Elections

80th District Special Election (2015), Conservative News, Democrats, Elections, Government Incompetence, Michigan, Michigan Politics, Part Time Legislature, Republicans

Irony

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i·ro·ny (ī′rə-nē, ī′ər-) Incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs. An occurrence, result, or circumstance notable for such incongruity.

Lansing City Hall & Court ComplexMichigan House Speaker Cotter just lost a round in the Courser/Gamrat felony criminal case preliminaries. Ingham County District Court 54-A Judge Hugh B. Clarke Jr. ruled Friday it would be “patently unfair” for Gamrat’s and Courser’s attorneys to not have an opportunity to question Cotter in their defense:Judge Hugh Clarke, Jr.

“Without answers to these questions, the Court cannot adequately balance the rights of the Defendants against the right of the Speaker to be free from being compelled to testify,” the order states.

“To make this decision, the Court believes an in camera hearing with counsel for the Defendants, Speaker Cotter and his attorney is warranted. This procedure would allow the court to properly balance the interests of the Defendants against the privilege sought to be accorded Speaker Cotter.”

Speaker Cotter has been claiming immunity under Public Act 27 of 1984 in Judge Clarke’s courtroom:

“AN ACT to provide immunity from civil action to members of the legislature of this state for acts done pursuant to duty as legislators; to prohibit members of the legislature of this state from being made parties to contested cases or other administrative proceedings for acts done pursuant to duty as legislators; and to provide for certain exemptions from subpoenas.”

Specifically Speaker Cotter is claiming immunity from a subpoena ad testificandum under the third section of PA 27 of 1984

MCL 4.553
Subpoena as to statements made by legislator
Sec. 3.
A member of the legislature shall not be subject to a subpoena for any matter involving statements made by the legislator pursuant to his or her duty as a legislator.

The issue here will be that the legal action against Courser and Gamrat in Ingham County District Court 54-A is a criminal action, specifically a felony action, not a civil action. Speaker Cotter is claiming immunity under a statute which pertains to civil actions, not criminal actions.  Michigan’s legislators have no constitutional or statutory relief from subpoenae in felony matters.

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Conservative News, Cronyism, Democrats, Elections, Flint Water Fiasco, Government Incompetence, Michigan, Michigan Politics, Republicans

Bad Optics = Serious Political Jeopardy

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Proper Prior Political Planning Prevents..............

Snyder ImageOur zillionaire Governor is hitting up the Michigan Treasury for $ 1.5 million to cover the cost of really excellent lawyers who are mounting his criminal defense in the Flint water fiasco. Yesterday, he suggested that the two MDEQ employees criminally charged in the Flint water fiasco will no longer receive State paid legal representation. The State had been paying for outside counsel for Stephen Busch and Michael Prysby since AG Schuette stripped them of direct state assistant AG legal counsel in February.

Apparently, the distinction here is actually being criminally charged. Snyder hasn’t been, but Busch and Prysby just got charged.. AG Schuette could not resist piling on with the same common law misconduct in office felony charge used against Courser and Gamrat, but the actual substance of the statutory charges here are lying and tampering with evidence.

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Conservative News, Democrats, Detroit, Elections, Flint Water Fiasco, Government Incompetence, Michigan, Michigan Politics, Part Time Legislature, Republicans

21st Century Education Commission

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This Summer's Dog and Pony Shows Commence With A Brazen Common Core Promotion

Dog and Poney Show Image 4Governor Snyder announced his 21st Century Education Commission in Executive Order 2016-6 last week. According to his press release:

“The commission will be responsible for analyzing top performing education systems in the nation, identifying issues impacting Michigan’s academic success, and recommending changes to restructure Michigan’s education system.”

You will be forgiven for harboring suspicions that this is another vehicle to promote Common Core. It is. Same type of political сове́т that did such a fine job promoting Proposal 2015-01.  Remember TAMC?  This playbook is getting old.

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Elections, Government Incompetence, Michigan, Michigan Politics

A Challenge

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An email I received recently mentioned the writer’s inability to reach our current representative.

The fact he would get no response, never heard anything that the incumbent of the 104th was doing, and didn’t know what that incumbent was doing was troubling.  “He just disappeared” was the statement and theme.

And absence from representation is spot on correct.

During a kick off last Tuesday I recorded some video that I will torture the regular readers of this blog with over time.   But I also had some good spots; One in particular in which I issued a challenge that might be useful to any district’s voters.

Posted on Facebook, the challenge was posted with this:

“Everyone reading this has the ability to find that legislation sponsored by our current incumbent, which enhances our liberty, creates new efficiency in government, or fixes our infrastructure. HB5152 is close, but even having 14 co-sponsors cannot make it out of committee. Anything else???

Challenge your legislators too perhaps?

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80th District Special Election (2015), Conservative News, Cronyism, Democrats, Detroit, Elections, Flint Water Fiasco, Government Incompetence, Michigan, Michigan Politics, Part Time Legislature, Proposal 15-1, Republicans, Taxes

RICO !!!

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It's Spring and Lawsuits Are Busting Out All Over

Blind Justice Image 3Just a few short weeks ago, it appeared that the Presidential race and State House elections would dominate political news in Michigan for the rest of the year. Now it appears that courtrooms in Detroit and Lansing will provide compelling political drama as well. Drama which is going to cost Michigan taxpayers a bunch of money.

There have been a number of lawsuits filed over the Flint water fiasco (over 71!), but yesterday a consortium of law firms filed a Federal class action lawsuit on behalf of Flint residents using the 1970 Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. This represents a whole new level of legal pain. Civil RICO provides for treble damages when a pattern of racketeering is proven to have occurred over time. It also guarantees the plaintiffs’ lawyers fees, a small fact which assures that civil RICO lawsuits will be pursued with enthusiasm to the bitter end. Conviction applies the stigma of typical previous RICO defendants, such as mobsters and drug kingpins, to a losing defendant. Michigan, at large, is a defendant in this suit. Capisce?

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Conservative News, Elections, Michigan, Michigan Politics, Opinion, Philosophy, Republicans

Proportional Backfill

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Did the Michigan Republican Party pull another fast one with RNC delegate allocation?

Those of us who’ve been hanging around RightMichigan since prior to 2014 likely remember well the Michigan Dele-Gate Fiasco of 2012. As a quick refresher, on Tuesday, February 28th of that year, Mitt Romney defeated Rick Santorum in the statewide popular vote, 41.10% to 37.87%. However, because 28 of Michigan’s 30 post-penalty delegates were awarded on a district-by-district basis (Romney and Santorum splitting the state at 7 districts each), and because the statewide vote totals were so close (requiring the two at-large delegates to be split one each), the resulting 15-15 delegate tie didn’t exactly square with the RNC/GOPe’s preferred media narrative that Romney won his native state. Thus, in the telephonic equivalent of a late-night, backroom deal, the MIGOP Credentials Committee (then consisting of Bobby Schostak, Sharon Wise, Saul Anuzis, Holly Hughes, Bill Runco, Mike Cox, and Eric Doster) voted 4-2 – Hughes was not present at the meeting – to creatively interpret State Party Rule 19C, and award both at-large delegates to Romney. The resulting backlash fueled an eleven-week effort that culminated in a two-day Showdown in Motown, with the end result being the ballot box blowout ouster of the national committeeman regarded as the chief engineer of the ex post facto railroad job.

It’s probably not going to draw much attention (likely because damn near no one noticed), but the potential for a Grand Theft Delegate con job similar to the Michigan Dele-Gate Fiasco of 2012 was averted, largely due to one person explaining a key state party rule in a way that eliminated the possibility of applying that rule by political discretion, and instead imposed a resolution rubric according to plain mathematics.

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Conservative News, Cronyism, Democrats, Elections, Flint Water Fiasco, Government Incompetence, Michigan, Michigan Politics, Republicans

An Ill Portent From Michigan’s Presidential Primary

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Massive Democratic Turnout on March 8th Puts Control of the Michigan House in Play

Dead Elephant Image 4aYesterday’s Presidential primary in Michigan broke the participation record set back in 1972’s Presidential primary – both in absolute terms and as a percentage of registered voters participating. While the League of Women Voters types will laud this, the establishments in both the Republican and Democratic Parties are flummoxed. Donald Trump crushed John Kasich and Bernie Sanders beat Hillary. Establishment candidates failed. Both party establishments are scrambling to finesse the insubordination of their voters.

Pundits figure that the Democratic Party establishment can bring their obstreperous base to heel, but few figure the Republican Party establishment will have any corresponding success. The prospective success or failure of their counterinsurgency warfare, and its effect upon November, fixates the press and both establishments.

But there is a less obvious, very ill portent here for Michigan Republicans.

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Elections, Michigan, Michigan Politics, Republicans

Kasich Surge In Michigan Changes Math Slightly.

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Fun with delegate numbers

bizarro-voteMichigan has a proportional system to settle the 59 delegates choosing the GOP candidate for the presidential primary in 2016.

Because legislators chose a date prior to March 15, the is no winner take all system in place.  Currently polling has Trump at about 42%, Cruz and Kasich each at about 20, and Rubio falling flat at 10 or so.  In the delegate pooling (hopefully I calculated this correctly), this would result in 25 delegates for Trump, 12 for Cruz, 12 For Kasich and zero for Rubio.  The remainder is split the same 8 for Trump, and 1 each for Kasich and Cruz.

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Conservative News, Elections, Michigan, Michigan Politics, Opinion, Republicans

A Path To A Brokered Election

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Subject: Look At The Numbers Michiganians

Kasich-RubioA vote for Rubio or Kasich in Michigan is a vote for a RINO brokered convention. Look at the numbers.

Rubio will not win Florida! Why? Northern Florida…aka the “red neck riviera”, will probably go for Trump. Southern Florida, which is predominantly Cuban Americans, will go for Cruz. Why? Rubio’s support for amnesty and immigration reform allowing more Mexicans and Puerto Ricans and other non Cuban “Hispanics” into the U.S. will be his downfall.

Cubans trace their heritage back to mother Spain as do the Argentines and Chileans. They are the true Hispanics. Lyndon Johnson bastardized and generalized the term Hispanic to mean all persons living in Latin America. There is significant bias and prejudice in Southern Florida between Cuban Americans and Mexicans, Puerto Ricans and other Latin American cultures that do not derive their heritage and roots from mother Spain. They are predominantly perceived by Cubans as indigenous Indians.

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80th District Special Election (2015), Conservative News, Democrats, Elections, Firearms, Flint Water Fiasco, Government Incompetence, Michigan, Michigan Politics, Opinion, Part Time Legislature, Proposal 15-1, Republicans, Taxes

Bitter Consequences

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Scorched Earth Politics Isolates the Republican Establishment in Michigan

Mitt Romney Image 1Anyone who watched or listened to Mitt Romney’s lame assault on Donald Trump yesterday had to wince at the Obamacare architect and gun control proponent questioning the bona fides of the current Republican front runner. Hypocrisy at its finest. A blatant violation of Reagan’s Eleventh Commandment. A testament to the abject desperation coursing through the Republican establishment today. Stark evidence of how few friends the Republican establishment actually owns has.

Just how did the Republican establishment get themselves into this predicament?

What does their predicament portend in Michigan politics?

This year’s Presidential nomination process demonstrates convincingly that money is no longer a substitute for actual human support in a political process where the great unwashed get to vote. Money – and the TV advertising it bought – had a 40 year run buying elections, but this elixir of modern American politics is no longer working. ¡Jeb! is very expensive history. The great unwashed are in open revolt.

Ace over at the Ace of Spades HQ blog offered the very best analysis of the national Republican establishment’s current predicament, which compelled Mitt’s embarrassing performance yesterday. You should read it in its entirety, but in a nutshell:

The Republican establishment has no one credible to make their case against Donald Trump. Absolutely no one who has even a shred of credibility with Trump supporters. They sent Mitt Romney out on yesterday’s kamikaze mission because they had nothing better to offer. Then they will have to spend a mountain of wealth with no real prospects of success. And engage in strong arm tactics. Making an embarrassing spectacle of themselves.

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