My conservative friends can insert their own “leave it to the private sector” phrase here. My liberal friends can insert their own “but this doesn’t address X” story here, too.

Vaughn, who is African-American and lives on the Near Westside, is just as much of an Internet user as the suburbanites who own multiple computers and pay $50 a month for home broadband service.

What it means to be an Internet user, at least according to researchers, is changing rapidly as gadget makers continue to flood the market with Web-capable mobile devices such as smartphones, netbooks and tablets such as the Apple iPad.

And when those mobile devices are taken into account, national statistics show that African-Americans access the Internet almost as much as whites do — narrowing, at least from a technology standpoint, a digital divide that for years fell along racial lines.

Today, the division of who has ready access to broadband is more about socioeconomic status than race.

“Since the first survey in 2000, race and ethnicity have become increasingly less important predictors of Internet use,” said Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Internet & American Life Project, which studies how the Web affects society. “In 2000, race alone was a predictor.”

African-Americans are now the nation’s most active users of the mobile Web, according to recent studies by Pew.

Prior to 1973, the United States had no coherent energy policy.

And we do now?

For years, white middle and  upper class folks have fled cities to live in the suburbs and then return to the city only to work. As can be seen by Indy’s suburban county growth, this seems to be a reasonable trend. But, our cities are different now. Young college grads want the urban lifestyle more and more than a suburban life. Oh, and gas is $4.00 a gallon.

I wonder now if we’ll see a shift in the planning of our cities. I think you’ll see more development projects featuring ascending towers and sprawling shopping centers located amidst a downtown area.

Indianapolis has always enjoyed one of the best downtown-based malls in the country at Circle Centre. Comparable cities like Detroit, Columbus and Cincinnati have always failed miserably. Perhaps this is because Indy’s transportation system sucks so bad and no one worries about funneling “the no-gooders” into the downtown area.

I think, here in Indy anyway, we’ll see a reverse trend over the coming years that’ll bring people back downtown and we’ll see a rebirth of our cities to the extent that Paris and London have.

For years I’ve only seen the benefits of the leasing. The billions pushed into state coffers have offered nothing but pluses for me as a metro-area driver. Northern folk would bemoan the opposite — citing that the money from “their toll road” is being used elsewhere (particularly Indianapolis).

For two years now, Democrats have opined that we’re selling off the state. Frankly, it’s too soon to know if the seemingly excessive 75 year lease will be worth it or not. Either way, letters have allegedly poured into the state’s inbox from pissed motorists arguing poor road conditions, gas gouging and poorly operated toll booths with untrained workers have inundated this once seemingly asphalt-paved paradise.

Tully decided to do something no other reporter has done: he actually drove on the damn thing. Tully’s column today starts:

More than two years have passed since Gov. Mitch Daniels persuaded the General Assembly to let him lease the Indiana Toll Road to a private company and use roughly $3.8 billion in proceeds to finance road projects around the state.

If you listen closely, you can still hear echoes of the screams of anger from back in 2006. And though the screaming has quieted, time hasn’t dulled the debate over what was arguably Daniels’ most divisive policy decision. In recent weeks, the controversy saw new life after reports in Northern Indiana newspapers about letters of complaint that frustrated Toll Road drivers had sent to the state.

The reports sparked such a debate about the state of the Toll Road — from road conditions to the quality of toll plaza bathrooms — that I decided to head north on a recent day to check out Indiana’s most controversial stretch of pavement. Starting just after 8:30 on a Monday morning, I entered the Toll Road a few miles west of the Ohio border. From there, I spent several hours driving the 157-mile road to Chicago, making a dozen or so stops along the way to check out toll plazas and toll booths, and to talk to people in cities the Toll Road cuts through.

This column probably would be more interesting if I’d found anything to complain about: A traffic jam. A pothole to rival those that marked Indy’s streets this spring. An obvious sign of mismanagement.

Anything.

After all, the complaint letters had conjured images of long lines at toll booths, roach-infested bathrooms, rude toll collectors, $10-a-gallon gas and massive potholes. But I found none of that. Instead, I found a road that was easy to drive, free of problems and freshly paved in many spots.

We can debate the decision to lease the road. In time we’ll know for sure whether Indiana came out ahead on a deal that featured a 75-year lease and a one-time payment. Moreover, a one-day drive provides only a snapshot. On a summer afternoon in 2007, I fumed while sitting through a poorly run toll booth in Hammond; a year earlier, I drove the Toll Road on a snowy day and found it unplowed.

But on one Monday, at least, life on the Indiana Toll Road was fine, and certainly not anywhere near as bad as critics are portraying it. Here are portions of the Toll Road diary I kept as I cruised across Northern Indiana: MORE

Even from the Republican-friendly, Gannett Corporation-owned Indy Star, I can believe Tully’s story. Daniels has strongly supported his plan saying it was the “right thing to do for taxpayers.” I don’t have, nor have I ever, had any numbers in front of me on projected income vs. expenses, but if the money we have now is worth more than the 75 year lease could have produced, it woudl have been irresponsible and idiotic NOT to have sold the road.

This does beg one question, though: Do we really need West Virginia? Can we give it back to the Brits?

CalorieLab says that among the fattest states, those in the West and New England rank the lowest and that states in the South and the Rust Belt rank the highest. “Rankings were computed based on a three-year average of state-by-state statistics…

States that round out the top ten include Mississippi, West Virginia, Alabama, Louisiana, South Carolina, Teenessee, Kentucky, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Michigan at number 10.

Indiana ranks 11th.

Thank goodness none of Indiana’s senators attached their name to the writing of this bill:

“On Monday, the Senate passed a resolution honoring soil. That’s right. Soil. I mean, isn’t soil happy to let its accomplishments speak for themselves? Sustaining life, surviving for millions of years, etc. Does it really need a nonbinding resolution to make it feel important? Seems if we were going to do something for soil we ought to at least give it a Congressional Gold Medal or something. The first sentence says it recognizes soil as an essential natural resource. I have always wondered whether soil is an essential natural resource, and now I know. The Senate has spoken.”

Democrats in Congress today plan to introduce a bill to halt the recently-announced closing of some 600 Starbucks coffee stores, noting that the displacement of 12,000 Starbucks baristas would overwhelm government aid offices…

[...] Rep. Pelosi’s bill would subsidize the 600 money-losing Starbucks locations by giving away millions of taxpayer dollars in so-called ‘Venti Vouchers’ to residents of these hard-hit neighborhoods. If the effort fails to revive the flagging stores, Rep. Pelosi said Democrats would “seriously consider nationalizing the coffee industry to ensure the free flow of java at fair prices.”

Okay, so the above isn’t really true, but you thought it was, right? That’s how bad things have gotten.

The Indiana State Policewould like for all Hoosiers to have a safe Fourth of July holiday. Due to many Hoosiers celebrating our nation’s independence, with the use of fireworks, the Indiana State Police would like to inform citizens of the Indiana fireworks law which is in place for the safety of everyone.

…

Fireworks can only be discharged between the hours of 9:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. any day except on Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, and New Years Eve when the times are 9:00 a.m. to midnight. It is important to check with local officials, as local ordinances may restrict the use of fireworks.

And stay off my lawn!

Now Town Council President Bill Guarnery admits the town might have overreacted and will curtail strict enforcement of ordinances.

“We will go back to enforcing ordinances when there is a complaint,” Guarnery said.

The issue arose last month after a complaint about street basketball in the Country Walk neighborhood. The council told the police to issue warnings to homeowners violating the ordinance. Within two weeks, the department had handed out 35 warnings to Brownsburg residents.

That’s what you get when you start messin’ around with the state religion.