Now, the citizen initiative is so thoroughly ingrained into Michigan's political culture that you're not going to get rid of it anytime in this generation.  But what you can do is raise the bar high enough that we keep most of the stupidity off the ballot.  In order to meet the county-by-county  distribution benchmark, signature gatherers are actually going to have to go to Gogebic, Keeweenaw, Berrien, Huron, and Presque Isle to find out what the electorate there thinks, instead of just focusing on the area between I-69 and Lake Erie.  The amount of prep time needed to successfully execute a citizen initiative under this benchmark almost guarantees that it won't stay below the radar, that a discussion of the merits of the proposal will be well underway before the signature gathering even starts.