by Leo Morris Reading up on my journalistic hero Ernie Pyle, I came across this startling paragraph near the end of a mostly laudatory article about him in American Heritage magazine: “Ernie Pyle had some off days in his wartime columns. Sometimes he laid on the Hoosier folksiness a bit too heavily. Sometimes the GI’s came off just a little too good to be true, not only rugged and brave but also unfailingly good-humored in…

by Mark Franke I am a child of the 1950’s; I freely and proudly admit that. My entire outlook on life was formed by my upbringing during that decade in the home, the church and the school. One concept we learned about our nation was its potential for everyone to make himself better through hard work, education and moral living. The goal parents set for their children was simple: achieve a better standard of living…

by Leo Morris All I want to do today is tell you where I was born, but be patient. It will take a while. The following is mostly accurate, based on a real occurrence. While some parts of the conversation quoted might have taken place largely in my head, there is a greater truth involved, and I have been faithful to the essential spirit of the exchange. I believe that meets what passes for ethical…

“Nearly a third of property taxes now collected by City Hall go into 143 special taxing districts controlled by Mayor Rahm Emanuel and aldermen, according to a new report by Cook County Clerk David Orr” — Chicago Tribune, July 24, 2018 by Craig Ladwig “I don’t care who does the electing, so long as I do the nominating,” said William M. Tweed, “boss” of New York City’s Tammany Hall. Few in Indiana know what it’s…

by Mitch Harper A few years ago, my city council considered a personal property tax abatement for a specific business. There was a lengthy discussion of the particulars of that request — quite lengthy. After the other council members had spoken, I raised my hand. I noted we had used up a lot of time talking about a specific business personal property tax abatement of a single business. I said that the view from 18,000…

by Leo Morris In 1657 the mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal wrote a letter in which he included the following apology (translated from the French): “I have made this longer than usual because I have not had time to make it shorter.” I suspect that the Indiana Policy Review’s Craig Ladwig has that quote framed and hanging on a wall somewhere. When he recruited me to write these pieces, he said one of the cruelest…

(For the use of the membership only.) “I have never worked with a more honorable man than Dan Coats. He oozes integrity out of every pore. He is motivated by a sense of patriotism and duty to the security and the safety of this nation. I would tell anyone to heed his advice and his counsel.” — Gov. Eric Holcomb COULD IT BE POSSIBLE that the president knows something strategically important about Russia that hasn’t…

by Mark Franke I am conflicted. I love history. One of my historical heroes is Alexander Hamilton. I wrote what was the equivalent of my senior thesis as an undergraduate major in economics on Hamilton’s plan to put the new nation on a sound financial footing. Needless to say, I have looked up to Alexander Hamilton my entire adult life. But I hate musicals. Especially musicals that purport to be on historical topics but turn…

“There are very mediocre people out there who run stuff, but nobody out there told them they can’t. You’re just as capable.” — Michelle Obama to the Women’s Fund of Central Indiana, quoted by Suzette Hackney in the Feb. 13 Indianapolis Star by Richard McGowan, Ph.D. Recent news stories have again focused on affirmative action, the program established on behalf of those who have been disenfranchised by government design or cultural neglect. That groups of…

by Leo Morris I honestly wasn’t going to write about the Miss America pageant dropping the swimsuit competition, even when the news came that the Miss Indiana contest would naturally follow suit, so to speak. It’s not that I didn’t have anything to say about it. I just calculated that anything I did say was likely to get me kicked out of the state, and, despite Indiana’s well-documented flaws, I still like living here. I’m…