I did not go to church today. That will be my embarrassment for the day - I fell asleep and did not hear the alarm. I must have been far more tired than I thought, I did not wake until around noon when the neighbors started screaming. Well, it imposes on me an obligation to use my time even more wisely. To the good, I think a good idea for "Road Tripping" came to me as a dream - Jim on the bluff overlooking the Ohio River.
Some political things that came to me between Wednesday and today.
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Critics of law firms' deals with Trump are starting a firm of their own
Joining Lowell at the new firm, to be called Lowell and Associates, are Brenna Trout Frey and Rachel Cohen, both of whom resigned publicly in recent weeks from Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP, one of the highest-grossing firms in the United States, over what Trout Frey described in a LinkedIn post as the firm’s “capitulating to the Trump administration’s demands for fealty and protection money.”
Not every lawyer puts filthy lucre above the law.
Session process shuts out Hoosiers (Indiana Capital Chronicle)
Making space to hear everyday people is not the sole responsibility of individual elected officials. The limited availability of legislators is an institutional failure–one that arises from the design of the assembly and calendar rather than only the individual choices of legislators. Whether students agreed with their legislator or supported the outcome of a bill, a healthy democracy requires citizen involvement, and the institutions must be designed in ways that support this engagement.
Getting shut out of the process and seeing the IGA in action has led some of our students to grow more pessimistic – threatening to lower Indiana’s already abysmal rates of voter participation. For some students, gaining the “tools necessary to feel empowered to change government” (according to their reflections) only made them more committed to the process . Regardless of any individual student’s reaction, the Indiana General Assembly must address the institutional barriers that shut out everyday citizens – they work for us, afterall.
Which goes along with my ideas that we need to change Indiana's Constitution to more direct action. We are in a death spiral of voter participation.
Ex-AOC chief of staff going after the most powerful woman in Congress (SFGate); Pelosi is being challenged. I started unimpressed, then admiring, and now wondering why she must keep on.
Remembering South Vietnam (History Today) - just read the article; no commentary will suffice.
A great three-minute lesson in civics that Americans do not seem to understand:
‘Not everyone has to be sent to jail’: the judges who train peers on sentencing (The Irish Times)
This is the view of Supreme Court judge Mr Justice Peter Charleton, director of the judicial studies programme run by the judiciary for the judiciary, despite the views of victims’ groups that claim that some sentences handed down can be lenient.
“It’s basic: you have taken an oath to try and give a just verdict, not a verdict that might be lauded in a newspaper,” he said.
He dismissed the influence of social media, saying: “I doubt if any judge is going to be reading social media. You would be mad to.”
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“Not everyone has to be sent to jail. In the District Court and Circuit Courts, offending is at a lower level, you are trying to divert people away from overcrowded jails, looking at, say, community sanctions,” said the judge.
“Obviously, if a crime falls into a very high level of seriousness, what can you do? That is just the way it is. The guidelines are there.”
What is true for Ireland is even more true for Indiana, with the state's Bill of Rights making reformation the key principle of the criminal justice system. I think - have thought for a very long time - that community service should get more emphasis than imprisonment. The criminal law punishes individuals for injuring the peace and dignity of the community; criminals do not see themselves as part of the community and/or do not understand the harm they do to the community. The object of community service should be to reintegrate them into civil society by educating them about their place in the community and of the harms they caused. For civil society, it is a healing process by way of healing the individual.
There is a rising coming: A glorious week of people “punching Trump in the face!” (The Dean's Report). Albeit, Democrats need still need to sharpen their approach to Trump: The Ballad of Big Gretch by Jonathan Cohn - The Bulwark. And I was really pulling for Whitmer; now, she will be lucky to get out of Iowa's caucuses.
This probably does not seem like politics, then you probably only think politics is electoral and not cultural: 30 Ways to Revitalize Arts & Culture by Ted Gioia.
The Goldsmith Prize will give one Indiana city a grad student for a year (Axios Indianapolis)
The big picture: The Goldsmith Prize for Innovation in Local Government, created by the Sagamore Institute, invites the state's 500-plus cities and towns to submit their biggest, boldest ideas for how to make their communities more resilient, sustainable and vibrant places to live.
- One winner will get a graduate student for a year to help develop and implement the idea.
Why it matters: Indiana's cities and towns are entering a challenging new era. Mayors say they feel like expectations from citizens are at an all-time high, but so too are constraints on resources.
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Sheila Kennedy has been putting great posts:How it works: The contest is open to every mayor in the state.
- The application window is open until July 31.
- Each mayor can submit a new idea or an existing one the community would like to scale.
- The winner will receive a graduate student with expertise in the project field who will be dedicated to leading the innovative effort in the community for a year.
- The prize will pay the student a one-year stipend for their work.
Section 9. No law shall be passed, restraining the free interchange of thought and opinion, or restricting the right to speak, write, or print, freely, on any subject whatever: but for the abuse of that right, every person shall be responsible.
And if you have the time:
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