Republican Shift and Shaft Spending Cuts Target Kids and Local Governments

Great piece! (0.00 / 0)

Excellent work pulling it together and good commentary. Now suggestions from everyone on how we defeat this GOP Spin Machine?

I want to change the world, not help people adjust to it. - Millie Jeffrey, MI - National Women's labor and Democratic activist, Presidential Medal of Freedom Recipient

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by: LiberalLucy @ Fri Mar 23, 2007 at 07:53:39 AM CDT

Budget "Cuts" are a misnomer (0.00 / 0)

Almost without exception, attempts in any government, State or Federal, to "cut the budget," or "balance the budget," or whatever euphamism they want to use, is merely a reorganization away from social spending and toward spending that benefits those who suckle mightily from the government teat, such as Big Pharma as mentioned above.  The real agenda isn't to balance the budget, or decrease government spending (because indeed, as the dairist also notes above, government spending in certain sectors would increase dramatically under these proposals), but rather to choke off public services and force the average citizen either into the arms of a big corporation or onto the street.

Some people may buy it when the issue is presented to them as a way of making the state fiscally sound again, but once they realize that the effects of such a plan would weaken their schools, their health care, even their immediate safety in the form of cuts to local fire, police, and paramedic units.  Exposing this agenda will go a long way, in my opinion, to rallying support in the community for stopping the cuts before they get even deeper.

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by: Mike Ramsey @ Fri Mar 23, 2007 at 10:00:12 AM CDT

Shocking! (0.00 / 0)

What, first the Republican Congress and Bush shift cost burdens to states and now our state is shifting cost burdens to local governments?  I'm shocked! 

This reminds me of the video from Chicago of the off-duty police officer beating the crap out of a petite female bartender who refused to serve him more alcohol, and the other customers just watched while the beating happened.

The lack of adult responsibility in our governing bodies is shocking.

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by: jimwhitaker @ Fri Mar 23, 2007 at 10:00:19 AM CDT

Republican Spending Cuts (0.00 / 0)

  Gruppenfuhrer Mike Bishop has now become the self-appointed Destroyer of Michigan. He says he's no longer a state Senator but a "turnaround manager". I'm sure his heroes are the likes of the Northwest Airlines, K-Mart and Delphi management that ripped off their employees by massive corporate "restructuring".

  Herr Gruppenfuhrer pledges now to do for Michigan what the corporate raiders did to their employees.He pledges to do all in his part to create a Michigan diaspora by driving away 10% of the state's population to distant lands by pulverizing what's left of Michigan's infrastructure.

  Wonder who in the population is represented by the million people he says are going to leave the state soon. Could it be disenfranchised gays? Unemployable ex-offenders banned by the Nazi-like state police background checks? Minorities driven to desperation by chronic downsizing and job loss? Unemployed auto workers? You, perhaps?

  It sure as hell won't be the established grandees who sponsor the likes of Bishop and his cronies. If Senator Bishop has his way there will be precious little left in Michigan except fancy resorts populated by the rich and an impoverished class of the permanent under-employed who will be forced to serve the rich on peasant wages.

  Check out the Gruppenfuher's pronouncements in today's Gongwer article:

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BISHOP: MASSIVE CUTS STILL NEEDED
Saying he was convinced that Michigan could lose as many as 1 million residents by the 2010 census, Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop (R-Rochester) told reporters Thursday that the cuts the chamber enacted to the 2006-07 budget were "baby steps" towards the larger goal of massive budget cuts and restructuring that has to begin with the 2007-08 budget.
"We have been reduced to turnaround managers," Mr. Bishop said of the Legislature.  "In the end this will be our legacy that we reduced considerably the cost of government."  And Governor Jennifer Granholm had to recognize the need for that, he said.
Speaking to reporters as the Senate awaited the bill substitutes to enact its proposed cuts, Mr. Bishop said the state could no longer maintain the budget it had for years.
Revenues are continuing to decline, he said, and the May revenue estimating conference will likely show that revenues for 2007-08 are less than what was anticipated in the January conference.
With continuing job losses and population shifts, Mr. Bishop said it was entirely likely "that we could go from a state of 10 million people to 9 million people."  And if the state fell to that population level then it could not continue to maintain a total budget in excess of $42 billion, he said.
While Ms. Granholm called the budget cuts the Senate Republicans were proposing unacceptable and harmful to the state's needy citizens, Mr. Bishop said those cuts had to be just a beginning to reducing the size and cost of government.
"In '08 there has to be significant cuts, real reforms," he said.  Repeatedly he said the state had to act "dramatically" and that there had to "massive downsizing in the upcoming years"
Doing so will require tough decisions, he said.  Asked specifically how the state would have to cut Medicaid services to an estimated 800,000 children, Mr. Bishop said he did not yet know, but that the public could not continue to finance operations that he said are fiscally insupportable.
Asked what if such cuts are enacted and they do not stimulate a turnaround, that businesses decide to continue leaving the state because they no longer cared for the quality of life, Mr. Bishop said the Legislature can only do the best it can to control costs and the size of government.  "We have to hope that will stimulate jobs and the economy," he said.
 

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by: WMD @ Fri Mar 23, 2007 at 11:01:53 AM CDT

Mr. Bishop.. (0.00 / 0)

... fails to recognize that the "drown government" crowd LOST the last election in a big way. If we wanted his ideas, we would have elected DeVos and kept a Republican House.

We did not.

Time for the Democrats to SPEAK UP.

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by: wizardkitten @ Fri Mar 23, 2007 at 12:04:48 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Democrats Speak Up (0.00 / 0)

  Amen. The time has long since passed in this state to kick some conservative Republican butt.

  Anyone ready for a general strike?

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by: WMD @ Fri Mar 23, 2007 at 13:40:19 PM CDT

Cost burdens will be shifted to local communities (0.00 / 0)

We already saw that happen last November when communities across the state voted on police, health care, senior citizen programs and other funding.  Shifting cost burdens is a solution for the middle and upper class cities where citizens are willing to shell out the tax dollars to keep their communities humming, but it penalizes the cities challenged by high levels of unemployment, aging populations, falling populations, etc. 

That won't matter to Republicans though because their business friends got what they wanted, their rich friends all live in communities where the cutbacks won't make much difference, and they can crow about cutting taxes. 

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by: KS @ Fri Mar 23, 2007 at 13:41:37 PM CDT

If we wanted this, we'd have kept Laura Toy! (0.00 / 0)

WTF, Glenn?

The Senate took up the tax bill Thursday against the wishes of Granholm and its Democratic sponsors and defeated it on a 22-16 vote. Sen. Glenn Anderson of Westland was the only Democrat to side with the Republicans voting against it.

I hope he has some good alternative plans up his sleeves...

Did you exchange a walk-on part in the war for a lead role in a cage?
The PhiKapBlog

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by: phikapbob @ Fri Mar 23, 2007 at 14:32:50 PM CDT

Maybe.... (0.00 / 0)

He's planning on getting drafted and didn't want to be accused of raising taxes by Jackass McCrybaby.

Putting conservatives in charge of our government makes about as much sense as GM hiring a CEO who hates cars.

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by: djtyg @ Fri Mar 23, 2007 at 17:14:08 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

That vote didn't matter (0.00 / 0)

That bill was never going to pass anyway. It was one piece of the Governor's first Executive Order--alone it meant nothing. Bringing that bill to the floor was a politlcal move by the Republicans, and there was no reason for Anderson to take the bait. The Republicans are just trying to use their majority position to write that annoying campaign mail.

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by: GranolaGirl @ Fri Mar 23, 2007 at 18:22:48 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Bishop's Way (0.00 / 0)

All I can say is that if Bishop and the Republican's get their way a million people will be leaving this state, and I will be one of them!

The end of the human race will be that it will eventually die of civilization.

 - Ralph Waldo Emerson

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by: michmark @ Fri Mar 23, 2007 at 16:15:02 PM CDT

Have you told them that? (0.00 / 0)

I understand everyone's frustration, believe me I do. But all the talking on here and other online forums doesn't mean a damn if Bishop and Co. don't hear it.

It's quite clear the only pressure that the Senate GOP will bow to is public opinion, and now is the time, ladies and gents, that we need to stop talking and start walking.
Call/email Bishop and your own legislators, and tell them that you want to INVEST in Michigan, not continue to further pillage it. They all need to hear from us.

Mike Bishop - 517-373-2417 or email at senmbishop@senate.michigan.gov

I want to change the world, not help people adjust to it. - Millie Jeffrey, MI - National Women's labor and Democratic activist, Presidential Medal of Freedom Recipient

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by: LiberalLucy @ Fri Mar 23, 2007 at 16:42:30 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Here is the letter I sent yesterday to my Republican State Senator (0.00 / 0)

The Honorable Valde Garcia

Senator Garcia,

My name is T** K********* and I am a constituent of yours.  My wife and I live and raise our children in Mason and we also both work for the Michigan State Police.  So like you, our family also works for and receive our income from the people of Michigan.  As you are aware the Michigan State Police is already experiencing severe cuts in services and the Senate Republicans have now passed additional cuts to school funding and are planning even more cuts in services that affect the people of Michigan.

In the meanwhile, state and federal income taxes are at the lowest levels they've been in decades while Michigan's economy is becoming the weakest its been since the early 1980s.  Right now there are many other states (such as Minnesota) with higher taxes and better economies.  Clearly, cutting taxes and services does not mean a better economy.

Because of this, I urge you and the rest of the Senate Republican caucus  to consider raising taxes on all Michiganders -- my family and yours included -- to help turn our struggling state around.  By providing the proper investments to education, law enforcement, and infrastructure (such as better roads) Michigan can become a more attractive state for businesses. While no one likes paying taxes, no one likes driving on disintegrating roads or sending their kids to underfunded schools and universities.

Please support Governor Granholm's two-penny tax plan and please reconsider your spending cuts.

"I never did give anybody hell. I just told the truth and they thought it was hell." -- Harry S Truman

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by: Butch Snider @ Fri Mar 23, 2007 at 22:23:59 PM CDT