Rex Bell's blog

When I was a kid back at Millville Grade School, my old buddy Stinky Wilmont used to tell stories about his Uncle Pug. It seems he had a fondness for hard liquor, and according to Stinky, Uncle Pug knew his limit when he began to imbibe. The problem was he always passed out before he got to it.

It's always nice to get a "heads up" about a potential problem. This morning, I heard on the news that people who received gift cards for Christmas should redeem them as soon as possible. Apparently, people who study such things have predicted that due to business failures, as many as one fourth of the gift cards may be rendered worthless in less than two years. Luckily for me, I didn't get any gift cards for Christmas. One less thing to worry about, I guess.

Good news!!

The Indiana General Assembly's efforts to make property taxes fair and equal are about to pay off. Even if they don't agree to allow Hoosiers to vote on making the property tax caps part of the Indiana Constitution, we can still sign up, by December 31st, for an exemption to insure that our property taxes don't increase by more than 2% over the previous year's taxes.

Well, not everybody can sign up for the exemption. The gross assessed value of your homestead can't exceed $160,000.00. Other than that, you're good to go.

About 40 years ago, Arlo Guthrie blasted his draft board for questioning whether or not he was moral enough to kill people after having been accused of littering. I always thought he raised a valid point, although I still didn't think it excused his littering.

There is a trial going on in Richmond right now, where a young man has been accused of hitting another young man in the head and then taking his laptop computer. I won't speculate on the outcome of the trial, but I imagine if the accused is found guilty, he will probably spend some time in jail. Most civilized societies take a dim view of assault and theft.

There is a lot of talk this election season about the Kernan-Shepard report. Every forum and debate I have attended this fall, and every candidate questionnaire I have received (except for the single issue types) have included some reference to some portion of the report.

I see they're having another Presidential debate between the Republican and Democratic candidates this Wednesday. I doubt if I watch it. I heard enough in the first two debates to convince me that I had made the right decision when I decided that I couldn't support either one of them.

 I'm reminded today of the story of the man who asked a woman if she would sleep with him for a million dollars. After she said yes, he asked her if she would sleep with him for a dollar. When the offended lady asked "What do you think I am?!", the man replied, "We've already decided that. Now we're just haggling on the price.

   58 representatives that voted against the taxpayer funded bailout changed their minds for $130 billion worth of pork. I guess that means that representatives cost $2,241,379,310.34 each.