Democrats

Democrats, Michigan, Opinion, Taxes

Be Proud of Yourself Detoilet

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Because Teh #ComebackCity and “Reserve your judgment.”

Imagine that…

Johnson has a list of past financial issues including a foreclosure, unpaid child support, evictions, bad debts, unpaid income taxes and he even bounced a check to himself.

Yep. Aren’t y’all glad that RINO Ron and Slick Rick flushed our money down the drain bailing out that cesspool? Me? I’m ecstatic about it, and the next bailout in the wind.

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Conservative News, Cronyism, Democrats, Detroit, Michigan, Michigan Politics, Philosophy, Proposal 15-1, Rent Seeking, Republicans, Taxes

Did Proposal 1 Decamp to Washington?

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Spectacular Death in Michigan No Bar to Success in Washington

Government Spending Image 3While Michiganders were being entertained and infuriated by the lies of Proposal 1 proponents, few of us noticed that the very same roads funding strife is reaching a crescendo in Washington. The Federal Highway Trust Fund spends about $ 50 billion dollars on ‘transportation’ across the U.S.A. each year. Michigan received $ 1.39 billion from the HTF in Fiscal Year 2014 for new construction of roads and bridges, along with mass transit activities. As a point of reference, Michigan spent an additional $ 2 billion of funds raised within the state for the same ‘transportation’ purposes. The Federal HTF paid for 40.9% of Michigan ‘transportation’ spending in FY 2014.

Funded in the past by an $ 0.184 per gallon Federal gasoline tax ($ 0.244 per gallon on diesel fuel), the Highway Trust Fund’s traditional fuel tax revenues have fallen to about $ 34 billion. The Federal government has been supplementing the Highway Trust Fund from general deficit spending revenues since 2008. In Fiscal Year 2014, the Federal government supplemented the Highway Trust Fund with $ 11 billion in general revenues.

How did this happen?

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All the Other Stuff, Conservative News, Cronyism, Democrats, Detroit, Elections, Michigan, Michigan Politics, Opinion, Part Time Legislature, Philosophy, Proposal 15-1, Rent Seeking, Republicans, Taxes

From each according to their ability…to each according to their need – Part, oh, whatever

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First off, I’d just like to thank those who have sent in suggestions so far for “The Right Michigan Solution for Fixing Michigan Roads” (and yes, I have gotten a few already). I’ve got an update that I like to pass along after the fold.

And for the record, the title of this post isn’t referring to these “poor” schemps.

{More below the fold}

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Cronyism, Democrats, Detroit, Michigan, Opinion, Part Time Legislature, Rent Seeking

Forget it, Duggan, Your Bailout Subsidy Answered the Door Naked

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Slick Rick’s clown-car of gimme, gimme, gimme actors in Detroit, are completely delusional.

Money SwirlMayor Mike Duggan says he doesn’t expect his proposal for low-cost auto insurance in Detroit to be derailed by the legal troubles of the bill’s planned sponsor, state Sen. Virgil Smith.

According to an article I read while going through Safeco insurance reviews, Duggan told City Council members on Tuesday he is pressing forward with his January timetable for the plan, which would allow auto insurance companies to sell Detroiters lower-cost policies with a maximum of $275,000 in medical coverage for auto-related injuries.

Smith, D-Detroit, who last month announced he would sponsor the proposed legislation, was arrested in connection with an assault and shooting involving his ex-wife.

The mayor stressed Tuesday that Smith’s challenges will not jeopardize the proposal. The next stop, he added, will be to seek a Senate hearing.

“We’re going to do what we’ve got to do and line up our votes,” Duggan told reporters, adding he’s confident that he’ll ultimately gain the support of the Michigan Legislature.

MORE

Ya, right. Below is a glaring representative example why insurance rates are higher in the City of Detroit.

So, which legislator would like to sign his name to Duggan and Snyder’s special carve out? Better yet, which legislator would like to put his name next to a vote for that?

Good luck.

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All the Other Stuff, Conservative News, Cronyism, Democrats, Detroit, Michigan, Michigan Politics, Opinion, Part Time Legislature, Philosophy, Proposal 15-1, Rent Seeking, Republicans, Taxes

Weasel Words? Really? We can do much better than that!

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You people in Lansing are supposed to be Conservatives. Why not try acting like a Conservative for a change?

There is an axiom that everyone has probably heard numerous times already that goes something like this: “Those who fail to learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them.”

A friend of mine would add in a second line to that to make it a little bit more interesting…”Those who fail to learn the lesson of history correctly, well they are just plain doomed.”

It strongly looks like were seeing that second line play out here in Michigan after the defeat of Proposal 1.

This time around, though, it doesn’t have to end that way.

{More after the fold}

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Democrats, Detroit, Michigan, Opinion

LMAO: Detroit Teh #ComebackCity

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Mike Duggan’s auto insurance subsidy legislator buddy in action…

Police: State senator facing charges after Detroit shooting

2015_mercedes_benz_gla

Sorta looks like ‘ol Virg took Slo-Joe Biden’s advice to heart, huh? Actually, it also appears that ‘ol Virg took Bill Clinton’s advice to bed, too. Yep. Democrats being Democrats. #WhiteMercedesMatter

But, never fear, Worthy is kicking that can down the memory hole from the 36 hour *news* cycle.

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Conservative News, Democrats, Elections, Michigan, Michigan Politics, Philosophy, Republicans

Mackinac Center’s ‘VoteSpotter’ Application for Smartphones

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A Useful Political Intelligence Tool for Political Junkies

VoteSpotter JPG Image
The Mackinac Center for Public Policy has created a free, interactive smartphone app which tracks state and federal bills pending floor action and your legislators’ votes.on those bills. This useful app is called VoteSpotter and has has been debugged to the point where it works well. There are only about 1,000 Android users of this app presently, but it is growing in popularity. It is available from both the Google PlayStore and the Apple IOS App Store.

You enter your voting address and the program determines your state and federal representatives from its database. Then you receive regular notifications of impending legislation soon to be voted upon by those legislators, described in plain English. You can then contact your legislator on any legislation for which you receive a notification, indicate your preference before the vote, and then concur or disagree with your legislator after the vote. Legislators have access to the ‘polls’, but not your individual information unless you elect to send them an email through the program.

Mackinac Center is now in the process of extending this application beyond the State of Michigan.

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Cronyism, Democrats, Michigan, Opinion, Part Time Legislature, Rent Seeking, Republicans

Day by Day the Irony Grows Thicker

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Prop 1 Unpopularity to Voters was Unprecedented
‘We can elect Democrats and get that result’

Go read for yourself.

kermit

All I’m going to say about Snyder’s SRY Team is, does it take a $100k contribution to sit at the table?

Now, we return you to regularly scheduled blame the other Party programming…

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2015 MIGOP State Convention, Democrats, Elections, Michigan Politics, Philosophy, Republicans

Protecting The Brand

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We have an opportunity to clean up the way in which Republican candidates are selected.

This weekend the Michigan Republican State Committee will likely vote on a motion submitted by Tom McMillin to rescind the Open Primary rules that were passed last year.

Generally, many of us who are still in the GOP have decried the corrupting influence of those who could give a rats ass about the platform; a platform which is perfectly reasonable if it was honored.   A couple days ago, Tom wrote to state committee members

Dear fellow State Committee members
Attached is an FAQ regarding rescinding the Open Primary rules passed by the prior state committee.

This year’s state committee, not last year’s, will administer next year’s primary.  We should not shrink back from that responsibility.  It’s clear that Republican activists are tired of people outside our party influencing the primary process, especially when casting votes.

I think it would be wise and healthy for us to reset the table, discuss and debate the options and have the current state committee come to a conclusion.

Sincerely,
Tom McMillin
8th District Chair

I don’t have a copy of the FAQ at this time, but have learned to trust McMillin’s instinct on items like this.

And frankly, we’ve seen the damaging effects of the corrupting influence.

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Conservative News, Cronyism, Democrats, Detroit, Elections, Michigan, Michigan Politics, Opinion, Philosophy, Proposal 15-1, Rent Seeking, Republicans, Taxes

Plan B – A Philosophy

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Spending Money Is Not Leadership

Kwame's and Bobbie's 'Bridge of Bucks' over Telegraph Road

Kwame’s and Bobbie’s ‘Bridge of Bucks’ over Telegraph Road

Now that Michigan voters have mercilessly dispatched Proposal 1 to the garbage can of history, lets talk a bit about the philosophy of a truly effective plan to get Michigan’s roads and bridges up to par. This will provide a proper foundation for developing a ‘Plan B’ which will actually improve Michigan’s roads and bridges, and be acceptable to the population as well.

The underlying premise of Proposal 1 was that the only action required to fix up Michigan’s roads and bridges was injecting big money into the Michigan Transportation Fund. The depraved philosophy of modern American government. Not true and the voters knew it. But Michigan’s power elite believed that opposition could be neutralized by icing a pile of feces with chocolate frosting. Didn’t work despite a lavish $ 10 million effort.

The condition of Michigan’s roads and bridges has only a casual relationship with the funds available in the MTF. In 2014, 11% of MTF funds were siphoned off by various State of Michigan Departments in the form of charge backs for ‘services’ rendered to the MTF, as well as priority grants that have little to do with roads and bridges. Debt service is also a component of this 11%, but that is effectively a payment for previous time preferences of bureaucrats and politicians. Then 9.5% of the remainder was diverted to the Comprehensive Transportation Fund for mass transit. Finally, the MTF was partitioned amongst the State Trunkline Fund (36%), county road agencies (34.6%), and cities (19.8%). In each partition, further funds are siphoned off by charge backs, pension payments, and OPEBs. What’s left for the roads is more a function of politicians and bureaucrats preferences at every level than the amount of money front loaded into the MTF.

So how do we proceed? First develop a philosophy to frame and inform the ‘Plan B’ debate.  After the fold.

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