By Bruce Ippel, M.D. In the office, we have a handout for smokers that gives some potent hints and tools on how to quit. What it doesn’t cover, however, is the magnitude and scope of the economic interests trying to keep them addicted. There’s a river of money flowing into a variety of pockets from tobacco — and money talks, not usually politely or with your health in mind. Here’s what it’s saying: Virtually any…

By Maryann O. Keating, Ph.D. The belief in tons of gold in Fort Knox backing the U.S. dollar is an illusion. There is absolutely no commodity backing for the dollar, either gold or silver or anything else. The dollar is accepted on faith; it is a “fiat” currency. This means that individuals accept the dollar in return for their labor, services or products because they trust those in authority to maintain its value. A rising…

by Andrea Neal On the morning of Sept. 4, 1838, 859 Potawatomi were forced at gunpoint from their homes in northern Indiana and sent on foot and horseback to the “Unorganized Territory” of Kansas to begin a new life. The march became known as the Trail of Death because 42 Indians died along the way. Hundreds fell ill during the two-month journey across Indiana, Illinois and Missouri. A few escaped and returned to Indiana. Most…

For the use of the membership only. THESE TROUBLING TIMES tend to shrink our circle of friends in high office as statehouse ambitions clash with economic reality. But we have at least one left, a state legislator, and he has an idea for unleashing investment throughout Indiana. He would counter what the economists call “regime uncertainty” — in a sentence, the stagnation caused when investors not only have to calculate likely returns but also potential…

For the use of the membership only (708 words) TOO MANY REPUBLICANS miss a fact central to the disturbance playing out in Ferguson: Quite a few people get shot and killed by police officers in America every year; not many of them, however, are unarmed. Suspicions rightly arise when an unarmed individual is killed by the police. Those suspicions are greater in circumstances in which the police officer is white and the victim is black,…

by Cecil Bohanon, Ph.D. The world just seems to be filled with stupid, lazy and greedy people. A Wall Street Journal article a few years back described a really dumb practice of a major American automobile company. Passenger vans produced in Turkey are imported into the United States. As soon as they clear U.S. customs, they are shipped to an auto shop. The windows are removed from the vans and panels are installed in their…

“Amid all of the daunting challenges facing Indianapolis, and despite the deep concern about growing poverty and increasing crime, the city now has an opportunity to help thousands of at-risk children and, along the way, set the stage for generations of repaid dividends.” — Matt Tulley, Indianapolis Star, Aug. 15 by Hang La Democrats in the Indiana Senate are pushing for universal pre-kindergarten while the Republican governor focuses on low-income children. An independent survey of…

For the use of the membership only (534 words) INDIANA’S ONLY STATEWIDE newspaper has reinvented itself, we are told. You should hope it succeeds — for the sake of the hard-working, ink-stained souls there but also for the health of our public discussion. Yet, there are veteran newsmen still at their desks who have been “reinvented” dozens of times during the last couple of decades only to see their paper’s circulation numbers steadily decline. “My career objective,”…

by Tom Charles Huston I cannot resist a certain admiration for the sheer audacity of the criminal enterprise that is the Obama administration. Its tentacles extend to so many branches, bureaus and cubbyholes of the Leviathan as to defy diagramming, and its unity of action without unity of command offers a new model for imperial government. Its spokesmen are wonderfully shameless, its enforcers are ruthless and efficient and its disinformation operation is of KGB quality.…

by Andrea Neal James Whitcomb Riley was the most acclaimed, but he wasn’t the first Hoosier poet to gain national fame. Sarah T. Bolton deserves that honor. Even today her poem “Paddle Your Own Canoe” is cited and recited, though few know anything about its origins. Her poetry “was known everywhere,” and the canoe poem was set to music and translated into a dozen foreign languages, according to historian Jeanette C. Nolan in the book…