Tag: deficit (page 2)

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 freshman Representative Kenneth Kurtz (R-Coldwater).

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 freshman Representative Jim Stamas (R-Midland).

Interview after the break...

Add 18,000 more to that list.  The Associated Press reports that that 23 transmission and parts plants will also be closed during that time to help cut down on excess inventory.  

The good news?  Workers will be affected a heck of a lot less than Lansing.  

Laid-off blue-collar workers would still get most of their pay because their United Auto Workers union contract requires the company to make up much of the difference between state unemployment benefits and their wages.

GM also will pay salaried workers 75 percent of their pay if they are furloughed under a new company policy.

I knew I picked the wrong career field.  I should have moved to the D when I turned 18 and scrounged up a UAW job.  I could go for a summer vacation with nothing to do and a negligible dock in pay.  

General Motors winds up saving cash on parts and operational expenses, cuts down on excess inventory and the furloughed workers get to catch some rays.  Talk about a win-win.  Meanwhile, Lansing becomes the Biggest Loser.  Which you could read any number of ways.

Tough to replenish the state's wad of unemployment cash when workers take home less income directly from their employer, the state cuts a bigger overall unemployment benefits check every month and then sees the legislature vote to extend benefits again.

Come August and September, Budget Process 2010 may have Lansing yearning for the good old days of $1.32 billion in red ink.  Going to take more than laying off 100 state troopers to balance those books.

As you know, the Michigan Legislature this week approved the governor's Executive Order to resolve a deficit of more than $1 billion for the current fiscal year. This is only the first step in addressing our state's overarching budget crisis.

Be ready.

To the thousands of people across Michigan who attended the Tea Parties on April 15 - be ready.  Despite the fact that the mainstream media under-reported your passion for smaller, more reasonable government, you know who you are.  Standing on the steps of Michigan's Capitol, I felt the passion of your convictions. You came to the Capitol not to rally against anyone, but to stand up for an idea - that government must live within its means.  Now I encourage you to be ready to put your convictions to work and encourage a new direction for our state government.

But on the other hand, the Wings got robbed last night.  Robbed.  

I know, as I sit in front of the television at 1AM when any of my teams are out west, that I'm going to regret it in the morning but when they actually win it's a great feeling.  A great, currently absent feeling.  A premature whistle?  Are you serious?  Oh well.  It isn't like these are the Stanley Cup Playoffs or anything.

Besides, good times are back in the D again in spite of NHL referees, after voters hit the polls and elected a brand spanking new mayor.  The Detroit News reports that Dave Bing will be the guy steering the Motor City into the future.  

"What we will bring ... is efficiency, transparency, honesty and integrity back to the mayor's office," (said Bing).

Cockrel, who led in the polls, lost to a first-time politician despite the backing of nearly every powerful union in the city and matching Bing in fundraising in a race that cost more than $2 million. He thanked his staff at a banquet hall in southwest Detroit, pledged his support to Bing and conceded at 11:30 p.m.

"You have not seen the last of me," Cockrel said.

He challenged Bing, who moved last fall from Franklin for the race, to get to know the city.

"Hang out with the brothers in front of the liquor store, drinking 40s out of paper bags. .. Get to know that. Get to understand and know the people you'll be representing."

Or, you know... don't.  I'd actually feel a heck of a lot better about the future of Michigan's biggest city if the Mayor weren't on the street drinking 40s out of paper bags.

Read on...

First and foremost, it is an election day.  If you're reading this, the polls are open and you haven't yet, stop everything you're doing and go vote.  There are tax hike proposals in seemingly every city, township and village in the State and far left extremists running for just about every school board seat available anywhere.  

No, seriously, go vote.  We'll wait...

...

......

..........

Back?  What took you so long?  If you're in Detroit we already know it wasn't long lines, so don't try that excuse.  The Detroit News reports this morning that a measly fifteen percent of the registered voters in the D are expected to cast a ballot today to elect the city's next mayor.  Suppose that's what happens when you get a race between a pair of Democrats who are much more alike than they'd have you believe.  Don't give the voters a choice then don't be surprised when they don't bother showing up to make one.  Not even the 200,000 phantoms on the books.  

Meanwhile, an hour and a half to the west, the Granholm-Cherry administration is set today to unveil their sweeping, shocking, devastating, budget-balancing spending cuts.  Except that they aren't sweeping, they certainly aren't shocking, the Dems' core constituency won't be devastated and they don't balance the budget.  

Other than that, though, the administration is pitching a perfect game.

Read on...

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.

We talk so often here about the things that are going wrong in Lansing and what the tax-and-spenders are up to that I think it's important to check in with the good guys from time to time to get their take on the issues facing taxpayers and the legislature today.

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 Calhoun County freshman Republican Representative Jase Bolger.

Interview after the break...