The answer is to the first is that, yes, it was as stupid as everyone thought it was on first blush. Sometimes, first impressions aren't wrong. The ad's message might have broad appeal. The ad itself has appeal only for the racist fringe that calls itself the Tea Party, which largely made up its mind a while back to back Clark Durant. And, those people don't change their minds. So, the ad isn't going to build him support among the people he directed it at. At the same time, it created ill feelings towards him among the non-fringe racist set, where Hoekstra is drawing his support. Please note the letter from the Washtenaw Republican who is of Asian descent who wrote the angry letter about this. Hoekstra's ad didn't build support, it helped kill it. It's like he ran a negative ad against himself, which is the opposite of what you're supposed to do.
But, did Democrats do it first? We go to Nolan Finley.
I’m not sure whether Pete Hoekstra’s Super Bowl ad can be labeled racist, offensive or insensitive — those are moving targets in an election year, when sensibilities shift on the winds of opportunity.
Democratic Party Chair Mark Brewer, for example, pioneered the tactic of China-bashing in Michigan politics, and yet here is is crying foul when Hoekstra mimics him.
Mark Brewer screws up a lot of stuff, but suggesting that his ads decrying Amway Guy's outsourcing of work to China is to actual racism what grape jelly is to wine. And, the idea that Nolan Finley can't define an ad that relies on bad stereotypes about broken English usage by people with bamboo hats on their backs as racism says a good deal about him.
Meanwhile, when I first saw the ad Sunday night, my initial reaction was, "Wow, what's the governor think about this and how it might undermine his work in building relations with China." After all, they're in the same political party and Hoekstra insults people who the governor thinks we ought to be working with to build trade. Someone in the biz had the same reaction. In other words, what's good red meat to throw to the Tea Party is bad for business.
First off, we nod to acknowledge the 9th Court of Appeals decision today tossing out Proposition 9, the homophobic California ballot initiative that forbade the state from endorsing same-sex marriages. This is a Michigan blog about Michigan news and politics, so what's this mean? The Michigan homophobes who pushed and got Proposal 2, which ultimately was used as a rationale to take away the right of local governments to extend domestic partner benefits, shrink increasingly into a boil on humanity's ass. Yet, somehow they're still making the rules. I leave that to you, dear reader, to do with what you will.
Onward!
*--Peter Hoekstra invoked every bad Chinese stereotype to pander to the far right of his party, something that didn't work since they endorsed the other guy. Laura Berman points out that the China we're supposed to be afraid of is not the China of the Hoekstra ad, which is the China that evokes images of the Vietnam War.
*--Republicans like Peter Hoekstra's ad, but hate Clint Eastwood's pep talk to America. I remember when Dirty Harry was the Republican mayor of Carmel ... when did he go liberal squish? The answer: He didn't. You have to ask yourself about a political party that embraces race-baiting political advertising but hates ads that suggest that America's best days are yet before her. Again, this is a party to which Reagan wouldn't be welcome.
*--The Lansing State Journal is the latest paper to advise state Republicans to avoid Right to Work, and instead embrace benevolent overlord Rick Michigan's business-oriented collaborative approach. Those guys haven't shown any inclination to collaboration, instead favoring division and faction. Meanwhile, the News orders labor to accept the shit sandwich being put together in the kitchen of the Legislature and be happy that it's not worse.
*--Senior citizens surprised to find out that not only do they have to pay more in taxes, but that tax payments are being deducted automatically from their checks. This was necessary so that most LLCs don't have to pay taxes ... even if they continue to consume government services just to operate.
*--Tim Walberg avoids questions of why House Republicans are huddling with business lobbyists to set the annual GOP agenda. The reason? Tim Walberg is one of Club for Growth's paid-for boys in Congress.
*--An editorial that shouldn't have ever needed to be written: America's Shoutiest Mayor should avoid using racially charged language to promote the Lansing casino.
Washtenaw County, Michigan Commissioner Alicia Ping (R) says she was leaning toward endorsing former Rep. Pete Hoekstra in the Republican primary for Senate. But that’s all over now. On Monday, Ping donated money to Clark Durant, Hoekstra’s longshot rival in the primary. She told me she’d publicly endorse him if Durant asks her to.
Why the change of heart? Hoekstra’s controversial Super Bowl ad, which the Chinese-American Ping called “demeaning”, is a part of it. But it was more Hokestra’s refusal to acknowledge that he’d made a mistake running the ad that really lost him Ping’s support.
“If he didn’t know it was racist on some level, then shame on him,” Ping told me in a phone interview Monday night. “He didn’t apologize or say ‘maybe it was over the top’ or anything. He said, ‘I stand by what I believe in’ and, ‘the liberals are just making a bigger thing out of it.’ Well that’s not the case at all. It’s offensive and it’s racist. It’s demeaning to the Asian-American population.”
Hoekstra's latest blunder has, as of this morning, netted him nationwide press. It's a remarkable feat considering he isn't actually the Republican candidate, yet. Naturally, Hoekstra has his own thoughts about the ad, which in an act of cluelessness not seen since the Freep ran a story puzzled at how an unmoderated, open comment thread about politics turned into a flame war are that it is great because it focuses attention on Debbie Stabenow's voting record.
Here's a little nugget, and a sign of things. The people who produced the ad are the same people who produced Christine O'Donnell's "I'm not a witch" ad. At some point, when this campaign was vetting companies to create this ad, they had to have seen that and Carly Fiorina's "Demon Sheep" ad, and said, "Those are fantastic ... go with it!"
Update! ... By the way, most of you have no doubt seen this already, but this was the reaction to Republican operative Mike Murphy:
Mike Murphy, the well-known national Republican political consultant, said of the ad in a Twitter post: "Pete Hoekstra Superbowl TV ad in MI Senate race really, really dumb. I mean really."
Or, as someone said down in comments ... Hoekstra is working very hard to make the War of the Roses as competitive as possible (well, I added the War of the Roses metaphor, but whatevs).
Update 2! ... More? Why not. This is currently the political story everyone's talking about, so we may as well be boring. Over at the New Yorker, they point out that Hoekstra's ad isn't just racially charged but downright factually inaccurate.
For all the xenophobia and mistakes, the thing that might really worry a voter is that a man can get this far in the U.S. political system without a basic grip on the mechanics of his government. “You borrow more and more,” the N.P.S.A. says. But that is false, says the U.S. Treasury. Chinese holdings of U.S. treasury bonds, in fact, declined from November of 2010 to November 2011. “China has not been a major buyer of U.S. treasury notes on the margin for a couple of years now,” Victor Shih, an expert on Chinese economics and politics at Northwestern University, told me.
Hoekstra's history of gaffes and blunders are pretty well documented, from Tweeting about secret visits to Iraq while on House intelligence committee to the above-mentioned bit where he blamed his gubernatorial primary loss to benevolent overlord Rick Michigan on Right to Life's endorsement of Mike Cox, something that prompted a fake Tea Party Right to Life to spring to life (don't these people always manage to find new and interesting ways to split people into divisions?). Why at this late stage should anyone expect that Hoekstra's second shot at the big stage be any different? That means you, Stephen Henderson. A political campaign reflects the leadership at the top, and if the campaign is making poor choices in advertising, perhaps that's as much an indictment of the leadership at the top as it is of the people who made the ad. Meanwhile, Hoekstra continues to defend the ad as one focusing on the voting record of Debbie Stabenow, except that it has done that in the same way that the Komen Foundation's decision to stop funding breast cancer screenings through Planned Parenthood struck a decisive blow in the rightwing's war on abortion providers.
Hoekstra defended the ad, calling it a "home run" during an interview Monday with Detroit radio WJR-AM's Paul W. Smith. He said it's only "insensitive" to the spending philosophy of Stabenow and Democratic President Barack Obama.
Let's see, the ad opens to the cheesy strains of music best remembered from film noir dramas incorporating elements from "The Orient" that were made five decades ago, and with a woman wearing a Chinese coolie hat and riding a bicycle next to a rice paddie. Then, she proceeds to talk in halting, broken English that evokes images of the "Me love you long time" whore from Full Metal Jacket. We haven't seen this many bad racial stereotypes since last week, when Virg Bernero referred to a Native American as "Chief Chicken Little" for opposing the Lansing casino. I mean, someone made the conscious decision to have her ride into the scene with the bamboo hat on her back, as a prop that was never worn.
One is a hopeful look at the spirit of Detroit and the spirit of America. The other has embroiled the controversy-prone Hoekstra in yet another bitter controversy.
There's loose talk in sports circles that the people responsible for the NFL entertainment product wish to extend the season by two weeks. That's two more weeks of meaningless storyline hype, nonsensical analysis, football-related advertising so stupid it makes the brain hurt, and overconflation of what should be a fucking game with a symbol of the state of things. It also means two more weeks in which players could suffer career-ending injuries. But, if it means pumping more money into the NFL entertainment product, it's not like we don't have more worthy places to devote those resources (roads, health care, modern electric infrastructure, the arts, etc...).
Onward!
*--The Detroit News launches a broadside against the minimum wage under the guise of concern trolling Willard Mitt "Mittens" Romney. As usual, it's filled with cherry picking facts (unemployment rates among young and minority workers vs. overall employment trends tagged factlessly not to overall changes in the labor force but to select policies the paper wishes to denigrate) and bland assertions not only unsupported by facts but that fly in the face of basic economic theory and 20 years of experience (reducing business costs, not finding ways to increase demand for goods and services, creates jobs).
*--Brian Dickerson bemoans that anyone who didn't see the Komen controversy coming is perhaps naive. It is a very sad thing that a simple thing like fighting to reduce breast cancer mortality rates has become politicized, but let's at least agree who is chiefly responsible for this. Who would I tag for that? A prime example comes by way of reader response to a column I wrote saying much this same thing. One of our local pro-Life people thought the proper thing to do was inform me that a few breast cancer deaths, by way of taking away "free" cancer screenings from poor women, is a small price to pay in the larger war fought on behalf of the unborn. We could have both, but one side of the political spectrum isn't interested in that. What say we not pretend that all sides are equally guilty of that?
*--Local governments and schools (and, no doubt, other educational institutions) have hands out, looking for more cash. How does budget director John Nixon answer? "... We still have to make tough decisions because, if you had four or five times the amount or revenue we had, you still couldn't meet all the requests that are out there, and all the need." If four or five times the amount of revenue coming in couldn't address all the needs, why in hell did they cuts revenue by $1.8 billion last year?
*--Do you know how Peter Hoekstra's gambit to buy Super Bowl ad time works? If the political media pretends, as it did in 2010, that political advertising are legitimate campaign topics, creating a buzz that returns much more on investment. They aren't just hoping to buy Tee Vee time. They're hoping to also buy pixels in the political columns. Note to state's political media ... you got played for fools in 2010. If it happens again, you have only yourselves to blame.
*--Speaking of cuts to funding, a project at MSU that everyone agrees could be transformative and important may not get federal funds. Why? Because of the deficit caused to large extent by financing economically worthless tax cuts during two wars, and by pretending since that the deficit was caused by money spent weatherizing homes for the poor. This is the face of austerity spending. I hope you like it, because it's your date to the prom.
*--America's shoutiest mayor completes his transformation from one-time gubernatorial candidate into cosmic joke. Last week at this time, his office was sending on press releases hailing one of those lists in which Lansing was named one of the greatest places since sliced bread. By the weekend, someone issued a different list, to which Hizzoner responded, "Who takes such lists seriously?"
*--The USDA releases its latest list of Michigan's garden hardiness zones. We're getting warmer, and the story is filled with anecdotal evidence from long-time gardeners about how once-frail plant species are now better able to handle an increasingly toothless Michigan winter (come on, folks, I remember when winter lasted from mid-November until late March). The USDA says, however, that you shouldn't believe your lying eyes and think that winters are becoming increasingly moderate. Me? I just harvested the last of my Brussels sprouts last week.
*--This is nothing new, and not even associated entirely with Michigan, but it is the outgrowth of years of advocacy from places like the Detroit News. Tea Party activists believe that environmental projects and policies are all U.N. plots. Why would they believe something so asinine and crackpot in nature? Because of the likes of Detroit News doodler Henry Payne, who've said as much.
Privately, MDOC officials acknowledge that many mentally ill inmates don't belong in prison, where security demands trump treatment needs. Over the last two decades, however, Michigan has slashed spending on in-patient treatment, leaving courts with few options but to send mentally ill offenders to jail or prison.
"We don't control who comes to us," said Russ Marlan, administrator of MDOC's executive bureau.
Between 1987 and 2003, Michigan closed three-quarters of its 16 state psychiatric hospitals. Michigan now provides fewer psychiatric beds per capita than all but five other states, according to the Treatment Advocacy Center. County jails and state prisons have become, in effect, the state's primary mental health institutions.
This is universally true across basically all state agencies, and it is the impact of nearly 20 years of cuts in government spending and cuts in taxes for those most capable of paying them. Last year's massive tax shift from businesses -- which still consume government services (what idiot wants to argue that Chrysler didn't make prodigious use of them when it was managed into its merger with Fiat, and ought to be exempt for paying for them?) -- to individuals only represented the latest broadside in a trend that's been ongoing since the Engler years.
This isn't at all different than what we described last week when noted Very Serious Person Phil Power talked about growing university student debt as a result of decades of disinvestment by state government, but that the real solution was that universities need to make peace with people who believe we can continue to cut our way to prosperity. We've tried it across the board for two decades and in our university system for four, and it not only hasn't worked but has proven to be counterproductive. Yet, our media elite continues to pretend that it's more important to compromise with inflexible lunatics than it is to just do the right thing ... which also usually also happens to be the most cost effective thing possible (i.e. giving the mentally ill necessary medication vs. incarcerating them and giving them medication occasionally, but restraining them when that's not the case).
Wow, where has the winter gone? It seems like just yesterday that we were thanking the MEA for their end-of-year support, and suddenly it's early February, that furry pig in Howell tells us that winter is ending soon, and our good friends at Main Street Strategies have gone unthanked for their support for this site.
Well, thanks guys. Thanks a bunch for your support, your past support, and your continued support for the things that appear on this site ... the posts, the comments, and the ratings of comments. Speaking of which, the good people who now operate Soapblox have rolled out new comments ratings. Rather than just 0, 1, and 4, there are now 2 and 3. Smell freedom!
And, as always, thanks to all our past sponsors and a pre-emptive thanks to everyone who will support this site in the future. Your support makes keeping this site up worthwhile.
If you'd like to support this site through a sponsorship, please contact me at ebaerren@michiganliberal.com.
Again, this is what Tim Walberg is asserting: A federal gun sting, which started under the Bush administration, was purposefully designed to end in the bloody deaths of federal agents so the federal government could start confiscating firearms from private citizens. Who's his source for this? A former militia person and anti-ATF nut.
Fish, turkey, chicken, hog, beef, venison, caribou and not wild boar: Those are the eight different kinds of animal flesh, as of about noon today, that currently are stored in my freezer. The boar came courtesy my old boss at the newspaper, who got it from a friend of his who shot it at the local game ranch. I've bellyached about those things before, about how they help add to the problem of a nuisance non-native species and especially those down and around Jackson County that people think maybe escaped from the game ranch of Michigan's most famous overgrown adolescent (that is, before he fled the "Socialism" of Jennifer Granholm for Crawford, Texas), but now that it's dead and processed into breakfast sausage form, it would be a crime to let it go uneaten. Word on the street is that I might be able to lay my hands on some black bear, and if that comes to pass it'll be a mighty special day. By the way, for the record, there's a coop in Traverse City called Oryana that makes -- or used to make -- its own tofu right on site. If you ever get a chance, get some, because that tofu is the shit (and by "the shit" what I mean is really, really, really, really good).
Onward!
*--By now, you're aware that Indiana -- glorious Indiana, where every economic metric is worse than it is in Michigan -- passed Right to Work legislation. The Mackinac Center feels this is great, because Michigan ought to be a lot more like Indiana (that is, a place worthy of living in only if you're already wealthy). Thankfully, benevolent overlord Rick Michigan isn't so hot on Right to Work. Right to Work's chief legislative champion Mike Shirkey, by the way, committed a few campaign finance violations, which he categorized as "rookie mistakes." We're all capable of committing rookie mistakes, but would you want someone who is so wet behind the ears that they do to be responsible for engineering such important public policy? Right, chalk this up to a perpetually rookie Legislature tinkering with things its members don't understand and, as noted previously, over the objections of the business community the tinkering is intended to help.
*--Welfare reform was much more successful in throwing people off public assistance than anyone imagined. By the way, no one has any idea if the people thus tossed are finding ways to make ends meet ... say following Ken Horn's suggestion that the involved male's "man up" and "swing a hammer." And, of course, the working poor were hit 1,000 harder by last year's tax reforms than were people capable of absorbing the hit. How do you define shared sacrifice? The working poor complain about being routinely screwed, and benevolent overlord Rick Michigan has to get bored to tears listening.
*--L. Brooks Patterson is a crybaby because Democrats are FOIAing documents associated with his Oakland County power grab.
*--Brenda Lawrence made it a three-way race in announcing her bid for the 14th District this week, making it the race most of us will watch most closely this upcoming primary season. I realize there are four candidates. There are only three that are very interesting to me. Mary Waters has spoiler potential, maybe.
*--The stupidity of centrism via Chad Selweski. Jack Brandenberg wants to continue to restrict the amount of revenue state government can collect. What will result? More budget cuts, and probably to education. That means more cuts in funding for the state's university system, which will force universities to once again look to students to make ends meet (i.e. pay faculty who are already underpaid compared to private sector counterparts). They will raise tuition, further shifting the burden of costs onto individual students and hiking up student debt. If you listen to the priests of High Broderism, the problem here is that universities won't meet legislators who exist in an absolute fantasy world halfway by making cuts that will water down the value of the university system.
*--Magic Frank bumbles through an entire column attacking Jennifer Granholm's new Tee Vee show on a network most of us will never see.
*--Without taking sides in the 14th District primary, I note that Gary Peters attempted to get on record what anyone with a shred of sense already knows ... the Bush tax cuts, coming in the middle of two wars, ballooned out the deficit.
*--This is really sad: Jack Hoogendyk lugs around CFLs to beat up Fred Upton, while light bulb manufacturers complain that they've already invested lots of money in meeting the new federal standards they helped craft.
Very Serious Person Phil Power has penned another of those Op-Ed pieces that suggests that he isn't terribly aware of how the political grounds have shifted. It's all, "The solution can be found in the center." His latest topic? University funding and student debt.
Not surprisingly, student debt in our state has ballooned to $1.8 billion for last year alone. Talk to university officials, and they have no doubt why this is so: They say it's the result of our governors and legislatures choosing — for decades — to shortchange higher education.
The less state support, the argument goes, the higher schools have to push tuition.There is, indeed, evidence for this: In the 1970s, the state covered around three-quarters of total university costs; today, the numbers are reversed. Not surprisingly, tuition has soared.Consequently, it's not unreasonable to conclude that Michigan has imposed a stiff "college use tax" on hundreds of thousands of Michigan students and their families.
Power's own outlet, The Bridge, has accurately reported this, and pointed out that the burden of costs for a degree have shifted from three-quarters of it being paid for through state appropriations to one-quarter of it. In other words, the state has for decades rolled back its support for its university system in a way that is quantifiable through data. How long is it going to be before Phil Power takes seriously the reporting of his own outlet?
He goes on.
But the folks in the current legislature, particularly the House of Representatives, sharply disagree. They think the universities are constantly whining for more state money while asserting that their constitutional autonomy immunizes them from legislative attempts to cut costs, boost productivity and enforce graduation standards.
There are two major fixed costs in our universities, labor costs and energy. Labor study after labor study have concluded that when compared to private sector employees, those in the public sector -- and this includes university faculty -- are not compensated as well. In other words, we're already underpaying our most important university employee pool ... tenured and tenure-track faculty (i.e. the people responsible for teaching the kiddos). And, that represents one of the two major fixed costs that eat up a university's budget. As for energy costs, the university system is largely leaps and bounds ahead of everyone else in energy efficiency and finding newer and cheaper ways to create energy and reduce those costs.
The problem here isn't that a solution exists in the center that no one can agree one. The problem here is that one of these parties exists in a fantasy world, where the solution to everything is to cut spending. The other problem is that it is no secret that this party exists in its fantasy world, because it's solution for the last decade has been to cut spending ... long after it's become obvious that continued cuts to spending is the lunatic course. These are the same people who don't believe that economically-useless tax cuts amid two wars exploded the deficit, that the housing crisis and near collapse of the financial sector in 2008 was the product of unchecked Wall Street greed (they continue to assert that it was somehow Fannie Mae's dalliance into subprime lending, ignoring that it was illegal for Fannie Mae to do so until long after everyone else had gotten into it), that refusing to pay off loans will damage the nation's credit, and that global warming is a hoax.
Again, the problem here is that Phil Power has correctly identified the problem ... student debt caused by university budget shortfalls. His outlet's reporting correctly identified the most likely culprit ... a massive shift in the cost burden of universities from society as a whole to individual students. His solution ignores that, however, and once again posits that the real solution rests somewhere in the middle of ironclad facts and unfounded fantasy. Why again does this sort of thing get treated with the gravity of the Word of God?
Millions of women battling breast cancer have counted on the pink ribbon as a symbol of hope, solidarity and strength. Now even that has been taken away, thanks to right-wing leaders who think they have more rights to control our bodies than we do.
I’ve been a conflicted supporter of Susan G. Komen for years (I’ll get to that in a minute), so their decision to cut funding for Planned Parenthood, hiding behind a ludicrous congressional investigation, makes cutting my ties with them a little easier.
There are two tragedies here: 1) that our system is so screwed up that any politician can initiate a bogus investigation - in this case, tainting Planned Parenthood with that tired old abortion scandal that we all know is a lie, and 2) that influential, trusted organizations allow themselves to be pressured by these extremists.
Planned Parenthood received $680,000 in 2011 from Komen, which has paid for 170,000 clinical breast and 6,400 mammogram referrals for the organization since 2005. Because of the right-wing's absolute disdain for a woman's ability to make her own choices, and their absurd conviction that only they know what's right, tens of thousands of women will go without the life-saving mammograms they can't afford.
Just like because of the outrageous, mean-spirited right-wing attacks on abortion rights and abortion providers, more women will be at risk of health complications and more children will be born into difficult circumstances. Meanwhile, the right-wingers pass laws that make it harder for people to donate money to nonprofits that DO take care of these struggling folks and drive arbitrary restrictions on which loving individuals can adopt the children of unintended pregnancies (oh no, not the gays!).
And here in Michigan, the mostly male Legislature is busy passing laws that are demoralizing and dangerous to women. And by caving in now, organizations like Komen are buying into the anti-woman agenda.
Now, as the sister of (an incredibly strong!) breast cancer survivor, I know that the pink ribbon and the entire Susan G. Komen mystique is vitally important to those struggling with this damn disease and mourning those it has taken. I’ve bought every permutation of pink/pink ribbon product you can imagine, because it cheered my sister up, and I’ve collected far too many Komen race shirts.
Because our money matters: Instead of donating to Komen, consider donating directly to Planned Parenthood to support them and ensure services are delivered directly in our community.
Because our votes matter: We hear it again and again, and examples like this should make it sink in: Elections matter. Mobilize, organize and strategize TODAY to put people in power who respect the needs and rights of women come Nov. 6. Our lives depend on it.
I think I'm probably wrong in saying that today marks the first time this year we've hit 50 degrees ... something tells me we might have done this even earlier this year ... but it is somewhat heartening that it happened during what is supposed to be the coldest part of the year. As in, I really hate cold weather and can't wait until I can turn off the heater and grill. Them's is gonna be good times. Meanwhile...
Onward!
*--Thanks to Angela Wittrock for the love over yesterday's post. As for America's Shoutiest Mayor, he says that referring to a member of one of Michigan's Native American tribes as "Chief Chicken Little" isn't a racially-charged remark. Neither apparently were comments referring to "bows and arrows" and a target on Bernero's back.
*--One last item on the Lansing casino, this time also from MLive's Angela Wittrock ... the Sault Ste. Marie executive is okay with the disparaging remarks by America's Shoutiest Mayor. Reading this reminds me of that scene in Goodfellas where Joe Pesci gets killed and Ray Liotta through narration says that it was between the Italians, "real greaseball shit," and that they had to stay out of it. I mean, ultimately, this boils down to marketplace competition, just as marketplace competition is what motivated the Saginaw Chippewas to bankroll Prop. 1 back in 2004 to limit gaming in the state (they were chiefly going after the racinos, including one that would be built at the Mt. Pleasant horse racing track). The question for most people ought to be whether casinos in general are positive economic development tools, or whether they just take money from one pocket to deposit it in another. I think most everyone who's read this blog for very long is familiar with my feelings.
*--Tomorrow, Southfield mayor Brenda Lawrence will officially enter the race for the 14th District. Also, via press release, Gary McDowell is reporting $340,000 in fund raising for his campaign against the Teabaggin' Surgeon.
*--Flint's Emergency Manager may sell off municipal assets to pay the bills. This makes nearly as much sense as the state of Michigan selling off the Mackinac Bridge to balance the general fund.
*--The Muskegon Chamber of Commerce is told that Right to Work would be a pointless, counterproductive, divisive exercise. Last week, we heard the same from the state's business community. Will Republicans in the Legislature actually listen to the business community, or will they continue to lecture the business community on what it needs?
*--Remember the Hutaree? A judge tells them that if they can't afford lodging where their trial is taking place, they can stay in jail. And, since they were arrested, we can presume them guilty, so when the sentence is handed down for it, at least they can apply the nights alread slept in the slammer as time served. And, so it goes in the Republic where you are presumed innocent until convicted based on a preponderence of evidence.
*--Teh Demas on the recurring disparaging of women down in Lansing. What has been most regrettable for me is to see the silence on the part of the Lansing press corps, and of the state's political press corps in general. There's been quite a lot of speculation in the last month that Rick Jones' "hooker" comment was made possible in an atmosphere of term limits. That might be, but they are enabled only where people don't believe they'll be held accountable for the things they say, that ultimately they'll be given cover by the press to say horrible things about other people.
P.S. Andy Schor officially files paperwork for the 68th House District seat today.
Senate: Senator Stabenow's campaign is beginning to collect nominating petitions for her re-election. It's generally a routine part of a campaign - getting 15,000-30,000 signatures to appear on the ballot. But In 2006, Republican Jerry Zandstra failed to qualifty for the Republican primary balloty by just a few dozen signatures. In 2010, Alma Wheeler Smith dropped out of the race for governor the day nominating petitions were due - leading many to believe that she couldn't get all the signatures she needed. For Stabenow and Hoekstra, getting on the ballot should just be formality. For tea partiers like Hekman, Durant, etc., one wonders if any of them will be tripped up by the requirement. (And no, don't expect all tea partiers to rally around one candidate at their confab this coming month.)
House 1, 5, 6, 8, 10, 11: Be sure to vote for your picks for DFA's Grassroots All-Star program! Gary McDowell, Derek Bailey, Dan Kildee, John Waltz, Lance Enderle, Henry Yanez and Syed Taj are representing the Great Lakes State in this vote.
House 7, 8, 11: Tim Walberg, Mike Rogers, and Thaddeus McCotter are all facing primary challenges, per Politics1. Yes, even they are too liberal for some.
House 13: As Eric mentioned, Conyers is a sponsor of SOPA. Not good. Three things, though: 1) Even if it does pass, Obama has said he will veto it. 2) It's not always a good idea to be a 'single-issue' voter. 3. Nobody has explained to me why a 24-term legend like Conyers is facing three state lawmakers. Why are they all running against Conyers? And moe importantly, why should Conyers go? I have yet to see any solid answers.
I have heard that with three African-Americans in the race, Anderson might be able to win because the district is 43% white. Anderson would need to get most whites and probably some non-whites to vote for him. That said, he's got quite a bit of grassroots support, so it could happen. Plus, the non-Detroit parts of the district usually see higher turnout than Detroit. I wonder, however, if Conyers might benefit from a split anti-Conyers vote. It could go either way (or neither way).
House 14:Brenda Lawrence is set to announce tomorrow that she's running for Congress, challenging Gary Peters and Hansen Clarke. The mayor of Southfueld ran for Oakland County Eecutive against L. Brooks Patterson in 2008 and, as we all know, was our nominee for Lieutenant Governor. If Lawrence somehow manages to win the primary, she would be one of the few people to defeat two incumbent congressmen in a primary.
If I lived in the 14th, I would have a hard time picking who I would support. They're all outstanding. I can see the winner of this race going on to run for Senate in 2014 (assuming the then-80-year-old Levin retires - as he had originally planned to in 2008).
House 13, 14: One thing that Clarke, Peters, Lawrence, Conyers, Anderson, Jackson, and Johnson all have in common is that they are all great Democrats and would do a great job in Congress. Too bad only two of them can win. My concern, though, is that if Peters and Anderson win, Michigan will likely be the most populous state in the unio with an all-white Congressional delegation. Think about that.
Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero is under fire this morning from two Michigan Indian tribes and a tribal lobbyist who said the mayor made several racially insensitive remarks about Native Americans at a fund-raiser last week.
The Nottawaseppi Huron Band of Potawatomi and Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribes, who have come out in strong opposition to a proposed Indian casino in Lansing, said Bernero “repeatedly used profanity and racial slurs in describing the (casino) controversy.”
The tribes said Bernero referred to a bull’s eye on his back and that he was the target of “bows and arrows” for championing the casino proposal. James Nye, a Lansing lobbyist and member of the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians, said he was told by several attendees that Bernero singled him out as “Chief Chicken Little.”
The man who was the Democratic nominee for governor in 2010.
It goes without saying that using racial slurs against Native American tribes isn't the way to oppose their opposition to your casino, and that in fact it's very stupid. A little added context to this is that when the Saginaw Chippewas got fleeced by Jack Abramoff and Michael Scanlon, both men traded e-mails that used similar language to describe them. In other words, when it comes to being racially sensitive in dealing with one of Michigan's wealthiest Native American tribes, the 2010 Democratic nominee for governor is no better than Jack Abramoff. For those of you who perpetually complain that Bernero winds up on the list of most odious political figures in the state, let that percolate a quick second.
By the way, just so we're clear on this. I hate the Soaring Eagle casino. I think it was an overall lousy addition to the community, and that it's economic impact is offset by the problems it's created. I also have no ties to the Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe, and my time working full-time at the local newspaper involved a number of very public fights between the tribe and my employer, including one in which they ordered the newspaper boxes off reservation land. The only thing we share is real estate.
*--Disclaimer: Yes, I know. The only way the headline could be more purposefully offensive is if I'd included a reference to wampum. Some references, however, are better left unmade.
