Indiana dreamin'

My experience with Indiana is minimal. When I was a kid, my parents, brother and I would drive through it every year on route to my grandparents' place in St. Louis for Thanksgiving.

Indiana was just a long flat stretch of earth that I had to endure between the equally endless Ohio and Illinois in order to get to the exotic city with the giant Arch on Wednesday and again on Sunday during the less festive trip home. But there seems to be a lot of bluster whirling around Indiana these days, so let's go there.

I am straight. I like men. I like them a lot. I do not like homophobia. I dislike it a lot.

Truth: if you draw a line and designate one end as 100 percent gay and the other as 100 percent straight, we'd almost all fall somewhere between the two extremes. And the more you try to convince me you're at the 100 percent straight end, the more I think you're closer to the middle than you care to admit. After all, how many anti-gay preachers have proven this point? (And yes, I've had bi-curious moments in my life. They did not stick.)

So what the hell is going on in Indiana? The pithy memes and angry shouts don't reveal much. The Indianapolis Star, however, published a very thoughtful read on the subject by Stephanie Wang:

In Indiana, about a dozen cities, including Indianapolis, have local nondiscrimination laws that specifically protect gays and lesbians in employment, housing, education and public accommodation, which include business transactions. But in much of Indiana there is no such protection. The concern among opponents of the law is that it could embolden people to challenge those local laws, reports Wang, subsequently adding, During RFRA discussions in Indiana, state Republican leaders have dismissed statewide class protection for sexual orientation or gender identity. She goes on to note how the Christian Conservatives were the force behind this latest measure.

The underlying agenda seems clear to me. Frankly, I am so fed up with the religious right that I just don't know what. I cannot believe that in the year 2015 sexual puritanism continues to rule us. Yet, here we are.

I have no idea how the Indiana situation will play out (but according to the numbers, the good guys are winning the big game), but it will play out. It will likely dash any presidential aspirations for Mike Pence. Perhaps more significantly, now that Indiana has pushed this issue to center stage, will unconditional support for similar "religious rights" laws become a litmus test for the 2016 GOP primary? How far will the zealots push Jeb & Co. on this when the country is running so fast in the opposite direction?

Just like I had to endure the miles of Indiana as a kid in order to get to the gleaming Arch, the GOP is going to have to wade through this thorny mess in order to get to 2016.

Lumber on, elephants. The parade is simply fascinating. Disgusting, but fascinating.

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Phone cam round-up

Boob, leg and foot

Yo carhop--gimme an order o' fries and a vanilla shake

Mail call ...

"High Performance"

I'm guessing crap

Urban wildlife and sliced bacon

Road pickle

Photo that does not require a caption

Beer people

Silly sideways selfie

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Man screams at yellow paint

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Baby you can drive my car

Lil' OB, first day of senior year

On our quiet little dead-end street, there will be no less than four 2015 high school grads come this June, including Lil' OB. I refer to them and their compadres as the "Youth of America."

"Good morning, Youth of America," I used to say to them as they waited at the bus stop during the grade and middle school years. Now they've all grown up. No more bus stop congregations.

You want to know something about the Youth of America, dear reader?

They don't care about driving.

This perplexed the Goat and your humble hostess when we saw it evidenced among some of Lil' OB's cohorts. They put off getting their drivers' licenses as long as possible. Parents were the ones coaxing kids to learn to drive. Plenty of parents had to issue a mandate: you have to get your license or else ...

Driving has become a necessity, not a recreation. Kids don't romanticize driving and cars the way older generations do. Kids don't cruise around. They don't hang out anymore. Social media has replaced the casual impromptu drive-in parties in parks and convenience store lots we all remember.

Turns out this is not just a thing around here. Per the U.S Federation of Public Interest Research Groups, "the percentage of high school seniors with driver’s licenses declined from 85 percent to 73 percent between 1996 and 2010, according to the AAA Foundation for Highway Safety, with federal data suggesting that the decline has continued since 2010." The Washington Post detailed what's behind those staggering numbers in this exhaustive article last fall.

Humble Hostess with first VW Bug, circa 1981

Dear reader, the Youths of America do not want cars. They don't want another loan on top of their student loan. They don't want to deal with insurance. They don't want to buy gas or pay for expensive parking spaces downtown. Driving is just a hassle. They don't care if you believe in climate change or not; they don't like hydrocarbon exhaust. And none of this is going to change any time soon.

Although I suspect the GOP will do everything in it's power to stop this trend, forcing people to drive more and buy cars is a tricky business, particularly when the good ol' free market offers up solutions like Zipcar and Uber. Read this Cleveland story to get an inside look at what users say about ridesharing. Nonetheless, there is a little problem brewing in this kettle of stone soup.

Got infrastructure?

Car or no car, we all need it and we all finance the vehicular infrastructure with the gas tax, but per the first link up there: "Between 2001 and 2009, the average number of miles driven by 16- to 34-year-olds dropped by 23 percent."

Less miles driven means less gas purchased and less gasoline tax paid. Considering "both the Highway Account and the Mass Transit Account of the Highway Trust Fund are nearing insolvency," this does not bode well.

And while this matter percolates beneath similar issues such as building a fiber optic infrastructure, maintaining the antiquated electrical grid (amid a burgeoning solar revolution) and even grappling with the landline telephone system, what's our Congress doing?

Why, worrying about rape and abortion, of course, and trying to repeal Obamacare, and broadcasting partisanship across the globe and and and ... doing nothing to shore up the middle class or solve its very real problems.

Who's going to pay for the roads when traffic is reduced by 25 or 50 percent or more?

Who is going to pay for the roads?

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Dad and Great Gramp Doubler

circa 1942

circa 1945

circa 1950

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Cleveland cathedral

Heinen's Cleveland, left, future Kimpton Hotel center.

Okay. I admit it already. I fibbed last week when I posted all those photos. I wasn't downtown on a whim, I was covering the opening of the new Heinen's grocery store for Fresh Water.

Here's my article.

Heinen's grand opening

I write a lot about CLE in these hallowed pages, but there is something about the Heinen's project that marks a turning point. The grand opening was simply thrilling.

Got bubbly?

I love that the Heinen family has elevated their family business to unprecedented heights: yes, a local grocer is worthy of selling hamburger, canned corn and paper towels in the grandest of spaces. Yes, every shopper, deserves to browse aisles in a building fit for royalty.

Heinen's Cleveland

Between this, the new Kimpton Hotel going into the historic Schofield Building across the street and the Metropolitan at the 9 in the center of it all, the corner of Euclid and East 9th Street in Cleveland is soon to be one of the premier addresses in the country.
  

Heinen's Cleveland

This is Cleveland, people. There is no stopping this town now.

Heinen's Cleveland

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Sold it to Jacobs for a hundred dollars

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