We are supposed to be overjoyed at the prospects of Indianapolis playing host to Super Bowl LII®. City leaders have boasted of the money the last Super Bowl® brought to Indianapolis. Those leaders overlook some of the financial incentives Indianapolis extended to the NFL®, such as the NFL® not having to pay certain taxes.

   The City came up with a study that showed we "made" $152 million from acting as the host city of the last Super Bowl.® The report is from Rockport Analytics,…

Indianapolis municipal code bars people under 18 from purchasing condoms and vibrators, under the Orwellian mantra of "promoting the public morals, health, peace and security in the city".  Safe sex and masturbation are good things.

Municode link: http://tinyurl.com/7v9ql2y

   We stream "live" on Ustream®. I was unaware that The Show has a link to the website and automatically provides access to archived shows. I should have taken that course in FORTRAN in undergrad.

   Yesterday’s Show was great. A lot of people showed up at The Recovery Room Lounge to show their opposition to the smoking ban in Indy. There were a lot of interesting points made:

-ALL of the bar owners noted loss of business since the ban took effect.

-Other businesses—juke…

   In 2005, the City-County Council passed, and Mayor Peterson signed into law, restrictions on smoking in public places. The first section of that ordinance, Sec. 616-101, delineates the reasons for the ordinance. Under the title "Findings and Intent," Sec. 616-101 cites secondhand smoke (SHS), a/k/a environmental tobacco smoke (ETS), as a "major contributor to indoor air pollution," "a cause of disease in nonsmokers, including heart disease, stroke, respiratory disease, and lung cancer." …

   From the Recovery Room Lounge, 1868 Lafayette Road on Saturday, July 14, 2012, we shall shoot Civil Discourse Now. The starting time will be 2 p.m., a departure from our usual, as the location is host to a special event.

   The first segment of The Show will be "What’s Going On," 14 minutes of discussion of three or four headline items.

   The rest of The Show will be about the smoking ban Indianapolis put into effect on June 1. People who are opposed to the ban should come…

   One aspect of Indianapolis’s recently-amended smoking ordinance is that it is a ban. Unless a person is a member of a private club, or is in a casino or off-track betting establishment (referred to as a "satellite" in the ordinance) she or he cannot smoke a cigarette inside the premises of a business in this county. Cigar smokers still can smoke, but only in (again) private clubs that vote to allow smoking or cigar bars. Cigarette smokers cannot smoke in cigar bars.

   The Indy…

   Congress bailed out the big banks with the idea that the money given promptly would be lent out to the public and the economy, thereby, would be stimulated. Some estimates put the amounts received as high as $16trillion. The idea, that the big banks promptly would lend the money, turned out to be wrong. The big banks—JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Citibank, the usual suspects—have sat on the monies they received. I guess they await a rainy day. Given the severe drought conditions in…

  The Supreme Court’s June 28 decision on the Affordable Care Act a/k/a "Obamacare" is a read of interest. Chief Justice Roberts has caught flak from many—usually the right-wing—for his unexpected opinion that found the individual mandate passed constitutional muster, but the expansion of medicaid did not catch up. (I am sorry about the play one words, but I had to do that.)

   Many people point out that those who promoted the Act said it did not raise taxes, and yet the taxing power…

   Mitch Daniels has been named as Purdue’s new president. Several questions came to me when I heard the news.

-Will his million-dollar annual salary enable him to return contributions he received from convicted Ponzi schemer Tim Durham so the small-investor victims of Durham will receive a pittance of their stolen investments?

-Will the former governor be given a "pass" if he rides his Harley past the dorms during "quiet hours"?

-Will Mitch allow the capable people at…

   With all the consternation of the Affordable Care Act—a/k/a "Obamacare" a/k/a "Obamneycare"—many people have missed the forest for the trees.

   I have Multiple Sclerosis. I make no secret of the diagnosis and wrote about the disease as part of the reason I walk in the Indianapolis 500 Festival Mini-Marathon® each year.

   When I was diagnosed with MS in 1994, I had no health insurance. I applied to a private carrier, but was rejected for my "prior medical condition." I…

   Kurt Lorey raises an excellent point. We shall shoot today, Saturday, June 30, at my office. That is at 1915 Broad Ripple Avenue a/k/a 62^nd Street, at 11 a.m. The topic will be on student debt.

   In 1972-73, the total cost—tuition, room-and-bard, and fees (not books because textbooks varied from outrageously high to extortionately high—for one year at one of the four residential, four-year degree State universities (Ball State, Indiana State, Indiana, and Purdue) was…

   In the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s decision on the Affordable Healthcare Act, one might believe we would discuss that decision on The Show. There is another issue building up with nearly as much significance and that is—student debt.

   The costs of higher education in the United States are insane. Some students who attended graduate or professional schools after receipt of their bachelor’s degree are in debt in amount that reach six-figures.  Our country is at risk of the…

   About a month ago a Broad Ripple business person told me the outrageous amount she had to pay in property tax.

   Taxes are necessary for our society to function. Some people and non-people get passes on that particular tax.

   Yesterday I saw an item posted about Indy’s food trucks. These are not restaurants on wheels. A restaurant provides its patrons with a table and chairs at which those patrons may enjoy the meal provided. Food trucks are delivery vans made over to…

   Will SCOTUS hand down the decision on the Affordable Healthcare Act today? Inquiring minds want to know.

   I have read a few pieces in which the authors predict the decision could be as bad as Dred Scott.  That decision, at 60 U.S. 393, handed down by the Taney Court in 1857, has been considered by many the worst case handed down by the Supremes. The decision was so bad it shook the Court as an equal to its two counterparts in the system of checks and balances. The decision…

   In its June 15 editorial against the lawsuit brought against the City of Indianapolis over the recent increases in the smoking ban, The Indianapolis Star made inaccurate and false statements in support of its position.

   One of these false statements is: "Opponents of the smoking ban can’t argue credibly against the health risks of secondhand smoke.  Again, the evidence is simply overwhelming."

   A general statement such as that takes time to refute. First, one…

   Saturday, June 23, 2012, at 11 a.m. we will live stream The Show from Pitts Stop Bar & Grill, 1640 South Meridian Street in Indianapolis. (Kurt Lorey corrected my spelling of the first word in the name of the bar. I was born and grew up in Indiana, and so did not think of a possible nuance to the name of the establishment. For that, I apologize—and thank you, Kurt.)

   We shall discuss—in "town hall" format—the recent ban of smoking adopted and put into place by the…

"Civil Discourse No" will live-stream a town-meeting format Show on Saturday, June 23 at 11 a.m. from the Pit Stop Bar & Grills, 1640 South Meridian Street, Indianapolis. The topic is the recent smoking ban in Indy. All are welcome.

   Yesterday, Tim Durham was convicted on all twelve Counts on which he had been indicted for running a Ponzi scheme in which small investors were bilked out of nine figures total. He faces a sentence of what amounts to the rest of his life in prison. His defense attorneys immediately requested he be allowed to be held on house arrest pending sentencing (or maybe appeal), as he has been since he was indicted. The Government objected and said Durham is a flight risk.

   This perplexes…

   On Saturday, June 23, at 11 a.m., "Civil Discourse Now" will return from hiatus. The format of The Show will a bit different from our usual format. Members of the public always have been welcome to watch. We have had audiences. The main audience to which The Show has been directed, however, has been through the internet—and this is not meant as a slight to Kurt, Art, Janice, Jeff, and others who have turned out to watch. When we first started, the aim was to gain access to audience…

   "I thought the town-hall thing only was for political candidates who were confident enough about their message and/or the audience before they were to appear?"

   Saturday, June 23, at 11 a.m. will be a new format for The Show. This will not be the format we have for every week, but special for this week. If anyone is interested in the smoking ban wrought by the City-County Council and Mayor Ballard, she or he should attend—or watch on the internet.

   Every day, as adults,…