Tag: Board of canvassers

Fear of those time wasting recalls, and by golly the possibility that scorn of the public might translate into some form of holding-feet-to-fire action, has encouraged action by certain legislators.  In fact that fear has energized the bunny governor, who has hopped right into the wrong side of the argument.

In his statement regarding passage of HB6060 and HB6063, the governor frames the role of recalls incorrectly. He says;

"The option to recall an elected official is an important feature of our state's democratic process, but Michigan's current recall system has some components that all sides have agreed are flawed. These changes will help ensure recalls are done in a fair and consistent manner and help prevent political gamesmanship from both sides of the aisle."

Oh my, such pressures to live by.

The Democrats have not liked the EFM law since it had its new dentures installed under the Republican legislature, and Governor Rick Snyder.  Once the realization that bloated contracts might actually be dissolved to preserve solvency for some governments, activists in labor and the donkey party got to work on placing a ballot measure before the voters.  The underlying hope of course, would be to inundate the airwaves with imagery of the starving kids of municipal workers and their uncertain futures.  Riding the guilt train all the way to the election where likely another 7 other ballot initiatives will reside.

But once again, someone forgot to dot an 'I'.

Or at least forgot to check the validity of the petitions used with the canvassing board BEFORE collecting 226,000 signatures.  Perhaps if they had done so, they might be a little more satisfied with the result.  Norm Shinkle, one of the board members, weighed in:

"Outside the meeting room, Shinkle said it was clear that Stand Up for Democracy's petitions did not comply with state law and that the group should have had the documents' format approved by the board before it started collecting signatures.

"None of this would have occurred today if they had their petition approved like almost everyone else does," he said. "The petition was defective." "

Defective.  Big 'D' .. 'efective'.

Its easy it seems, for the Dems to cry foul.  Party lines!  Partisanship! Favoritism! Those rotten Republicans!!!

Yet when one looks at the vote, split as it was along party lines, one should also weigh in the rule of law. And in doing so, see the partisanship FOR BREAKING THE LAW. Or perhaps bending it.  To assume that the Republicans are unfair by rejecting it against the will of the 'other' partisans, is to ignore the fact that the 'other' partisans are asking for an acceptance of the petitions, even illegally.

The Donkeys that have brought us the RMGN, High taxes, Granholm, Obama, and this year the FAKE TEA party, have taken a blow on the face.  The Fake Tea Party has been denied its position on the November ballot for now:

Petition forms didn't have "The" before "Tea Party" on it, which is the proper name that the mysterious startup political party used on other campaign documents. The vote to approve The Tea Party petition failed in a 2-2 vote with the two Republican board members voting not to approve it.

Michael Hodge, the attorney representing The Tea Party, said he expected to be in the Michigan Court of Appeals as early as Wednesday. At issues is whether the missing word on the petitions is "substantially" not in compliance with the petition gathering laws, given that there is another entity claiming the title of "Tea Party," without the definite article "The" in front of the name.

Although forgetting "The" in the proper name was considered a technicality by Hodge, there were bigger issues presented to the canvassers during the Monday meeting, including allegations of fraud involving the creation of The Tea Party.