Franklin Township schools had a news conference today spelling out the gloom and doom facing the district since voters turned down the referendum on Tuesday.  I didn’t get a chance to attend due to prior commitments and apparently neither did Derek Trovillion of Hoosier Access who was kicked out of the building.  Luckily, he got it on tape.  Enjoy.

When you pull stuff like this are you surprised the referendum went down in more flames than a Lady Gaga concert?

If there are two things to take away from Tuesday’s primary here they are. First, there is something to be said about county organizations being able to deliver their candidates. Second, despite a 10-point Democratic lead, this November’s elections have the potential to be very competitive.

Look at the numbers. With 98 percent of the vote in there were more than 71,000 votes cast. Nearly 38,000 voters pulled a Democratic ballot. 30,000 pulled a Republican ballot and about 3,500 just voted in a referendum. Despite that 8,000-ticket advantage both incumbent Greg Ballard and Democratic challenger Melina Kennedy got practically the same number of votes. Kennedy received 28,352 votes (nearly a 10,000 vote drop off), while Ballard received 28,254 votes (less than 1,200 vote drop off).

In the race for the at-larges, if you were to take them all in the order of most votes received the order is as follows: Joanne Sanders (25,519), Leroy Robinson (21,885), Barb Malone (21,392), Michael Kalscheur (20,526)and John Barth (20,349); two Democrats and two Republicans. The next finisher is Jackie Cissel (20,182) who beats Zach Adamson (18,923).

Interesting, n’est ce pa?

Now of course this is a primary and the same people who come out in a general election aren’t necessarily the same people who come out in a general. And then there’s the question of what will the Ron Gibson and Sam Carson supporters do as well as who will the Libertarians field at their convention later this month? There’s also how well the individual Councilors do and what are the big news issues of the day?

So many questions and we have until November to answer them. Let the political games begin. I’m looking forward to playing.

Well today is primary day.  Republicans and Democrats go to the polls and pick their nominees for a host of local offices.  Libertarians don’t have primaries.  There are also referendums on the ballot in Franklin and Perry Townships as well as in Avon.

According to the Marion County Clerk’s office more than 4,300 people had taken advantage of early voting, more than 60 percent of them took a Democratic ballot.  That’s also indicative of the more competitive races for Mayor and City-County Council seats on the Democratic side.

Here’s a breakdown early, either in person or mail.  Not some voters may have submitted an application to vote by mail, traveling board or fax/email but have not yet returned a ballot. ….

• Center – 922 votes; 194 Rs, 728 Ds.
• Decatur – 70 votes; 34 Rs, 36 Ds .
• Franklin – 588 votes; 366 Rs, 148 Ds, 74 Other.
• Lawrence – 497 votes; 235 Rs, 262 Ds.
• Perry – 658 votes; 340 Rs, 251 Ds, 67 Other.
• Pike – 544 votes; 123 Rs, 421 Ds.
• Warren – 347 votes;  113 Rs,  234 Ds.
• Washington – 862 votes; 264 Rs, 598 Ds.
• Wayne – 468 votes; 164 Rs; 304 Ds.

Now go vote, so I can complain!

It’s always a great day when you can wake up in the morning.  It’s an even better day when the mastermind of the 9-11 terrorists attacks can’t.

As we sit and wait to find out whether Mitch Daniels will run for President, this latest ad from the Indiana Republican Party gives me a pretty good idea on what he would run on if he decides to take the plunge.

Speaking of Governors, I’m hearing Indiana Congressman Mike Pence has scheduled a call to his supporters at 10 a.m. this morning.  It’s widely believed he’s going to announce his intent to run for Governor with a more formal announcement set for later this Spring.  Stay tuned.

I figured the Carmel Mayoral race would get a little tense but I wasn’t expecting the following mailer to go out from the John Accetturo campaign attacking incumbent Jim Brainard.  You make your own call…

(I know this blog post is a little longer than usual, but it’s necessary.  I’ve gotten conflicting stories from  from very reliable people regarding the same event so I decided to print them both.)

Imagine it’s a weeknight and you’re at the third meeting of your new organization with nearly 100 of your closest political friends.  Some of them are elected officials, aspiring candidates for office, some are the party faithful.  You have a primary coming up in less than a week and you really want to get everyone motivated to turn out the vote because you’ve got some primary challengers and not a lot of voters are interested in the election.

You’re having a good time and one of your main speakers takes the floor.  He’s your local Congressman who kicked some serious butt in the last general election and has rock star status inside the party.  He walks up to the podium and begins to speak.  And instead of words of inspiration coming out of his mouth he literally goes off on your slated candidate ticket as well as other members of the party.  Shortly after he finishes, your County Chairman takes the floor and tries to do damage control.  And then to make life even more interesting, one of the non-slated Mayoral candidates stops by and says hello.

Hard to imagine?  Not really if you’re a member of the new Center Township Democratic Club and it’s last Tuesday.   At least that’s one version of what took place.

What was supposed to be an uplifting rally turned into a jaw dropper as 7th District Congressman Andre Carson ripped into some of his fellow Democrats about their slated City-County Council At-Large candidates and accusations of him being a sellout and traitor to his race for backing Melina Kennedy for Mayor as opposed to his uncle, Sam Carson.

The Congressman basically called slated at-large candidates Zach Adamson, John Barth and Leroy Robinson “the weakest slate he’d ever seen”, said they brought nothing to the table and wanted to know how they ended up getting chosen.   He also complained about candidates calling him and asking to put his name on fundraising letters and told them to stop calling him.  Adamson and Barth were not there, but Robinson was.

In addition, Carson was also livid at accusations of being a traitor to his race for backing Kennedy over his uncle. Carson told the crowd that Kennedy had approached him about his endorsement for Mayor while his uncle was looking at running for city-county council.  He said he gave Kennedy his word that he would support her for Mayor and he had no intention of going back on his word.

Shortly after Carson finished his terse remarks, County Chairman Ed Treacy reportedly got up to do damage control. Saying the slated candidates were picked by the precinct committeemen and ward chairmen.  And if they didn’t like the slate they should have picked someone else. he told the audience he was only doing what the party faithful told him to do and told them not to get mad at him.

Treacy also said if you didn’t get out and work for the slate you were not a good Democrat.  Treacy also told the crowd that they really needed to get out the African-American vote or they were going to lose in November.  He told them he met the day before with 14-17 pastors from Black churches across the city and they agreed to help get their flocks to the polls to give the Democrats a November victory.

Now that was one version of events.  In the other version, Carson was not angry, but he was direct in his approach.

The Congressman did talk about the slate, but what he said was that he understands that nobody wants to feel like they’re being dictated to about who they vote for and that who you vote for is a personal decision.  He was saying he understood people’s angst, and he also said that Democrats needed to do a better job of ensuring that our candidates follow through with what they say they’ll do.  He did not attack the slate, but instead gave them high praise the following night at a Lawrence Township function.

I am told he was somewhat bemused about the fact somebody had apparently asked him why he was supporting a white woman over his own uncle.  He was also talking about the bonds of family and the expectation people had that you stand by family.

With respect to Treacy, I’m told he did talk about race with respect to the slate but provided more of a historical overview of racial politics in Marion County  including a  line that white candidates used to get slated and black candidates would exercise veto the decision at the primary, but he added that this time the party had a more inclusive process and gotten a more inclusive ticket because of it, and he actually held up a slate mailer to prove it.  He never told people they could have voted for somebody else.

He did talk about meeting with 17 ministers that morning, but his comment was that the Democratic Party in Marion County is 27% African-American, which means that they constitute over half of the votes we need for victory.  He said he told the ministers that the African-American community is a powerful voting block for Democrats, and they need the votes of the black community.

So who is a pundit to believe?  The truth is usually somewhere in the middle.  But the fact that people were willing to go into that much detail with the person who is considered to be public enemy #1 at Marion County Democratic headquarters says quite a bit.

Also running for Mayor is former City-County Councilor Ron Gibson. Running at-large are former city-councilor Sherron Franklin and community activist Pat Andrews.   The primary is May 3.

Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels today said he would sign legislation that bans state dollars from going to most medical providers and health clinics that provide abortion services.  This has the right-to-life folks cheering and the abortion rights supporters screaming.  It also has everyone under this building speculating whether this means the Governor is more or less likely to run for President.  However if people would just take a step back and think three-dimensionally for just a second at the end of the day nothing has really changed in Indiana.  Here’s why.

First, Planned Parenthood can still provide abortions.  The agency says abortions are not paid for with state or federal dollars.  Secondly, the Governor made it clear in his news release that no person receiving Medicaid would be denied reproductive health services.

I commissioned a careful review of access to services across the state and can confirm that all non-abortion services, whether family planning or basic women’s health, will remain readily available in every one of our 92 counties. In addition, I have ordered the Family and Social Services Administration to see that Medicaid recipients receive prompt notice of nearby care options. We will take any actions necessary to ensure that vital medical care is, if anything, more widely available than before.

However, what was more important was this line from the Governor’s news release…

Any organization affected by this provision can resume receiving taxpayer dollars immediately by ceasing or separating its operations that perform abortions.”

That tells me that Governor’s Office has found away to split the difference on this controversial issue.  All Planned Parenthood has to do is break off the portion of its operations that performs abortions and create a separate legal entity.  And since abortion services are already pay for themselves and no state or federal money goes there, the new agency can continue as business as usual while Planned Parenthood’s $2-$3 million in state funding is restored.

Am I the only who sees this or am I missing something here.

Indiana lawmakers are voting on the $28 billion budget today.  There is is $150 million more for schools and full day kindergarten.  Lawmakers also have agreed to split the difference between taxpayers and the teachers pension fund of any budget surplus of over 10 percent of state revenues.   I’ve embedded a copy of the budget summary below for your own reading pleasure.

With a few days to go before the May primary, Democratic City-County Council at-large candidate Pat Andrews is hitting the airwaves with this commercial.  I think the the two most interesting things about the ad are one, a commercial was actually made.  Second, it’s running on Black Entertainment Television, which tells me Andrews is trying reach an African-American audience, a key demographic in any democratic primary.  An interesting side note, I saw the ad run late in the evening on BET which made it the most intelligent thing to air on the network at that hour in a long time.