Tag: Cobo

Pete Hoekstra will be there.

Terri Lynn Land will be there.

Tom George will be there.

Mike Cox will be there the day after officially announcing his candidacy along with a pledge to cut taxes on Michigan residents by a full $2 BILLION!

Heck, even radical pro-abortion candidate Alma Wheeler Smith will be there representing the Democrats.

Cherry... not so much.

Then again, if I were a part of a Democratic administration that was responsible for the largest tax hike in Michigan history, chronic budget "deficits" and thorough economic stagnation I'd probably duck a debate in front of the state's most prominent business leaders, too.

Why give voters... ANY voters... any extra opportunity to examine the goods... so to speak?

At first I thought we were looking at a case of abject political cowardice but I've since mellowed.  I hadn't considered the alternative.  

Read on...

In the classic movie Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Jimmy Stewart plays the naive Jefferson Smith, who is appointed a U.S. Senator. Lacking any political experience, he goes to Washington and is rudely confronted by machine politics and a culture of corruption, with other senators, including one of Smith's heroes, passing legislation to pay off their backers.

Here in Michigan, we are either accustomed to this culture or worn down by its relentlessness or simply unable to keep up with it all. As a public service, therefore, let's look at one state representative pushing the agenda for those who are responsible for her election, rather than looking out for the people of her district and the state.

Shanelle Jackson is the representative for the 9th District in northwest Detroit. This is the district in which I grew up. On March 26, Jackson introduced House Bill 4712, which amends the school code by imposing a new requirement if a school is not meeting expectations:

If the school is an elementary school, the superintendent of public instruction shall issue an order requiring that the maximum class size in the school for grades K to 3 shall not exceed 17 pupils per classroom.

Read more...

The Detroit News and everyone else report that GM and Chrysler are expected to meet with President Obama's foreign-car driving "auto task-force" to ask for a fresh $21 BILLION in free cash to avoid the scarlet B.  (That stands for bankruptcy.  I shouldn't have to explain these things to you... if you'd been paying attention... heh.)  This is on top of the $17 BILLION they took from the feds late in 2008 and on top of the BILLIONS they've taken and are hoping to take from the Canadian government.  

As the Presidential administrations get more liberal the requests get bigger and there is still no end in sight.  This has out-of-state GOP lawmakers crying foul and even the staunchest Michigan partisan shouldn't have a tough time understanding why.  When does it end?  Is there a bottom of the barrel?  That's why some are urging a merger or bankruptcy.

There's a real debate to be had here.  On paper, in the math world bankruptcy makes the most sense.  Free the companies from the $73.50 an hour employment costs associated with Big Labor so they can compete with other American auto manufacturing plants paying closer to $25 an hour "all-in."  But in real life?  We're talking about literally hundreds of thousands of Michigan jobs that many believe WILL disappear should the Big 3 become the Big 1 or the Big 2.  On top of the hundreds of thousands that have already disappeared under Jennifer Granholm and John Cherry's clumsily catastrophic impersonation of "leadership."

The worst part is, the plight of the Big 3 is only the tip of Detroit's iceberg.  

Read on...

My morning routine is pretty well established at this point.  About 5:30 I roll out of bed, or off the couch (its comfy and I'm a bachelor, sue me), do the whole wake-up song and dance, brush my teeth, the shower, shave... if I feel like it... spend some time praying and in the Word and then I'll sit down with a bowl of cereal and a glass of OJ and I'll browse the morning's headlines.

By eight or nine I usually have a splitting headache.  I could never figure it out but I finally caught it.  Lately, when I read the news, I grind my teeth.  I'm not talking a little bit but a full bore, gnashing sort of a grind.  

I suppose that means that it is officially painful to read the headlines here in Michigan.  Don't know why I didn't notice it before.  Take this morning for example...

The Detroit News tells us: State jobless rate hits 11.6%

Only gets worse when you read the article and realize that's the worst its been in twenty-five years and is about 150% higher than even the national average.

The Lansing State Journal: GM's future in doubt, auditors say

They're talking bankruptcy here, people.  And yeah, mathematically that might make a lot of sense... heck, that kind of tough medicine might even save ten or twenty-thousand jobs by the time its all said and done but at what price... We're talking surgery without anesthesia type painful.  Yeah, you can do it but boy is it going to hurt.

Then there's the Macomb Daily which opines: New director hopes to give State Fair a great send-off

Yes, the State Fair has been eliminated, scratched from the budget.  And yes, apparently it just received a brand spanking new "director" to the tune of $97,000 a year.  

OK, so that one might be more open-hand-slap-to-forehead than grind-your-teeth but either one will send you screaming for the ibuprofen.  

None of those are nearly as cringe inducing as the latest act by the Democrats on the Detroit City Council, though.  

Read on...

Then again, maybe in a city like Detroit that's all that's left of the people who genuinely care.  The Detroit News:

"It's sad," said City Clerk Janice Winfrey, who had predicted turnout of 10 percent to 15 percent. "Anytime an individual chooses not to express themselves ... chooses not to participate in the Democratic process, it's sad.

"I can't fathom not voting and I don't really understand folks who don't."

The mood among voters vacillated from hope about the future to worry about the present. Some said they hoped to move from the city as soon as possible.

I'm not going to seriously knock anyone in the D for staying home on Election day.  Look at their choices...  You've got Democrat A, Democrat B, Democrats C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N and O and that was just on the Mayoral ballot.  Not a single Republican anywhere to be found.  No choices.  No alternatives.

And the rumor, though I haven't been able to substantiate it, is that the other 85 percent of voters actually stayed home because they'd been assaulted by Democratic Detroit City Council President Monica Conyers in the past four months and didn't want to risk another political "adventure."  

Threats of physical violence may or may not be what got to four of her fellow Council members who yesterday joined her in voting down a nearly $300 million expansion of Cobo Hall, citing worries that too many people from outside the City (crystal clear and unambiguous code for "white," by the way) would have too much of a say in the event-center's future.  Never mind that the bulk of the cash would be coming from those regional folks... can't let equity, equality and common sense get in the way of racial politics.

The Ivory Tower reports:

The legislation, passed by the state Legislature in December and signed by Gov. Jennifer Granholm  in January, would have transferred ownership of Cobo Center to a five-member regional authority with representatives from Detroit, the state and Wayne, Oakland and Macomb counties. Each board member has veto power, requiring decisions about Cobo to be reached by unanimous vote.

The stakes, by the way... nothing less than the North American International Auto Show.  Dealers have been pulling out of the show for years, citing space and maintenance concerns around crumbling Cobo Hall, and if you've been there you know it's a pit.  The cash and expansion would have gone a heck of a long way towards solving those problems.

Alas, racism is alive and well in Detroit.  Said Councilwoman Barbara-Rose Collins:

Detroit should get the stimulus money directly (from the Obama administration), "bypassing the racist extortions of the state of Michigan."

Yep.  I totally see where she's coming from.  The State of Michigan, cash-strapped as it is, managed in a bipartisan fashion to dig up nearly $300 million to give to the City of Detroit to repair a building the City of Detroit has let crumble into utter disrepair for the last twenty years, saving, preserving and enhancing the ability of the City to host large-scale, money making events now and well into the future.  

Racist bastards.