Indiana Republicans are hailing a new poll of 1,000 likely voters showing incumbent Governor Mitch Daniels with a 14-point lead over Democratic challenger Jill Long Thompson. Here are some of the highlights…

• Daniels leads JLT 50-36 percent.
• Daniels’ approval rating is 55-33 percent. JLT’s is 31-17 .
• Daniels leads JLT 47-40 amongst voters who voted for the first time in 2008 Democratic primary.
• 49 percent of Hoosiers say the state is on the right track, compared to 31 percent who say it isn’t.
• Both candidates are competitive with female voters.
• Only 60 percent of Democratic voters say they will vote for JLT in November.

The poll was conducted by Bellwether Research and Consulting between June 22-29. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percent.

My own thoughts on this is that while you never put out a poll that doesn’t work for you, it does show that JLT has a lot of work to do to reach beyond her core base of the 30-35 percent of the voters who just can’t stand Mitch Daniels.

And while November is still a long way off, for every day JLT does not move ahead, she ends up further behind.

There is another story of another IMPD officer getting in trouble.  This story is on the heals of another IMPD officer who got in trouble and three other IMPD officers who got in trouble.  And they are not to be confused with the former Public Safety Advisor turned Marion County Sheriff employee who is also in trouble. 

While it is important to know that these handful of bad apples are not representative of the other 2,000 or so men and women of law enforcement who go to work everyday to protect us and keep our streets safe, they do give cops a bad name.  Of course it doesn’t help that all this bad news comes at one time. 

While the officers are ultimately responsible for their actions, you can’t ignore another individual who also bears some responsibility for this, Sheriff Frank Anderson.  When Anderson ran IMPD, the department ended its polygraph practices, which some top officials in the department tell me could have been a deterrent to some of this behavior.  Anderson was also in charge when another one of these officers was reportedly kicked out of the Police Academy and rehired under IMPD.  And it was Anderson who hired Jerry McCorry.

It was Anderson’s leadership that set the atomosphere that allowed this type of bahavior to grow and now Mayor Greg Ballard is cleaning up his mess and cleansing the air he left behind.   

My recent post on crime in this town has apparently caused quite a little stir.  Some friends have asked me if I’m going to respond to what’s been written in the blogosphere?  Not really. 

The way I figure it, if someone doesn’t have enough synaptic activity to understand sarcasm and satire when they read it,  then what would be the point of trying to explain it to them?

I would probably have an easier time convincing R. Kelly to date someone his own age.

Everyone who knows me knows I have no use for township government, however today the Marion County Township Trustees get a major thumbs up from me. 

I hear there’s a plan being circulated amongst the Trustees that would put people who repeatedly get poor relief to do mandatory work for either the township or the County government. 

I’m all for it.  There is no reason why someone who is able-bodied who is on the public dole shouldn’t do a little work to earn their keep.   They can sweep streets, pick up trash, plant flowers in urban greenways, the list just goes on and one.

I personally would like to expand it so they would also work for individuals who had jobs that needed done, but this is a nice start.

The only thing better than when a bad law is tossed out from the courts as unconstitutional is when a stupid law is thrown out.

U.S. District Judge Sarah Evans Barker said a state law that would have forced stores and retailers to pay $250 to register if they sold sexually explicit material was vague and too broad (insert Beavis and Butthead laughter here).

Judge Barker said, “the new law could have applied to lawful and non-obscene materials such as R-rated DVDs or a widow selling a collection of old Playboy magazines at a garage sale.”

There is nothing worse than when lawmakers find a stupid idea and jump on it (insert more Beavis and Butthead laughter here).

Laws like this need to narrowly tailored and well-written; this was neither.

If lawmakers are trying to protect us from obscenity, I can think of a lot better ways and they don’t involve adult-oriented material.

John McCain will be speaking at 11a.m. in Indianapolis today.  You can watch it here courtesy of my friends at WRTV.

Democratic Gubernatorial candidate Jill Long Thompson is expected to continue her call to suspend the sales tax on gasoline at a news conference in Indianapolis today.   If you’re interested in what she has to say you can find an extensive interview here done back in May 2007 by my good friend Thomas Cook over at  Blue Indiana. 

By the way, JLT calling for a suspension of the sales tax on gas would put her position at odds with the Democratic nominee for President Barack Obama, who opposes such a move for the federal tax gas.

There are two more stories of violence in Indianapolis this morning.  One involved the shooting of a man at 38th Moeller Road, the second was a shooting last night outside the Walker Theatre.

Frankly, I’m getting a little tired of  reading or watching another story about violence in this community.   And while I’m all for crime prevention, I’m falling back into my old belief that what this town needs are a couple good police beatings.

I don’t want anybody killed or put into a coma,  but I honestly think that a clear message needs to be sent that crime won’t be tolerated and if these knuckleheads even dream about pulling out a gun on someone or committing an act of violence, they will wake up and apologize.

Of course this is also based on weeding out the bad cops, which makes me wonder who was responsible for hiring our latest round of bad actors?

The word is in on the number of signatures collected by Taxpayer Party candidate John Waterman.  So far Waterman has 128 reported signatures that means he has to collect 32, 872 by the end of today.  Do you believe in miracles?

I’m wrapping up my business trip to St. Louis this morning, but I had to share this story from dinner last night.

My old law school friends and I got together and started talking about the Presidential race. One of my good friends who is a true-hearted conservative from Kansas asked me who I thought was going to win the Presidency? I told him, with the appropriate caveats included, that I thought the race was Barack Obama’s to lose. Two main reasons that came to mind was first the national trends; the polling data shows him ahead in five of the seven key battleground states and winning the Electoral College, 331-221. Second, John McCain doesn’t work weekends.

My friend told me he was disgusted with the GOP at the national level, but couldn’t bring himself to vote for Barack. He was also somewhat hesitant to share his opinion because he didn’t want to come across as racist. I told him genuine disagreements don’t make a person racist. Although I think some of the attacks against Obama can be construed that way when they have nothing to do with policy.

However, I told my friend if he really wanted to fight bigotry, he should vote for Barack, because if Barack was elected President, Blacks would have nothing else to complain about and could no longer point the finger at white people for their troubles. I told him when someone calls him racist he can say, “Hey, I’m not prejudiced, I voted for Obama.” Barack can’t win the Presidency without white voters so what better way to get people to shut up about racism.

In addition, Blacks can no longer complain about the man, because as one comedian put it, President Barack Obama means we are the man.

The same people who complain about white rice being “enriched” and brown rice being “wild” will have to go somewhere and sit down.

The same people who complain about white cake being called “Angel Food cake” and black cake called “Devil Food cake” will have to shut up.

And the best thing about electing a Black President, Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton will have to go find real jobs.

My friend from Kansas is giving Barack a second glance. I’m back in town tomorrow.