Remember back in February 2007 I wrote about a possible federal investigation of the city’s pea shake houses?  Fast forward 18 months. My sources are telling me that a reported grand jury probe of some IMPD officers may involve Indianapolis’ pea shake houses. It’s still unclear what the charge is, although bribery, money laundering and tax evasion are the first things that comes to my mind.

A source close to the department would not confirm any investigation, but said “they would not be surprised”.

Please note, grand juries don’t just show up out of nowhere.  Word is a number of individuals, including officers have already been questioned.  I’m keeping an eye on this but it looks like some long-time chickens are finally coming home to roost.

It’s sad such a cleaning is necessary, but things should have never been allowed to get to this point in the first place.

Stay tuned.

I’m taking a few seconds today to write about something other than politics.  I’m actually writing about college.  At one the schools I teach at they’ve instituted a new policy;  the instructors are now required to take attendance at the beginning and end of each class. 

The logic is that students should be as acclimated to the world of work as possible so someone thought making them “punch in and punch out” would be the best way to do it.  Now as instructors, we are obligated to carry out the policies of the institutions we teach in, but I’ve always wondered if mandatory attendance policies in higher education is a good idea.

I’ve always believed that as a student, you have a responsibility to come to class, period.  It’s part of being a grown up. Now some classes (i.e. history) being there everyday may not be as important as say calculus or nursing.  And I’ve never understood students who chronically miss class.  You wouldn’t spend $7.00 on a burger and fries, get your food and not eat so why would you do it for an education that costs you thousands of dollars a year?

As a teacher/instructor my job is make the class engaging enough so that students don’t want to miss class and they feel bad when they do.  I also have a duty to make sure that what is taught in the class isn’t necessarily what’s in the text, so students should have a reason to come.   And students who tend not to show up, tend not to do so well.

I’ve never thought making people show up somewhere is a good idea.  Smart people get it.  Good teachers get.  The ones who tend not to show up are the ones who probably shouldn’t have been there in the first place.

Back to politics tomorrow.

If you get a chance, read this piece by Politico’s Roger Simon. It’s a great analysis on how the Clintons lost to the Obama camp. I especially loved reading the part where Hilary tells an aide who brought her bad news to “Shut the f*** up!” So all the Clintonistas who are still whining during this convention have no one to blame but themselves and their unorganized candidate.

As the Democratic National Committee gets underway,  I had a few thoughts I thought I would share.

• Despite Evan Bayh not being on the ticket, Indiana is still in play and will come down to a good old-fashioned ground war.  The GOP has one of the best get-out-the-vote operations in the nation, but the Obama people are opening offices and engaging in massive voter registration drives.
• The last best hope for Jill Long Thompson to run a competitive race against Mitch Daniels just went out the window.  Had Barack picked Evan Byah, the Governor’s race would have become a U.S. Senate race because the Governor would pick Bayh’s replacement.  Millions of dollars would have flown into the state to her campaign.  Now she’s on her own.
• The Biden pick also makes me turn my attention towards Mitt Romney as John McCain’s VP choice. 
• A final note from Springfield, one unofficial count put the crowd at 30,000.  Not bad from the 10,000 that were there 17 months ago.  However, I’ve never seen so many people who drive hybrid vehicles leave behind so much paper, trash and empty water bottles. 

Barack Obama has picked Delaware Senator Joe Biden to be his running mate. 

Here’s U.S. senator Dick Lugar’s reaction, “I congratulate Senator Barack Obama on his selection of my friend, Senator Joe Biden, to be his vice-presidential running mate. I have enjoyed for many years the opportunity to work with Joe Biden to bring strong bipartisan support to United States foreign policy.

“I share the disappointment of many Hoosiers that my partner in the Senate, Evan Bayh, was not selected on this occasion, but I believe he will continue to have widespread support for higher office during many years ahead.”

Lugar made his statement while en route to Tbilisi, Georgia.

I’m off to cover the event.  It will be a long, fun day, for a political junkie like me.

I am in my other home of Springfield, IL tonight getting ready to attend the Obama event tomorrow.  MSNBC is reporting that Evan Bayh and Tim Kaine have been notified that they are off the list for VP and the text message announcing the candidate won’t go out until 10 am tomorrow.

And radio talk show host Alan Comes is reporting that a plane from Midway Airport in Chicago is on it’s way to New Castle, Delaware.

Looks like Biden to me, at least for now. 

 I’ll update you tomorrow. 

When I was in college my art friends had a saying, “we came to study the Renaissance while our parents go baroque.” That was the only thing I could think of when I saw the City-County Council chambers packed with people from the arts community.

They were mad that $500,000 was being cut from the arts budget, because the city of Indianapolis is in this situation which is known as broke.

I guess what galls me the most about the arts community is they keep throwing out the line that the arts brings in more than $468,000,000 dollars to the city in economic activity. If the arts bring in that much money, why are these people whining about a paltry half a million? Can’t they use their own creativity to find what basically amounts to .001 of the money they generate. Which by the way is also an intellectually dishonest argument.

Most of the money the city gives to arts programs are usually for educational purposes, not commercial endeavors. It’s also funny the arts community didn’t mention the money they get from the Capitol Improvement Board or the hundreds of millions they manage to raise on their own at events and fundraisers. For some reason they think the taxpayers’ pockets are the only source of revenue.

This city is broke and the budget needs to be balanced. But that brings in another saying, the balancing budgets is a lot like going to heaven; everybody wants to go, but no one wants to die to get there. By showing their complete disregard for the taxpayers the arts community obviously isn’t trying to get to heaven, so I will be more than happy to show them how to get to the other place.

By the way, you can find their annual report here.  Look on page 15 for their finances and see how they spend their money.  You’ll be pleasantly surprised.

The Obama campaign has just released their weekend travel schedule. They’re hitting Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin, Missouri, Montana and Colorado. No Indiana, so maybe, no Evan Bayh for Vice-President?

Enjoy.