He’s also a fan of Star Molecules, on Facebook.

 

He lived in Wabash at one time, and operated a business called the Pine Farm Greenhouse. It appears he may have co-owned it with his father.

Court records. Not much, really.

7 seat belt violations, 3 speeding.
Lost house to foreclosure in 2006.

Divorced in 2006

Not sure what this was all about. Had another in 1990, same basic thing.

WABASH COUNTY SUPERIOR COURT
85D01-0507-CM-518
ST VS ERBFile date: 07/14/2005   Disposition Date: 08/10/2005
Minute Date:7/15/2005
Order Location:Book: 86 Page: 61Court examines probable cause affidavits and determines there is probable
cause. Court orders defendant to appear for initial hearing on
8-10-05 at 9:00 a.m. Service by mail. llMinute Date:8/10/2005
Order Location:Book: 86 Page: 307

State orally moves to dismiss. Granted.

Interesting case study for someone.

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This is not all of them, I only searched two locations. Look at the last guy.

http://www.icrimewatch.net/offenderdetails.php?OfndrID=778693&AgencyID=54034

Physical Description
• Age:	39	• Height:	5’10”
• Sex:	M	• Weight:	280lbs
• Race:	Caucasian	• Eyes:	Brown
• Hair:	Brown
• Scars/Tattoos:	Tattoo on L_forearm (TAT:SKULL (IRON MMAIDEN EDDIE)) , Tattoo on Back (TAT: DEVIL WITH FLAMES) , Tattoo on Chest (TAT:HARLEY DAVIDSON EAGLE) , Tattoo on R_arm (TAT: MERMAID WITH KING NEPTUNE)
Address
9435 N CLINTON ST LOT 34 FORT WAYNE, IN 46825		View Map
Offenses
• Description:	35-42-4-1 – Rape (attempted)
• Date Convicted:	12/29/2005
• Conviction State:	Indiana
• Date Released:	02/06/2009
• Details:	CONVICTION: ATTEMPTED RAPE
• County of Conviction:	ALLEN
• Case Number:	02D04-0408-FB-125
• Sentence:	12 YRS DOC
Comments
SEXUALLY VIOLENT PREDATOR

http://www.icrimewatch.net/offenderdetails.php?OfndrID=1217802&AgencyID=54034

Physical Description
• Age:	40	• Height:	5’11”
• Sex:	M	• Weight:	220lbs
• Race:	Caucasian	• Eyes:	Blue
• Hair:	Brown
• Scars/Tattoos:	Tattoo on L_arm (HEART W/ JACKIE)
Address
9435 N CLINTON ST LOT 12 FORT WAYNE, IN 46825		View Map
Offenses
• Description:	35-42-4-9 – SEXUAL MISCONDUCT WITH A MINOR
• Date Convicted:	11/28/2005
• Conviction State:	Indiana
• Date Released:	03/04/2010
• Details:	CLASS B
• County of Conviction:	Allen
• Case Number:	02D04-0503-FB-26
• Sentence:
• Description:	35-42-4-9 – SEXUAL MISCONDUCT WITH A MINOR
• Date Convicted:	11/28/2005
• Conviction State:	Indiana
• Date Released:	03/04/2010
• Details:
• County of Conviction:	Allen
• Case Number:	02D04-0503-FB-26
• Sentence:
• Description:	35-42-4-9 – SEXUAL MISCONDUCT WITH A MINOR
• Date Convicted:	11/28/2005
• Conviction State:	Indiana
• Date Released:	03/04/2010
• Details:
• County of Conviction:	Allen
• Case Number:	02D04-0503-FB-26

http://www.icrimewatch.net/offenderdetails.php?OfndrID=640118&AgencyID=54034

Physical Description
• Age:	39	• Height:	5’10”
• Sex:	M	• Weight:	197lbs
• Race:	Afr Amer	• Eyes:	Brown
• Hair:	Black
• Scars/Tattoos:	Scar on abdomen (BIRTHMARK)
Address
XXX IN CUSTODY IN DOC FORT WAYNE, IN 46816		(Address not mappable at this time)
Offenses
• Description:	35-42-4-3 – Child Molesting
• Date Convicted:	11/18/2002
• Conviction State:
• Date Released:	09/19/2007
• Details:	class B felony
• County of Conviction:	Allen
• Case Number:	02D04 0106 CF 000241
• Sentence:	15 years, none suspended

http://www.icrimewatch.net/offenderdetails.php?OfndrID=1398401&AgencyID=54034

Physical Description
• Age:	50	• Height:	5’10”
• Sex:	M	• Weight:	230lbs
• Race:	Caucasian	• Eyes:	Brown
• Hair:	Red
• Scars/Tattoos:	Tattoo on L_bicep (HEART) , Tattoo on R_bicep (SKULL) , Tattoo on L_Breast (WOLF) , Scar on Chest (HEART SURGERY SCAR) , Scar on R_leg (SURGERY)
Address
2522 CORVALIS AVE FORT WAYNE, IN 46809		View Map
Offenses
• Description:	18.2-67.1 – Forcible Sodomy
• Date Convicted:	05/15/1996
• Conviction State:	Virginia
• Date Released:	10/01/2010
• Details:
• State Equivalent:	35-42-4-3 – Child Molesting
• County of Conviction:	Fauquier
• Case Number:	CR95-381
• Sentence:	10YRS/10YRS PROB
• Description:	18.2-67.3 – Aggravated Sexual Battery
• Date Convicted:	05/15/1996
• Conviction State:	Virginia
• Date Released:	10/01/2010
• Details:
• State Equivalent:	35-42-4-3 – Child Molesting
• County of Conviction:	Fauquier
• Case Number:	CR95-378
• Sentence:	5 YRS
• Description:	18.2-61 – Rape
• Date Convicted:	05/15/1996
• Conviction State:	Virginia
• Date Released:	10/01/2010
• Details:
• State Equivalent:	35-42-4-3 – Child Molesting
• County of Conviction:	Fauquier
• Case Number:	CR95-380
• Sentence:	20 YRS
• Description:	18.2-67.3 – Aggravated Sexual Battery
• Date Convicted:	05/15/1996
• Conviction State:	Virginia
• Date Released:	10/01/2010
• Details:
• State Equivalent:	35-42-4-3 – Child Molesting
• County of Conviction:	Fauquier
• Case Number:	CR95-379
• Sentence:	2YRS

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Burn in hell Plumadore.

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From my sources, (paraphrased).  The reason the search was called off may be due to a ponderousness of facts and evidence. The FBI, needing time to obtain federal warrants, today entered the park, as well as other areas to continue the search for evidence. Note: Evidence.

I believe, based on the conversations I have had, they are no longer looking for a missing child that is alive. I know, this is terrible. I’m praying this is not the case, and my tears won’t help. Just pray for her.

Also, it seems Mr. Plumadore has had more brushes with the law, including assaulting a police officer in 2000. See here.

More as this develops.

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It’s hard to remember a time when so many citizens have been galvanized into action.  People, seemingly in record numbers, are sitting up and taking notice of what Washington is doing.  This is confirmed by the raucous town hall meetings and the tea parties held across the country from a couple or so summers ago.

This phenomenon, known as the Tea Party movement, is, of course, a throwback to the original Boston Tea Party wherein disgruntled settlers protested government tyranny by dumping tea into Boston Harbor.  It was a symbol of rebellion, a shouted, “Enough,” by the colonists.

While I haven’t personally attended a tea party, I believe I may have staged a couple of real informal ones in my youth.  Who, after all, hasn’t protested heavy-handed parental interference in the form of curfews and chores?  I clearly remember arguing with my mother about how many nights out were required for my busy social calendar.  Somehow, our numbers never matched.

She learned what a log cabin tea party looked like, and I learned what a log cabin tea party shutdown looked like.

Now I’m the mom.  I don’t have a log cabin on 1.5 acres, but I have an old farmhouse on 3 acres, which gives plenty of room for our local ‘colonists’ to revolt.  And revolt they do. 

From the young adult down to the three-year-old, they have proven to be prolific revolters.  It’s tough, for instance, to be a YA (young adult) in college who, understandably, wants to live a college-dorm lifestyle.  Only, he doesn’t live in a college dorm.  This provides any number of issues that spark tea parties.

Take curfews, for instance.  If we lived in a sprawling mansion with four separate wings, this would be a nonissue.  But since we live in a tiny farmhouse with hardwood floors, it’s a big issue.

For one thing, you just can’t buy socks quiet enough to sneak up the squeaky wooden stairs without detection, especially since they run up three feet from my pillow.  And there’s no such thing as a quiet flush, either, not when the pipes run directly behind my pillow.

Since I’m a “working besides” mom (I have a paying job besides all the non-paying ones I do), sleep is rather important to me.  When I was a YA myself, I could run on fumes.  Now, as a forty-something, my carburetor goes kerplunk by roughly 10 a.m. if I don’t get my rest.

Chores have certainly afforded some choices opportunities for the tea partiers over here.  In our economy, everyone has to help.  In fact, our family motto is, “You live here, eat here, sleep here, you work here.”

Chanting this with the offspring before tackling the Saturday list doesn’t help my poll numbers, but it builds character like crazy.  They don’t know it, but I believe this proves that I’m a very forward-thinking future mother-in-law.  I figure that someday, there will be four girls who will kiss my feet and call me blessed because of all the things my boys know how to do.  This will grease the skids, so to speak, with my daughters-in-law.

There’s a method to my madness.

Occasionally, the peasants revolt amongst themselves.  The cause?  Perceived injustices.  These range anywhere from work-related claims (“I did it last time”) to finding their socks on a sibling’s feet to strictly bogus charges.

Instead of stealthy tea dumping by the light of the moon, their demonstrations are comprised of angry shouts, flying fists, hair-raising chases around the dining room table, and Air Soft guns.

The British could have learned a thing or two about quelling peasant rebellion from Mr. Schrock.  Pretty much all he has to do when unrest flares is to move purposefully toward the rioters.  They suddenly lose interest in expressing their civil unrest and gain a quickly-renewed concern for walking in paths of righteousness.  And that’s me over on the sidelines, “trouble laughing” again.

If I wanted to, I could hold my very own tea party over any number of things, including the recent intrusion into my rare sleeping-in time the other Saturday.  This in the form of a three-footer full of wiggles that knocked on our door and hopped into our bed.  This also in the form of his certainly-not-three-foot daddy who instigated a wrestle and tickle session that left the covers tangled in a heap and the wiggler gasping, “Leave me alone!  You ticka Mama.”

And did I mention the countless Sunday afternoon nap interruptions, thanks to thumps, bumps, scrapes, loud talking, and constant traffic on the stairs?  This finally led to the father of the thumpers, bumpers, scrapers, and loud talkers to suggest that we should institute a counting method as factories do to track “safety days,” or days wherein no accidents occurred.  At our house, however, they’re called “good nap days wherein no one under the age of 21 gets strangled by an angry, sleep-deprived mother.”

I should revolt.  I’d like to revolt, but I’m just too tired.  Maybe next week.

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This time it started with an email Wednesday by Matt Kibbe, President and CEO of FreedomWorks to Anna Kroyman with the White County Tea Party:

Dear Anna,

FreedomWorks, Hoosiers for a Conservative Senate and local tea parties
are joining forces to host a series of grassroots training events around
Indiana the week of December 12th-16th. I wanted to invite you to join
our grassroots team at any of these exciting events, which will be held
near Lafayette, Elkhart and Indianapolis.

[...]
Sincerely,
Matt Kibbe
President and CEO, FreedomWorks

Pretty clear to me. FreedomWorks, HFCS and local TEA Parties.

Greg Fettig has been tirelessly working with FreedomWorks and is on the board of HFCS. Greg sent Anna this email yesterday after Mr. Kibbe sent his.

Anna

I will be in attendance at all the training sessions, as will other representatives of HFCS.  FreedomWorks and HFCS are co sponsors of the GOTV training sessions as part of the overall strategy HFCS layed out in early January in Tipton and which was overwhelmingly supported by the 55 groups in September in Greenfield at the straw poll/convention.

FreedomWorks partners with tea party groups when those groups have
agreed to work together in a common campaign.  In this battle to defeat
Senator Lugar and support Richard Mourdock, the vast majority of the tea party groups in Indiana have agrred to work together in this one goal.
As such, we collectively have won FreedomWorks’ endorsement and support. This cooperative and coordinated effort must remain intact up to the May 8th primary.

The necessary efforts to achieve this goal will require an ongoing and
coordinated strategy and partnership.  HFCS is grateful for the
commitment of dozens of groups committed in working together, and with FreedomWorks as a partner, success will be the Tea Parties’.

Greg Fettig

Here’s a snippet of an email Kroyman sent him.

However, our December 12th meeting is planned to host FreedomWorks, NOT HFCS. I already spoke with Josh and he and Amanda will be the only speakers at our meeting that evening. You and Monica are welcome to attend but only as participants, as all the rest of the folks attending. You can find seating anywhere in the room same as the rest of the people who will attend.

HFCS, you have now been sent to the back of the bus.

FreedomWorks is a successful and influential organization dedicated to Social Security reform, repeal of the Death Tax, tax cuts in general, and limiting the size and scope of government. They also  trains volunteers and assist in campaigns. This is their program, not the White County TEA Party.

Then Mr. Fettig sent this email to Peter “the turd” Recchio, who is the Grand Poobah of Tea-MAC, based in Elkhart, IN.

Hey Pete

I want to give you a heads up so you can make arrangements for the upcoming Hoosiers for a Conservative Senate/FreedomWorks GOTV training session. We will need 6 seats for our delegation.

Looking forward to a very productive evening on December 13th.

Greg Fettig
Hoosiers for a Conservative Senate

Enter Susan Chilberg. She’s Tea-MAC’s co-founder.

I’m not exactly sure why you sent this email to Pete. Pete had nothing to do with this meeting setup. I did. Apparently you sent this to Pete to provoke him. Let me tell you in no uncertain terms that you and your group will not be allowed in our meeting. I will inform the restaurant owner that you are excluded and will be stopped at the door.

I have furthermore sent notice to Josh and cc’d our group that I have taken this action. If this is what Freedom Works intends, that you attend, I will cancel this meeting with them.

As you perfectly well know, Tea-MAC already has close connection to Richard Mourdock in personal friendships. We were the first groups in the state to endorse him. We do not need you. Period.

Be advised, Greg. After what you and your people did to Peter, Anna and myself, you are not welcome in any meeting under our name.

Susan Chilberg
co-founder, Tea-MAC

The “After what you and your people did to Peter, Anna and myself” should actually be directed at me, for writing, this, this, and this.

After reading all of the above emails (and more), I sent Miss Chilberg a message on Facebook, explaining I intended on writing a story today. Fifteen minutes later, she posted this on Tea-MAC’s MeetUp board.

From: Susan Chilberg
Sent on: Wednesday, November 30, 2011 11:53 PM

this man is part of the Greg Fettig, Monica Boyer group, HFCS. This is what you are aligned with?

I think we had better just cut out of this meeting now, Josh. I will not tolerate this sort of despicable behavior from this ….person. His name is Dan Turkette. This is bullying and it’s a threat. I will be forwarding it to the sheriff of Elkhart county, who happens to be a member of Tea-MAC. THIS IS INTOLERABLE.

The sheriff? Seriously? I suspect Chilberg is one of those people that would call 911 if Taco Bell forgot to put hot sauce in her bag.

Susan and friends seem to think AWB is somehow in cahoots with HFCS and it’s board members. The fact is, I’m not. I’ve never met Greg Fettig, and have only met Monica Boyer once, which was at the 3rd congressional caucus. I’m also not a member of any TEA Party or 9/12 groups. I discover, I research, I report. It’s really that simple.

Chilberg and friends are addicted to power and can’t admit it, as illustrated in this video.

Warning, NSFW, contains profanity.

Related posts:

1. Turd in the Tea Party Punch Bowl – Part Deux I recently wrote about Peter Recchio and the Indiana Tea...

It’s the presidential campaign.  Still a year out, it’s dominating the news.  Everyone’s writing about it, including the candidates themselves.  And that’s what I’m talking about.

It was during the last election cycle in 2008.  Feeling the weight of civic duty and with a deep, abiding love for God, country, Mom, apple pie, cross country, and Starbucks mochas in my heart, I did the only responsible thing I knew to do.

“I think a mother of boys could straighten out this mess,” the initial press release stated.  “And that’s why I’m running for office.  You know, the oval one with that cool desk and the spectacular drapes that didn’t come from J. C. Penney?”  And with that announcement, the official “Mom for President” campaign was underway.

In the weeks that followed, I laid out my platform.  I’d be tough on crime (just ask the local pantry pirates).  I could empty the prisons (think “really huge gardens with endless weeding beneath the summer sun in polyester jumpsuits”).  I’d secure the borders (ask the bullies who mess with the cubs), and I’d balance the budget.

The fact that I got seven votes, not counting the two voters in our little district, had nothing to do with my message.  After watching the current crop of candidates, I know now what I did wrong – I didn’t write a memoir, and that was my fatal mistake.

I know why they do it.  It makes perfect sense, actually.  In a memoir, you can tell where you’re from, where you’ve been, how many ladders you’ve climbed, how many glass ceilings you’ve shattered, and how many high-stakes mergers you’ve facilitated.  Wait.  No.  Wrong plot line.

Anyway, writing your memoir, if you’re a politician, is like publishing your resume, extended edition, with pictures.  Throw in a few photos of you rolling around on the lawn with Rover, grass in your hair, and you and the kids in their jammies on Christmas morning, and it humanizes you to a skeptical populace.

Not only that, but it gets you a book tour to the biggest U. S.cities where folks line up in droves to shake your hand.  It also nets you some great interviews with the best in the business.  All of that is almost enough to make me write my own memoir.  Almost.

It’s not that I wouldn’t love the tour.  I would.  It’s not that I’d shy away from interviews with the best, the brightest, and the blondest.  I wouldn’t.  What holds me back is the fact that mine’s far too boring to make it into print.

Unlike many of the pols, I’ve never been a CEO.  I had no lemonade stand at the age of six that went public by my seventh birthday.  Nor did I mow lawns or deliver newspapers, building an empire with ever-expanding fleets of Simplicity mowers and/or Huffy bikes.  There was business, alright, but our parents called it monkey business and  shut it down.

There were no fancy vacations on Martha’s Vineyard where the little Yoders mingled with the young Kennedys.  Instead, we had summer nights on Grandpa’s farm with the cousins, playing Kick the Can.  Inevitably, a game would spring up with eager participants scattering everywhere through lanes and outbuildings.  That’s what we were doing while the Kennedy kids were out sailing.

According to family lore, there is one small incident that allegedly occurred on the farm when I was a toddler.  I say “allegedly” because I have absolutely no recollection of it and cannot testify as to the veracity of the claims.

The story goes that one day after Grandma had gotten a new batch of baby chicks, a tiny cousin and I wandered into the building where they were kept.  Toddling through a sea of fluffy, yellow balls, we discovered that the whole crowd would move and shift at our approach.  Squealing in delight at this discovery, we moved the crowd, alright, scaring them straight into a corner where they piled themselves into a heap and suffocated.  Allegedly, of course.

This is the story that’s been fed to us for years by The Establishment (i.e., our parents).  For all we know, it’s nothing more than urban legend, which is why I’m admitting nothing and pleading the fifth.

If that’s as scandalous as it gets, it won’t make for a riveting read.  Neither will stories of a voracious reader who shocked herself and everyone else by winning a county spelling bee and going to the statehouse.  Who fell in love, got married, and had baby boys.  Lots of them.  And then after all of that, became a writer and a storyteller.

And that’s why (I know it now) my presidential bid flopped.  Well, that, and the fact that the voters were nervous about the jelly.  As Mr. Schrock said drily when he heard of my bid, “Well, the White House was white when we got there…”  Yes, there’s that.

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Fabini voted democrat in 2008 and 2010 primaries, and as never voted republican as far back as the 1995 primary.

Gospel of Matthew 7:15 Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves .

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For nearly four weeks now, they’ve been gathering in parks and streets, stretched out in sleeping bags, marching with signs, tooting horns, and banging drums.  They’re American citizens, this ragtag mob, and as such, are perfectly within their rights to assemble and to speak their minds.

The problem so far has been figuring out what, exactly, is on their minds.  ”Community awareness,” one woolly-headed fellow said, gazing at the camera.  ”Global warming,” someone else offered.  ”Corporate greed!”  ”Social inequality!”  ”Economic inequality!”  Huh?  What?

I couldn’t help but note, as the images streamed in, that in their zeal to stomp out corporate greed, they were dealing a blow to the businesses along the avenue; businesses, mind you, that create jobs and hire people.  Wall Street, it seemed, wasn’t suffering at all.  The “Mom and Pop’s” were.

“If Wall Street goes down,” my financial advisor husband observed, “then so will a whole lot of other people.”  Yes.  There’s that.

“What are they expecting?” said one presidential candidate, “That the Wall Street folks are going to rush out and write them checks?”  Not likely.

Reports coming in have been disturbing.  No one’s showering there.  There’s gratuitous sex in the streets, police cars are being soiled (think ‘human waste’), and drugs are being sold openly.  Which is probably why the synapses of many being interviewed don’t seem be firing too briskly.  Wait.  Maybe it’s the humidity.

Anyway, it’s shameful, that’s what.  This kind of behavior would’ve gotten us paddled as kids.  My mother would never have tolerated such shenanigans.  It would have earned us a serious ear lobe twist with a “Shdop sell aw-gashick,” which is Pennsylvania Dutch for, “Stop these goings-on!”  Or something like that.

This would’ve been followed by orders to “clean that up” and “shick dich kshat awh (act properly)” and “get back to work.”

Hey, maybe I should send my mom to Wall Street.  I’ll bet she could clean it right up, restoring law and order and helping folks down there to find a purpose.

It worked for us.

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Up on the Hill, we’ve got blue dogs, old dogs, new dogs, and, in my opinion, a few dirty dogs, and they’re all fighting.  Like cats and – you know.

It’s enough to make the average citizen throw up his or her hands and shout as one with Dr. Seuss, “Go, dogs, go!”  This is exactly why much is being made of the upcoming elections, which is when said average citizens will get their chance to put some teeth to the woof and help those dogs go.

Author Robert Fulghum says that all he needed to know, he learned in kindergarten.  I would submit to you that all our elected officials need to know, they could learn in elementary school; more specifically, in Mrs. Beehler’s fifth-grade class at Wakarusa Elementary.  That’s where our third son and 23 of his classmates are learning some very valuable lessons about life, responsibility, and running a business, lessons that many in Congress seem to have missed.

Here’s what they’re doing. 

At the beginning of the year, a letter came home, stating that mini economy would be starting soon.  “Mini economy,” it read, “is a form of instruction in which students participate in a classroom economy in order to simulate real-world activity.”

Students would be applying and interviewing for classroom jobs.  For faithful completion of daily duties, they would receive a biweekly paycheck.  They would pay rent, taxes, utilities, and supplies, due the first of every month.  Health insurance, a plan that would cover their salary in the event of illness, was optional.

Later, students would be given opportunities to purchase items at a bonus store, to set up a business in order to sell items in a mini mall, and to participate in an auction at the end of the year.  All of this, of course, would be done with the money they’d earned and saved.

“Helping students understand and apply economic concepts to their lives helps them to make better choices and understand the consequences for those choices,” the letter concluded.

Shortly thereafter, 24 parents wrote up personal references for 24 eager scholars who began feverishly applying and interviewing for 24 different jobs.  Mini economy was on.

Unbeknownst to the participants, the mini economy system provides more than just instruction on performing basic financial transactions and balancing a budget.  It’s a very effective form of crowd control.

Using a system of fines for certain offenses, including excessive talking, being tardy, having a condemned or messy desk, being late with homework, and not following Lifelong Guidelines (personal best, truthfulness, etc.), order and discipline are maintained.

For most infractions, a fine of up to ten dollars is levied against the offender.  In other words, being disorderly or irresponsible will bite the hapless scholar in the britches right about where his or her wallet is located.  Such actions will be deeply regretted at the next shopping opportunity.

Stealing, proclaims their employee handbook, is a serious offense that will result in immediate termination from mini economy activities.  They’re not messing around in Mrs. Beehler’s class.

Just recently, the students held their mini mall after weeks of preparation.  First, they drafted a business plan stating what they would sell, what supplies were needed, and whether or not they planned to hire an assistant.  Expenses included booth rental and a business permit, payable up front.  At this point, they decided if they wanted to enter a partnership, form a corporation, or be a sole proprietor.

They studied supply and demand to figure prices and profit margins.  They polled each other to see what consumers were willing to pay for certain items.  Then they moved into their marketing campaigns.

They made posters.  They created slogans.  Several went so far as to create Power Point presentations to advertise their products.

Our son decided to sell cupcakes as a sole proprietor.  He hired an assistant to cover the booth while he was off spending money elsewhere.  He and a buddy formed a partnership, selling tickets for the showing of an original movie they’d made.  Cheap tickets got you in the door.  High-end tickets got you the show, popcorn, and a drink.

What I found in the elementary school gym when I arrived was a microcosm of American capitalism.  Young vendors lined the sides, selling everything from snow cones to milkshakes to top-your-own sundaes.  There were handmade items for sale.  The beef jerky stand, I noted, was doing a brisk business.

As the hour went by, prices began to drop like rocks as anxious entrepreneurs scurried to make a sale.  When it was over, they calculated their final profits and deposited it in the classroom bank to be held for the end-of-the-year auction.

Yes, there’s a lot to be learned in the fifth grade.  Important stuff like paying your bills on time and not spending more than you make.  Things like how a business really works.  Stuff like following the rules, being responsible, and that it’s wrong to steal.

All the pols need to learn, I think, they could learn in Mrs. Beehler’s fifth-grade class.

No related posts.

It is CRITICAL that any TEA-MAC member that has thoughts of attending this caucus put on by Hoosiers For A Conservative Senate understand some legal issues their attendance creates for TEA-MAC.

First, Freedomworks, a pac, is attending, therefore any group attending this caucus puts their not-for-profit designation in legal jeopardy. (Not true) Not-for-profits cannot, by law, attend a meeting such as this with a pac…which Freedomworks is. If you go YOU DO NOT AND CANNOT REPRESENT TEA MAC OR ITS MEMBERSHIP, YOU ONLY REPRESENT YOURSELF WITH NO AFFILIATION TO TEA-MAC. YOUR MERE attendance AS A TEA-MAC MEMBER PUTS OUR WHOLE GROUP IN HARMS WAY. (another lie)

Second TEA-MAC, by unanimous vote, voted to support RICHARD MOURDOCK months ago, (all 12 of them) so this upcoming meeting is redundant. TEA-MACers have known since our inception that candidate advocacy was the ONLY way we as a tea party can truly effect the political landscape. Remember the last senate election where the Indiana tea parties/tea partiers, split it’s vote by NOT being specific candidate advocates. We were lucky because Dan Coats was the winner, and has, by in large, done a fine job for conservatives as he promised he would.

Our choice this senate election is abundantly clear: RICHARD MOURDOCK. That is why the well educated TEA-MAC group endorsed him months ago.

Susie and I have taken this appropriate stance since last December when this HFCS group was formed, and will continue to abide by it. We can name many, many tea party leaders from around the state who are not attending for the same, and other reasons as above.

We wish HFCS well, and all its members included. Susie and I WILL NOT be there, as we are the sitting current co-founders of TEA-MAC, and therefore, it’s only official representatives.

Respectfully, Peter Recchio / TEA-MAC Co-Founder

So why does Recchio continue to attempt to discredit the efforts of a legitimate organization? Control freak? I think so. I called Peter today and confronted him with the fact that his group, TEA-MAC, has no standing with the IRS as a non-profit. He stammered a bit, then was silent for maybe 10 seconds and then said, “I have no comment.” Of course he has no comment, it’s a lie, and they have never filed for 501 (C) status of any kind before. Minutes after our conversation he sent out another email. Here’s a snippet.

This is a straw poll. It’s no different that the Iowa straw poll. If what Reechio is saying is true, every TEA Party group that participated in the Iowa Caucus violated IRS rules.

Freedom Works President, Matt Kibbe confirmed today that the unit of their group that’s attending is a legitimate 501(c)4, which allows them to attend. On top of that, this event is only a straw poll. In no way will participating effect anyone’s (501) non-profit status, in spite of the lies sent out by Recchio in the above email.

As I have stated before. Peter Reechio thinks he’s a “King Maker,” and will stoop below any standards to have his way.

Full disclosure: I’m not a member of any TEA Party or 912 group. However, I am friends with many that are, and I believe in the smaller government and constitutional path they want this country to take. I will be at the September 24th event to cover it as a blogger, and I strongly urge TEA Party leaders to ignore Recchio’s lies and mistruths, and show up for the event.

In summary, Recchio represents at best less than 2% of the TEA Party members in Indiana. He’s a gnat on a boil on a pig’s ass.

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We know how to get Indiana out of this economic mess. The idea comes from Abe Lincoln’s father, who migrated here from Kentucky across the great Ohio in search of sure title to land. Old Tom Lincoln was attracted to Indiana by a massive jobs program of historic proportion and success. It does not resemble, however, anything the president mentioned last week before the joint session of Congress.

More about that later; let me first share the results of a study by Cory Craig in the current issue of The Indiana Policy Review. It can be put in the form of a demographic map using U.S. Census data to illustrate the only facts our economists say are worth knowing,i.e., how many are coming and how many are going.

The map’s mauve shading, covering virtually all of outstate Indiana, shows that Hoosiers are leaving — nay, have abandoned — the archetypal hometown. Rural America, we are told, has fallen to just 16 percent of the nation’s population. “Many communities could shrink to virtual ghost towns as they shutter businesses and close down schools,” an Associated Press article warned recently.

Click to enlarge

It is arguable why outstate Indiana is waning. Some say it is dreamy, anachronistic zoning codes. Others blame monetary chicanery. Still others point to arbitrary regulations, the inheritance tax, mandatory unionism, regional tax nets and generally a ruinous and pernicious loss of local control.

It is enough to know that the remnant out here understands the seriousness of the situation. We are desperate for assurance that our All-American Hoosier communities can be revived.

So we fund economic-development offices that post (for the gullible) the numbers of jobs purportedly saved or created. We try to ignore that Indiana suffered a decrease in private-sector employment while government appropriations for economic development increased by over 150 percent.

Mostly, we worry that it’s all bushwah, to take a page from David Mamet’s new book, “The Secret Knowledge”:

“Government can do little with this product (wealth) save waste it: It cannot produce, it can only profess to do more, its bureaucrats and politicians playing on our human need for guidance and certainty, and, indeed, our desire for justice.”

Many years ago our foundation hosted a coffee for the late William F. Buckley. During the conversation Mr. Buckley pulled from his pocket a large, inscribed coin. It read, “Don’t just do something, stand there.”

Is that our position? Stand there confident that the inscrutable workings of a free market will restore our failing towns?

Pretty much. Any council or mayor in the mauve of our little map would be wise to simply leave their citizens alone to take care of their property as they are able, perhaps saving or borrowing to improve things when possible and appropriate.

And while they stand there, they could busy themselves wiping the zoning laws clean, shoring up private-property rights and purging the municipal and county code, especially the sections on taxes and regulations, striking out anything adding to the cost of starting a business, maintaining one or investing in one. (Allowing citizens to arm themselves against banditry and assault is a proven economic confidence-builder.)

There will be those on the local council who will object each step of the way, saying this would strip the town of civilization’s veneer, make it difficult to fund the amenities, unleash the savage forces of greed.

Exactly, if greed is understood to be a dysphemism for ambition. To grow, our cities and towns must attract it, must use it to recreate the economic spontaneity of a frontier where Indiana can prosper through reinvestment and, yes, resettlement — a new Northwest Ordinance.

That, to return to old Tom Lincoln, was Indiana’s first jobs program. The Northwest Ordinance meant “Rule of Law,” ensuring the freedom to succeed or fail, to build or buy here or there, to contract with him or her, to invest one’s energy and wealth as one thinks best under the Golden Rule. The economist Arthur Laffer has put this in a modern context — a proposal for new American “enterprise zones.”

That’s the only way it’s going to happen, or has ever happened. Hoosiers need to quit messing around and get back to it.

T. Craig Ladwig is editor of The Indiana Policy Review. A version of this article appeared in the Aug. 20 Indianapolis Business Journal.

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Rhonda Schrock is the working-from-home mother of 4 sons, ages 5 to 21.  She pens a weekly column for The Goshen News and blogs regularly for Bethel College.  With a “wry and light-hearted sense of humor and a sharp ear for dialog, her subject matter ranges from family stories to sensible commentary on current events and politics to her strong Christian faith.”  (Jim Kroemer, Goshen News publisher)  Figuring a mother of boys could straighten things out, she ran for President in 2008, garnering 7 votes.  She’d run again, but fears she has far too much common sense to be elected.  Besides, with all those boys under foot, the White House wouldn’t stay white very long.

Her first post will be up shortly.

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