This weekend there were many NWI celebrations by local politicians, public servants, and “community” leaders at the South Bend swearing in of the newest Federal Judge Joseph Van Bokkelen. With this swearing in, he has now moved from U. S. Attorney, representing the prosecutorial power of the Federal Government against public corruption, to a Federal Judge as part of the U. S. Judiciary. The celebrations and their noise level increased in direct proportion to how close the public officials were to northern Lake County.
Sadly one can say that most Democratic politicians in Lake County were ecstatic, especially the further north their area of dictatorship is in Lake County. Let us all be honest, the Democratic rulers of the Cities of Gary, Hammond, East Chicago, are doing somersaults and breathing a sigh of relief, if they have so far escaped being indicted. Further, the people sitting in Lake County Government Complex, who have not been indicted, are also greatly relieved. They all feel that they have just dodged a bullet. Let us not forget their many “sucker-uppers” that tag along for the benefit of money and glory. Some are lawyers, business people, or educators, but their goal is the same to suck the life out of NWI in favor of their financial or electoral betterment.
I suspect that even the indicted people like Mayor McDermott’s fixer Robert Cantrell and Lake County Councilman Will Smith are partly relieved to face trial without a permanent U. S. Attorney.
Judgeship is a well deserved reward and advancement for Mr. Van Bokkelen. The only effective elected or appointed individual during the past decade in NWI, period, at least the only one who knew what he was doing and made a difference. He always made unquestinably clear that he, i.e. the legal system, could not solve the whole NWI public corruption problem if the people did not act. He was right; but, sadly not a single change has occured in NWI. The "Tribalism" of NWI politics continues as usual.
There are uniquely many criminals in the public arena in Lake County. It is one of the few commodities that we suffer from an over abundance. From my study of this ongoing problem, I estimate that there are a little over 43.5 criminals in action in public service in NWI for every indictment returned (i.e. indictments not convictions). That would leave over a thousand criminal actors that in theory could be indicted and are continuing to do the public's business. They have not been indicted because they have not been discovered or they are known, but there is not enough evidence.
Now to be perfectly clear this is not any kind of criticism of Mr. David Capp. He is a very capable attorney, a very, very dedicated and honest Assistant U. S. Attorney, and now an acting U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Indiana (for the third time now). However, the reality is that in an “acting" status one of the difficulties that he, or any one in his position would have, is getting attention for more resources and focusing those resources at the crime of defrauding the public trust. Another difficulty is the temporary nature of the appointment. It makes it hard to start new long-term investigations when things may change in six months or less.
This sadly makes the Lake County Democratic Party and its army of patronage employees very, very happy. They are truly singing, “Happy Days are Here Again.” The problem is that until abuse of public trust is ended in Lake County governmental units, business development will never occur here. This is the major reason new business, not retail businesses, will not come to Lake County. Munster is the exception that proves the point. The fact is that according to the most recent figures there have been no additional new busnisses growth over the past ten years in NWI.
As the exodus shown by the latest U. S. Census Bureau population figures makes clear, you can kiss Gary, Hammond, and East Chicago goodbye. The people who used to live there are on their way out of twon. Except for corrupt government and public officials, there is nothing those cities produce. The remaining hope is Indiana’s State Attorney Steve Carter and the jury is still out on him. He now can be the sole leader in bringing integrity to public service in NWI, without the usual criticism that he was just following in Van Bokkelen’s shadow.
The king Van Bokkelen will no longer be with us to save the northern cities by throwing fear into public officials and their friends every time he would hold a press conference. From now on, it is business as usual under Lake County Democrats and we will all be poorer for it.
