Angry White Boy and Indiana’s Conservative Hardball have posts up noting some difficulties that Todd Young is having with the FEC regarding some of his campaign finance reporting.

The FEC is like a glacier; it moves slow but grinds down things in its path. It probably wouldn’t undertake any enforcement action on these issues before the primary (should it deem enforcement action necessary).

After the primary, when (or if) Todd Young loses, the committee will be defunct and out of money, at which point the FEC would go after the campaign treasurer and not the candidate.  Remember, Tom DeLay ended up on Dancing with the Stars, but Tom DeLay’s treasurer ended up in prison; Young’s problems probably aren’t that bad, but repeated FEC violations are nothing to sneeze at.

Update after the leap.

(Originally written in the community blogs by Porter)

Shouldn’t it say something when a blogger is donating “policy research and writing” as an in-kind contribution on a campaign finance report?

Exhibit 1: Zach Main attacking Dan Burton and praising Luke Messer to the heavens. There are numerous other examples, this just being the most recent.

Exhibit 2: Luke Messer’s campaign finance contribution report for Q4 2009, showing an in-kind contribution from one Zach Main of “The Celerity Group, Inc.” for $2,250 for “In-Kind: Policy Research & Writing.”

Exhibit 3: Luke Messer’s campaign finance distribution report for Q4 2009, showing the expenditure side of the in-kind contribution.

Now, every blogger has their preferences in races that are important to them, and I’m no exception (though I don’t care about the 5th District race except as an academic exercise). There’s nothing wrong with advocating for a candidate or a position.

This being said, there’s something strange here. Does it go beyond just having a preference? You be the judge. I’ve never seen anything like this before.

Zach Main appears to be giving in-kind “policy research and writing” services to a campaign he is blogging about. What exactly does that mean? Does that include blogging? Were these “policy research and writing” services ever disclosed on the “donor’s” blog? Should it have been disclosed?

No easy answers there. Just questions and random thoughts.

Todd Young’s campaign, which had been accused of using robocalls, a practice that is illegal here in Indiana, was recently cleared of any wrongdoing by Indiana Attorney General Greg Zoeller after a complaint had been filed against his campaign.

According to the notice of complaint sent to the Young campaign by the Indiana Attorney Generals office:

The office of Attorney General of Indiana has received a complaint that your campaign has made one or more auto-dialed pre-recorded message calls to Indiana residents.  According to our information, your campaign, or someone acting on behalf, called Indiana telephone numbers on the enclosed list and transmitted pre-recorded messages.

…

You are requested to cease making auto-dialed pre-recorded message calls to Indiana residents immediately.  If you believe that you fall within any exemptions provided by Indiana law, you  must provide documentation supporting your exemption claim.

The Todd Young campaign responded in writing by saying:

“… our campaign would like to make clear that we have never used, employed, or otherwise engaged the services of automatic dialing – announcing devices, auto-dialers, auto-dialing, or predictive dialing equipment of any kind, whatsoever.

Second, after a thorough investigation our campaign believes the alleged auto-dialed message was actually the product of our live person volunteer phone bank processes…”

The letter from the Young Campaign in response to the AG’s offices allegation then spelled out the steps they took in making the calls. The process can be found in the pdf link at the bottom of the post.

(Read more after the leap)

From his blog:

John Hostettler’s first press release is an attempted attack on Evan Bayh that’s a little tough to follow. Hostettler first assures voters that Bayh will vote against health care reform.

His argument is that Bayh will vote for his own economic self interest because Susan Bayh serves on the Wellpoint board of directors. Then, Hostettler says he would vote no, as well, but for the right reasons, apparently. Those would include doing what Hoosiers want.

Is that a distinction that will get you elected?

If you expect one press release to constitute the entirety of a campaign against someone with perhaps the Senate’s largest campaign warchest, then–obviously–no, a distinction made in just one press release is not something that will get you elected.

But Shella, almost certainly deliberately (you can just see the mustached doyen of the Statehouse reporters looking down his nose as he says “attempted attack”), is missing the point of Hostettler’s press release, to say nothing of its sarcasm and its irony.

Apparently, also, Shella has no concern whatsoever with the interesting correlation that has been proven–by folks inside (and here) and outside (also here and here) of this state–to exist between Evan Bayh’s voting habits and his wife’s financial interests as a member of the various boards of directors on which she serves.

It’s interesting that Hoosier newspapers, for example, can (rightly) busy themselves with endless editorials railing against the close relationship that the General Assembly has with lobbyists and special interests, but can then be almost completely silent about the relationship that Indiana’s junior senator has with special interests courtesy of his wife. Maybe Hostettler’s efforts will wake them up.

I suspect that Hoosiers will be concerned with this interesting aspect of Bayh’s finances. It’s good that Republican candidates challenging Bayh are making an issue out of these sorts of things; his opponents never bothered to highlight such shadiness before, and most newspapers in the state have tip-toed ever so delicately around the subject of Bayh’s votes relative to Bayh’s wife and their family’s financial interests.

And as for voters punishing elected members of Congress for their party’s sins, as opposed to their voting records, they have a habit of doing that. Evan Bayh could vote against ObamaCare and still find Hoosier voters punishing him for its passage (or just for the President’s folly in attempting it).

Irony of ironies, John Hostettler voted against most of the most unpopular policies of the Bush administration (the Iraq war, spending, government expansion, etc). Hoosier voters sent him packing anyway. It would be an interesting irony of history for Evan Bayh to meet the same fate.

From Saturday’s Indianapolis Star:

On Friday, Indiana Democratic Party Chairman Dan Parker called on other politicians who have taken Durham’s money — almost all Republicans — to pay it back, whether or not they have already spent it.

“If they agree with the premise that the money shouldn’t have been in the process to begin with, where they spent it is irrelevant,” Parker said. “You need to find a way to get it out of the process.”

Well, let’s see…

Who listened to Dan Parker?

Well, not the Democratic National Committee and not Baron Hill:

“Tim Durham is innocent until proven guilty, and we’ll reassess once that decision has been rendered,” Democratic Rep. Baron Hill said in a statement relayed by a spokesman, when asked if he planned to give back his $5,600 contribution.

A spokesman for the Democratic National Committee also said it would not give back the $3,000 it received.

Attorney General Greg Zoeller and State Senator Mike Delph, though, have the right idea:

Republican Attorney General Greg Zoeller, who is up for re-election in 2012, and state Sen. Mike Delph, who is running for re-election in 2012, each received about $10,000.

And both have set aside an equivalent amount pending resolution of the investigation. That way, if the money is tainted, they can give it to charity or even to a fraud victim’s fund, if one is established.

There you have it. Baron Hill and the Democrats aren’t returning Tim Durham’s money, despite trying to score political points by calling for others to give it back.

The only people to have made arrangements to return Durham’s money are principled Republicans like Greg Zoeller and Mike Delph.

I’d also like to call attention to Becky Skillman, who was the only statewide elected official up last year (and perhaps period) who did not take any money at all from Tim Durham.

Advance Indiana has a number of posts (most recently here and here) about the situation involving Indianapolis financier and socialite Tim Durham, who has given a not insignificant sum of money to a lot of politicians (mostly Republicans, it must be said) in the past.

Of particular note to voters in southern Indiana, however, are the contributions that Durham made to Baron Hill of $2,300 in September of 2007, $2,300 in December of 2007, and $1,000 in October of 2004. He also gave $3,000 to the Democratic National Committee in 2000.

Mike Sodrel, it should be noted, got no money from Durham in his campaigns in those cycles (or any other cycle, for that matter).

Let’s see Democrats mention that if they decide to make political hay out of this Durham matter. I doubt that Baron will be in any rush to divest himself of those campaign contributions.

Ok….This Administration needs to get a clue! Because someone may or may not agree with you…you attack them and try to block them? It is not Presidential and actually childish if you want my opinion. Kind of “I’m going to take my ball and go home” mentality. Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to for this Admin to read books on Leadership and maybe just maybe read some books on what happens when you try to argue with those who buy ink by the barrel.

I am so sick and tired of the Democrats pushing blame to the Republicans and Fox News for their failures, do they honestly think the American People are that stupid?? When you have control of both the House and Senate and you cannot get something passed, I have a reason to believe it is a lack of leadership skills.

I have to give the other networks a hand…they refused to interview the Pay Czar if Fox News wasn’t invited and well the White House invited Fox into the interview.

When this President promised an open and transparent Government here, here and here. He has broken all of these promises, did he think we would forgot? I even have friends who are strong supporters of Obama and the Democrats shaking their heads about this and other issues that this Admin and Democrat controlled Congress has done. When some Democrats and their supporters are so blind to the issues then they need a wake up call.

I am going to post two videos…..H/T to Hot Air and Chicks on the Right for these two videos.

You can have your own take on this….I have not seen that kind of transparency yet…and I am not going to hold my breath waiting for it either!

From the Indy Star comes reaffirmation of something that bloggers in this state have known all too well for all too long:

Hoosiers can easily learn about their state songs and state flowers with a quick search on the Internet, but most will have a harder time checking whether their children’s school buses are safe or a local gas station is charging too much.

Indiana tied with Montana, Oregon and Wyoming for the second-worst ranking in a 50-state survey of government information accessible online, conducted as part of the annual Sunshine Week campaign. The state with the sparsest information online was Mississippi.

(More after the leap)

By: Brian Sikma

It appears that now you can have the “perfect” baby as far as appearances are concerned as a result of work done at a Los Angeles fertility clinic.  Doctors at the clinic are using medical procedures that have been around for awhile they say to manipulate embryos and obtain the “right” combination of genes needed to get a specific hair or eye color or skin tone.  The corresponding cost of this manipulation is the creation of more embryos than are normally necessary for IVF.

The unethical creation of multiple embryos for experimentation is not the only thing that is disturbing about this new practice.  Encouraging parents to chose only those children that have the “perfect” combination of eye, hair and skin colors and tones overlooks the basic fact that a person’s identity is not bound up in the way they look.  Perhaps we should not be surprised that designer babies are being promoted as a good thing when for years we’ve been led to believe that looks matter more than character, the outward appearance and attractiveness more than the inward person.

(Read more below the fold)

I hope Obama keeps Robert Gibbs on for as long as he is in office.

First of all, he’s entertaining. Second of all, he’s incompetent.

The glowering of old liberal crone Helen “Snow White’s Wicked Witch” Thomas to Jake Tapper’s question is just delightful to behold.

Transcript, via Power Line, for those of you that don’t want to watch the video:

(Read the transcript after the leap)