Politics

Hey! Who Stole My Democracy?…or What’s Going on in the State of Michigan?

Submitted by Elaine Magliaro, Guest Blogger

Warning: You are about to enter the Twilight Zone.

Imagine, if you will, that you live in a state where a governor wields extraordinary power over its residents. Imagine, if you will, that your governor has the legal authority to appoint an “Emergency Manager” to oversee the local government in the town where you reside. Imagine that the monetary compensation for the Emergency Manager of your community has no cap. Imagine that your Emergency Manager declares that there’s a financial emergency in your town and then takes over control of it. Imagine that the Emergency Manager can break contracts, seize and sell assets, eliminate services—and can also fire duly elected public officials who serve your community. Imagine, if you will, that the Emergency Manager empowered by your governor to run your town has the right to dissolve your school district and to disincorporate your town. AND imagine that you and your fellow residents have no say about what is going on! Just imagine how you might feel if you lived in a state where that kind of thing was going on. Well, the people who live in Michigan may not have to imagine much longer.

Who, you might ask, will be responsible for transforming the state of Michigan into a Rod Serlingesque otherworldly undemocratic Twilight Zone right here in the United States? Why, Governor Rick Snyder and his bold band of Republican state legislators–that’s who. In January, Governor Snyder called for “Emergency Manager” legislation—and the Republican state legislators were more than happy to comply with his request.

This all seems hard to believe, doesn’t it? I’m not making it up. Karen Bouffard of The Detroit News reported the following: Legislation that would allow emergency financial managers to throw out union contracts and overrule elected officials in financially distressed municipalities and school districts was approved Wednesday by the state Senate. Similar legislation passed in the House in February, and the two chambers are working on a final version to send to Gov. Rick Snyder.

In an article published in The Michigan Messenger, Eartha Jane Melzer wrote:

Under the law whole cities or school districts could be eliminated without any public participation or oversight, and amendments designed to provide minimal safeguards and public involvement were voted down.

An amendment to require Emergency Managers to hold monthly public meetings to let people know how they are governing was rejected by Senate Republicans, along with proposals to cap Emergency Manager compensation and require that those appointed to run school districts have some background in education.

Critics say that Republicans are manipulating concerns about budget problems in order to consolidate power by undermining unions.

According to E. D. Kain: Snyder’s law gives the state government the power not only to break up unions, but to dissolve entire local governments and place appointed “Emergency Managers” in their stead. But that’s not all – whole cities could be eliminated if Emergency Managers and the governor choose to do so. And Snyder can fire elected officials unilaterally, without any input from voters. It doesn’t get much more anti-Democratic than that.

Mark Gaffney, Michigan State President of the AFL-CIO said: This is a takeover by the right wing and it’s an assault on democracy like I’ve never seen.

Do you agree with Mark Gaffney? Do you think what’s going on in Michigan is an assault on democracy?

SOURCES

Rachel Maddow Exposes Michigan Republicans Secret War On Democracy (Politicus USA)

Michigan Governor Plays Fast and Loose with Democracy, Invokes Radical New Powers (Forbes)

Michigan Republicans Use Budget Crisis to make Outrageous Assault on Democracy (AFL-CIO)

Michigan Senate passes emergency manager bills (Daily Tribune)

Emergency managers bill sweeps toward final approval (The Michigan Messenger)

Conyers: Emergency Manager bill ‘raises serious constitutional concerns’ (The Michigan Messenger)

Mich. Senate passes bill to give broad powers to emergency managers
State appointees could terminate contracts for teachers, government workers (MSNBC/Associated Press)

Financial manager bill passes Michigan Senate (The Detroit News)

Michigan bill would impose “financial martial law” (CBS News)

897 thoughts on “Hey! Who Stole My Democracy?…or What’s Going on in the State of Michigan?”

  1. “Back when I was cashiering at a liquor store,”

    Buddha,

    I did that also, except I had to also use my own car for deliveries. I’d work 3:00pm til 9:00pm, 6 days per week. Had to make sure all my University courses ended by 2:00pm, so I could get to work. Made $37.50 + tips for a 36 hour week and had to pay for my own gas. My two employers were “neer do well” son-in-laws of a bookie, who knew they were to stupid to go out on their own and so bought them a business that couldn’t fail. I imagine Maury is in the same boat, because both of them were also hard line Conservative Republicans, who talked a lot about the “free market.”
    They were each dumb and dumber.

    Considering I was self supporting and lived in a furnished room my tastes ran to cheap Chianti and sometimes Mogen David 20/20.

  2. “But hey you are a liberal so you wouldn’t understand hammer, nail or anything else having to do with a full days work.”

    Schmuck,

    I’ve been self supporting since I was 18 and worked my way through college by supporting myself on numerous difficult and low wage jobs. After getting my BBA I had a rising career which initially consisted of difficult and dangerous work, which continued to be dangerous even after I joined the supervisory ranks. I then received a Masters and post-degree training, while working and eventually rose to the top echelons of a 23,000 person organization, with a budget measured in billion$. When I retired from there, I developed and ran programs that dealt with treating people with co-pathologies of Major Psychiatric Disorders and extreme Drug Addiction, based in dangerous crack infested communities.

    Your accomplishments don’t even begin to compare to mine, which is obvious because of your ignorant postings. The irony though is that I’m not even close to being the most knowledgeable, or successful people of those who write here. You on the other hand are merely addicted to your silly belief systems, which you are probably unaware is a philosophy at whose base is ensuring that the super wealthy remain that way.

  3. Brian,

    The vituperation you receive is merely because you produce over-long monologues that are difficult to ignore because scrolling past them wastes unconscionable lengths of time and reading through them is reminiscent of examining the logic in Alice in Wonderland.

    In that spirit I give to you and others The World’s Foremost Authority on Everything: Prof. Irwin Corey. Learning from him might spice up your routine.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhr32uzyVho&feature=related

  4. Interesting excerpt from the Inc. article (published last month) that Buddha provided:

    But there is precious little evidence to suggest that our low taxes have done much for entrepreneurs—or even for the economy as a whole. “It’s actually quite hard to say how tax policy affects the economy,” says Joel Slemrod, a University of Michigan professor who served on the Council of Economic Advisers under Ronald Reagan. Slemrod says there is no statistical evidence to prove that low taxes result in economic prosperity. Some of the most prosperous countries—for instance, Denmark, Sweden, Belgium, and, yes, Norway—also have some of the highest taxes. Norway, which in 2009 had the world’s highest per-capita income, avoided the brunt of the financial crisis: From 2006 to 2009, its economy grew nearly 3 percent. The American economy grew less than one-tenth of a percent during the same period. Meanwhile, countries with some of the lowest taxes in Europe, like Ireland, Iceland, and Estonia, have suffered profoundly. The first two nearly went bankrupt; Estonia, the darling of antitax groups like the Cato Institute, currently has an unemployment rate of 16 percent. Its economy shrank 14 percent in 2009.

    Moreover, the typical arguments peddled by business groups and in the editorial pages of The Wall Street Journal— the idea, for instance, that George W. Bush’s tax cuts in 2001 and 2003 created economic growth—are problematic. The unemployment rate rose following the passage of both tax-cut packages, and economic growth during Bush’s eight years in office badly lagged growth during the Clinton presidency, before the tax cuts were passed.

    The counter argument to the tax cuts, it seems to me, is that corporate income tax increases help the economy in two ways (and both ARE consistent with the Laffer curve): First, those that pay the tax will increase government revenue and thereby we at least have the chance of reducing the debt without cutting services that the majority of us agree we need.

    Second, if we understand that corporations deduct expenses and are only intended to pay income tax on their profits,, and we understand that new outlets, new ventures, new research, and new employees are all legitimate business expenses and grow the economy, then corporations have a legal, legitimate, job-creating way to avoid taxes: Grow their business. Of course if we do that, the government ends up with more revenue anyway. If we make it tax-wise a better deal to grow it in America, and we closed the loopholes that let them pocket the extra cash without paying the taxes, then higher taxes on corporate income solve our national financial problems even if they do not increase government revenues, because if the taxes were avoided by reinvestment, then they bought materials, paid for services, and increased the flow of money in our economy.

  6. Bob,

    I like the first one very much….a lot of truism to be attested to on that one….

  7. Buddha,

    Back when I was cashiering at a liquor store, Young’s Double Chocolate was one of those things that when it came through my line about half the time I ended up going home with a bottle. Although for my money the best chocolate in beer comes from Ommegang, Chocolate Indulgence.

  9. “If a conservative is a liberal who’s been mugged, a liberal is a conservative who’s been arrested” — Tom Wolfe

    “The Liberals have many tails, and chase them all”
    — H.L. Mencken

  10. Aye, I’m a big fan of the Samuel Smith’s. It was probably my favorite stout until I discovered Beamish.

    And raff? I prefer to think you as sturdy. :mrgreen:

  11. Young’s Double Chocolate Stout. I’ve never had one of those, Gyges. That sounds like a fantastic idea though. I do know that chocolate-chocolate goes well with Beamish – a taste excursion discovered while ingesting . . . something else, but if the Young’s truly has chocolate undertones, it can’t be bad in a cake. Sounds kind of heavy though as a beer though.

  14. Buddha,

    I’m partial to Murphy’s as far as Irish Stouts go, but I’d have to go with Young’s Double Chocolate Stout on this one.

  16. Brian,

    I do not care about all of the dribble you posted. Nothing you said makes relevant sense. I do believe a child with special needs could make more sense in one paragraph than you could make writing an entire chapter of a history book…..You have not a clue why people are tired of you. Heel thyself Doctor….

    I feel for your family if you treat them anything like this….They may need protection from you….

  17. Epicurious says Guinness, but I’d guess if Guinness is good, Beamish is better. Perhaps a Samuel Smith’s Oatmeal Stout? What is your call on this very important question, Biermeister Gyges?

  18. Aren’t we forgetting what’s really important? Cake and beer.

    I mean, let’s be honest with ourselves. I doubt there are very many people sitting their thinking “Hmmm, I can’t decide if Maury is right or wrong, if only there was somebody out there to give an opposing view.” The people who agree with him won’t see that he’s changed fascism from a word with a concrete meaning in regards to political philosophies to one that simply means “someone I don’t like.” On the other hand, everyone else pretty much knows he’s wrong.

    But, do we all know what the right kind of stout to use when baking a cake is?

  19. He should also look up oxymoron, because it doesn’t mean the same thing as redundant.

  20. Maury,

    If you are going to post an opinion piece by someone who doesn’t know what “liberalism” means, I suggest you use a book called a dictionary and look up “liberalism.”

    While you’re there, it is recommended that you look up “plagarism”, too.

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