Otherwise known as “What's good for thee, but not for me (con’t).

Breaking from the republican kakistocracy’s latest rope-a-dope on the Grassroots (aka Dave Agema’s “controversial comments” brouhaha), it is important to note that Governor’s Snyder’s plot to raise the Michigan Sales Tax 16.7% is beginning to pick up a few supporters.

On the plus side; So is the opposition.

And what interesting bedfellows are beginning to appear.

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Several days ago, one of the player’s submitted paperwork to the Michigan Secretary of State forming a campaign committee. There isn’t very much known about the Michigan Citizens for Better Roads and Schools (and who doesn’t want better roads and schools?) aside from the fact that they are based out of Lansing and that its treasurer is Howard Edelson.

If his name sounds familiar, it should.

He is the democratic strategist who was partially responsible for Prop 1 last August to get rid of the PPT on Michigan Businesses. He was also Jennifer Granholm’s campaign manager in 2006.

They are currently looking for additional supporters, along with donors (preferably deep-pocketed ones). Not surprisingly, MITA (which has pledged money), MML & the MEA are tentatively behind this push to raise the sales tax.

No word yet on when(/if) the Michigan Chamber will be signing on with them.

It is known that they are going to tout the spending of an additional $300-million to schools (which already are showing a surplus in the state budget), $130-million to mass transit, $70-million into local governments and an undisclosed amount for EITC deductions as reasons to support this tax hike.

It will be interesting to see them pour industrial-quantities of perfume on a pig hear them explain why those items could not have been addressed separately.

Opposing Gov Snyder’s scheme is the group Protect MI Taxpayers. What is known about them so far is that their spokesman is Keith Allard who is the Chairman of the Grand Rapids Taxpayers Association. He is also the LA for Michigan State Rep. Cindy Gamrat.

The AFP/AFP-Michigan will also reportedly be against the ballot proposal, but they have not released anything regarding this as of today.

It should be important to remember that this Gov. Snyder’s scheme is conditional on the passage of the May ballot proposal which has the “officials” backing it a little skittish.

Should the ballot be voted down, the process will start off all over again in the Michigan Legislature.

And just like clockwork, we have Gov. Snyder lamenting on how bad that would it be were that the happen.

Never minding the fact that he would have essentially brought this himself by brokering this ballot mess in the first place, he offered the same tired excuses on just how hard it is for him to locate any savings in a $52-billion Michigan Budget (from The Detroit News),

 

“We do need this $1.2 billion-plus over time and that’s not within the current budget that we have. Now is the time to invest in our roads and I don’t say that lightly. … This is a smart investment.”

 

Adding insult to injury, even though House Speaker Cotter isn’t very keen on the idea of raising taxes and even indicated that he is willing to use the old House ideas of just shifting the sales tax collected at the pump strictly for Michigan Roads, the same cannot be said of Senate Majority Leader Meekhof.

Echoing Gov. Snyder’s tired excuses he said in The Detroit News,

 

“Going back to (the House) plan would be a disappointment because it wouldn’t fix the problem. At today’s less than $2-a-gallon pump prices, it would come up more than a half-billion dollars short of what’s needed.”
“We should not fool ourselves into thinking we can solve the problem without spending more money. I’m going to work very hard to make that (voter approval) happen.”

I should close with something I picked up while out of state a few days ago.

On Monday, Illinois just swore in a Republican governor by the name of Bruce Rauner.

One of Gov Rauner’s first acts as governor was to institute a statewide ban on all non-essential spending.

For a Cracker Jack accounting guy who is big on quantifying every decision he makes and adopting proven ideas, the actions by an actual Republican Governor is a great place for Gov. Snyder to start looking before he tries shoveling that line again about being “unable” to locate any additional road funding in a $52-some-odd-billion budget.