"Pensions are deferred payments for work done. 'Benefits' are pay for work, not a handout. Pensions and benefits are arranged by contract. If there is not enough money for them, it is because the contracted funds have been taken by conservative officials and given to wealthy people and corporations instead of to the people who have earned them." - George Lakoff
Simply put, Snyder has chosen to join on the Welcher Wagon. The numb nerd has bought into the "airy fairy" world of Karl Rove and William Kristol. Snyder has become the manservant of that nasty little corporate gofer , Grover Norquist and his anarchist John Bircher buddy, Saulis Anuzis.
The Back Story
Years ago, a nominal moderate (at the time), former House Speaker, now corporate officer at DTE, Paul Hillegonds, said that the local communities had been "too generous to teachers." He said that the state take-over of local schools was the way to force (that's "coerce" - a term of endearment our Tea-Publicans adore) by the "shift and shaft" mechanism that become Proposal A. That pushed costs back on the local taxpayers so that they, in Hillegonds' scheme, would have to make "hard choices."
Prop A was a clever device that gave the taxpayer a sugar coated, measured dose of arsenic, accumulative poison. The candy coating was the immediate "tax relief" in the form of a 60% annual reduction in local property taxes for "homesteaders" and hoped owners ignored the "hit" that was backloaded in the form of "state transfer taxes" at the point of sale. Prop A saw several categories of state responsibilities such as retirement costs (state obligations) drilled back to the local schools as part of the required responsibilities due under the so-called "foundation grant." That provision included what has amounted to hundreds of millions of indirect support to private and church schools.
Sen. Jack Welborn was less sophisticated in his truth and revelations, he knew exactly what was happening in 1993 and spoke up revealing how "foundation grants" were designed to undercut public schools.
The sharp decline of the Michigan economy is now a decade along. The "gifts" and "ear candy" bandied about by John Mathias Engler and cronies (many of whom are back at the state salary trough under Snyder) were illusions. The slippage following Prop A created huge loopholes for corporations who weaseled out huge tax "give-backs" from local units of government. Tens of millions of tobacco taxes were lost to cross-state-boundary smuggling, which became an industry until the tardy tax stamp was affixed.
Did Engler save the Big Three? Did Engler's Revolution insulate Michigan from recession or produce a business boom in Michigan? Decidedly NO. The structural games and devices he and cohorts peddled began to ravish the state even before he left town for a millionaire Bonus for Bonzo as chief lobbyist at NAM, aggressively promoting China over Michigan. How weird is that!
The debt Engler left Jennifer, and the many, many holes "King John" drilled in the revenue bucket did just what he designed them to do, they revenue starved Michigan. That huge "unfunded" business connected to "state obligations" to pay deferred constitutional income to superannuated public employees: That's a nasty Engler legacy.
On 2/17 we said, "Shut up we don't want to hear about history," "we want what we want" taken back from our deserving retirees. And "Oh Yes," we have the majority power to do it, "so there."
2/17 will live on in Michigan History as a very dark day; the day Snyder walked the state away from its moral obligations in order to award his business cronies and boost Karl Rove's efforts to defund unions.
This last week we have seen the final chapter of the Engler Revolution make a direct hit on our children and our seniors. Granddad and grandma are hit with the leeching effects of a decades long campaign from Engler's Willy Wonks over at the Mackinac Center. They are so proud, so happy! Just drop by their new showy headquarters near the Lansing capitol and pay them a visit, ignore the party trash in the back conference room! MacCen benefactors: Dow, Amway, Consumers, the Insurance lobby as well as a whole host of outside anti-government foundations have been paid-off big time with the proposed Snyder/Engler Redux Michigan Budget proposals.
Whoa, just a jiffy!
Snyder is imposing dramatic "new taxes." Does anyone believe all those "NO NEW TAXES" Tea Party legislators can stay true to their solemn oaths and support HUGE NEW TAXES ?
Snyder's Voo Doo vocabulary usage, neutralizing the REAL facts, notwithstanding!
Just you wait, Just you wait. The people are coming to Lansing.
Original Post.
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