www.RightMichigan.com

Posted at 8:19am on May 16, 2008 Maybe that's why Barack finally came back to Michigan!

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

Barack Obama is not a Muslim.  I'm not saying he's a Muslim.  But we've all gotten those junk emails that swear to high heaven the man's a closeted Koran reader.  He stopped going by Barry and insists on being called Barack.  The man wants to hang out with the lunatic Islamic ruler over in Iran, a move that even most Democrats agree is nuts.  The Clinton campaign sent out those pictures of him wearing some traditional ethnic African garb.  And so the ignorant continue to insist he wears a crescent around his neck, not a crucifix.  

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Posted at 8:40am on May 15, 2008 Michigan Dems seeing the (neon) light on smoking ban?

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

Talk about a role-reversal.  Not too long ago the Michigan Senate approved a statewide ban on smoking in bars, restaurants, bingo parlors... pretty much anywhere you might find a stranger.  Second hand smoke is a killer, they reminded us, and just because smoking is legal and a gorgeous cash cow for the state treasury doesn't mean you should actually be allowed to smoke.  

That was the Senate.  The Republican controlled Senate.  That said, all but one of the votes against the ban came from the GOP delegation so not everyone lost their minds on the issue, but it only takes two or three.  All but one Democrat voted in the affirmative.

Enter the House of Representatives.  You know, bicameral legislature, that whole deal.  After a pretty good sized delay the bill finally made it's way across the hall at the Capitol where... drum roll please... absolutely nothing has happened yet.  The hold up?  Some House Democrats are worried that banning smoking in bingo parlors and the Detroit casinos will KILL JOBS!  (All caps is still the text equivalent of screaming, right?)  The Detroit News reports:


Rep. Bert Johnson, D-Detroit, is among those who oppose the harsher Senate version. He said he fears it would hurt business and cause layoffs at the Detroit casinos...

"It's about jobs," Johnson said. "I have people at home who get hurt when (Detroit's) casinos are threatened."

Brenda Clack, who heads up the Black Caucus all the way from Flint echoes the same concerns on behalf of her members, most from Detroit.

Consistency is increasingly difficult these days, especially in Lansing but I can't help but wonder how the good Representatives from Detroit justify banning smoking in any private business establishment if they understand, as evident from Representative Johnson's statements, that doing so would kill jobs.  It's not like Casinos exist in some magical fairy land and cigarette ashes are pixie dust.  There's nothing special or unique about them in the context of customer nicotine habits.  

Then again, I could be over thinking things.  I suppose it's possible that there are entire House districts in Detroit entirely devoid of restaurants, clubs and bowling alleys.  It's possible I've been wrong all along and Johnson is 100% consistent in his position.  Maybe he doesn't have any constituents who employ people but has plenty whose employment depends on Casino gaming.  And if that's the case I sincerely apologize.  

More likely, this is your basic lefty double-speak... saying one thing but doing another.  Looking out for big business but ignoring the little guys.  Wait, isn't that the GOP stereotype?  See?  Role reversal.

So, novel concept, how about we all get on the same page and stop doing things that kill jobs.  Heaven knows the State could use a dollop of common sense.  Especially with our unemployment rate dropping two tenths of a point to a new, lower, 6.9%.

Yeah, you read that right.  Especially with it dropping.  Because as the Ivory Tower reports:


...The underlying news isn't good.

The rate dropped mainly because Michigan's civilian labor force is shrinking and included about 15,000 fewer people overall last month than in March. About 2,000 fewer people were employed last month...

The total number of seasonally adjusted payroll jobs in Michigan fell by about 19,000, to just less than 4.2 million.

Michigan reported job gains in government and professional and business services. Each of those segments picked up 3,000 jobs in April.

Phwew!  At least government's growing again.  Other than that, yikes.  You know you had a rough month when 15,000 people just plain gave up.  19,000 fewer jobs, 15,000 fewer job seekers but government on the rise.  Only in Michigan.  Literally.

But the papers aren't completely devoid of good news for workers in-State.  The Lansing State Journal reports that the Capitol City's own four-week-long automotive labor strike might be over soon.  


The tentative deal came a day after GM canceled company health insurance and other benefits for the 2,300 workers represented by UAW Local 602. The workers walked off their jobs in a dispute over local contract issues.

The Detroit automaker canceled the benefits for the duration of the strike, which began April 17.

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Posted at 8:49am on May 14, 2008 Dem spending creates monster new budget deficit

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

Remember last fall when the State was facing a massive budget deficit and the Governor teamed up with Mark Schauer and Andy Dillon to ram through a couple of equally massive tax hikes?  Remember the promises that they were "balancing the budget" and that they were fixing the problem for the future?  

Yeah, so much for that.

The Ivory Tower reports this morning that we're about a half-billion dollars in the red.  Again!


Some of the anticipated red ink results from new tax breaks to filmmakers who produce movies and commercials in Michigan. Those credits could reach nearly $120 million in the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1, according to the House Fiscal Agency.

In all, a weak economy and tax credits will leave $430 million less for Gov. Jennifer Granholm's proposed 2008-09 budget than previously expected, according to the fiscal agency.

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Posted at 9:02am on May 13, 2008 Michigan! Want to see Obama? Better go to Florida.

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

Even when we get a little attention we're treated like red-headed step children.  What gives?

By now you've probably heard the news that Barack Obama is finally planning to visit what the Associated Press refers to as the "politically neglected"states of Michigan and Florida.  He'll be here on Wednesday, May 14th.  In case you're not in front of a calendar, that's tomorrow.  

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Posted at 7:46am on May 12, 2008 Michigan Disenfranchised: Another day without a solution

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

Did you hear the news over the weekend?  It turns out the race for the Democrat nomination is over.  Game, set and match.  Hillary Clinton hasn't gotten word just yet and neither, by all indications, has her BFF Jennifer Granholm but if you put any stock in what the mainstream media has to say than you know it's over.  All of it.  Mostly.  There's still one pesky issue the Dems haven't resolved and it's finally starting to garner a bit of the spotlight on the national stage.

Still no solution for seating Michigan and Florida.  

Two major battleground states that have approximately zero voice right now in the Democrats' nominating contest.  No say on who very well may become the next President of the United States of America.

But we might get a say.  Maybe.  Eventually.  Partially.  The regressisphere is abuzz with proposals and possible solutions, most of which focus on Florida getting a full delegation and Michigan being relegated to secondary-citizen status, being stripped of as many as half our delegates.  Others think we should just toss out the votes of hundreds of thousands of residents and split the delegates down the middle between Hillary and Barack... oh, but don't touch those super delegates.  They can do whatever they'd like.

The MSM, they're reporting dutifully on the left's heroic (/sarcasm) efforts to seat our delegates, conveniently ignoring the fact that it's the left that pulled the chair out from under us when we went to sit down.  (Even if Michigan gets to send a few delegates to Denver they'll be staying somewhere else in Colorado... the DNC months ago even released the State's hotel block.)

But while the national press bumbles their way to the most flattering possible coverage they can generate for the Barackstar, Detroit News columnist Daniel Howes provides a bit of a Michigan perspective.  And when you're realistically discussing Michigan AND Barack Obama it's bound to be an uncomfortable conversation.  The man hasn't exactly endeared himself to the State, what with his 300+ day absence and his constant verbal assaults on the troubled auto industry.  Which leads Howes, the columnist perhaps best respected on all things Big 3 and equipped to discuss the auto industry to deliver a bit of advice while doing something Obama, I'm sure, wishes he hadn't.

He compares the Senator to George W. Bush.


...To suggest that Japanese rivals aren't being pinched by sky-high gas prices is mistaken because, as Toyota Motor Corp. confirmed last week, they are. Also mistaken -- and unfair -- is suggesting that Detroit doesn't build fuel-efficient cars, just like when President Bush exhorted Detroit to build "relevant" cars and refused to meet with the CEOs of Detroit's Big Three.

You're right: America needs "truth telling" from its president -- especially one who grasps the facts and understands that truth can cut two ways.

It's actually a pretty scathing piece that takes the candidate to task for his ill-informed comments about the Big 3 and his penchant for piling on with non-constructive criticism.  It'd be easy to quote the whole thing but fair use and all that.  Suggested read.  

That is, of course, if you aren't entirely soured on all things Detroit after the latest revelation from the Hip Hop Mayor's office.  We knew he had a problem firing folks he shouldn't have been firing but hiring family members he shouldn't have been hiring?  

The Associated Press reports:


City records examined by the Detroit Free Press showed that at least 29 people with close ties to Kilpatrick have been appointed since he took office in 2002. Kilpatrick has cut more than 4,000 city jobs since then, including firefighters and nearly 1,000 police officers, mayoral spokeswoman Denise Tolliver said.

Tolliver defended the appointees, saying they not only are well-qualified but also are part of a tradition in Detroit...

Also a part of a tradition in Detroit...


Some Kilpatrick appointees have faced legal and ethical problems, including at least two relatives who remain on the city payroll despite falsifying their college credentials on their resumes, the Free Press said.

Political patronage.  Gotta love it.  At least it's a tradition.  Tradition makes everything OK.  Besides, Detroit's got one heck of a role model in Lansing.

The Ivory Tower follows up on that report with a quick look at term limited State House members and their next careers of choice along with those who might be replacing them.  There'll be a lot of familiar names on ballots this year, though they might not be where you're used to finding them.  

With legislators getting termed out many of them are looking for a taxpayer funded paycheck elsewhere in the State.  The bureaucratic mentality is, I think, best summed up as follows:


"I don't think anybody anticipated the consequences of a three-term career," said state Rep. Fred Miller, D-Mt. Clemens, who is caucus chairman for House Democrats and will face term limits in 2010.

"You spend your first term locking down your district, the second term trying to do some policy initiatives and your third term looking over your shoulder to see where you're going next."

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Posted at 9:20am on May 8, 2008 So much for that particular "distraction"

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

Dillon, D-Redford Township, wasted no time in denouncing the (recall) effort as a distraction from the state's serious problems...

--Detroit Free Press, May 2, 2008

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Posted at 11:01am on May 7, 2008 300!

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

There's a lot of speculation this morning that the race for the Democrat nomination for the Presidency ended last night somewhere on a back road in North Carolina.  Barack Obama delivered a WWE sized butt-kicking to Hill-Rod there in the squared (or in NC's case, rectangular) circle of primary politics.  

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Posted at 9:39am on May 7, 2008 If you MUST run with scissors pointed up...

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

(The relevance of this particular graphic is coming... promise...)

Most days you don't have to look far in Michigan news to find a ridiculous headline or a story about behavior that defies logic and common sense.  And that's not a dig on the mainstream media.  Sure, they're responsible for a laughable or frustrating choice of words from time to time but you work with what you're given, you know?  They can only report on what's happening out there (in theory) and it's usually our fair State and the good folks running it who create the ridiculous situations they cover.  

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Posted at 8:29am on May 5, 2008 Maybe Cinco de Mayo can save Michigan... Obama isn't particularly interested in the job

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

!Hola!  Como estas?  You didn't know I'm bilingual, did you?  It's OK, don't beat yourself up over it... I'm actually not.  But sometimes I like to pretend I am.  Every now and again if I'm over at the homestead with the family for dinner or something I'll answer the phone in Spanish too... something my parents either find endearing or annoying, depending on whether or not the caller hangs up, convinced she had the wrong number.  Everyone should try it sometime.  Seriously.  It's a kick.  Or, more likely, I'm more goofy a kid than I should ever admit again in public.  

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Posted at 8:14am on May 2, 2008 Monica Conyers (MI-14) goes to school... errr... gets schooled

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Friday morning fights.  This morning we have a battle for the ages.  Brains versus brawn.  Age versus youth.  Decades of experience versus precocious curiosity.  A contrast in styles for the ages.  A sitting Detroit City Councilwoman and wife of a United States Congressman versus a girl barely in her teens.  

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Posted at 8:26am on May 1, 2008 Presidential politics return to Michigan (GOOD!) while another few thousand jobs leave (BAD!)

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

He was here just over a month ago, touring a Ford plant back on February 21st.  And now he's coming back.  Who?  I'll give you a few hints... he's a guy.  He's running for President.  He's actually invested in Michigan this campaign season with staff, mail, radio, TV and all sorts of assorted political chum purchased from local vendors.  He talks about Michigan issues and has taken an active interest in the domestic auto industry.  If you do the math on February 21st it's only been sixty-nine days since he last visited even though our election was held long ago... and he didn't even win it!

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Posted at 8:35am on Apr. 30, 2008 Lemonade and electric cattle prods

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

Yesterday "in the sphere" I linked to a column over at Life with Mr. O about the utter inanity of Michigan's current crop of child protection laws.  In a State and under a system where Ricky Holland and Isaac Lethbridge were sent to homes where they met tragic and violent ends without a single head rolling at DHS it's more than a little frustrating that the "system" went out of it's way to strip the Ratte family of their 7 year old son because Mr. Ratte accidentally purchased him an alcohol laced lemonade from a Comerica Park concession stand adorned with this sign...

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Posted at 8:20am on Apr. 29, 2008 Hsu's the fourth largest contributor, you ask?

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

Indicted Democrat money-man and long-time wanted felon Norman Hsu can't get him enough of Jennifer Granholm.  And apparently she can't get enough of him either.

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Posted at 9:07am on Jan. 8, 2008 Court won't save partial birth abortion ban tossing it back to the Legislature and the Governor

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

The Grand Rapids Press reports that the United States Supreme Court opted not to hear an appeal to a lower court ruling throwing out Michigan's ban on the barbaric killing procedure known as partial birth abortion.  

An appeals court tossed the law last summer claiming that by banning a procedure which involves delivering a living human baby feet first, shoving a pair of scissors into the base of the kid's neck, sliding a suction tube directly into his brain and then turning on a vacuum, pumping out his grey matter and crushing his skull (while he fights and moves and kicks and flails his little arms) the legislature might have also accidentally banned other killing methods.  And we couldn't have that, could we.  I mean, as a civilized people we absolutely have to protect neat little tricks like these.  After all, it's science.  Or something.

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Posted at 9:35am on Jan. 7, 2008 MI Governor hits a new low: Granholm playing political games with Human Services

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

Some interesting details began to emerge over the weekend regarding the sudden three-hundred-plus million dollar budget surplus the State miraculously discovered after closing the books on 2007.  When all was said and done there was about $350 million sitting in the bank that the good folks in Lansing hadn't expected to be there and before they got a chance to figure out the where and the how and the what-now a creeping, insidious spin started to permeate the press almost instantly.

While people like House Minority Leader Craig DeRoche suggested immediately that something was amiss the administration began talking to the press and "reminding" them that with projected deficits facing the State in 2008 this money was almost like a Christmas miracle.  They shouldn't question it, they should just note that this will help balance the books in the coming year.  It's a subtle move.  Just don't address the "where" and the "how" and talk about the money in "conservative" terms.  Talk about how it will help avoid future tax increases.  Because no one likes tax hikes in an election year.

All of a sudden no one remembers to ask where it came from or what the appropriate response really is (did I hear someone say "refund").  Heck, some folks in the press even lose their minds and start printing flat out lies.  Take the big headline story from the Associated Press over the weekend:


Faced with a $1.75 billion shortfall, lawmakers and Granholm increased revenue by $1.3 billion by raising the state income tax on Oct. 1 and placing a surcharge on the new Michigan Business Tax that took effect Jan. 1. They also trimmed or restricted spending by more than $400 million.

Some House Republicans say the surplus shows the government wasn't as desperate for new revenue as it claimed during last year's budget negotiations.

"Normally finishing financially in the black is a job well done, but I can't look at it that way when the wallets of hardworking families of Michigan were just squeezed because the state said it needed more money or else," GOP Rep. Kevin Elsenheimer of Kewadin said in a release last week.

Representative Elsenheimer brings up a good point.  And the article is presenting the "conservative" angle, so what's the problem?  Where's the inaccuracy or the bias?  Go back to that first paragraph.  Not only was it a $1.4 billion tax hike complete with a $900 million compliance cost (making it a $2.3 billion tax hike on businesses) that's not the sentence that'll drive you crazy.  "They also trimmed or restricted spending by more than $400 million."

Patently false.  Unequivocally untrue.  The FY2007-2008 budget was the biggest budget in the history of the State of Michigan.  Spending increased over FY2006-2007.  There was no trimming.  There was only restricting if you go with the strictest definition of the word and assume that the fact they didn't spend a hundred billion dollars buying every Michigan child a pony represents some sort of fiscal restraint.  

But the article has done it's job.  It's muddied the waters.  It's protecting the entrenched Democrat big government interests in Lansing (as the MSM is want to do) and put on a nice coat of camouflage by talking to Republicans to make the piece look bipartisan.  And still the question remains... where exactly did this extra cash come from?

For the answers we'll go to this morning's lead editorial in the Detroit News:


Half the surplus in the General Fund is the result of unexpectedly strong revenues in the last couple of months of the budget year. The other half is the result of what are known as "lapses," or unspent appropriations that are returned to the treasury. Three-quarters of this amount came from the Departments of Health and Human Services as the result of reductions in their spending in the last quarter of the budget year, according to an analysis by the state Senate Fiscal Agency published late last month.

It should be remembered that these departments, along with the State Police, were embarrassed when it was revealed that they had overspent their appropriations for the 2006 fiscal year by about $50 million and state lawmakers were not informed until after the gubernatorial election.

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