VANE: Unsung Ballard seeding city with string of talent
Perhaps the most intriguing question in what is shaping up to be a remarkable political year is the following: Will Greg Ballard seek a third term as mayor in 2015?
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DANIELS: With jobs, it’s mobility, not just ‘equality,’ that matters
There is a lot of talk these days about income inequality—the growing gap between the incomes of the rich and poor. Arthur Brooks, president of the American Enterprise Institute, acknowledged in a recent speech to our Economic Club that the ”recovery” is working only for the rich: The poor are seeing no benefit from it, and income inequality is growing.
MARCUS: Rising prosperity still an elusive aspiration
Sometimes it seems our political leaders know only four-letter words like jobs. They often precede this with another four letter word: good.
MACALLISTER: We change our laws to match our definitions of truth
I wrote a piece recently that suggested truth is not eternal but transient. It moves, changes, flexes.
KRULL: Marriage message boxes Pence into contradiction
So much for being governor of all the people of Indiana. Earlier this month, not long after the House of Representatives voted to strip the controversial second sentence out of House Joint Resolution 3—the proposed state constitutional amendment banning gay marriage—Gov. Mike Pence told WISH-TV Channel 8 that he supported the HJR 3 in its original form.
SIDDIQUI: When religious and civic values collide
The recent decision by the Plainfield-based Islamic Society of North America to support the Employment Non-Discrimination Act has created concern among some Muslim Hoosiers.
BECK: Get to know those the amendment would affect
Since the General Assembly convened in January, it seems that nearly everyone I’ve talked to has an opinion on House Joint Resolution 3, the divisive constitutional amendment that defines marriage as between a woman and a man.
MAHERN: The substantial life of a Democratic pillar
I first met Mary Berry in the fall of 1960, but I’m getting ahead of myself.
YODER: Funds are better allocated to existing school districts
As the General Assembly works through the 2014 session, a familiar issue has risen to the forefront of discussion and debate. It’s the idea of providing funding for children to attend pre-kindergarten programs.
ROGERS: Pence’s plan should be extended universally
I commend the governor for recognizing the state’s long overdue need to expand access to quality early-childhood education. In my years as a teacher, I found the difference between students arriving with a preschool education and those without to be profound.
VAUGHN: Fixing a rigged game requires neutral referees
Allowing legislators to draw their own districts is like the NBA allowing the home team to hire its own officials; it would be an obvious conflict of interest that would discredit the process and lead to unfair play. That’s why redistricting reform tops Common Cause Indiana’s legislative agenda and why I’m pleased that the House took action early this session by passing House Bill 1032.<
STYRING: Stereotypes aside, business taxes really do matter
Gov. Mike Pence has proposed eliminating property taxes on business machinery and equipment. How exactly that is to be done, and over what time frame, he has left to the wisdom of the General Assembly.
CARPENTER: The governor finesses controversial issues
To the Matador, we don’t matter. All he has heard so far when he bows ever so deep toward the grandstand is, “Olé!”•
DOWD: Truth obligations are bigger than Bambi
I started speaking truth to power early. And my older brothers didn’t like it. They told me that archness in a 10-year-old was not welcome.
SOWELL: Facts challenge our beliefs about race
Depressing news about black students’ scoring far below white students on various mental tests has become so familiar that people in different parts of the ideological spectrum long ago developed their different explanations for why this is so. But both may have to do some rethinking, in light of radically different news from England.
FRIEDMAN: Another machine age is upending society
My favorite story in Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee’s fascinating new book, “The Second Machine Age,” is when the Dutch chess grandmaster Jan Hein Donner was asked how he’d prepare for a chess match against a computer, like IBM’s Deep Blue. Donner replied: “I would bring a hammer.”
TAFT: Just whose downtown is it, anyway?
Downtown Indianapolis was recently ranked No. 1 for livability among smaller cities by Livability.com—gratifying praise after $9.3 billion of reinvestment. Recent debates and plans, however, have raised a fundamental question: Whose downtown is this?
BOEHM: Solid reasons to build justice center now
Mayor Ballard proposes to create a judicial center that would bring the dispersed offices of the criminal courts, prosecutor, public defender and perhaps other agencies together with the county jail in one facility at a location to be determined, and free up the jail site for development.
WESTERHAUS-RENFROW: Diversity still has bad rap in Indiana
What “D” word is used most sparingly or avoided altogether by Hoosier political, business and civic leaders when sharing how to position Indiana for growth and success? a) debt, b) deflation, or c) diversity?
KETZENBERGER: With religion, to welcome one is to welcome all
I read recently that a proposed statue of a goat-headed figure of Satan, known as Baphomet, is a bad idea on the grounds of Oklahoma’s Capitol.