Think About It with Michael Leppert

Representative government in Indiana will look drastically different next year. Or will it?

Four of the state's nine U.S. House members from Indiana will not seek reelection this year. Districts currently represented by Reps. Larry Buschon, Jim Banks, Greg Pence, and Victoria Spartz will all get new House members next year. The question is: How will that matter?

None of these departing members spent any time, to quote "Hamilton," in "The Room Where It Happens." None chaired a committee or were on track to do so. I consume an abundance of national media on Washington politics, and only in the rarest of circumstances would any of these soon-to-be retirees appear there.

Now, media appearance frequency is no way to measure value, but extended periods of radio silence should cause people back home to wonder: Is my representative representing me?

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For nearly half my life, I have had my eye on the Indiana General Assembly. Looking back on all the things I could have watched during the bulk of the last three decades, I'm deeply saddened by the choice I made. I could have chosen sunsets, priceless art, or what social media now knows is a favorite in my house, Golden Retriever and Dachshund videos.

But not Hound Dogs. Nope. The best thing about a hound dog is the song. And that one isn't flattering either. Even when The King himself sang it.

Rep. Bruce Borders, R-Jasonville, is famously known in Indiana politics as an Elvis impersonator, a tragically embarrassing vocation. Now, I love Presley as much as anyone, but imitating him should be limited to the privacy of one's shower. Those doing it in public are likely to do other dumb things. Like file House Bill 1334.

To quote this masterpiece, HB 1334 actually says: "An employer may require an immunization only if the employer respects the employee's right to refuse an immunization." No, that's not edited. No, I took no dramatic or creative freedoms with the actual words on the paper.

In case any employer or contractor out there is curious whether this innovative policy idea applies to them, the answer is yes. Unless, drum roll, you are the federal government. It turns out the Indiana legislature is not the boss of them.

Something that could make this mess of a bill seem sane would be comparing it to Senate Bill 187, filed by Senator Gary Byrne, R-Byrneville. That is also not a typo.

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Another government funding deadline looms in Washington on January 19, precisely two weeks before Groundhog Day. While this Congress has been the least productive in modern history, it has produced multiple versions of the shutdown dance, and other predictable jigs, worthy of being added to Groundhog Day 2.

How has this movie sequel not been made yet? A movie famously about repeating history hasn't been repeated. Come on Hollywood, how'd you miss this one?

"Shut the border down or we will shut the government down," was the language several Republicans were using last week on social media platforms, according to Forbes. I came across one of these posts myself, hoping it was an outlier. The problem in the House right now is that the "outliers" have been running it.

Speaker Mike Johnson reached a tentative funding deal with Democrats over the weekend that will not satisfy these outliers, just like the last speaker's deal didn't. As reported by PBS News Hour, the spending package doesn't deeply cut anything and leaves negotiations on funding for Ukraine, Israel and broad border policy changes still to be addressed separately.

If it seems like a status quo deal, it's because it primarily is one. "It reflects the funding levels that I negotiated with both parties and signed into law last spring," President Biden said in response. Democrat leaders in both the Senate and House also gave the deal their approvals.

Outliers, particularly in the House, won't like this one bit. The only question at the moment is whether they will go along with their new speaker or if they will run Johnson out just like they did Kevin McCarthy last year. Other than the person holding the gavel, I don't see what has changed.

Except, of course, the most recent absurd negotiation stance about the border. It's as if the outliers don't understand that shutting down the government, at some point and by definition, also means handicapping border enforcement. Details are not the specialty of the outliers.

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During my professional career, I've said it countless times and in countless ways: perception is reality. Oh, I wish I could take those moments back! Not just because of my awful tendency to weave profanity into my version of the cliché, but because the cliché itself has engulfed far too many of us.

In 2024, the battle between what is real and what is not will be epic.

Yes, yes, it's a big election year, the latest in a streak of the-most-important-elections-of-our-lifetimes. And nothing strains the perception and reality continuum more than election season. This year, that is practically the entire game.

Let's talk about the pesky Fourteenth Amendment and other inconvenient laws that will impact the presidential race. The never-ending legal saga of former President Donald Trump is ground zero of the perception versus reality war. His most recent problem of being removed from the ballot in Colorado and Maine has inspired debate and conversation that is straight out of the Twilight Zone.

Too many politicians from both parties are pandering to voters by taking the position that Trump's quest to return to the White House should be decided solely by the election. Of course, we all agree with the authority of elections, even though Trump and his supporters didn't agree with it in 2020. Many of them still don't. But before voters get to decide in any year, candidates must be qualified to hold the office.

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I am one of those people who is difficult to shop for. Modern Christmas, you know, the capitalist part of the holiday, is something that died in me after my children aged out of the Santa Claus years. Don't get me wrong, those were good times. And those boys got some really cool things that I often enjoyed as much or more than they did.

They weren't the only ones who aged out though. I'm old enough to have acquired all of the things that I really want, or accepted that possessing some aspirational memento was just not meant to be. So, now a great gift for me might be the offer to take things away. The crap in my garage, for example, take it all!

However, aside from a liberating cleanse of a lifetime's worth of accumulated junk, there are some invaluable things I want for all of us. I think they'll help make us better.

I finished Adam Grant's new book, "Hidden Potential: The Science of Achieving Greater Things," last week. Dr. Grant is an organizational psychologist, and a tenured professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. He is that rare someone I discovered on Twitter who makes me think, and more importantly, helps me learn.

This Christmas, I want more of that. Learning, not X.

Take it easy out there. Yes, I am aware that I am already a teacher myself. Also yes, I have learned more since becoming a teacher than I have in any other stretch in my life. Dr. Grant writes about this: that teaching, coaching and mentoring others is often the best way to learn more, or to learn more deeply, or to just learn better.

So, my next Christmas wish: more teaching. I can't wait to get back to teaching in a couple of weeks. What might I learn?

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t's hard to even recognize good news anymore. No matter what the good news might be, it won't be long before someone from 'the other side' energetically claims it's cherry picked, not completely accurate, or my favorite, that the news is actually bad.

Good news of the week: the U.S. economy is outperforming almost every country on Earth.

I should pause there, so those on 'the other side' of that accurate, documentable, statement of fact can get its alternative description of the situation together. OK, now that the crowd who wants us to believe everything is actually terrible is ready, we can proceed.

On January 19, 2021, the day before Joe Biden was inaugurated, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) closed at $30,930.52. On Friday, the Dow closed at an all-time high of $37,305.16. Now, the market doing well, and the economy doing well is not the exact same thing. But I remember a president who pounded that erroneous equivalency into our heads. It was the last president. While it might be cute to agree with him this one time just because it's convenient for my side, I won't.

The Dow is just one measure of how the economy is working. There's more to it than that, of course.

Steve Rattner, an investment banker and financial journalist, discussed the impact of the Federal Reserve Board's quarterly meeting on MSNBC last Wednesday. He said this holiday season, "Inflation on goods, from used cars to computers and televisions is actually turned into deflation. Prices on those goods are actually lower than they were a year ago."

Again, it is not the rate of increase that has shrunk. It is that prices themselves are lower. For consumers, during their spendiest time of the year, that seems like good news. But again, not if your side wants consumers to be mad, and stay mad, until further notice.

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Last week, former House speaker Kevin McCarthy attended the New York Times's DealBook event where he was interviewed by Andrew Ross Sorkin. During their discussion, McCarthy reminisced about a striking observation he made during the 2019 State of the Union. "…I look over at the Democrats and they stand up. They look like America. We stand up. We look like the most restrictive country club in America."

The observation isn't as new or striking to America as it apparently is to the country club, at least to this prominent, soon-to-be former member. McCarthy also announced on Wednesday that he is leaving office by the end of the year. And truth telling on the way out the door like this has become commonplace for Republicans during its Trump era. I'm sure we will hear more of his truths in the coming weeks and months.

What would be stark to me would be a more honest conversation of the lack of demographic representation from those McCarthy is leaving behind. But waiting for the truth from the country club shouldn't inspire Americans to hold its breath in anticipation.

"The Club" is more apt to declare war on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) training, and anything else it can weirdly label with their weirdly created negative adjective of "woke," than it is to adjust. Just ask Rep. Jim Banks of Indiana's third district. Rarely does a day go by without him defending the whiteness, the maleness, of a government made up of far too much of both.

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I was watching the IU men's team play its first Big Ten game against Maryland with a friend on Friday night when I saw it. During the game's first time out, Mike Braun's newest commercial in his campaign for Governor of Indiana ran.

When it was done, we turned and looked at each other for a silent moment before my pal broke the silence, asking, "What the hell is he running for?" My question exactly.

Back in October, I evaluated a couple of ads by two other gubernatorial candidates, Brad Chambers and Eric Doden. The theme of that critique was that their first ads were void of the reason, or the "why," Indiana would be better with either of them in its highest office. Yea, they were the introduction ads, strategically designed to play on Hoosier sensibilities while they politely shake voters' hands in a digitally manufactured way.

Their task at hand was clear to them both. My disagreement with the strategy was that neither of them made clear what issue, what challenge, what commitment would define their campaigns. Is it taxes? Is it healthcare? Is it education? In those ads, the strategy apparently was, "you can trust me because I am one of you." Neither of them has run for office before, so, the strategy has merit, even though the lack of any stated policy position made both ads deficient to me.

Braun's new ad, on the other hand, is offensive.

The ad is titled, "Safer," but it's not about how he can make Indiana safer at all.

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The Portland Public Schools (PPS) and the Portland Association of Teachers (PAT) reached a tentative agreement to their labor dispute on Sunday. The impasse had led to a three-week strike, cancelling eleven instructional days in Oregon's largest school district. Students returned to the classroom Monday.

The highlights of the dispute weren't novel. Teacher pay was a big item, and this deal landed in the middle ground there. Class size, student mental health support, class planning, and health and safety protections were also at issue, according to Oregon Public Broadcasting. But as is often the case in disputes like this, the collective total means more than the individual parts.

"This contract is a watershed moment for Portland students, families, and educators," said PAT President Angela Bonilla. "Educators walked picket lines alongside families, students, and allies — and because of that, our schools are getting the added investment they need."

That sounds familiar.

Last week, members of the United Auto Workers ratified their new deal with The Big Three. The deal brought wage increases of at least 25% over four and a half years for members, but it was bigger than that. Toyota, Honda, Hyundai, and Subaru have all announced wage increases since the tentative deal was announced.

"These were just extraordinary wins, especially for those of us who've been studying strikes for decades," said Jake Rosenfeld, a sociology professor and labor expert at Washington University in St. Louis, to the Washington Post. "Research has consistently found over the past few decades that most strikes are defensive, rear-guard efforts to protect the status quo … to fend off steep cuts to wages and benefits. It didn't mean actually gaining new ground."

Both leading presidential candidates publicly supported, in starkly different ways, the union efforts. President Joe Biden joined the picket line, an unprecedented move in American history. It is on brand for the pro-union president, but the gesture is only possible because of the public support for workers in the matter.

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It's that time of year again. The emotions, expectations and traditional series of events converge for six weeks to make up what we refer to as "the holidays." Viewing the goings on around us this opening week of the season might lead one to believe that we all sort of, kind of approach Round One the same way. But obviously, we don't.

Thanksgiving is the greatest American holiday. As it exists today, there is little in the way of religion driving the tradition, a feature of which I am particularly fond. That wasn't always the case, and I will thank Thomas Jefferson for the church-free atmosphere of this week's celebration. Apparently, he refused to endorse the tradition, due to his unwavering view of how church and state should remain separate. Thanks, TJ.

Today, the fourth Thursday of November has no space left for church or state. What, with football and food binges dominating the day, who has room for any spiritual cleansing? Actually, all of us.

Take Blake Corum for example. I don't often write or speak glowingly about a star football player for the University of Michigan. Often? Ever is more like it. But Corum's Sunday-before-Thanksgiving tradition caught my eye. The senior running back spends that day giving away turkeys to families in need using some of the money he makes from the use of his name, identity, and likeness, or NIL. In 2021, he donated and delivered 200 turkeys. Last year, he upped it to 300. And on Sunday, he doubled it to 600, this year in the Ypsilanti area, east of Ann Arbor.

"This is my purpose," Corum said Sunday. The day before, he carried the ball 28 times in Michigan's win over Maryland. This coming Saturday, he'll play in the biggest game of his life against Ohio State, a game devotees of the Big Ten Conference likely consider the national championship. I know I do.

It's a charitable gesture. It's not all that unusual. Yea, he's got a lot going on at the moment and it would be easier to focus on that moment, instead of focusing on others. But I believe him when he says giving is his purpose.

The news of the weekend was the passing of one of the planet's most notorious givers. Former First Lady, Rosalyn Carter, was admitted to hospice care on Saturday, and died on Sunday. She was 96. She and former President Jimmy Carter were married for 77 years, and as any married person can attest, that alone defines a life full of giving.

But she and her husband are the standard, the modern example by which all other givers should be compared. They both gave until their dying days, with the type of enthusiasm and grace that made it clear that it was their purpose too.

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