Going to a convention really is a “bucket list” item for those of us who find politics so compelling. I can only imagine what the conventions were like a hundred years ago—much less scripted and scrutinized I’m sure—but there was such tremendous optimism and energy in Tampa last month.
I admit it. Even though I was a political science minor in college, I did not watch one minute of the Republican or Democratic national conventions. But I am not alone. In some very informal polling, I have learned that lots of engaged local leaders also skipped these television events.
For an actor, actress or movie buff, it is the Academy Awards. For a basketball player and fan, it is March Madness or the NBA Finals. For the swimmer, gymnast, or distance runner and those of us who admire their talents, it is the Olympics.
Now that the national political conventions have come and gone and the presidential campaign season is about to reach top gear, at least two Hoosiers have to be watching with mixed emotions.
When women vote, women win. That’s the mantra the 51% Club has adopted in an effort to encourage women to vote this election cycle. An organic, grass-roots movement of Democratic women throughout Indiana, the 51% Club has repeatedly shared some startling statistics.
War on women? The only one I see is the plight of the single mother suffering from broken commitments, her own poor choices, and an overwhelmed system poorly designed to serve her and her children.
The Indiana Coalition for Open Government was putting together such a list for the gubernatorial candidates as I wrote this column. While I played a small role in that effort, I would also like to ask a few questions of Mike Pence and John Gregg that are not on the list:
As attorney general, and in my prior position as chief deputy in this office, I understand and appreciate the relationship between the Office of the Attorney General and the General Assembly. Indiana is one of only six states where the office is created by the Legislature and not by the state constitution.
The piece of legislation I believe is most critical is a comprehensive revision of Indiana’s criminal code. The last comprehensive revision of the code occurred in 1977. Although there have been some legislative changes since then, our criminal code is terribly outdated.
I find it awkwardly self-serving when a candidate for public office tells me the next election—when he or she is on the ballot—is the most important election of my lifetime. This happens at least once every election cycle.
With every public survey since the May primary repeatedly showing Republican U.S. Senate nominee Richard Mourdock in a dead heat with Democrat Joe Donnelly, the Indiana treasurer has taken on a remake of his battered image.
Four-term Carmel Mayor James Brainard has to be on a publicity-induced high. Keystone Parkway recently got a design award from a national transit engineering firm. Better still, Money named Carmel first on its list of America’s best small cities.
In colonial America, conventional wisdom held that women could not get pregnant unless they enjoyed the sex.
I’m a libertarian in part because I see a false choice offered by the political left and right: government control of the economy—or government control of our personal lives.
Isn’t it amazing? Two introverts facing off in the brightest spotlight of all for president.
Most of the discussion of Paul Ryan, the presumptive Republican nominee for vice president, has focused on his budget proposals. But Ryan is a man of many ideas, which would ordinarily be a good thing.
A few years ago, President Barack Obama established a debt commission that was led by Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles and had a group of eminences, including Rep. Paul Ryan.
Pardon me for reminiscing on this 25th anniversary of the 1987 Pan American Games. Others have told how the Indianapolis “sports strategy” helped regenerate downtown, grow IUPUI, and establish Indianapolis as a major league city and a convention destination.
Mitch Daniels is leaving office because of a term limit. As he departs at the end of his second four-year hitch, a recent independent poll placed the Daniels approval rating at 66 percent, showing a large majority of voters still approve of the job he’s doing.
Mr. Chapman lived across the street from my elementary school, in a ramshackle house behind the candy store. I’d seen him around, but never met him until I started to deliver the Auburn Evening Star along 15th Street.
