State GOP Facing Challenges Of Own Making

Ok Class, here’s today’s test. Who is Daniel E. Kelly?

Googling is not allowed.

Anyone? OK, here’s a hint. Mr. Kelly is connected to Dr. Brewster M. Higley.

It’s OK, I’ll wait.

Still nothing?

One last hint. Dr. Higley wrote a poem called My Western Home in the 1870s.

Give up?

Daniel took that poem and started playing around with it on his guitar. He added a few words here and there and when it was all said and done, the song you and I know as Home on the Range came out.

I share all that to offer my sincere apologies to Danny and Brewster. Pretty sure what follows is perhaps the worst rendition the song ever got.

Hang on while I clear my throat . . .

We live in a home

Where the buffalo roamed

And the state keeps our money all day

Where never is heard

An encouraging word (between the two parties)

And Hoosiers are feeling betrayed!

Blown, blown all away

Where our money gets pilfered away

They tax and they take

It’s really absurd

And leaves us worn and dismayed

Let’s start with the recently concluded and so-called special session. The only thing special about it was that Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb couldn’t wait until January to jump on the abortion bandwagon. Between that and what lawmakers laughingly called economic relief, they decided to spend around a quarter of a million bucks to meet.

What came out of it?

Actually, I’d like to avoid the arguments – pro and con – on the abortion decisions made. For today, could we just focus on the money side of things?

And let’s start with Indiana’s rainy day fund – a stockpile of your money and mine that is currently at more than $6,000,000,000.

Yes, that is nine zeroes.

Billion.

Black gold. Texas T. (Oops, sorry. Wrong song.) Just like Uncle Jed and the Clampetts, Holcomb and legislators find themselves with more money than they know what to do with. Think not? Well, they had to have a special session to decide to send Hoosiers what, $200, $125, $325, $650? The more they talked the muddier the amount became. At the end of it all, the Republicans decided to send some of our money back to us.

Mighty big of them considering they have more than $6 BILLION OF OUR MONEY SITTING IN THE BANK!!!

And please do remember the key word there – O-U-R, as in our money, as in belongs to us, as in we are the state’s source of money . . . don’t forget, the state really doesn’t have any cash without us.

To be sure, some of that money we send them is necessary. Schools, public safety and such are paid for by us. Not the state. Us. Somehow, we always seem to forget that. But hey, we can take at least take some comfort in the fact that our state highways and byways are smooth and seamless and . . . oh, hang on. I’m writing this while I sit stuck in traffic on the stalled interstate. What was the stall caused by? Who knows? Could be that someone hit a giant pothole and ran off the road.

Everyone keeps predicting a red tidal wave come this fall’s elections. Indiana, a decidedly red state, might be an exception to that since the GOP, the party with the super majority, can’t seem to figure out how to manage from the lead. That doesn’t say much for any of the Republican leadership, does it? Here’s hoping they figure it out sooner rather than later.

Two cents, which is about how much Timmons said his columns are worth, appears periodically on Wednesdays in The Paper. Timmons is the publisher of The Paper and can be contacted at [email protected].