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.

Survey USA is reporting Governor Mitch Daniels with a 16-point lead over Democratic challenger Jill Long Thompson.  The survey of 687 likely voters showed Daniels leading  53-37.   The poll was taken Sunday and Monday of this week.

What’s interesting about this poll is that Daniels is leading in all areas of the state. 

• Northern IN, 46-42.
• Central IN, 56-32.
• Indianapolis, 59-34.
• Southern IN, 56-38.

Any of this sound familiar?

• Share everything.
• Play fair.
• Don’t hit people.
• Put things back where you found them.
• Clean up your own mess. 
• Don’t take things that aren’t yours.
• Say you’re sorry when you hurt somebody. 
• Wash your hands before you eat. 
• Flush.
• Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you.
• Live a balanced life – learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some.
• Take a nap every afternoon. 
• When you go out in the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands and stick together. Be aware of wonder.
• Remember the little seed in the Styrofoam cup: the roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that.
• Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the Styrofoam cup – they all die. So do we.
• And then remember the Dick-and-Jane books and the first word you learned – the biggest word of all – LOOK.

I need to make a point of clarification in yesterday’s post.  I talked about Jill Long Thompson’s campaign’s criticism of Governor Mitch Daniels’ travel on the day the stock market lost nearly 800 points.  First, I think her staff should have waited to make a big deal out of this on another news day. More importantly, JLT’s campaign is basically saying the Governor used taxpayer money to attend non-governmental functions.

However, the rules on travel are not as clear as JLT would probably like for them to be.  In JLT’s news release she cites the following statute…

“According to state law (IAC 1-5-12), a state officer, employee or special state appointee shall not make use of state materials, funds, property, personnel, facilities or equipment for any purpose other than for official state business unless the use is expressly permitted by a general written agency, departmental or institutional policy or regulation.”

When I asked JLT’s staff if they got a copy of the administrative rules to see if any of the Governor’s non-state travel might fall into an exemption, they told me “no.”  It would have made more sense to have a copy of the rules ready and just to have all the bases covered.  Because if the Governor’s non-state business travel is covered by the exemption, someone is going to be looking real silly.

Okay, it’s quiz time!  Which was the bigger political train wreck today?

1. The stock market losing nearly 700 points because of no financial bailout?
2. John McCain taking credit for the bailout coalition right before it fell apart?
3. Jill Long Thompson’s campaign talking about the Governor’s travel using incomplete records and an incomplete statute on the day stocks fell nearly 700 points because there was no bailout?
4. All of the above.

In case you were wondering what you could do with the $700 Billion that’s going to bailout the nation’s financial industry, here are a few thoughts courtesy of Time magazine.

• You could give every poerson in the United States $2,300 or give every household $6,300.
• You could buy gas for every car in the United States for the next 16 months.
• You could pay the income taxes for every American who makes $500,000 or less.
• You could fully fund the departments of Defense, Treasury, Education, State, Veterans Affairs, Interior Department and NASA.
• You could buy every NFL, NBA, Major League Baseball team, build each one a new stadium and pay every player $191 million each for a year.
• You could pay off 7% of the nation’s $9.8 trillion debt.

Okay, let’s all be honest, no one is crazy about writing a check for $700 billion to bailout a bunch of people who made bad decisions.  

However, the problem is what would happen if we did nothing.  As much as I would love to see a lot of people get their up-comings, someone has to be the grown-up here.

Think of it as a parent whose kid gets arrested.   You can leave him their indefinitely or you can let him sit for a while.  My father did the latter and somehow it worked.

I don’t think it’s the best deal in the world and I don’t think it’s the worse deal.  It could use some improvements definitely.

But as much as it costs to do something, it would have been a lot worse and cost a lot more to do absolutely nothing.

Now if you don’t mind, I’m off to go run up a bunch of bills so I can qualify for my government bailout.

Your favorite political pundit is back after spending several days in Montana.  Believe it or not I actually rode a horse up a mountain.  I was there as part of a conference sponsored by the Liberty Fund.  I got some interesting ideas which I will scribble down over the next couple of days. In the meanwhile, it’s nice to be back where the is air thick and the land is flat.

I’m getting on a plane this morning to spend a few days in Montana for a conference.  You may now dispense with the Blazing Saddles and “Brokeblack” Mountain jokes.

I don’t know if I’ll have Internet access yet.  If I do, I will try to post from afar.  If not, consider this an open forum post where you guys are free to talk about whatever floats your boat.  I’ll be back Sunday.

Try to conduct yourselves with a little bit of dignity, people.

Have fun.

I had some problems with my DVR last night so trying to watch the second Gubernatorial debate was a little difficult, but it really didn’t matter because nothing changed all that much.   Both Mitch Daniels and Jill Long Thompson were a little more aggressive and Andy Horning was still Andy Horning.  So here are my overall grades based on style, delivery and content.

• Mitch Daniels – B+, good on specifics and calling JLT’s facts on the carpet.  Maybe a little too aggressive with one member of the audience.
• JLT – C/C+.  You continued your attack on Daniels and added a couple more specifics to your plan for Indiana, but you still didn’t give voters a reason to switch.
• Andy Horning – B.  Good performance, but when people are looking to government for answers telling them to look elsewhere might not be the best thing.