The Macomb Daily
June 18, 2007

The word blackmail conjures up images of store owners paying protection money to underworld wiseguys, or a Hollywood image of a sleazy character grubbing for money in exchange for not spilling the beans on a cheating spouse.

But the unsavory description doesn't belong in the day to-day lexicon or operation of our political leaders in Lansing.

Yet that's exactly what happened last week when Michigan House Speaker Andy Dillon, a Democrat, urged Republicans to get on board to raise taxes to balance the state budget.

Dillon, through his spokesman Dan Farough, threatened to reduce state funding to Macomb Community College if our local GOP state officials oppose the Democrats plan to address the budget shortfall that approaches $2 billion.

We are urging Republicans to awaken to the fact that we need revenues to protect great institutions like Macomb Community, said Farough. Without a bipartisan solution that includes revenues we'll have an unprecedented budget crisis of $1.8 billion deficit with schools, healthcare, police and fire protection and great institutions of higher learning like Macomb Community College all threatened.

Leveraging funding for higher education into the fight over the state budget is wrong. We agree with Rep. Brian Palmer, a Bruce Township Republican, who first labeled the comments blackmail.

 There have been threats here and there, but nothing with any credibility, Palmer said about the budget battle before Dillon's latest remarks. That (an MCC funding reduction) is blackmail, and I'll expose it for what it is.

After The Macomb Daily first reported the threats June 12, elected Republicans reported similar incidents.

The following day, the Associated Press reported that a handful of House Republicans said they had been threatened by Democrats with individualized budget cuts to universities, community colleges and even K-12 schools in their own districts if they didn't vote in favor of an income tax increase or a tax on some types of services.

Lobbying for proposals is one thing, but direct threats to individual lawmakers are highly inappropriate. Worse, those threats may have been leveled at legislators, but if they are followed up on, the real people suffering will be the real people and students who attend the colleges and schools, and the teachers and professors who work at them.

Said House GOP Leader Craig DeRoche of Novi, Now, the Democratic leadership is holding Michigan residents hostage because Republicans are fighting to protect taxpayers hard-earned dollars from an excessive and crippling tax increase. It's unacceptable, completely unethical and it has to stop.

Whether the state can balance its budget without additional taxes is not the issue. State Democrats and Republicans can disagree without the blackmail.

Michigan residents deserve better behavior from their elected officials.