It’s not going to be a pleasant year at the General Assembly.  That much was evident from yesterday’s Organization Day. 

It never is when there’s no money to spend.  Indiana may be in better shape than a lot of other states, as a report from the newly-reconstituted Indiana Fiscal Policy Institute claims.  But the same report describes what’s coming as a “fiscal hurricane.”  State revenues are already starting to go into the tank, as laid-off Hoosiers pay fewer income taxes and the downturn in retail sales produces less sales tax revenue.  And it will likely get worse next month, when the state’s fiscal advisers make their new revenue forecast for the coming biennium.  That forecast is going to be ugly.

  All this is complicated by last year’s property tax fix.  Now that the state has taken over all school district general funding from property taxpayers, it’s the one that will have to come up with every penny for things like teacher salaries.  If there’s no money for any raises, teachers will raise hell.  And that will complicate passage of the budget. 

One of the first things every lawmaker does when the budget print-out and school funding formula hits their desks is to scan the schools in their districts to find out how much money they’re getting.  If they don’t like it, they’re not going to vote for the budget.  In past years when House Democrats needed every vote from their narrow majority to pass budgets, Mishawaka’s Craig Fry was famous for holding out until he got more money for Penn High’s district.  We may now see a lot more Craig Fry’s. 

Prayer Is Back

  House Speaker Pat Bauer is no longer doing the prayers this year.  Instead of him reading the lawyer-approved non-sectarian prayer, clergy are back to give the invocation.  Yesterday’s appeared to be non-denominational.  Over in the Senate, however, members are still doing the praying.  And Sen. Pat Miller made a reference to Jesus Christ, which is what a district court forbade in an order that was later overturned.  It’s possible that might bring another lawsuit, but not likely.  What stirred things up the first time was not a single prayer, but a full-fledged revival under then-Speaker Brian Bosma, with a clergyman backed by instrumentals singing about Walking With Jesus.  If legislators stay away from something like that, the ACLU probably won’t go to court again.

Bauer’s “Barber”

  This is something I should probably step lightly on.  But I’ve been getting too many comments and questions to ignore it.  Pat Bauer is, as one Democrat diplomatically described it, “seeing a new barber.”  It’s been evident in his last few appearances that he had less “hair” but it was, let’s say, more stylishly done.  The Speaker has apparently made the purchase many Hoosiers have wondered why he didn’t make for years.  Quick question:  Does this mean the Star’s Gary Varvel will have to stop doing the Minnie Pearl number, drawing Bauer with a price tag hanging from the back of his head?

U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson says because the banks aren’t lending he want to take your $700 billion bailout money and give it to credit card and other loan companies.   Regardless of the fact that this is totally messed up on so many levels, think about this.

The government is taking your money to loan to the banks so the banks can loan you money.

Wouldn’t it make more sense for the government to just not take your money in the first place?

It looks like that $700 billion federal bailout that was supposed to buy troubled assets and bailout the banks and financial institutions won’t get used for its original purpose.

Now it’s being used to bail out credit card companies because people ran up too much debt.

Feel free to gather your torches and pitchforks and go bend your plowshares back into swords!

I wrote this post back in January.  In the wake of today’s financial meltdown and subsequent baliout/rescue, I thought it was worth re-posting.

ECONOMICS 101

With a recession breathing down America’s economic neck, the politicians and bureaucrats in Washington are scrambling to do something.

They’re seriously considering giving tax rebates to people who don’t pay income taxes.

And they’re also lowering interest rates so people who make bad business decisions on the stock market can borrow more money and make even more bad business decisions on the stock market. This comes from a need to do something to save the economy.

Well here’s a thought, how about we do nothing? That’s right, nothing. Recessions and economic slowdowns are normal parts of the business cycle. You need them to help eliminate inefficiencies and waste in the economy.

Remember the dot-com bust of the late 1990s? Stupid internet companies went away and the strong ones survived.

That’s what we need to fix our American economy. We need to let the system crash and the financial bodies hit the floor. Bad companies need to go away so good companies can rise to the top. This is the only way for the market to truly correct itself after 20 years of unprecedented growth. This is Econ 101 folks.

We can’t keep artificially messing with the economy because the longer we try to hold back the bad times, the harder they’ll hit when it all comes crashing down. Just think October 1929, if you still don’t get what I’m saying.

 Days like this I feel like Nostradamus.

Here’s an interesting question in the wake the financial bailout/rescue plan.  When you send someone to public office, are you asking them to represent you or use their best judgment?  Remember a pure democracy is four wolves and a lamb deciding what to have for lunch?  In a republic, the lamb has a shotgun.