by Leo Morris Some years ago, life as I knew it was put on a sudden and dramatic hiatus in the form of an inattentive driver who attempted to cross U.S. 30 near Plymouth in the path of our car. My left hip was broken and, this being before insurance companies decided an overnight stay was sufficient for anything less than a heart attack accompanied by a brain tumor and multiple gunshot wounds, I spent…

by Ken Bisson, M.D. As a retired physician I have been following the developments of the Novel Coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic with interest. I think there will continue to be great disruptions to our economy for the short term. We are all becoming familiar with the obvious disruptions to our “old normal” routines. But I believe a “new normal” will be developing in several months.  My contemporaries are all too fond of saying, “That’s the way we’ve always done it.”…

WITH THE WUHAN VIRUS upon us we are gaining perspective on the Holcomb administration’s “leadership” style. It boils down to this: If there is the possibility of criticism, based on even the most narrow or isolated of anecdotal misfortunes, they throw principle out the window. The tenant-landlord relationship is an example. The administration, fearing an Indianapolis Star photo of some evicted tenant or another sitting forlornly by some curb, suspended centuries-old laws of private property…

MY FRIENDS KNOW THAT l tell these stories too often, especially in chaotic times. So I promise to keep them short on the chance they might guide those fashioning Indiana public policy today. First, the San Francisco earthquake of 1989 (also called the Loma Prieta earthquake, perhaps to avoid upsetting San Francisco realtors) caused 63 deaths, 3,800 injuries, and an estimated $6 billion in damage. This, please know, was a time when CNN was a reliable news source,…

by Eric Schansberg, Ph.D. Economists talk about the “human capital” and “signaling-screening” aspects of education. The impact of the COVID-19 virus on schools and students allows us to consider these two ways in which schooling is useful for individuals and society. Human capital is the role of education in building general and specific skills. In elementary and secondary schools, it is foundational — basic knowledge and basic skills in literacy, fluency, numeracy and socialization. In college, human capital accumulation…

by Jason Arp On Friday the 13th, I attended an emergency meeting of local government officials regarding the Wuhan Flu or novel coronavirus. A variety of city and county elected officials were convened for a briefing from the county health department. After an assortment of scary words, like “pandemic,” “quarantine” and “police power” were pronounced, we were treated to a few statistics, none different than what you are seeing on the news. These were married…

by Leo Morris If enough people do something utterly stupid, you have to do it, too. That’s an Immutable Law of the Indifferent Universe that I just made up at the supermarket the other day. Having completed my run at the coffee section and the bread and donut aisle, I was confronted by nearly empty shelves that once held bathroom tissue. Well, now . . . I had spent days making fun of all those…

by Maryann O. Keating, Ph.D. When ordinary people feel that politicians and experts lack answers to important questions, they respond to leaders offering a complete change of course. Such changes are often referred to as being populist. Populism is a political philosophy directed to the needs of the common people and advocating a more equitable distribution of wealth and power. In practice, however, many populist leaders show ambivalence toward representative democracy and instead exhibit a…

by Leo Morris Sorry, Hoosier tourists – you’ve just been given one more reason to cross a state line in search of that perfect day trip. Indiana Beach, the amusement park operated on the shores of Lake Shafer in White County for nearly 100 years, has been shut down by its corporate owners in California. When all the chin-scratching trend watchers speculate on reasons for the closing, a couple will probably stand out. One is…

by Barry Keating, Ph.D. Turn on the television, and every third add is for something called 5G. The adds say that 5G is fast, reliable, and the next “must-have” technology. But what is 5G, and do you need it? Your current smartphone is probably a 4G device. That is, it uses 4th generation cellular technology. 3G preceded 4G, and about the only difference, you might have noticed when you purchased your latest phone was that…