments on the post defending Malkin, which I deleted, per my comment policy. Comments are closed due to conservative dickishness.
My family is originally from southeastern rural Iowa, and regardless of the small town life aspect, they’re very well-educated and don’t talk like hayseeds and goobers. Sit down and talk to them about the election and they have intelligent, thoughtful conversations about the issues. They have slightly different political agendas than those of us who live in cities, but rural American life and uneducated, unsophisticated behavior DO NOT go hand in hand.
I know there are some differences in education levels between rural Iowa and rural Indiana, but does it account for the reason that Kokomo seems to be embracing their inner hayseed in this lovely New York Times article, or is it stereotyping on the part of NYT? (My editorial commentary is inserted, in emphasized text.)
KOKOMO, Ind. — With all the talk among the Democratic presidential hopefuls about change, they may wish to consider this as they wander Indiana: People here practically revolted a few years ago when their governor, Mitch Daniels, pushed to change to daylight saving time like most of the country. (DST is a horse of a different color, and not a good example “disliking change.” That falls under the category of “didn’t take the brown acid like the rest of the U.S.”)
Change, it seems, may not carry quite the same political magic in this state as it has elsewhere.
“We hold onto a lot of traditional values,” said Brian L. Thomas, 39, (What a geezer, stop boring us rambling about walking to school in the snow in bare feet, Grandpa… Oh, wait… 39? Hey!) as he bought a cup of coffee along the courthouse square here on Wednesday. “Saying you’re ready to change is probably not the best or only thing you would want to say around these parts. Frankly, we want it to be like it used to be.” (Kokomo was a sundown town, BTW, where black people couldn’t be in down after dark or they’d be lynched. So nostalgia ’bout the “way it used to be” should be given a skeptical eye and a challenge.)
Many of the two dozen voters interviewed in this central Indiana manufacturing city of 46,000 expressed queasiness over the notions of change that both Democratic candidates have proudly pledged elsewhere. Though residents bemoaned economic conditions that have taken away thousands of factory jobs and given the state the 11th-highest rate of foreclosures, they also said they worried about doing things — anything — very differently.
“What are we going to change to?” asked Ron O’Bryan, 58, a retired auto worker who said he was still trying to decide which Democrat to vote for in the May 6 primary. “You mean change to some other country’s system? What do you think they mean?” (Yes, all this talk of giving you health care and bring back the manufacturing jobs your company shipped overseas to communist China – that’s akin to that wicked Socialism. You know, the kind that used to be RUN BY THE SOCIALIST PARTY OF INDIANA, back when your grandpappy was their treasurer in 1933. Ahem. Indiana, being a manufacturing state, was a prominent supporter of the labor/socialist movement at one time.)
Jeremy Lewis, a 28-year-old window washer, said simply, “Old-fashioned can be in a good way.” (Yes, bring back the good old days of Saturday morning Smurfs and Light-Brite makin’ things with light…. Wait, those are MY good old days. This kid is 28. What the fuck was it then, Transformers and Underoos? And Wham!)
As the Democratic presidential hopefuls turned to Indiana as a new battleground in the fight for the nomination, they find themselves facing a different audience in places like Kokomo, a blue-collar city in the middle of endless expanses of farms north of Indianapolis. In some ways, these are voters not so unlike those in other Rust Belt states, like Pennsylvania, but with an added dose of nostalgia and a practical, Midwestern sensibility. (I think they watched the musical The Music Man a few too many times before heading out to the midwest, because this whole article sounds like that song… “And we’re so by God stubborn We can stand touchin’ noses For a week at a time And never see eye-to-eye. But we’ll give you our shirt And a back to go with it If your crops should happen to die. Farmer: So, what the heck, you’re welcome, Glad to have you with us. Farmer and Wife: Even though we may not ever mention it again.”)
“We are manufacturing workers, farmers, beer drinkers, gun owners, pickup drivers,” said Karen Lasley, 64, who was volunteering on Wednesday morning in Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s field office in Kokomo (one of 28 Mrs. Clinton has opened around the state along with Senator Barack Obama’s 22, including one just down the street). “We are full of pride for this country.”
After the photographers left, they all hopped out of their overalls, slipped on their DKNY and Jimmy Choos and took a stroll around the town square, high-fiving each other at putting one over on the the Grey Lady.
2019 Update: Lest it be lost to the ethereal ravages of time, this was the subject of the above posts.
From: gwelsh@indy.rr.com
Subject: Tyrion
Date: April 9, 2008 4:55:22 PM GMT-04:00
To: bil@bilerico.com
It’s quite interesting that you, of all people, would allow the anonymous postings of one Tyrion who has at times called me “crazy”, “bipolar”, a “liar”, “going over the edge”, “lost it”, and “left my brain in Charleston”, among other things, and who has falsely and with defamatory intent accused me of professional misconduct as an attorney. Obviously, you know the identity of this person. You can graciously identify the name of this person, or you can be named as a defendant in a lawsuit and be served with a subpoena commanding you to reveal his identity. Take your pick. If this guy wants to make it his hobby to professionally trash me on anonymous blog postings, then he can suffer the consequences of defending his actions in court. And if you want to serve as his enabler, you can suffer the consequences as well.
My post below about Butler student Evan Strange who asked Chelsea Clinton an inappropriate question spawned an interesting response. I received several emails from Butler student Lauren Laski defending her fellow student. I’m not going to go into detail of what they said, other than that Lauren really needs to take a logic course while she’s there at Butler. But I want to talk about this a little more, because I still think Evan’s a moron, but apparently I need to spell out why for some.
Let’s look at the question Evan actually asked: He asked Chelsea to give her opinion “on the criticism of her mother that how she handled [Bill’s affair] might be a sign of weakness and she might not be a strong enough candidate to be president.”
First, where the hell is this “criticism” coming from? Evan asked the question like everyone has heard this, and it’s a statement of the obvious, and that it’s a question in the minds of most Americans — but it really isn’t. There are a tiny handful of people out there making this criticism – but it’s not average Americans, it’s people like drug-addled Rush Limbaugh, who also thinks Clinton shot Vincent Foster and faked the moon landing herself. The criticism doesn’t have any legitimate basis; it’s a smear campaign like all the others coming from the same right-wing conspiracy nuts. Given that, the question really didn’t need to be asked.
But let’s even suppose there’s actual merit to the question. is Clinton’s “credibility” today affected by the decision she made ten years about how to handle her marital difficulties?
Of course not. The answer to that is so obvious that again, the question really need not be asked. Hillary’s choice about how to handle “Bill’s affair” was a choice that over 100 million Americans have had to face. What do you do when you have a serious problem in your marriage; is it better for your family to stick it out, or to get a divorce with the help of family law claims attorney? There’s no right or wrong answer to that question, as anyone who’s been through it can tell you.You can also contact attorneys from law firm for divorce charges as they can help you legally in dealing with the matters related to relationships. You have to pick what you think would be best for your family and even your community, and hope and pray that the decision you’ve made is the best one. You can also contact experienced divorce attorneys serving in Crossville to give you legal counseling and take the best decision for your future. And you may not know whether it was for decades.
But no matter which option you pick – there’s not a moral failing in making it. Suggesting that Hillary’s credibility is in question over the choice she made to stay married is also calling into question the credibility of 100 million other Americans who’ve had marital difficulties and had to make that choice. That’s a pretty audacious thing for a 20-year-old unmarried college student to do. If Evan has anyone around him who’s been divorced, they should be bitch-slapping him right about now.
I believe that the above answer to Evan’s “question” is obvious to 99% of America. Most people understand exactly what Hillary went through when her marriage got such a public and painful challenge, and most people would have the common sense not to judge her for how she handled it. Most people would never ask such a question in the first place.
Now let’s go back to Evan’s claim that he’s a Hillary supporter and was trying to help her out. I don’t have any evidence as to his real motivation, but his body language and tone belie what he’s saying. Anyone with common sense would understand that asking this question does nothing to help the Clinton campaign – perhaps Evan is genuinely lacking in that common sense, but I don’t think so.
It’s my opinion that Evan wanted to be on national television, that he didn’t mind causing Clinton some bad news cycles, that he was savvy enough to know that Monica’s name uttered in a room with Chelsea Clinton would be explosive, and that he was willing to make himself and the state of Indiana look dumb to ask the question.
Lauren claimed that Evan didn’t intend for his question to make the news. That’s a bit of a stretch, considering that he had interviews with 12 different media outlets; appearing on Fox News and the Today Show, among others. If he was sincere about his question to Chelsea and his motivation in asking it, when the media came calling he would have said “no comment.”
Leave it to an idiot Hoosier to embarrass the state of Indiana now that we’re in the national spotlight. I’m sure it’s the first of many bonehead moves Hoosiers will make when they see television cameras. From the Chicago Tribune:
INDIANAPOLIS – The college student who got a stinging brushback from Chelsea Clinton when he asked about the Monica Lewinsky scandal said Wednesday he’s a Clinton supporter who was trying to get her to show “what makes Hillary so strong.”
Evan Strange, a Butler University student who works on the school’s newspaper, The Butler Collegian, said he had asked Chelsea Clinton her opinion “on the criticism of her mother that how she handled the… scandal might be a sign of weakness and she might not be a strong enough candidate to be president.”
…
Strange’s question at Chelsea Clinton’s appearance Tuesday at the school brought a stinging rebuke from Clinton’s daughter. “Wow, you’re the first person actually that’s ever asked me that question in the, I don’t know maybe, 70 college campuses I’ve now been to, and I do not think that is any of your business,” Chelsea Clinton said during the campaign visit for her mother.
Evan, you’re a dumbass. And you’ve made us all look like dumbasses. Thanks, idiot. If you want to know what Evan looks like so you can, perhaps, throw a mudball at his head if you see him in the street, here’s a video of the moron trying to explain is his idiot question.
July 20, 2007
Dear Neighbors:
We have taken the first important steps toward long-term property tax reform. The Governor’s order of a Marion County reassessment is welcome news to our friends and neighbors who have been shocked by the unacceptable tax bills issued this month. Thanks to the reassessment, Marion County tax bills will be frozen at 2006 levels. Although this immediate fix is enormously helpful, we will continue to push for a special session of the General Assembly to harness the momentum and frustration of the community and translate that into long-term reform of our broken property tax system.
As community concern has risen, so has the flow of misinformation. It is important that we all understand the facts and causes for the dramatic increases many are experiencing. Some have argued that runaway city government spending is the cause of the increase. This couldn’t be further from the truth. We have been frugal, cutting $83 million from our budget, and have led the charge for government efficiency and consolidation. In fact, the city’s portion of the property tax bill has actually decreased significantly since I took office and the city tax rate is about the same as it was in 2003. Further, city and county expenses were only 2-3% of the total property tax increase for Marion County.
The source of the increase is complex. The tax rate in Marion County is made up of dozens of taxing units that are under the control of independent boards and separately elected officials. The real cause of the property tax increases has been a combination of many factors including:
The elimination of the inventory tax, which has shifted the tax burden from businesses to homeowners this year.
The apparent under-assessment of commercial property, shifting the tax burden to homeowners.
The State capped the “property tax replacement credit” which provided annual relief to property taxpayers.
Many school capital projects hit at the same time this year.
Mandated state payments for child welfare and juvenile incarceration increased dramatically in 2006 & 2007.
As a result of the reassessment, Marion County Treasurer, Mike Rodman announced that the tax bills are now due on August 10, 2007 and instructed taxpayers to pay the amount listed as due on your tax bill from last year. If you are unsure what to pay, check online at www.indygov.org and click the link for “View your new 2007 property tax.” If you have further questions, call 327-4444. In addition, I have activated a team of lawyers to give assistance during special evening hours.
As I have said from the beginning of this crisis, now is not the time for finger- pointing or playing the blame game. Working together with the Governor, the legislature, and our City-County Council, we will get this fixed.
Sincerely,
Bart Peterson
Boy, I wish he had left off the first sentence of the last paragraph, ’cause that just sounds Republican.
A very disturbing Associated Press report about a rare set of deaths in the Fort Wayne area.
FORT WAYNE, Ind. — A rare degenerative brain disorder was suspected in the deaths of four people in northeastern Indiana during the past five months, health officials said.
Allen County Health Commissioner Deborah McMahan said the deaths were suspected to have been caused by Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease. After the third death, McMahan contacted the state health department and asked that the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention be notified.
Northeastern Indiana’s hospitals serve about 1 million people, McMahan estimated. Based on CDC figures of fewer than 300 cases a year across the country, the Fort Wayne area might expect one death from the disease a year.
Testing of brain tissue from two victims was planned as that is considered the only definitive way to determine whether a person had CJD. Health officials said the four deaths appear to be from classic CJD and not related to mad cow disease, which is linked to the rare variant CJD found in humans.
Pam Jacquay of New Haven lost her 53-year-old husband, John, to the disease in March. She said that within weeks after Christmas he couldn’t drive and soon forgot how to do common tasks such as dressing and shaving.
“One minute he could do something and the next minute it made no sense to him. … In the last week of his life he lost any ability to communicate with us at all,” Jacquay said. “This just wasn’t the way it was supposed to happen.”
She said she hoped health officials continue to investigate the reasons for the area’s number of cases and that increased awareness will lead to treatment for what is now an incurable disease.
State epidemiologist Bob Teclaw said he was not drawing any conclusions from the deaths in northeastern Indiana. At this point, “we’re in the wait-and-see mode,” he said.
Well, that makes me feel safer. Think maybe instead of “waiting and seeing” perhaps they should be looking at what all these people had in common? Like what food with imported ingredients they all ate, or what meat products they consumed?
UPDATE: This is passed along by one of my readers:
OK – mad cow – possibly through feed given to cattle here in Indiana via grain mills that also process venison. And – have they looked into the chronic wasting disease issue? That is a big bad TABOO subject here in Indiana because of the backroom political deals done by the current administration to accommodate canned hunt operations which are supposedy illegal on the books. Nevertheless, the Amish are raising shooter bucks to be sold for canned hunts and canned hunts are continuing and the DNR openly says they have “prosecutorial discretion” and do not prosecute on canned hunt violations. Obviously, you can see where a truck can be driven through the loopholes monitoring CWD. ALSO – NE (McIntosh/Reed) Indiana has two canned hunt operations that have violated various other permit issues and have been allowed to continue. All very interesting. SO – am wondering if the Chronic Wasting aspect is being seriously looked into. Let me know. I have been following this for eight years – the lack of agricultural/DNR oversight in Indiana on CWD and canned hunting.
Take a look at this link on Chronic Wasting Disease, which is basically a disease that attacks deer, in the same family of diseases as Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease and Mad cow disease.
A bit more from the reader quoted above:
Originally, there were great plans to monitor for CWD – in Lake County, IN there was even an additional feel for picking up roadkill because CWD was reported in nearby Illinois. Most of those precautions have been done away with once the ten operations were allowed to operate because of a special court injunction. It just all went off the radar screen.
Yes, these cases can be sporadic – but the sudden appearance of these “sporadic” cases defies the odds. Venison is ground up and fed to cattle. We have rendering plants that do this. At first there were strict requirements for animal feed plants in Indiana that used venision (road kill) and the DNR even wrote the Feds a complaining letter because they were not able to monitor the rendering plants because the plants knew that if even one case of CWD was found, they would be shut down. So – everyone took their chances and it all just blew over. Maybe …… who knows.
Anyway, I have that letter that was sent to the feds and also the DNR said they would check thousands of deer for CWD and, of course, did not. I am by no means saying this is the reason. Not at all. But – it is a dirty little secret in Indiana. If everyone’s luck holds out, no one will get the CJD that would result from chronic wasting disease. The domestic deer are monitored minimally and only recently. The secret shooter buck industry works behind the scenes. The motto of the shooter buck farmers in WI was – this is in print (shoot shovel and shut up). Of course, prion borne disease cannot be sterilized or buried. That is the threat of it. Incineration of the elk out west that had CWD was astronomicaly expensive. Anyway, I could go on and on. Just some food for thought. Venison can be put in chili, etc – the blades used to cut through deer spines can be infected – no sterilization works. That is why the rendering plants did NOT ALLOW the INdiana DNR to come in and inspect. Interesting, no?
