Yesterday in Indianapolis, State Senator Johnny Nugent (R – Lawrenceburg) challenged his own party’s “leadership” by proposing to amend legislation and to allow casino counties to retain riverboat revenue that Nugent’s fellow Republican looters are seeking to extract like some piously sanctioned fiscal root canal performed against the will of the patient, and of any sensible definition of conscience, by our reigning G.O.P. overlords.
Nugent’s proposal was duly crushed, and he was the only Republican to vote for it.
This unmitigated thrashing of inter-party dissonance provided high-octane Viagra to stoke the hubris of the State Senate’s most eloquent advocate of casino county rape and pillage, State Senator Robert Meeks (R – LaGrange), who provided these timely words to the Courier-Journal’s reporter on the scene:
"They've got a lot of money. We don't have any. They've had the gravy train for a long time."
Greed and envy … how characteristically Republican.
Pausing to climb higher up his barnyard fence and garner better acoustics for crowing, the rooster Meeks then shrugged, belched, and noted that the casually expedient thievery of Senate Republicans should come as no surprise:
"Even if we give a guarantee -- like we do in most bills we pass -- we change them somewhere down the line. This General Assembly modifies bills and laws every time we're in session. We do that constantly."
For the record, Meeks’s home county lies directly north of Harrison County, all the way by the Michigan state line, and between South Bend and Angola. Internet sources indicate that in most cases, the income levels of the two counties are almost identical.
Alas, NA Confidential's lonely vigil continues amidst the roar of crickets chirping and pins dropping.
Is there a single Republican in all of Floyd County who will attempt to justify – if for no other reason, then just for the hell of it -- the updated “If the Mongol Horde is Inevitable” mode of economic larceny espoused by their brethren at the state level in Indiana?
Bid to halt casino tax takeover is rejected, by Lesley Stedman Weidenbener of the Louisville Courier-Journal
Remember, this vote was taken in the presence and despite the vigorous lobbying of all our local mayors, the opposition of the Indiana Association of Cities and Towns, and is against every tenet of reason, logic, and equity.
ReplyDeleteLooking for even the semblance of conscience with this bunch is fruitless. For how long have they been planning this raid?
I've often contended that the outrages we've seen from the GOP in D.C. stemmed from their own belief that their days are numbered and they must create a new status quo before their entire house of cards tumbles.
America has not grown more regressive - they just vote that way, oblivious to the consequences and the dramatic dissolution of the New Deal and a near-century of progress.
Now, the state GOP knows they have only a limited time to make changes that will affect Indiana for years to come. People won't be fooled, and the current iteration of the Republican Party will change or fade to the margins as they overreach.