Still, the fact that auto employees are worried about their families and their jobs is hardly news here in Michigan.  We've lost tens of thousands of jobs since Granholm first took office and her administration continues to bungle deal after deal, opportunity after opportunity.  And now her husband is out there singing the praises of Japanese rival Toyota!  

Daniel Howes had that scathing piece yesterday.  Well, Daniel Granholm Mulhern must have a bullseye on his back this week.  Either that or people are finally starting to pay attention to this guy.  Whichever it is, its pretty clear noone likes what he has to say.  Michigan workers couldn't have liked his hyping of their arch-enemy in a mass email.  And job providers couldn't have liked his interview on WJR's Frank Beckman show yesterday.  Nolan Finley sure didn't.

On the show Mulhern started taking shots at Exxon for making $46 billion in profits last year.  It was, he said, "unconscionable."  Two things.  A) They made $36 million (a 10% profit margin... hardly beyond the realm of the human conscience).  B) I absolutely hate the word "unconscionable."  It has to be the most incorrectly used word in the history of American politics.  It's become the nuclear bomb of political discourse.  You always have to be careful of what you say because someone might drop it on you and then... LOOK OUT!  I also hate the word gravitas but I digress.

This, again, followed right on the heels of Mulhern's almost giddy praise of Toyota, a company pulling down a 7.5% profit margin themselves!

Finley explains:

"Mulhern went on to say that big profits are fine as long as they are "invested" in the workers who build companies, or in socially commendable enterprises like developing alternative fuels. His comments reflect the historic bleeding heart angst over profits -- the notion that there's something sinister about a company making lots of money. He seems not to have noticed what happens to workers when companies stop posting decent returns.

His ridiculous rantings, along with his wife's consistent anti-business tax and regulatory policies, reinforce the message that Michigan remains a place that is unfriendly to employers.

No wonder so few companies are using their "unconscionable" profits to create jobs here."

If I were giving Mr. Granholm Mulhern advice (and I'm not, he has an $80,000 a year radio coach doing that while his wife tells us we're not paying high enough taxes), I'd tell him to close his mouth for a few days and go back home to the kids.  Let these things sorta blow over.  And the next time you have something to say in public try not to look silly.

FREEP reports this morning that this weekend's Nation of Islam convention in Detroit may bring with it Louis Farrakhan's final speech.  Lovers of peace, justice, equality and those frustrated by bigotry, racism and hatred can only hope they're right.

The convention is expected to draw 65,000 according to organizers.  If they used the same formula they used for the Million Man March, Cobo Hall will be bursting at the seems with some 20,000 over the course of the weekend.

Stay tuned...