Is it me or are we getting mixed messages from the State of Indiana?

Obesity among Hoosiers is a big problem. The Center for Disease Control typically lists Indiana among the top tier of states whose citizens are considered obese. Studies have found that about one in four Hoosiers is in that category. The legislature has even tackled the problem with laws regulating vending machines in schools and mandating exercise for students.

So, it seemed odd this week when the Indiana State Fair opened its third annual signature food contest.

This year’s entries had to fit the 2008 fair’s theme, “Year of Indiana Trees.” To choose the winner, a blue ribbon tasting panel met earlier this month at the Indiana State Fairgrounds to sample the food vendors’ wares.

The panel’s favorite? Deep-Fried Bananas Foster Cheesecake On A Stick. (Cubes of frozen banana cheesecake on a stick were coated in sweet crumbs, then deep-fried and served with vanilla ice cream.)

Close behind were treats such as Maple Twists On A Stick (cinnamon-flavored yeast dough deep-fried and glazed with maple cream and sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar) and Deep-Fried Maple Latte (coffee-flavored batter deep-fried until crisp, then topped with maple cream, whipped cream, dark chocolate and espresso beans)

There are a couple of healthy barbecue dishes on there as well. However, my code of ethics does not allow me to speak ill of anything with barbecue sauce.

And it’s also confusing that one of the panelists was Cheri Daniels, wife of our extremely fit governor (who appoints the Fair Board.) You can go over to NIFS on the IUPUI campus almost any weekday and see Mitch vigorously working out. But his spouse is on a panel that’s choosing sinfully caloric desserts?

The panel was assembled with other food tasters: WFMS radio’s J.D.Cannon, 2008 Fair Queen Kristen Smith, Shannon Coleman of IndyMoms.com and my old friend Judge Smith of Judge’s Bar-B-Que. There should be no contest involving barbecue without having him passing Judgement (pun intended.)

Every year, all the media, 6News included, gets suckered into covering the foods at the Indiana State Fair. Deep Fried Twinkies, Deep Fried Snickers Bars,. And this August our anchors and reporters will eat them on camera and go on about how this year’s Deep Fried Whatever is even more decadent than last year’s Deep Fried Whatchamacallit. It’s the focus of the Indiana State Fair. Not animals, not crafts, not midway rides.  It’s Deep Fried Foods.

But, it does seem oddly out of sync with the other messages we’re hearing from the state about the health of Hoosiers, our obesity ranking and the toll it takes on our health and our economy

The Indiana State Legislature continues to be a superb training ground for future lobbyists peddling influence to their former colleagues. Currently, more than 30 former lawmakers are listed as lobbyists at the Indiana Lobby Registration Commission. 

Our legislators are quick learners.  Last summer, only a few months after starting new terms in the legislature, two state representatives, Bob Kuzman (D-Crown Point) and Matt Whetstone (R-Brownsburg) resigned to become lobbyists.  After they, and we, went to all of the trouble of going through an election got to their reward sooner than anticipated.

There’s a strong public perception that the arrangement between our lawmakers and the lobbyists whose job it is to influence that lawmaking is a little too cozy. That’s a perception among everyone. Well, almost everyone, except some of our public servants in the Legislature.

Last week, a bill introduced requiring lawmakers to wait one year after leaving office before being able to lobby the Indiana General Assembly was DOA.  Actually, it never got to arrive, being killed in committee by Senator Marvin Riegsecker (R-Goshen) who deep-sixed the proposal because he and other senators were angry about the insinuations. As head of the Senate Public Policy Committee, he controlled the bill’s fate.

Senator Riegsecker, it’s more than insinuations. It’s what’s going on.  What these guys don’t get is that there is a public perception that the lines get blurred. During hearings on the Senate bill, the lawmakers appeared to anything but open. Some proponents of the bill, testifying before the committee,  said the Hoosier legislators were hostile without a whole lot of provocation.

Look, legislation like this is good and it’s inevitable. Twenty six states have enacted one or two-year “cooling off” periods for lawmakers. Two years ago, Governor Mitch Daniels won passage of a law barring his aides from lobbying former colleagues for a year after moving into the private sector. What’s good for Mitch ought to be good for the Legislature.

It’ll come up again. And hopefully, these guys will wake up.

Next chapter: Legislators who also hold jobs with entities they oversee in their roles as lawmakers (see Ivy Tech)

For a group that reputedly doesn’t like change, Hoosiers sent a strong signal to politicians last night. Greg Ballard is the mayor-elect of Indianapolis. The retired Marine Corps officer didn’t so much as win the election; Bart Peterson lost it.

Ballard had a tough time raising funds to buy TV advertising, or any advertising for that matter. At one point he piggybacked in a spot with a city council candidate. Overall, it looks like Peterson spent ten times as much on TV as the mayor-elect.

I’m guessing if they had it to do all over again, the Democrats wouldn’t be as confident going against an unknown. They would have had a different message….earlier. And they would have ramped up spending. But that may not have mattered.

Ballard did get exposure in three televised debates with Peterson. Bart is probably wishing he had avoided those.

I don’t know much about Ballard; he seems like a nice, thoughtful guy. But he had a hard time getting the Republican Party to rally around him. If ever there was a grass roots campaign, this was it. He couldn’t even get Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels (R) to lend an endorsement.

But it looks like the Republicans are coming out of the woodwork now and hopping on the Ballard Bandwagon. And, he’ll need the help. He’s like the dog that chased the car. He caught it but didn’t know what to do with it.

Ballard wasn’t the only challenger to oust a sitting mayor in the region. In Lawrence, Republican Paul Ricketts beat Democratic Mayor Deborah Cantwell. In Franklin, independent Fred Paris upset Democrat Brenda Jones-Matthews, the incumbent. One exception was in Carmel where Republican Mayor James Brainard won re-election with 66 percent of the vote.

There are many takeaways but the main one for incumbents: You’ve already got two strikes against you, just by being the incumbent. Don’t take anything for granted and listen carefully to the messages coming from the voting public.

It seems like the Christmas season starts earlier and earlier every year.

Now, only one week into October, three weeks before Halloween, one Indy radio station has gone all holiday music – all the time. WNOU-FM, 93.1, a Contemporary Hits station until yesterday is changing formats and call letters in (conveniently) 93 days. Until then, you’ll get more Christmas music than you ever thought possible.

Then, on January 7, 93,1 becomes WIBC-FM (again- it had those calls from 1961-68 when it played classical music) and will switch to the news and talk content that has been on sister station WIBC-AM, 1070 KHz, since the late 80s.

And the old WIBC-AM will become the ESPN radio affiliate, leaving WXLW-AM scrambling for a new format.

Confused? How about those long-time WIBC NewsTalk loyalists who were born way before Major Edwin Armstrong figured out FM radio.

Even more confusing to their long time listeners was last week’s abrupt exit of Jeff Pigeon, the long-time voice of WIBC-AM, who “flew the coop” after nearly two decades on the morning show. His departure came a couple of months after the exit of Big John Gillis, long-time traffic reporter.

We changed anchors, the governor changed Daylight Savings Time, now Emmis Broadcasting is changing from AM to FM and shedding long-time newsmen.

We got mail. Mitch Daniels got mail.

Stand by for some nastygrams to the Monument Circle studios.