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    Who are the NERD fund donors Mr Snyder?

    Raise the curtain.

    Cherry, Dillon, Whitmer and Bing under fire in the MSM (surprise!) for ethical... inconsistencies


    By Nick, Section News
    Posted on Wed Mar 11, 2009 at 07:38:55 AM EST
    Tags: Cherry, Dillon, Whitmer, Bing, ethics, MSM, consistency, budget, salary, lies, lying liars (all tags)

    Call this the morning of surprises!  And they're big ones, and important ones too... I'm not even going to mention the fact that the Michigan Wolverines look to have moved off the bubble and on their way to their first NCAA Tournament in over a decade.  (OK, so maybe I'm going to mention that once but that's it, promise.)

    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...

    Jennifer Granholm returns between 5 and 10 percent of hers.  Good for her.

    The Democrat who wants to succeed her?  Not so much.  Lieutenant Governor John Cherry hasn't returned a penny and it looks like only after his office was approached by the Associated Press did the man decide that he'd be increasing his charitable giving, a promise (not yet a fact) that sort of ignores that whole "don't let the left hand know what the right hand is doing" principle, but whatever, the man is a hypocritical politician... we shouldn't expect a theologian.  

    Meanwhile, in the Senate, not one Democrat returns or has pledged to return one penny.  Not.  One.  Likely Dem Attorney General nominee Gretchen Whitmer?  Nope.  Minority Leader Mike Prusi?  No sir.  None of the rest of them, either.

    And things aren't any prettier over in the House, where Andy Dillon continues to refuse to share in the pain he's helped inflict on Michigan's working families, instead taking home every last dime of his $106,650 in annual pay.  When asked about whether the man maybe made up for his hypocrisy by foregoing other reimbursements his spokesman "declined comment."  That's usually code for "no."

    Not surprisingly, Republican elected officials look to be doing significantly better when it comes to literally putting their money where their mouths are.

    Secretary of State and 2010 Gubernatorial candidate Terri Lynn Land has never claimed a mileage reimbursement for the 50,000 miles she's put on her own car the last few years.  At the standard IRS mileage rate that amounts to $27,500 she's given back to taxpayers on top of the expenses she's saved by forgoing the use of a state automobile.

    (Worth noting, too, that neither she nor Attorney General Mike Cox tend to travel with armed police escorts earning overtime.  Yes, I'm looking in your general direction, Monica Conyers.)

    Senate Majority Leader and AG contender Mike Bishop has foregone the regular $12,000 in hotel and meal expenses he's offered and he and Republican Jud Gilbert also decline mileage reimbursements, saving taxpayers thousands more.

    All of that is only a drop in the bucket compared to what could be saved if the Governor's fancy political appointees were being asked to share in our pain.  AP reports:

    The commission's proposed 2011 pay cuts for lawmakers and the state's top elected officials are expected to save $1.25 million.

    Bishop said the state would save even more money -- $1.52 million, under some estimates -- by reducing the pay of Granholm's political appointees and other unclassified workers who work for the state...

    The 52 employees in the governor's office earn an average of $60,978, but some make much more, according to pay records released Tuesday by the governor's office.

    Among the top earners are Chief Operating Officer Dan Krichbaum, $136,000; legal counsel Steven Liedel, $135,636; and Granholm's deputy chief of staff, Genna Gent, at $126,992. Nine of the governor's staff make over $100,000.

    But Lansing Democrat say one thing and then do another.  Surprise!

    If you swing down to Detroit, though, the problem is suddenly Democrats CLAIMING one thing and having DONE another.  Mayoral candidate Dave Bing has been fibbing about his educational background.  The Ivory Tower reports the leading Dem has been telling folks for years that he only needed four years to graduate from Syracuse.  

    Darn it all if someone didn't go check with the Orange.  Turns out the man took 29 years to graduate, not four.  

    His claim to an MBA from Kettering University is even more goofy.  He doesn't have one.  Didn't get one in four years and didn't get one in four decades.  No MBA for Mr. Bing.

    A Democrat having trouble with the truth.  Surprise!  Now if someone could do me a favor and check the tape... was he ever REALLY inducted in to the National Basketball Association's Hall of Fame?

    < Kent County Republican Committee - February 2009 Executive Meeting | Wednesday in the Sphere: March 11 >


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    Now, now, Nick... (none / 0) (#1)
    by KG One on Wed Mar 11, 2009 at 11:06:38 AM EST
    ...you really didn't expect Andy Dillon and his comrades to cut his pay now, did you?

    After all, making sacrifices are for the "little people", not for the annointed elite.

    And does ANYONE have any evidence that the guv REALLY returned her pay?

    If memory serves, in years past, the guv actually had the chutzpa to make a sizable donation to a charity of her own choosing, and then claimed that the took a pay "cut" to the fawning media in attendance.

    Sorry, but that dog didn't hunt back then...this year doesn't look much better.

    Just to verify the basketball hall of fame . . . (none / 0) (#2)
    by Kevin Rex Heine on Wed Mar 11, 2009 at 03:16:29 PM EST
    . . . according to the reference website Basketball Reference, Dave Bing was indeed inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1990.

    Just to independently double-check, I looked at the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame's own website, and there in the class of 1990 is David "Dave" Bing.

    So at least he's telling the truth on that one.

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