Tag: Dillon (page 3)

Twenty-four hours ago we were reading startling and scary news about Michigan's state budget deficit.  $785 million, the experts told us, with a fresh $5 million added to the pool of red ink every morning and half of the fiscal year behind us.  

Those were the days.

By mid-afternoon the word had leaked in Lansing that things were much (much... MUCH) worse than anticipated.  $1.3 billion in red ink.  That's a rough six hours.

Listen, we have a good time here on RightMichigan.  Our tongue is often firmly planted in cheek, we razz, we encourage, we joke, we enjoy a good bit of sarcasm and cynicism.  This is not one of those times.  

$1.3 billion in red ink with a balanced budget requirement in the Constitution and only half the fiscal year remaining to make the cuts.  

Dear Lansing- the fun and games are over.

We could look back over the last few years and analyze how we got here and there's a time and a place for that, too, but this is not it.  It is time to look forward.

The Granholm-Cherry administration was expected early next week to make $200 million in budget cuts via an executive order while asking the legislature to plaster over the rest of the deficit with one-time cash via federal stimulus funds.  Not only would that move be insufficient in light of the drastically larger deficit, it would be just plain irresponsible.  Period.

The legislature should convene an emergency session TODAY to start making deep, drastic and yes, painful spending cuts.  If the Governor won't call an emergency session and the House won't play along then the Senate should be the adults in the Capitol City and do it themselves.

Lieutenant Governor John Cherry and Senator Hansen Clarke should cancel their mid-day open bar lobbyist meet-and-greet fundraiser, too.  We literally cannot afford one more day of inaction and status quo.

$1.3 billion in cuts from six months worth of a budget will not be easy and it is going to hurt like the dickens.  $1.3 billion in cuts from five months worth of a budget will hurt that much worse.  $1.3 billion from three months worth of a budget... you get the idea.

The time is now and urgency is required.  The House GOP, for their part, is ready to rock and roll.  Minority Leader Kevin Elsenheimer yesterday sent to budget negotiators a substantial list of proposed spending cuts while they continue to hunt and work for more.  

Representative Chuck Moss, the ranking Republican on the House Appropriations Committee said: "At the rate we're going, we may actually beat one of the auto companies into bankruptcy. We need drastic, immediate steps to put our state back in order. We tried the game of tax increases, look where that got us. It chased away business, foreclosed more homes, unemployment hit 12.6 percent. And we still didn't get the promised reforms. The day of reckoning is now. "

"Clearly the governor and Democrat's plan from 2007 has failed," said state Representative John Proos, R-St. Joseph. "We were promised that the largest tax increase in state history would solve the problem, but now we're left with a larger deficit and a much larger unemployment rate. History is repeating itself because nothing changed -- no reforms, no change in spending habits, and no change in budget deficits. We learned in 2007 that tax increases are not the answer. With the state of the economy and the national economy, we simply must spend less money."

Unfortunately, the House Minority seem to be about the only ones in Lansing taking this seriously, and that isn't just a knock on the Democratic Majority.  We could stand to see a little more leadership out of the Senate GOP, too.

Dear House Democrats- we tried your tax hike idea in 2007 and it has done nothing but made the problem (exponentially) worse.  Spending cuts will hurt.  Bad.  A real pain in the neck.  The alternative will hurt a lot more.  

Dear Senate Republicans- start acting like Republicans.  If the Left won't do the job (and every indication is that they won't) then it is up to you to save this state on your own even if that makes you "the bad guy."  Consider it the cost of character.

$1.3 billion in red ink.  And the legislature isn't in an emergency 24 hour marathon session to cut spending because...?

The sunshine and rainbows have gone away, ladies and gentlemen.  Time to get to work.

The GOP House minority continues to sponsor and introduce legislation, to work behind the scenes and to try to figure out some sort of positive solution to this tax-hike / budget mess.

We rarely hear about that in the MSM.

Being a member of a legislative minority makes it tough to garner headlines. But they're working hard and they're trying to make a difference.

This week I spoke with Livonia's freshman Republican Representative John Walsh.

Interview after the break...

The GOP House minority continues to sponsor and introduce legislation, to work behind the scenes and to try to figure out some sort of positive solution to this tax-hike / budget mess.

We rarely hear about that in the MSM.

Being a member of a legislative minority makes it tough to garner headlines. But they're working hard and they're trying to make a difference.

This week I spoke with Oakland County's freshman Republican Representative Eileen Kowall.

Interview after the break...

Especially the way the weekend ended... and with headlines like these greeting me.  There's good news and there's bad news.  The latter in abundance, sadly, but for the sake of general sanity we'll try to limit ourselves to only the most relevant stories.  (And by "most relevant" I mean, of course, the stories that I want to talk about.  Har.)

That means this particular post won't be discussing Peter Luke's dissection of Michigan Democrats local stimulus obstruction (via an MBT kill and other tax relief), how the UAW is dragging its feet on concessions with General Motors and Chrysler, what with the companies already showing a willingness to take "free" tax cash before making tough decisions or even about how the Granholm / Cherry team's pet economic development "success story", United Solar Ovonics has decided they aren't going to be doing all that growing they'd promised in press conferences after all.

Yeah, there's bad news out there.  This is Jennifer Granholm and John Cherry's Michigan, after all, but it isn't all thunderclouds and little black rainstorms. There's some good news out there, too, and, custom dictates I give you that first.

So... how `bout those Spartans?!  Feels good to keep dancing.

And while we're saying nice things about nice people, the Ivory Tower has a swell article this morning about Barsamian Prep Academy's work with expelled students in the D.  But I actually suggest you bookmark that one and come back to it later to help wash the rotten taste of the rest of the news out of your mouth.

Specifically the Associated Press report that DTE and Consumers Energy are going to be raising rates on residential customers by a full (and astronomical) 11%.

Residents and advocacy groups for the poor and elderly oppose the increases.

"I think it is crummy in this time of hardship," says Bonnie Banks, 61, a retired court recorder who splits her time between Ann Arbor and Oscoda and is a power customer of both Consumers Energy and Edison. "Because of the economy and all the layoffs and our high unemployment rate, it seems like there would be an even larger hardship for people."

It will be, Ms. Banks.  

Long-time readers of this blog will quickly attest that I'm NEEEEEVER one to say "I told you so," but... I told you so.

The Democrats in Lansing last year granted DTE and Consumers a monopoly on the energy market in Michigan.  It was a massive pay-off to their special interest pals and came despite warnings of double-digit rate hikes and customers getting pinched six ways from Sunday.  

Competition?  Bah.  Its over-rated, they assured us.

All told, the Dem's pet utilities are expected to raise rates by $593 million a year.  Make no mistake... that is a $593 million a year tax increase courtesy of Gretchen Whitmer, Andy Dillon, Jennifer Granholm and John Cherry.

Thanks, guys.  Really appreciate it.  Because working moms and dads in this state are just rolling extra cash these days.

Fair warning, before you read the rest of this post you're going to want to sit down.  If you're driving and doing the mobile thing its safer for the rest of us if you pull over to the side of the road.  Shock and highway speeds generally don't mix well.

Safe and secure?

Great.  Check this out.

It looks like most elected Democrats in Lansing, while begging the State Officers Compensation Commission to cut their pay starting in 2011 have and continue to refuse to return any of their pay voluntarily here and now. SURPRISE!

Read on...

Approved today, Senate Bill 93, sponsored by Senator Alan Sanborn prevents mandatory ergonomics standards in the work place that would severly harm the viability of Michigan job providers.  SB 93 prohibits the Michigan Occupational Safety and Health Administration from establishing mandatory ergonomic rules and standards.  

The legislation was needed because, well, the Granholm-Cherry administration is a big fan of following in California's footsteps on this issue.  The Sunshine State is the only one in the union with these sorts of onerous "standards" and the cost to job makers is expected to reach $500 million or more.

"Michigan's economy remains the worst in the nation, and if we're serious about recovery, we need to enact this bill," said Sanborn, R-Richmond Township. "Despite the lack of evidence that these rules are necessary, the administration has spent more than six years crafting mandatory standards. It's just plain bad policy, but to foist this on us during a recession borders on negligence."

"Just the specter of joining California in implementing mandatory ergonomics rules could affect job-provider decisions to locate, expand--or even to survive--here in Michigan,"

And before the bleeding hearts start belly-aching about carpal tunnel syndrome... Michigan's repetitive stress injury rate decreased by nearly 40 percent since 1998 without mandated ergonomic standards--better than the nationwide drop of 32 percent during that time.

We're not talking about a choice between healthier work places or more dangerous work places.  We're talking about work places (period) or no work places (period).

Props to the Senate for doing the right thing.  Again.  And the clock is now officially ticking on the state House.

And speaking of the House... the Republican caucus apparently isn't as interested in wasting the taxpayers' time as Andy Dillon is.  Minority Leader Kevin Elsenheimer, Paul Opsommer, Kim Meltzer and Tom McMillin joined Attorney General Mike Cox today in calling on the Granholm-Cherry administration to provide a healthy dose of desperately needed transparency to their wild spending.

Read on...

And while we little people have to sit at home in an icy, very much global-warming-free climate hoping for the change that Michigan needs in the worst way, the people we elected to deliver it for us here at the state level are out of the state getting ready to attend fancy balls this evening.

Sure, plenty of political hacks and activists and volunteers made their way to the inaugural, and good for them.  This is their day.  They want to self-identify with an incoming administration that has pledged to make its first official act all about making it easier to kill cute little innocent babies via the Freedom of Choice Act, hey, that's between them and their maker.  I know I wouldn't want to self-identify with that particular administration but I have what at least approaches a healthy fear of the almighty.  And karma.  

Particularly frustrating on a personal level that our supposedly pro-life Speaker of the House, Andy Dillon, is away from Michigan attending the festivities, jovially celebrating the arrival of a political climate that will be openly hostile to innocent life.  But he still finds a way to sleep at night and manages to justify each of his two faces and that's worthy of a round of applause.

(Pictured at right are Dillon with lefty political consultant and radio personality Kerry Ebersole.  Apparently this one popped up on Facebook with a headline indicating it was taken yesterday in DC.)

Of course, he's not the only prominent lefty who's taken the opportunity to abandon the ship here in Michigan to go party it up instead.  The Associated Press highlights the different approaches to potential state stimulus cash headed this direction via massive new deficit spending by congressional Democrats. The most obvious difference is that our local lefties want to use the cash to cover up their own budgeting mistakes by erasing red ink while Republican leaders in the House want instead to apply the cash, if it has to come, the way it seems to be intended, to sponsor work projects and give some of unemployed families a chance at a paycheck.  Oh, and the Republicans are actually here in-state working on fixing our problems.

Read on...

Michigan House Speaker Andy Dillon played the role of Mr. Roarke yesterday at the Capital in Lansing. Dillon welcomed 46 newly sworn-in state lawmakers, who began their first legislative day in traditional fashion - lobbyist receptions, buffets of food, pomp, and ceremony. Dillon welcomed these new lawmakers with a speech promising a House agenda focused on reform; including tax cuts, politician salary cuts, and new state programs - all with no loss in government tax revenues. Basically, Speaker Dillon welcomed the new lawmakers to Fantasy Island.

The alchemy that Dillon hopes the House can use to maintain state spending, add new programs and still cut taxes is called, "restructuring". By "restructuring" the tax burden, Dillon thinks he can find a magic formula that makes everyone happy by reshuffling the tax code without actually cutting taxes or cutting spending. Dillon believes that somewhere, out there, is an absolute perfect way of keeping people happy while making them pay high taxes. Maybe people don't like high sales taxes? OK. Dillon is willing to lower them as long as people pay higher income taxes. Don't like that? OK, how about higher business taxes instead? No? Ok, he'll cut business taxes, but hike fees by an equivalent amount.