Tea Party Pot Bellies: Michigan's Tea Partiers - What's in their Kettle?

Whistling from their ears, full of steam piped in from the boilers of Koch Petroleum, these angry men and women are pawns of the first order.

Dunces with dulled intellects and greedy with selfish desire to hold on to what little their corporate masters, have deigned to allow them to retain of all their years of work, labor, and endless toil, "Steamed" Tea Party Pot Bellies are in a manipulator's manufactured rage. It's actually one of the saddest stories to be told; it spells out how the public can be conned, hornswoggled, beguiled, into working exactly against what has always been in their best interests, futures, and well-being.

Centers of Civil Discourse Drown Out: American conversation on local concerns in the
corner of the hardware or general store replaced by Big Media and AFP Money
(General Store in Haysi, VA National Archives 1938)

The Michigan TeaPublican (Tea Party Republican) Super Majority back inside the Capitol, all comfy in their leather swivel chairs, faces lit by taxpayer provided laptops, saw an opening to their advantage. True to form,
GOPer's took the easy path: stick to the Corporatist scripts and rad right discipline: Put the burden of revenue off on children, the elderly, the pensioner, the poor, the public servant. By all means protect the business and corporate community!

If only these Republicans strove to serve the real needs of the public as much as they pride themselves in being errand boys/"buds" to business!

What a nunce Snyder is! Says he was "hired" by Michigan to be their "CEO"! Find that in your state constitutions, you uber-strict constitutionalists. It's not there.

Michigan Americans for Prosperity Propaganda Troupes for Senior Citizen as Shock Troops:
Michigan TP'ers at AFP / Mackinac Sponsored Rally in Lansing, MI April 14, 2011 (DailyKos)

Taking a reach-back look at the Lansing Capitol Rally of the Michigan Chapter of Americans for Prosperity (led by Scott Hagerstrom) last spring, one sees photos of row after row of ball capped, balding older white males, supported by carefully placed courtesy folding chairs. They are angry and frustrated waving provocative signs to prove it's just right to be ginned up for projecting anger and blame on someone else and advantage the Rovian Backroom Boys. Steampotters are ripe for backing the blacklash, then when their handlers have taken all the advantage they can, Tea Party Pot Bellies will be toast!

Staring at the ongoing effects of the worst economic catastrophe of our time, the ruinous, failed Bush regime and its unbearable and destructive rampage of eight years (misdirected wars, unprecedented debt, and unequal taxation) was bad enough; not seeing a clear way out, still forced to confront the seemingly intractable flaws and effects of G.W. Bush cataclysm, has left the worried public to sip the bitter dregs resulting from his bad judgment.

Steampotters are forced to stare at a resultant, potential economic and political collapse worldwide. That's too much for a potbellied TeaPartisan under duress and stress. They're ready for a brawl. But with whom? Their neighbors, their grandchildren, the first responders? The cause of their troubles which has them in a kink? They are supporting the very Corporatist interests that have been eroding their nest eggs and killing their democracy. How odd!

Steampotters are damn mad at the demise of their retirement assets stolen by Wall Street and speculators, the trouble their children are enduring, and the loss of their home equity value-stripped as it was in the Bush Bust of 2008. THEY NEED SOMEONE TO BLAME. They are ready to led by the Kochs MEGA-cash-campaigning. As chance would have it, Koch Brothers had shipped in that unsavory character, Dick Morris - and didn't fetish Dick strut his stuff?

Steaming potbellies are addicted to Right's Noise Machine and Rupert Murdock's pap-and-slap
Actually more than 70% of Republicans with cable access watch FOX News exclusively. Nothing satisfies an angry depressed curmudgeon more than more anger and depression. Bad news fuels fear, resentment and aggression.

As dailies, such as the Detroit News and the Grand Rapids Press, slide down the waste pipes, FOX News enriches itself and its Machiavellian owner. An alien with "bought" power and influence. It's a place of influence and profit FOX and Rupert do not deserve.

This is possible because of these same gullible discontents-the more they are depressed the more they want someone else to ante up and bear their far share of load. Many citizens from out the past paid for the infrastructure that was the life-long support of these Tea Party Pot Bellies-now whiners and malcontents.

The whole attitude is: I've got my "little bit" and I'm scared witless it will be lost to someone else. Their mantra: Me, my son John, his wife and my wife, us four and NO MORE. This kind of self-centered selfishness leaves behind both Christianity and neighborhood democracy.

Given permission to lash out and accost others, goaded on by Svengalis re-pleat with talking point books designed to manipulate and exploit exaggerated blame; as long as it distracts the November voters from the Bush Depression (still in bubble wrap) the danger plays right into the hands of the negativists who inhabit both the Detroit News and the dank dens of the deceitful enemies of public life and service.

Warming the Factories of Manufacturing and the Middleclass: Garland Stove Company's
World's Largest Stove, Postcard Detroit MI 1893 (Michigan Historical Archives)

Amway's Richard M. DeVos Sr. and the Brothers Koch are thought to be Depression proof. However, if they can manipulate the TeaPartisans to do the heavy lifting to lobby to remove regulations, and overturn customer protections, and collective bargaining rights, etc. to greatly benefit them and the other greedy Corporatists - this would be perfect timing.

And to assuage the pent-up anger and the angst tearing at the gut of Tea Potbelliers, what do the current Rad Republicans offer?

Actually Harry Truman laid out the genuine GOP "offers" best:

• Republicans approve of the American farmer, but they are willing to help him go broke.
• They stand four-square for the American home - but not for housing.
• They are strong for labor - but they are stronger for restricting labor's rights.
• They favor minimum wage - the smaller the minimum wage the better.
• They endorse educational opportunity for all - but they won't spend money for teachers or for schools.
• They think modern medical care and hospitals are fine - for people who can afford them.
• They consider electrical power a great blessing - but only when the private power companies get their rake-off.
• They think American standard of living is a fine thing - so long as it doesn't spread to all the people.
• And they admire of Government of the United States so much that they would like to buy it.

Harry T. enjoyed the blunt truth of strongly brewed black coffee in a big cup, not a steamy tea made with the deadly Kool-Aid of the Koch Bros. subversions, et. al. served up in a Koch Industries-made throwaway paper cup.

On the Reader:
History on the Garland Company Giant Stove and what happened to this Michigan landmark.
Gazette posts on the Americans For Prosperity run Tea Party Rally April 14, 2011 pictured above in "Greedy Bros Koch-Bought & Paid for Visi-Galts: The Randian Libertarian Spawn - Gleefully Storm the Gates of the People’s House in Lansing, MI" and "Americans for Prosperity’s Cotton Head Grump Out, High on Motrin 800, Fizzles.

Related Posts:
In Detroit: Resentment, Malice & Roaring Opportunism Ride a Wave of Harsh Tea Party Ideology (April 2012) - Revisit Occupy Detroit: the Tea Party is Different – Hank Payne’s Myopic View (November 2011) - The Occupy Wall Street Activists & Grassroots Tea Party Activists Have a Lot in Common (October 2011) - It Was No Frenzy Island: Neanderthals & the Nerd (Republican Leadership Conference on Mackinac Island) (September 2011) - Teaparty leader: The More We Pay Attention - The More Hopeless it Can Seem, Political Parties Only Exist to Get and Keep Power (February 2011) - Saint Ayn - Extolling Great Evil - Used As Source of Tea Party Political Punch Lines

Original.

What the Frack Fellas? Morality and Michigan's Environment - Back When & Now Then

In response to recent hydro-fracking enabling legislation, ad campaigns and spin led by ALEC and Big Oil surrogates in the Midwest (Michigan & Ohio).

"To waste, to destroy, our natural resources, to skin and exhaust the land instead of using it so as to increase its usefulness, will result in undermining in the days of our children the very prosperity which we ought by right to hand down to them amplified and developed."
- Theodore Roosevelt, in a Speech to Congress on December 3, 1907

"[Conservation] is the chief material question that confronts us, second only and second always to the great fundamental questions of morality."
- Theodore Roosevelt, Proceedings of a Conference of Governors in the White House, May 13-15, 1908

You Gotta Love Teddy: The Bull Moose Who Went to Bat
for America's Natural Treasures (Theodore Roosevelt National Achieves c.1910)

Memorial Day and its participants, those steadily declining visages of past conflicts like the Spanish-American War of Teddy's day to today's World War II veterans who have been hailed as the Greatest Generation, remind us all that a precious and hard won victory over oppression and an evil corporate-run government in the hands of foreign tyrants was secured by a stupendous act of redemption-not only for America, but the entire world.

One writer has lamented the deterioration of that honor, the tarnishing of heroic valor, the death of that victory, due to the excesses of the corporatist control of all levels of state and federal governance, the sorry state of affairs we now face:

"Back when people were actually almost "free" (immediately after WWII), when public education was not just another empty promise - and the trend in life was toward a better tomorrow for everyone - at that time 'control' was in retreat, and progress was the theme of every hour. Now what we have is control of every idiotic facet of everyday existence - rules for every waking act, every thought that is not controlled is seen as the enemy of the state (the corporatocracy).

"Our entire way of life has been stolen and shall never return to the lazy and hopeful days of living and loving, of joy and promise, with the possibility for doing real and meaningful things with one's own life - not to mention being able to envision a better world for more and more people - whose lives were so far below the levels we enjoyed.

" Instead of that promise, instead of that possibility - what we have now is the outright worship of Mistrust, of Fear, and of Paranoia - along with obscene profits for those who have purchased all the politicians, and who control every facet of this once nearly free society.

"If American life were a sporting event - today's game would be one in which all the officials and the referees had all been pre-purchased by what would obviously be the winning team. Now companies 'police' their own activities, deciding for themselves when they've gone too far - or stolen too much. The original point behind government providing a watchdog over industry - was to keep the playing fields equal - between players and owners."
(emphasis added)

The writer is on the right scent.

Take the following example from a Nation of Change article entitled "ALEC Slips Exxon Loophole into New Ohio Law":

"Wake up and smell the frack fluid. But don't ask what's in it, at least not in Ohio, cause it's still not your right to know. Ohio is in the final stages of making an Exxon trojan horse on hydrofracking into state law, and it appears that the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) connected Exxon's lawyers with co-sponsors of Ohio Senate Bill 315: at least 33 of the 45 Ohio legislators who co-sponsored SB 315 are ALEC members, and language from portions of the state Senate bill is similar to ALEC's 'Disclosure of Hydraulic Fracturing Fluid Composition Act.'...disclosure of fracking fluids? On behalf of ExxonMobil?

Frack fluids include unknown chemicals that gas drillers mix with sand and large amounts of water. The mixture is pumped underground at high pressure in order to retrieve gas and oil by fracturing shale formations. These are the chemicals that have caused widespread concern among residents near gas fracking operations; concerns echoed by doctors who don't know how to treat patients harmed by exposure to chemicals that oil companies keep secret. Oil companies like XTO Energy, a subsidiary of ExxonMobil, the first company lined up to drill in Ohio's Utica shale."

(emphasis added)

Milking Mother Michigan: Fracking (Shale Sands) Map
of the Lower 48 US States (US Energy Information Agency May 2011)

The blatant use of power and immense amounts of cold, secret cash to push aside the welfare and rightful concerns of the population in order to accomplish whatever is in the Corporatists' self-interest is best shown in the ongoing activity of the Koch Brothers cabal comprised chiefly of the Americans for Prosperity and The American Legislative Exchange Council.

It has become exposed and shown to the public that things so dastardly are being rammed through blindsided/defenseless state legislatures by A.L.E.C. members in those bodies, and ALEC's fellow travelers, that many premiere brands, former sponsors and supporters of ALEC, have bailed out of this corporate-owned and operated 'plug and play' Rad Right legislative mill.

What a blow to ALEC to have Walmart, Coke, Blue Cross and so many other familiar brands and corporations pull out of the Koch Bros. American Legislative Exchange Council. Yet here in Michigan A.L.E.C. powers on. The Mackinac Center for Public Policy joyfully and recently submitted in its own suggested boilerplate legislation, developed here in Michigan, to be promoted by ALEC nationwide.

US Rep. Dave Agema, a Michigan ALEC member and a Rad Right Screaming Eagle, succeeds, with the backing of the Koch's crowd, becoming Michigan's upstart male National Republican Committee member. Little wonder, when over 100 past or present members of the Michigan Legislature are /or have been complainant ALEC members.

Business Trumps Nature Leaving Just Stumps: When Michigan Big Business gets it all - Statewide Clear Cutting of Millions of Acres in the 1880-90's (Upper Peninsula Lumbering Operations Anon c.1880)

How do you suppose Michigan Koch-Heads will handle our fracking questions when the time comes to regulate (OR NOT) the fracking permits and permissions so intensely sought by Koch oil and other such interests? Last century rich investors left the face of Michigan a stubble of stumps, but the fact is nobody knows what toxic fluids flow through far flung fracking pumps.

Michigan families and their many out state guests have enjoyed its wealth of nature, pure beauty, fertile soils, and its bounty and plenty.

Who cares? We care!

Our state, with its tremendous water resources, must care; it's our wonderland heritage won and protected by heroes and workers, farmers and tradesmen, now so blatantly threatened by the overweening Corporatocracy and the greed of the rich and powerful 1%.

What the Frack? Will the Koch Brothers blast TDR off Mt Rushmore too?

On the Reader:

• Michigan grassroots movement website "Ban Michigan Fracking" and Michigan Petition Drive website "Let's Ban Fracking" 
• Key articles on Fracking in The World in "Burning water, contamination and natural gas 'fracking'" (16 May, 2011) and details about the relationship between ALEC and Heartland Institute in "Heartland Institute and ALEC Partner to Pollute Classroom Science" (March 30, 2012) and more MAPS on Oil Spills and Fracking Accidents across the country and in Michigan.
• Teddy Roosevelt and history of "Conservation as Morality" by Jessica Sheffield (January 2011)

Related Slates:
More of Teddy Roosevelt and ALEC in the Gazette.

Original.

Holy Tomatoes! Detroit News' Nolan Finley Plays Catchup

In response to Nolan Finley and those on the right attempting to spin the story that it's supposedly President Obama and Dems not the GOP that has been using 'social issues' to gin up votes.

Sez Brother Finley in "Obama milks social issues" (Obama gave Romney an implied snuggy) on May 11, 2012:

"Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney again took the bait, allowing himself to be drawn into this discussion. So again the campaigns are debating divisive social issues instead of fiscal policy. That plays to Obama's strategy of painting Romney as an extremist and avoiding having to answer for the economy."

Catch up to reality, Nolan. This is exactly what Republican Svengalis have been so artfully doing for decades; beginning under the nefarious tutelage of Newt "the genius" Gingrich or so he was labeled by friendlies until Newt crossed that thin red line and was tossed.

Rich Men Ride while the Rest of Us Run: Corporatocracy
and Income Inequality is THE current 'social issue'.

No one, no party, no group, no clique, no organized political faction does a better job milking the essence of divisive issue politics than the Republican Party; so weakened that the GOP can be taken over by the wealthy elites like the the Koch Brothers, the Club for Growth, various Christian Dominionists, religious and racial bigots, and radical militia elements (gun nuts) until the once sensible and civic-minded Grand Old Party is no more. Poof! Think Ike.

Let Ted Nugent go on wallowing in hate and incitement to mayhem; as evil as he is, he 's only a "scare'jim'crow" archetype of a certain redneck gnarl of lawless tyranny that smirks across the nation. Nugent's part of a cohort of wild and reckless men, dark alley troublemakers, civic hoodlums. And don't they love the trouble they incite... the attention they get!

For decades Newt Gingrich's distraction & negativatization of language made useful for undermining civil discourse has prevailed in the dark hearts of the "Hard Right," as former President Gerald R. Ford labeled them during the Pat & Bay Buchanan dominated 1992 GOP National Convention. It was at Houston where Pat Buchanan declared religious and cultural war on the nation. As a direct result George H. W. Bush, the standing president, high right off the First Gulf War 100 hour victory, when down to stunning defeat to William Jefferson Clinton.

From "Ford tells Gingrich He'd Better Tone It Down" by AP reporter Lawrence L. Knutson:

Ford believed Gingrich should leave "partisan attacks" to others. "One thing that speakers have to understand is that the speaker is speaker for the House. You have to keep that high-level attitude and let the partisan attacks come from your majority leader.... The Speaker (Gingrich) is better advised to stand back." Ford went on to say that looking at the wider future, he believes that if the "extreme-right" partisans within the GOP control the party's policies and dictate who is the candidate... "the party will lose at the polls."

Note: This account also appeared in the Grand Rapids Press, June 2, 1998 and is still spot-on for the 2012 election cycle.

Social Issues Aside: Our National Troubles & the Great Bush Recession Have Created Vast New Opportunities for Unscrupulous Business Opportunists & Scammers

The aggressive CORPORATOCRACY (see the expanded definition from Wiki below) had better get out their act together and begin to restore the rule of law in financial and banking affairs. So far they haven't. The plague created by Citizens United will make this a very reprehensible election season; bar none.

Corporatists were quick to sense an opening, an "opportunity" and they seized it. They have profited immensely from the great disturbance in the economy brought on by the buffoonery of George W. Bush, the Lesser. (The man no Republican can bring themselves to mention in favorable light.) The Bush TARP and the bailouts have put stunning amounts of cash in the coffers of bankseters and Wall Street schemers and shysters'; amounts so large and so excessive as to be incomprehensible in light of in historic perspective. Are we angry? You bet we are!

War profiteering has egregiously enlarged the holdings/coffers of Dick Cheney and Neo-Con Cronies.

Things are still in need of repair and restitution.

Corporatocracy for Idiots

"A corporatocracy is a situation in which corporate bodies interact with sovereign power in an unhealthy alignment between business and political power. In a corporatocracy an elite upper-class, maintains ties between business and government, sometimes by lobbying efforts or funding political advertising campaigns, or providing bailouts when corporations are seen as too big to fail, for the purpose of controlling government and dictating policy to serve its financial interests.

"A corporatocracy is viewed as anti-democratic or opposed to democracy or used to describe situations in which democracy has been manipulated negatively, sometimes resulting in a passive citizenry and subservient media.

"A corporatocracy represents what some see as economic exploitation, and the concept has been used to explain bank bailouts, excessive pay for CEOs, as well as generalized complaints such as the plundering of national treasuries, people, and natural resources. The concept has also been used by critics of globalization, sometimes in conjunction with criticism of the World Bank or unfair lending practices, as well as criticism of free trade agreements which, according to these claims, move high-paying jobs overseas.

"The term corporatocracy is a negative term, likened pejoratively to cancer, fascism, and Orwellianism, perhaps because, according to this view, business-government ties are seen as secretive, lacking transparency and accountability. The elite engaging in corporatocracy is sometimes termed the 1 percent."

Source: Corporatocracy on Wiki (Be sure to click on all the footnotes to this piece. Go from ignorant to informed.)

So Nolan, fearless thought leader, it's time you play catch-up. Pocket your rotten tomatoes, stop our carping, and do something substantive, pro-active about saving Michigan and America. You can begin by restraining yourself from "milking social issues" and move toward a sound economy and a restructuring of taxes so as to save Michissippi's middle class. Put aside your poison pen, and take up your Habitat for Humanity hammer, rise early, move out to save the day for a family in need. It would be a start.

Dump the tomatoes. Catch-up Finley, catch-up!

On the Reader:
List of Responses to Nolan Finley on the Gazette (Topic DATE):

• High up in Jim Crow’s Nest: Constant Cawing Incites Civic Upheaval by the Detroit News - Michigan View (General Idiocy and use of Racial Undertones February 2012)
• Nolan Finley: Maniacal Warmonger? (General Idiocy and Violence September 2011)
• Dead End/Bad Trade Off: Profitazation or Abandonment of Detroit’s Public School Children (Education June 2011)
• No National Honor Given Finley: Taking Down Detroit’s Public Schools is a Civic Crime (Education May 2011)
• Snyder, the Socialist, Takes on Local Democracy Calling it a "Status Quo" That Needs to Be Radically Re-invented.(Ideology April 2004)
• Honest Abel “AWOL” in Michigan just as in Wisconsin (Ideology March 2011)
• A one nostril false grunt from Nolan: It’s not my pigs that stink (Ideology June 2011)
• The Detroit News is "Tapped Out" (Taxes and Ideology February 2011)
• Nolan Finley Rocks Local Detroit High School With His Decision to Teach English to Sophomores (Education December 2009)
• Raw Revenge Raises Its Ugly Head (Education December 2009)
• An Additional Dollar a Day... (State Budget and Ideology November 2009)
• The only place a teacher gets a fair shake in the Detroit News is on its obituary page (Education June 2009) 
• Finley's Right Wing anti-teacher Crusade: A man with a forked tongue and a flaying pen (Education October 2009)

Related Slates:
More on Corporatocracy and the Republican Party on the Gazette.


Original.

In Detroit: Resentment, Malice & Roaring Opportunism Ride a Wave of Harsh Tea Party Ideology

A Scummy Tide of Power-Grabbing & Vengeance Sweeps Over Michissippi (Michigan). The threatening tsunami that is: the powerful have put Detroit in a stagnate Sargasso Sea of neglect for years.  Now the elites blame it all on minorities and labor--trapped and struggling amid the congealed flotsam and debris.

Reckless Abandonment: Corporate logos were removed, but the castaway
company carcasses remain (Fisher Plant - The Moter(less) City 2009)

Over the last decades hundreds of firms have simply walked away from stewardship and management of their real estate and concerns in Detroit.

In the book, "THE RUINS OF DETROIT" and others like it feature pictures of the grand and ornate high rise office buildings, libraries, schools, and hotels just left to rot. This reality sends a signal to the present. In some cases with fixtures and contents in place, we see places as though the management simply walked out, valuable real estate abandoned! And walk out they did!

It wasn't minorities who abandoned the billions dollars of capital assets moldering down as rotting, moldy architecture and as the visually evocative "war zones" comprised of abandoned industrial sites. It was the elites, the powerful, the men of money, and the politically connected who made/allowed this to happen, not the workers and the service staffs.

Putting the "walk-away" abandonment curse on the shoulders of an underclass is not and was not a "class act"; it was and is dishonest--a crime.

The vicious world of the landlord, rampant graft, and the spoils of the speculators is all around. This crisis was and is fueled further by greedy mortgage companies and fraud-promoting banks.

Detroit was deep, deep in trouble before the Great George W. Bush Recession. There were indicators revealing the impact of a devastating Michigan 'One-State-Depression' to be seen everywhere in Detroit prior to fall 2008. Events triggered then have loosed the bonds of civility and escalated urban hopelessness, thus creating a tinderbox for social unrest.

Charlie LeDuff made this salient point in his article, "The Ghost Mayor", March 17, 2012 stating:

"The governor might then use the only stick left in his bag. LET THE CITY DROWN."

"Already vendors and contractors are not getting paid and the city will run out of cash in a month. That means cops, paramedics and tax collectors won't get paid. Ambulances won't get fixed. Parks won't open.

"Under that scenario, you can expect a long, hot, bloody summer."
(emphasis added)

Let’s hope that such is not the case.

-----

Detroit has corporate rot at its very heart. It's former opulence and importance has been replaced with decadence, social decay, crime, and abandonment--all topped with a rich coating of cynicism and blame-speaking as a direct result of corporate malfeasance and neglect. Now, to walk away, to maliciously place exaggerated blame on the current elected officials and the managers of infrastructure (in tatters for years) is perverse.

To exalt at the destruction and ultimate downfall of what remains of this once great international city is a civic sin of huge magnitude and scope.

Golden Age of Upper Class Fun: Downtown Detroit Fisher Building
Penthouse Playground in 1925 (Michigan Historical Society Archive)

'One Tough Nerd' Snyder & Company of corporatists (BLM) have lots of plans. They hope to move in and take over, by dictatorial/undemocratic means. What which remains (be it fallow ground or crumbling ruins) is visioned as theirs to rebuild, making a portion of the city into a renaissance of re-invention. To do this they must do the "down and dirty" to those who for years have been trapped in a city with over three fourths of its residents who are on some form of assistance. Power must transfer directly into their hands.

Can we untangle the city from its mass of floatsam and start a New Detroit?  To do so will take a profound, pro-active commitment, determination, a new vision, and yes, a ocean of capital both financial and human.

On the Reader: 
Observations and iconic images on the blog "The Motor (less) City: Post-industrial Detroit" and Photo Archive.

Related Slates:
"Detroit: Behemoth 'Motor City' Whale Fights for Its Life as Snyder's EM & Scavengers Circle" - "Michigan GOP's Power Grab Thievery: Patterson's 30 Year Jim Crow / EM Plot to Steal Detroit's Royal Jewels & Liquid Assets" and the ongoing Emergency Management Jim Crow / EM Plantation SERIES.


Original.

If We Are Truly a Democracy: Quotes from James Madison and Mickey Edwards

"We have, it is true, occasional fevers; but they are of the transient kind, flying off through the surface, without preying on vitals. A Government like ours has so many safety valves...that it carries within itself a relief against the infirmities from which the best of human Institutions can not be exempt."
-- James Madison in a 1830 Letter to Lafayette

Former Congressman Marvin Henry "Mickey" Edwards penned the following in an essay entitled "How to Turn Republicans and Democrats Into Americans":

"ANGRY AND FRUSTRATED, American voters went to the polls in November 2010 to 'take back' their country. Just as they had done in 2008. And 2006. And repeatedly for decades, whether it was Republicans or Democrats from whom they were taking the country back. No matter who was put in charge, things didn't get better. They won't this time, either; spending levels may go down, taxes may go up, budgets will change, but American government will go on the way it has, not as a collective enterprise but as a battle between warring tribes."

"If we are truly a democracy-if voters get to size up candidates for a public office and choose the one they want-why don't the elections seem to change anything? Because we elect our leaders, and they then govern, in a system that makes cooperation almost impossible and incivility nearly inevitable, a system in which the campaign season never ends and the struggle for party advantage trumps all other considerations. When Democrat Nancy Pelosi became speaker of the House, the leader of the lawmaking branch of government, she said her priority was to ... elect more Democrats. After Republican victories in 2010, the Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said his goal was to ... prevent the Democratic president's reelection. With the country at war and the economy in recession, our government leaders' first thoughts have been of party advantage."

"This is not an accident. Ours is a system focused not on collective problem-solving but on a struggle for power between two private organizations. Party activists control access to the ballot through closed party primaries and conventions; partisan leaders design congressional districts. Once elected to Congress, our representatives are divided into warring camps. Partisans decide what bills to take up, what witnesses to hear, what amendments to allow."

"Many Americans assume that's just how democracy works, that this is how it's always been, that it's the system the Founders created. But what we have today is a far cry from what the Founders intended.
George Washington and James Madison both warned of the dangers posed by political parties. Defenders of the party system argue that parties—including Madison’s own—arose almost immediately after the nation was founded. But those were not parties in the modern sense: they were factions uniting on a few major issues, not marching in lockstep on every issue, large and small.  And while some defend the party system as a necessary provider of cues to voters who otherwise might not know how to vote, the Internet and mass media now make it possible for voters to educate themselves about candidates for office."

"What we have today is not a legacy of 1789 but an outdated relic of the late 1800s and early 1900s, when Progressives pushed for the adoption of primary elections. By 1916, all but a handful of states had instituted the "direct primary" system, under which a party candidate was selected by a public vote, rather than by party leaders in backroom deals. But the primaries, and the nominating conventions, were open only to party members. This reform was supposed to give citizens a bigger role in the election process. Instead, the influence of party leaders has been supplanted by that of a subset of party activists who are often highly ideological and largely uninterested in finding common ground. In Delaware in 2010, a mere 30,000 of that state's nearly 1 million people kept Mike Castle, a popular congressman and former governor, off the general-election ballot. In Utah, 3,500 people meeting in a closed convention deprived the rest of the state's 3 million residents of an opportunity to consider reelecting their longtime senator Robert Bennett. For most of the voters who go to the polls in November, the names on the ballot have been reduced to only those candidates the political parties will allow them to choose between. Americans demand a multiplicity of options in almost every other aspect of our lives. And yet we allow small bands of activists to limit our choices of people to represent us in making the nation's laws."

"I am not calling for a magical political "center": many of the most important steps forward in our history have not come from the center at all, including women's suffrage and the civil-rights movement, and even our founding rebellion against the British crown. Nor am I pleading for consensus: consensus is not possible in a diverse nation of 300 million people (compromise is the essential ingredient in legislative decision-making).

And I’m not pushing for harmony: democracy depends on vigorous debate among competing views. The problem is not division but partisanship—advantage-seeking by private clubs whose central goal is to win political power. There are different ways to conduct elections and manage our government-and strengthen the democratic process."
(emphasis added)

Application:
In Michigan we have seen the extreme example of extreme Teapublican partisanship "advantage seeking by private clubs" that back these rude Teapartisans whose legislative attacks on certain select groups of individuals in Michigan illustrate that the fact that Teapublicans of Michigan are seeking to help these "private clubs" in pursuit of their central goal "to win political power." All other impacts of this highly-targeted legislation, many of which are punitive and damaging, are held as inconsequential and unimportant in the triumphalism of this Teapartisan march toward a highly profitable political homogeny.

-----

As former Congressman Mickey Edwards stated in regret: "the struggle for party advantage trumps all other considerations." The mess in Michigan is a prime example of this outrage under a TeaPublican domination of all branches of Michigan governance: Executive, legislative, judicial.

Democracy in Michigan as it once was is no more. Emergency Managers and A.L.E.C. / Corporatists plug-and-play bill writing have broken the long chain of democratic practice and compromise. A tradition that has been the custom of Lansing over the decades - "a collective enterprise" in service of the citizens of our state - has been deliberately shattered.

On the Reader:
Read the original essay "How to Turn Republicans and Democrats Into Americans: An insider’s six-step plan to fix Congress" by Mickey Edwards (The Atlantic, June 15, 2011) and other Essays by Edwards:

"Why I'm Not at CPAC"by Mickey Edwards (The Atlantic February 18, 2010) Quote:

"I'm not at CPAC (2010) because I believe in America. I believe in liberty. I believe that governments should be held in check. I believe people matter. I believe in the flag not because of its shape or color but because of the principles it stands for--the principles in the Constitution, the principles repeated and underlined and highlighted and boldfaced and italicized in the Bill of Rights. The George W. whose presidency and precedents I admire was the first president, not the 43d. It is James Madison I admire, not John Yoo. Thomas Paine, not Glenn Beck. Jefferson, not Limbaugh."

"Reagan wouldn't recognize this GOP: The Gipper may be the patron saint of Limbaugh and Coulter, but he'd be amazed at what's been done in his name" by Mickey Edward in the LA Times, January 24, 2009) Quote: 

"The Republican Party that is in such disrepute today is not the party of Reagan. It is the party of Rush Limbaugh, of Ann Coulter, of Newt Gingrich, of George W. Bush, of Karl Rove. It is not a conservative party, it is a party built on the blind and narrow pursuit of power. (Break) ...conservatives have turned themselves inside out: They have come to worship small government and have turned their backs on limited government. They have turned to a politics of exclusion, division and nastiness."

More on the Republican Right Wing and Conservatism on the Gazette.

Original.

Jobs, Jobs, Jobs, and No Jobs in Michissippi (Michigan)

"The freest government cannot long endure when the tendency of the law is to create a rapid accumulation of property in the hands of a few, and to render the masses poor and dependent." 

-- Daniel Webster, 1782-1852

If the greedy Corporatists won't take a hint from the protests sweeping state houses across the land, then take it from a Founding Thinker and Patriot, extreme inequality between the OnePercenters and the 99 Percenters is a foreboding omen of coming disaster.

Be Glad and Give Thanks for the Occupy Movement: Light is shining in the darkness, and exposing the Wall Street deeds, and the Corporatocracy (an unhealthy alignment between business and political power) of the Koch brothers-so corrupt and evil-via A.L.E.C.'s 'plug and play corporate state legislation". It's all coming into that laser light.

Jobs, Jobs, Jobs, and No Jobs... this quote is from Pat Buchanan, Member the Conservative Caucus, during his campaign for the presidency:

"What is an economy for if not so that workers and their families can enjoy the good life their parents knew, so that incomes rise with every year of hard work, and so that Americans once again enjoy the highest standards of living in the world? Our American the most productive in the world; our technology is the finest. Yet, the real incomes of American workers have fallen 20 percent in twenty years. Why are our people not realizing the fruits of their labor?

We have a government frozen in the ice of its own indifference, a government that does not listen anymore to the forgotten men and women who work in the forges, factories, and plants and businesses of this country. We have instead, a government that is too busy taking the phone calls from lobbyists for foreign countries and the corporate contributors of the Fortune 500."

Source: Presidential announcement speech of Patrick J. Buchanan at the Manchester Institute of Arts and Sciences on March 20, 1995

One Buchanan supporter shares a vision: "Imagine a Ron Paul / Pat Buchanan ticket. I would cry with joy. But I can dream."


Original Part 1 and Part 2.

Discover Michissippi’s (Michigan's) Corporate Bosses: The Elites Who Now Run Snyder & the GOP Super Majority Legislature

These Business Leaders for Michigan Run and ran/created Snyder and put him over on an unwitting public. BLM pulls the strings on their sock puppets in the GOP Super Majority Legislature. Get to know who they are: they are openly listed on p. 46 the Business Leaders for Michigan pdf which can be found online in the Michigan Business 'Turnaround Plan'. The LIST is BELOW.


It's been THE BUSINESS LEADERS' TURNAROUND PLAN FOR MICHIGAN that has been the punch card/script for the unprecedented, dramatic, and entirely dangerous 2011 Legislation that has driven Rick Snyder and the largely inexperienced and incompetent TeaPublican Super Majorities in the Michigan House and Senate into dangerous malicious "mischief"

The BLM are betting heavily, thinking they know best and can dictate nearly everything for Michigan's 99%ers: wages, contracts, health coverage, working conditions. They believe the divine economic right right to "pickpocket" the poor, the kids, the retired at-will. As they say: "Money talks, everything else walks." Or as Mitt Romney has alluded to the old saying: "If you owe the bank a thousand dollars, the bank owns you; if you owe the bank a million dollars, you own the bank."

Keep a highlighter in hand when you scroll down the list of nearly 80 BLM Board Members and underscore those among the BLM leadership who are or are closely aligned/allied/family to the list of Michigan OnePercenter honor roll (via Forbes Magazine). Six of Michigan's OnePercenters are there. No surprise!


List of 1% in the Business Leaders for Michigan:

DAVID W. JOOS
CMS Energy Corporation

JOSÉ MARIA ALAPONT   
Federal Mogul Corporation

G. MARK ALYEA
Alro Steel Corporation

THOMAS A. AMATO   
Metaldyne Corporation

GERARD M. ANDERSON   
DTE Energy Company

JON E. BARFIELD   
The Bartech Group, Inc.

ALBERT M. BERRIZ   
McKinley, Inc.  

MARK J. BISSELL
BISSELL Inc.

DAVID P. BOYLE     
PNC Financial Services Group

KIETH COCKRELL 
Bank of America  

MARY SUE COLEMAN 
University of Michigan

ROBERT S. CUBBIN
Meadowbrook Insurance Group, Inc

KURT L. DARROW
La-Z-Boy Incorporated

DAVID C. DAUCH   
American Axle & Manufacturing

DOUGLAS L. DeVOS
Amway

J. PATRICK DOYLE
Domino’s Pizza, Inc.

JAMES E. DUNLAP
Huntington

ANTHONY F. EARLEY, JR
DTE Energy Company

JEFF M. FETTIG
Whirlpool Corporation

WILLIAM CLAY FORD, JR
Ford Motor Company 

YOUSIF B. GHAFARI
Ghafari Associates, LLC

DAN GILBERT
Quicken Loans

ALFRED R. GLANCY III  
Unico Investment Compa

STEPHEN E. GORMAN
Delta Air Lines, Inc

JAMES P. HACKETT
Steelcase Inc.

RONALD E. HALL     
Bridgewater Interiors, LL

RICHARD G. HAWORTH
Haworth

CHRISTOPHER ILITCH   
Ilitch Holdings, Inc.  

MICHAEL J. JANDERNOA
Perrigo Company

MILES E. JONES
Dawn Food Products, Inc

HANS-WERNER KAAS   
McKinsey & Company

JOHN C. KENNEDY
Autocam

BLAKE W. KRUEGER
Wolverine World Wide, Inc.

TIMOTHY D. LEULIETTE   
Dura Automotive Systems, Inc. 

ANDREW N. LIVERIS
The Dow Chemical Company

DANIEL J. LOEPP     
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan

STEPHEN P. MacMILLAN
Stryker Corp.

BEN C. MAIBACH III   
Barton Malow Company

RICHARD A. MANOOGIAN   
Masco Corporation  

FLORINE MARK   
The WW Group  

SARAH L. McCLELLAND   
Chase  

CHARLES G. McCLURE   
ArvinMeritor, Inc.  

HANK MEIJER
Meijer, Inc.

MICHAEL MILLER
Google, Inc.

JOHN T. MONTFORD
General Motors Company

MARK D. MORELLI   
Energy Conversion Devices, Inc.

MARK A. MURRAY
Meijer, Inc.

ATHLEEN H. NASH
Citizens Bank

JAMES B. NICHOLSON   
PVS Chemicals, Inc.

JERRY JAY NOREN  
Wayne State University

THOMAS D. OGDEN  
Comerica, Inc.

JAMES O’LEARY   
Kaydon Corporation  

WILLIAM U. PARFET
MPI Research

CYNTHIA J. PASKY  
Strategic Staffing Solutions

ROGER S. PENSKE  
Penske Corporation  

WILLIAM F. PICKARD
Global Automotive Alliance

SANDRA E. PIERCE  
Charter One  

GERRY PODESTA
BASF Corporation

CHARLES H. PODOWSKI
The Auto Club Group  

STEPHEN R. POLK  
R. L. Polk & Co.  

JOHN RAKOLTA, JR.    
Walbridge   

CARL D. ROEHLING   
SmithGroup

ROBERT E. ROSSITER
Lear Corporation

DOUG ROTHWELL  
Business Leaders for Michigan

RICHARD F. RUSSELL 
Amerisure Mutual Insurance Company

GARY D. RUSSI  
Oakland University  

ALAN E. SCHWARTZ 
HONIGMAN

J. DONALD SHEETS
Dow Corning Corporation

BRAD SIMMONS
Ford Motor Company

LOU ANNA K. SIMON, Ph.D.  
Michigan State University

DONALD J. STEBBINS   
Visteon Corporation 

ROBERT S. TAUBMAN
The Taubman Company
   
SAMUEL VALENTI III   
TriMas Corporation   

STEPHEN A. VAN ANDEL
Amway

MICHELLE L. VAN DYKE
Fifth Third Bank  

TIMOTHY WADHAMS   
Masco Corporation  

BRIAN C. WALKER
Herman Miller, Inc.

WILLIAM H. WEIDEMAN
The Dow Chemical Company

EDWARD E. WHITACRE, JR.
General Motors Company

WILLIAM C. YOUNG   
Plastipak Holdings, Inc.



Original.

Silent Night: From the Forbes 400 Counting House to Yours: Michigan’s One Percenters

Michigan's One Percent: The Mega-Wealthy or Ultra High Net-Worth Michiganders

The Michigan 1% Given Listed by Forbes: Rank, Name, Age, Michigan Residence, Company/Industry

1. #60,   Richard (Rich) DeVos Sr., $5 B, Age 85, Holland, Amway
2. #60,   Frederik Meijer (deceased at 91), $5 B, Grand Rapids, Supermarkets
3. #159, Alfred Taubman, $2.5 B, Age 87, Bloomfield Hills, Real Estate
4. #171, Ronda Stryker, $2.3 B, Age 57, Portage, Medical Technology
5. #212, Michael & Marian Ilitch, $2 B, Bingham Farms, Pizza
6. # 293, Daniel Gilbert, $1.5 B, Age 49, Franklin, Quicken Loans
7. # 293, Manuel Moroun, $1.5 B, Age 84, Grosse Pt Shores, Transportation
8. # 375, William Ford, $1.1 B, Grosse Pt Shores, Ford Motor Co.
9. # 375, Jon Stryker, $1.1 B, Age 53, Kalamazoo, Medical Technology

Sort them out. Ideological and Political Billionaire Bullies or Grand Noblesse Oblige Benefactors/Genuine Contributors to the Greater Good??


Original.

Confessions of A Well-Known One Percenter Scion of a Robber Baron

"For more than a century ideological extremist at either end of the political spectrum have seized upon well-publicized incidents...to attack the Rockefeller family for the inordinate influence they claim we wield over American political and economic institutions. Some even believe we are part of a secret cabal working against the best interests of the United States, characterizing my family and me as 'internationalists' and of conspiring with others around the world to build a more integrated global political and economic structure-one world, if you will.

If that's the charge, I stand guilty, and I am proud of it."

-- David Rockefeller, 'Memoirs' 2002, p. 405

Original.

Ayn Rand Speaking With Precision for the 99 %

The Evil of Supplicating to Men Who Produce Nothing, in Order to Produce:

"When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion - when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing - when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors - when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work and your laws don't protect you against them, but protect them against you - when you see corruption being rewarded and honestly becoming a self-sacrifice - YOU MAY KNOW THAT YOUR SOCIETY IS DOOMED."
(emphasis added)

-- Ayn Rand (1905-1982) Author

Source: Atlas Shrugged, Francisco's "Money Speech"


Original.

Who Assigned Gentleman Joe (Haveman) TeaPublican Slop Jar Duty?

Getting Joe Haveman R-Holland to carry the TeaPublican slop jar is a real feat of denigration. Joe is a good guy; a congenial straight arrow. Now he's labeled himself as a kill-the-teachers-association-by-any means-possible meanie - The kind of kid who loves to be the heavy on the top in a brutal pig pile on the school yard.

Haveman is one of many ethnic Dutch-Hollanders-in the Holland area-who are the decedents of highly religious/ conservative immigrants to the area mid to late 19th Century. In earlier times when they were the broken English speaking common labor, they were for unions and for collective action. Over time, however that changed.

"How strong the opposition to union membership was in the Christian Reformed Church is evident from the fact that, despite the decision of 1916, synods of the Christian Reformed Church were forced to face the issue again and again until the relatively late date of 1954, when the matter was finally decided. Even at that late date, A SYNODICAL STUDY COMMITTEE RECOMMENDED THAT SYNOD DECLARE MEMBERSHIP IN THE CIO-AFL SINFUL. But, as Swierenga relates in (his book) Dutch Chicago, "so many church members in Chicago, Patterson, Detroit, and other big cities belonged to these unions that the synod rejected the committee report"
(Robert P. Swierenga, Dutch Chicago: A History of the Hollanders in the Windy City, Eerdmans, 2002,pp. 644, 645)

It is well to remember that there is also this historic, signal labor incident to recall:

"The good beginning of the Christian Reformed Church regarding labor union membership was in Chicago, always a stronghold of the Christian Reformed Church. IN 1886, ALL THREE HUNDRED DUTCH REFORMED WORKERS AT THE PULLMAN WORKS IN ROSELAND CROSSED PICKET LINES TO HELP BREAK THE STRIKE"
(Robert P. Swierenga,  pp. 640, 641).
(emphasis added -  See related article)

Sympathy for the working man was replaced by the clannishness and stick together efforts that worked to the advantage of many of the Dutch who become middle class successes such as Haveman - a project manager for a large construction firm prior to election to the Michigan House of Representatives.

What was done today, September 15, 2011 by the passage of Haveman's bill to curtail the ability of the teachers professional association to have access to payroll deduction of association dues is but one of many recent and so-to come bills passed to "pig pile" on the Michigan Education Association in an attempt to quell their ability to participate in the right to regress of grievances and the privileges accorded them in the signing of legislation by Gov. George Romney, giving educators a fair and responsible voice in their profession, the terms of employment and professional improvement so necessary to a progressive and effective teaching cadre and excellence for students.

In carrying the unsavory slop jar for the Mackinac Center and other teacher haters such as Betsy DeVos, Haveman has lowered his image. Many of us were convinced that a man like Joe Haveman might be the re-visitation of the kind of statesman we once had in Western Michigan, a Paul Henry. Joe may repent. But having led the charge for the Out-of-State Corporatists owing A.L.E.C. Joe has sold his honor for the miserable job of slop jar duty.

The hope of the Kill-the-M.E.A. crowd is that teachers will be silenced and their influence will be diluted by any means legislated, to the point that they will have no voice in Michigan lawmaking and elections, thus be at the mercy of the TeaPublican marauders who are "sacking" the state of its ability to provide service and education for the children of our future.

A Teapartisan crowd of rowdies are using government to push highly partisan advantages: Their M.O. - take from others all they can.

The list to "take from" is extensive: Nurses, Firefighters, Local Police, Social Workers, the Poor, State Classified Workers, Michigan State Police, M-DOT personnel, the retired, Teachers and Public School Employees, and many, many more.

Original.

Round One: The People’s Grassroots Recall Crusade versus Boatloads of BLOATED BIZ BUCKS

A disquieting thrill/chill is running up and down the Citizens United cabal's spine. Imagine the single most expensive single state legislator race/ election in the nation's entire history-over$ 9 million spent just to attempt to retain/unseat a single TeaPublican in Wisconsin!

With the dirty work of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) just breaking on the national consciousness, with the $40 billions' Brothers Koch schemes and "walk-all-over-you" hobnail boot prints smearing the hallways and in-and-out of legislators offices in Madison, the "We are One" people's crusade winning 2 of 6 recalls against Republicans - in solid, rock-ribbed Republican districts - is an electrifying near miss. It's a shot across the bow of the TeaPublican's pirate frigates chartered to make confiscatory runs on: local control, public service and collective bargaining.

Spending a reported total approaching $40 million dollars in last night's Wisconsin Recall Races to save TeaPubicans ensconced in their HISTORICALLY BULLET PROOF/ GOP STATE LEGISLATIVE DISTRICTS (backed by mindboggling outside influences and juice) is utter insanity. Who says that money isn't the lubricant of all politics? Who can say that there isn't a MAJOR, MAJOR EFFORT AFOOT IN THE COUNTRY - A VERY DANGEROUS, AGGRESSIVE CORPORATACY/CONSERVATIVE COUP-which fuels such citizen recall efforts?

As such, THIS COUP D'ETAT IS DESIGNED AND INTENDED TO GO FAR BEYOND THE FABLED REAGAN REVOLUTION. It 's designed and determined to remake the entire economic and political landscape of America-one state legislature at a time. It intends to become-the new order. Wisconsin is but the beginning. We are seeing their MARCH OF MADNESS sweep other states.

Whatever you thought you knew about America; it's supremacy, it's stability, it's sustainability, its promise and dream, is entirely on the line. Not one aspect of public life is exempt from these profit-takers, the privatizers, the rampant profitization of government via the rancorous and Corporatist networks. Democracy be damned.

BIG BIZ has spoken. We have the BIG BUCKS to do whatever it needs to do to forward their agenda. STEP ASIDE... BUSINESS-CONTORLED DEMOCRACY IS PROPOGANDIZED AS THE NEW NORMAL!

One man, one vote has been the pervious standard. Now elections are most like stockholder meetings; the more one holds in terms of money, economic, and corporate control, the more votes one gets to cast to achieve the desired outcome.

Incumbent Wisconsin State Senator Alberta Darling won in her contested recall race. She was forced to defend her close relationship and support for Gov. Scott Walker's radical putsch. However this anecdote from the Wisconsin source (The Whitefish Bay Patch) yields an important swing voter insight:

"At the Cahill Park polling center in Whitefish Bay, Jane Collins said she voted for Darling in the past election, but on Tuesday, she voted for Pasch.

"'When Darling seemed to fall in lock step with Walker's agenda, I just decided that she no longer is looking out for the individuals. She is looking out for the party. It's very disappointing'," she said. 'You can go to the parade and wave and shake hands all you want, but it doesn't mean you are listening to the people.'"

On the larger stage the underlying "lie" festering in Walker's Wisconsin is exposed thus:

"Whatever happens tonight in Wisconsin, it has been a constant of this fight that Republicans have consistently falsified the reason labor and Dems have waged this battle so bitterly. They have steadily downplayed the most extreme union-busting aspect of Scott Walker's proposals, and have falsely asserted throughout that Dems and labor only made this stand because Walker asked public employees to cough up health and pension benefits."

So it's fitting that as the recall elections hit their climax, THE LEADER OF THE NATIONAL GOP REPEATED THIS LIE IN THE MOST HILARIOUSLY BLATANT WAY yet.

Here's RNC chair Reince Priebus on CNN this afternoon:

"ANCHOR: Is there buyers' remorse in your home state of Wisconsin with Republican/Tea Party policy making?

"PRIEBUS: No. I don't think there's any buyers' remorse at all. You have a leader in Scott Walker who asked state employees to pay just a little bit more in pension and healthcare benefits, which was about half of what the rest of the state pays in those benefits. And that's all he did. Now, in reaction to that, the public employee unions took $25 million, they put together a petition drive, and now they're dumping millions of dollars on television trying to recall the senators for trying to balance a state budget. It's the same type of tough choice that is were made in Wisconsin that the Republicans are trying to present to Americans in Washington.

"This is a completely false rendering of what actually happened. In reality, THE PROTESTS FROM DEMOCRATS WERE PROMPTED BY SCOTT WALKER'S PROPOSAL TO STRIP PUBLIC EMPLOYEES OF THEIR BARGAINING RIGHTS, protests that were later sustained by the deep cuts in his budget, leading to the recall drive. Priebus doesn't even mention the collective bargaining piece of the story, only citing the demand for pension and health concessions as the reason for the entire standoff. In the real world, of course, labor unions actually agreed to those concessions, yet WALKER PRESSED AHEAD WITH HIS UNION-BUSTING PROPOSAL ANYWAY, WHICH IS WHAT PROMPTED THE WHOLE BATTLE." 

(emphasis added) 

Source: "Wisconsin recall fight ends where it began: With a Big Lie", Greg Sargent in the Washington Post.

The recall movement is not out of the larger political/coup game. If, according to the senior seer, Bill Ballenger, just one successful recall in Michigan could stall and obfuscate the Snyder schemes; Just think what these two successful recalls in Wisconsin mean to those who are ardently working to save community and democracy from the Koch/A.L.E.C/ corporate usurpers!

There's much more Recall Action on tap!


Original Post.

Michigan ALEC State Chair Sen. Tonya Schuitmaker: A CHEERY FACE & A FAKE DEFENSE, promoting corporatist direct access to Michigan lawmaking

Sen. Tonya Schuitmaker doesn't seem to know her facts on A.L.E.C., but she knows how to use A.L.E.C. boilerplate defense of its secret corporatist, state by state "model" Plug-and-Play legislation that is undercutting Middle America.

Sez Sen. Tonya, as reported by MIRS:

"(W)hile the business community is involved, it's only at the task force level when they're 'around the table.' "'It's just a time for legislators to gather to see what's working in other states in terms of model policy,' said Schuitmaker. 'I really think the attacks are unfounded.'"

Using the stock A.L.E.C defense State Chair Schuitmaker wants the public to believe that everything's out in the open, "the business community is involved, it's only at the task force level when they're 'around the table.'"

Ignorance concerning a powerful/secretive organization that is part and parcel of the Corporatist/ TeaPublican agenda (now labeled GOP State Solutions) is no excuse to defend its, corrupting influence, trouble making, usurpation of individual rights and/or and federal government's powers to promote health and well-being throughout our nation.

Either SCHUITMAKER IS VERY NAIVE OR SHE IS SHILLING FOR A.L.E.C. and attempting to give it much needed cover. Around the nation the public is focused now on the extreme measures the long-term, Rad-Right Council is pushing on the various states in a blitz of legislation undercutting rules and regs not favored by the Corporatocracy and attempting to hitchhike legislation into law during this time of extreme economic crisis in the states.

"'Our members join for the purpose of having a seat at the table,' said Dennis Bartlett of ALEC in 1997. 'That's just what we do, that's the service we offer. The organization is supported by money from the corporate sector, and, by paying to be members, corporations are allowed the opportunity to sit down at the table and discuss the issues that they have an interest in.'

"This is the heart of the Trojan horse. Power in ALEC does not come from political acumen, IT COMES FROM BRUTE FINANCIAL FORCE. CORPORATIONS BUY THEIR WAY ONTO ONE OF ALEC'S SPECIALIZED TASK FORCES. There, 'legislators welcome their private-sector counterparts to the table as equals,' according to one ALEC publication. ACTUALLY, THE CORPORATE COUNTERPARTS ARE MORE THAN EQUAL. THEY HAVE VETO POWER. NO BILL IS RELEASED FROM A TASK FORCE WITHOUT THEIR APPROVAL. THE RESULTS OF SUCH AN ARRANGEMENT ARE PREDICTABLE. The task force on criminal justice, for example, has been co-chaired by a representative of Corrections Corporation of America, the nation's largest operator of private prisons. In 1996, ALEC issued model legislation to deregulate utility markets: the legislation was pushed by Koch Industries and Enron.

"After corporate members use ALEC to draft dream legislation, the "model" bills go home with state legislators. The ALEC bills are introduced, debated and voted on by other lawmakers who think the proposals are democratic creations." 

(Emphasis added)

-- Source: WILL POTTER , ALEC Documents Reveal How Corporations Secretly Create New Law.

So what does Schuitmaker's group sitting "around the table" promote or accomplish?

The Michigan group 'WE ARE the People' has formed a partial list:

"The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is a vehicle through which global corporations and state politicians collaborate and vote behind closed doors to design legislation to benefit the huge corporations funding ALEC. These so-called 'model bills' reach into almost every area of American life and include things like imposing voting restrictions, undermining environmental protections, scapegoating immigrants to profit the private prison industry and defunding public education." 

And this is only the tip of a nasty iceberg which is threatening the balance and sustainability of state governments.

Sen. Schuitmaker says that A.L.E.C. is bi-partisan. As in most cases, the group reaches that level by sticky via tokenism. The vast number of members are Republicans and now Koch/Rove style Tea Party members. The "work" it does is down and dirty:

"ALEC is a force. By the organization's own account, about 180 of its model bills are enacted in at least one state every year. ALEC scored some of its highest-profile victories during 2011 in Wisconsin and Ohio, where newly-elected Republican governors and legislators attacked budget shortfalls with legislation that sharply restricts the bargaining power of public worker unions. The bills were passed just a few months after companies in ALEC's leadership put more than $304,000 into the campaigns of Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and Wisconsin state legislators, and spent more than $563,000 on Ohio Gov. John Kasich and lawmakers in the Buckeye State. Both Walker and Kasich are ALEC alumni."

snip

"In Wisconsin, the $304,607 leading ALEC companies put into 2010 campaigns was felt far beyond Gov. Walker's anti-union budget initiatives. State legislators also agreed this year to cap " along lines suggested by ALEC - the 'punitive' damages that can be assessed in personal injury lawsuits. The caps could save millions of dollars for ALEC's corporate members. And despite pleas from consumer groups, Wisconsin lawmakers voted to deregulate the telecommunications industry, also along lines promoted by ALEC.

"In Arizona, where firms on ALEC's private enterprise board have put nearly $16.6 million into state campaigns since 2001, the legislature attracted national attention and sparked a bitter partisan debate when it passed ALEC-backed legislation that gives state and local police new authority to detain suspected illegal immigrants. An investigation by National Public Radio found that one ALEC-member firm, the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), was a key player in the ALEC task force that drafted the model bill that spawned Arizona's law. CCA, which builds or runs prisons in 21 states and reported 2010 revenues of $1.7 billion, has identified immigrant detention as an emerging market." 

-- These accounts are provided by Common Cause HERE.

The people of Minnesota are finding out about the work of Schiutmaker's A.L.E.C. which she describes: IT'S JUST A COFFEE KLATCH, we are just discussing our own state's problems and solutions amongst ourselves brushing aside. It's her feeble attempt to mitigate her misrepresentation of the heavy and controlling interest A.L.E.C.'s over 300 corporatist members have in their DIRECT PIPELINE lawmaking and resolution factories, set up over time in many states, and active for decades with LITTLE OR NO PUBLIC SCRUTINY OR KNOWLEDGE OF WHAT THEY ARE AND DO.THAT ERA IS OVER.

Here's what Minnesota Common Cause found in their state: "(A.L.E.C.) bills were revealed as Common Cause released a report on the influence of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), which is financially supported by corporations like Koch Industries and WalMart. At regular conferences, including one going on in New Orleans right now, these corporations draft corporate-friendly legislation that is approved by state legislators on legislative task forces and then introduced at state capitols across the country without disclosure that the business interests wrote them.

"'The work of ALEC shows how the Minnesota capitol is governed by corporate lobbyists instead of main street voters,' said Mike Dean, executive director of Common Cause Minnesota. 'Dozens of corporations are investing millions of dollars to write business-friendly legislation that is being passed into law without public knowledge and often at the expense of the public interest.'

"Common Cause Minnesota found a number of recent Minnesota bills that mirrored ALEC counterparts:

- Voter Restrictions: (HF 89, SF 479) Bill that critics say would suppress voter turnout. ALEC legislation.

- Taxation of Moist Snuff Tobacco: (HF 1079) This bill, created by tobacco companies, would create a tax break for moist tobacco. ALEC legislation.

- Cheeseburger Bill: (HF 264, SF 160) This bill partially shields large food companies from consumer lawsuits. ALEC connection from Inside ALEC magazine.

- End Greenhouse Gas Emission Goals (HF 509) This bill opposes efforts to restrict the emission of greenhouse gases. ALEC legislation.

"The ALEC conference in New Orleans this week includes workshops about pension reform, privatization of Medicaid and the benefits of C02 (in a global warming context)."
--Accounts from The Minnesota Independent & Minnesota Common Cause, Minnesota bills traced to controversial corporate group ALEC

What Tonya Schuitmaker wants you to never know is the true extent of the influenced and effectiveness of A.L.E.C.'s achievements and its many "gifts" delivered by state legislators, such as herself, to enhancing and abetting those contributing and controlling corporations in A.L.E.C.'s secret network:

Ms. Schuitmaker may give her time and loyalty to the American Legislative Exchange Council, enjoy its perks and privileges, go on its junkets, but back home she represents a very financially depressed district and many, many folks who live near "hand to mouth" - they deserve more and better from her than what her service to a corporatist front group is attempting to take from them and others in Michigan with Schuitmaker's facilitating- insider help-as a leading A.L.E.C. lawmaker.


Original Post.

No Brainer Legislation & No Brain Legislators who slavishly deliver for the Corporatocracy (via ALEC) inside Michigan’s Legislature

Meet the BIG BOYS (National & International Corporatists) who write legisative bills and offer them no-brainer - Plug & Play - (introduced by ALEC members) directly into our state's lawsmaking process. (SEE an eclectic list of ALEC corporate members, drawn from over 300 Corporations in its membership):

American Express Company, American Stores-Jewel/OSCO, Amoco Corp, Amway Corp., AT&T, Bank of America, Bayer Corp., Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association, Boeing Corporation, Cargill, Inc., Caterpillar, Inc., BP America, Inc., Chevron Corporation, Chrysler Corporation, Corrections Corporation of America, Coca-Cola Company, Coors Brewing Company, DuPont, ExxonMobil Corporation, FedEx, General Motors Corporation, GTE Corporation (Verizon), Johnson and Johnson, Joseph E. Seagram & Sons Inc., Koch Industries, Kraft Food, Inc., McDonalds Corporation, Microsoft Corporation, Miller Brewing Company, Motorola, Inc, Parke-Davis, Peabody Energy (coal), Phillips Petroleum Company, Pfizer Inc, Pharmacia & Upjohn, Sara Lee Corporation, Shell Oil Company, Sprint, State Farm Insurance Co., Texaco Inc., Union Pacific Corporation, United Airlines , United Parcel Service, UST Public Affairs Inc. (now United States Smokeless Tobacco Company), Wackenhut Corrections (now G4S), Wal-Mart Stores, Washington Times, Wausau Insurance Companies, Wendy's International Inc. ( the Wendy's/Arby's Group).

These are the folks who cook your fast-food hamburgers, insure your assets, invest your savings, deliver your packages, explore and refine your gas and oil, ship your goods by rail, ask you to recruit your neighbors in a MLM scheme, privately house your criminals, handle your calls and deliver your cable media, produce your drugs, and operate your community crushing discount giants. The American Legislative Exchange Council - A.L.E.C.'s big money, big influence is all over your life like super glue.

Don't you love the fact that these mega corporations have a special, direct and effective inside track to pre-packaged legislation directly into law, bills that favor them and exclude you and community?

What happened to a citizen legislature? What happened to your right to voice your opinion and effect change in law and regulations? It's all a far, far second to the power of Amway, Walmart, BP, Coca Cola, or Koch Brothers Industry who have a club with your state legislator as a "wine and dine" fellow member.

What you didn't know about A.L.E.C.'s simple disclaimer-for forty years its just been business as usual-corporate business as usual has accumulatively hurt you.

Now, A.L.E.C.'s post-election 2010 national blitz includes anti-public schools and anti-union, anti-poor legislation. A rugged agenda has come to a critical and direct confrontation with all you hold dear. You are no longer your own, you've been bought and sold for a price. How does it feel to be Kocholded?

MICHIGAN State Legislators--"Known ALEC Members Past & Present":

1. Justin Amash (ALEC Civil Justice Task Force) Now US Representative-Michigan
2. Patty Birkholz Appointed by Gov Snyder "Director of Great Lakes"
3. Bill Bullard, Jr.
4. Fulton Sheen
5. Mat. J. Dunaskiss (1996 ALEC Legislator of the Year Award)
6. Joanne Emmons
7. Beverly S. Hammerstrom
8. Dave Hildenbrand
9. Phillip E. Hoffman (ALEC Board of Directors; 1999-2000 ALEC Secretary; Treasurer 2000-2001; "1992 ALEC Outstanding Legislative Member Award")
10. Rick V.Johnson
11. Wayne Kuipers (has used ALEC models to benefit target corporations)
12. Mike Kowall
13. Tom McMillin (Active Introducing ALEC Legislation)
14. Mary Ann Middaugh (ALEC State Chairmen for Michigan 2004)
15. Margaret O'Connor (Wrote a number of reports for ALEC)
16. David Palsrock (ALEC State Chairmen for Michigan)
17. Bruce Patterson
18. Tom Pearce (ALEC Health and Human Services Task Force)
19. Randy Richardville (Current GOP Senate Majority Leader)
20. Tonya Schuitmaker (ALEC State Chairmen for Mich 2009-10)
21. John Schwartz
22. Susan L. Tabor
23. Jason E. Allen
24. David Camp
25. Craig M DeRoche
26. Beverly S. Hammerstrom
27. Rick V.Johnson
28. Jerry O. Kooiman
29. Mike Kowall
30. Aric Nesbitt
31. Tom Pearce
32. Ken Sikkema
33. Christopher C. Ward

MICHIGAN US Congress/Judges--"Known ALEC Members Past & Present":

1. Justin Amash
2. Judge Richard A. Bandstra (Named ALEC Legislator of Year for work on Civil Justice Task Force)
3. Dave Camp (ALEC Agriculture Task Force)
4. Mike Rogers
5. Nick H. Smith (ALEC Agriculture Task Force)
6. Tim Walberg

MICHIGAN FORMER LAW MAKERS/VIP's/MEGA DONORS-- "Known ALEC Members Past/Present":

1. John Engler (Governor) Member of ALEC since 1973 when it was founded. 1993 Received the ALEC "Thomas Jefferson Award"
2. Dick Postumus (Rick Snyder's Lt. Governor) ALEC Member since 1991. Now Appointed "Special Legislative Advisor" to Governor Rick Snyder.
3. Andrew Card ALEC Member; White House Chief of Staff to President GW Bush, US Secretary of Transportation for President G.H. Bush, Reagan Administration: Special Asst to President for Internal Affairs and Deputy Assistant to President & Director of INTERGOVERNMENTAL Affairs. Member of Massachusetts House of Representative (District 7 & 8) 1975-1983; From 1993-1998 Card was President and CEO of American Automobile Maufacturers Association. In 1999 he was General Motors Vice President of Government Relations.
4. Richard M. DeVos Sr.: ALEC Member; 1993 Received ALEC "Adam Smith Free Enterprise Award"; Co-Founder of Amway; Owner of Orlando Magic; 2011 Forbes Magazine listed DeVos as 79th Wealthiest American and 257th Wealthiest in the World; Member/Past President of "Council for National Policy", Board of Trustee Member for Northwood University and the National Constitution Center, Member Heritage Foundation. DeVos is considered a "mega-donor" to Republican Party Candidates
5. Jay Van Andel (deceased) ALEC Member; 1993 Received ALEC "Adam Smith Free Enterprise Award"; Co-Founder of Amway. Member of Heritage Foundation, Board of Trustee for Hillsdale College, Director of Gerald R. Ford Foundation; Van Andel was a mega-donor to the Republican Party. 2004 he donated $475,000 to Michigan Republican Party and $2Million for the re-election of President G.W. Bush.....

 There are many more....

List Sources: Democracy Watchdog Action Network and PFAW Reports


Watch Video on ALEC HERE or for more reading on ALEC HERE and HERE and HERE and in Michigan HERE.

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Positively Insane: Nerd Rick Snyder Doesn’t See or Comprehend His Role in the Systematic Decimation of Michigan

Snyder is one sad soul with a painted-on clown's happy face. He's so "into" his "nerdship" that he's unable to see how trapped and controlled he is. Rick Snyder came to the governorship with positive expectations, he was going to be "always positive." By putting a faux positive spin on every tough question or politically motivated legislative move, the Nerd was going to "Polly Anna" the state out of its one state depression. "Nerd" Snyder doesn't see or comprehend his key role in THE SYSTEMATIC DECIMATION OF MICHIGAN

Snyder did not understand or know the history of those "crony" operatives he embraced as advisers and staff- hold-over Englerites, American Legislative Exchange Council - A.L.E.C. bill delivery boys, and Mackinac Center types. The Nerd did not rightly comprehend or appreciate the fact THAT IDEOLOGUES ARE NOT TRIFLED WITH FACTS OR PUBLIC PROTEST-ROAD BLOCKS TO THEIR GOALS.

Swept Along by Corporatocracy
Snyder is unable to deal with the Far-Winger American Legislative Exchange Council (A.L.E.C.'s) ability to dominate much of the nation with pro-corporate "Plug & Play", fill-in-the-blank bill generation that amounts to a national coup by the Radical Right.

Now Michigan's "nerd" governor is neutralized and neutered in a very profound way. If "just one" of the some two dozen recall efforts succeed, there will be a huge political sea change says political soothsayer, Bill Ballenger, editor of Inside Michigan.

We all are on our way to pay BIG the price for Snyder's advanced "nerd" affliction.

Rick Snyder slip-streamed the voters with his brazen method of avoiding the revelation of what he would do to "reinvent Michigan," even refusing to fully present or debate his radical proposals in public.

Most crossovers and independents had high hopes, as did former Gov. William Milliken, that Snyder would move Michigan forward in a truly communal and common sense way-that's why they voted for him. Snyder was to be a breath of fresh air. The voters had no idea that Snyder would become the handy dandy "tool" of the Tea Party faction-backed and funded by conniving Corporatists such as the Brothers Koch, "Rotten" Murdock, and spinmeister Karl Rove.

Reinvention-A Catch Word/Canard
Do we need to re-invent the wheel? No, we have the wheel and it works. Did we need to so savage the governmental infrastructure and the legislation underlying our state-giving a huge, unprecedented TAXPAYER FUNDED BAILOUT TO BUSINESS AND CORPORATIONS?...NO.

A temporary Michigan income tax hike of less than one-half a percent would have covered the state deficit and prevented the coming economic and educational carnage.

As the details unfold; as they are being published now across the state,  we find that taxpayers are taking a very uneven and egregious hit with new taxes.

The Michigan House Fiscal Agency analysis reports:

• A couple with 3 children making $110,000 annually will take a tax hit of $190 while a couple making $55,000 will take a hit of $549 in NEW TAXES.
• A couple with 2 children earning $250,000 will pay $989 MORE IN TAXES because they will lose personal exemptions for joint filers earning over $200,000.
• A couple married with 2 children and making $34,000, less the removal of earned income credit, will pay MORE IN TAXES to the tune of $396.
• A Michigan retired couple, born after 1952 with $53,000 in income and property taxes of $4,000, will lose their entire homestead credit and pay Michigan Income Taxes on all of their pension(s) which will mean a whopping $3,130 TAX INCREASE. That's enough to make the couple decide to move outstate and take their remaining assets with them.

Take these TAX HITS watchdog TeaPublican Nut-Wingers. This is A MONUMENTAL VIOLATION OF T.P. BASIC PRINCIPLES. It's the dreaded Snyder/Chamber of Commerce taxpayer funded Business BAIL-OUT. Are TP'ers (Tea Party followers) going to simply roll over and take this duplicity? Or will they fight back?

Nerd "Positive" claims his gargantuan tax increase is not a tax increase. The way he sees things, in his rose colored world, shifting nearly two billion dollars away from businesses and corporations and on to elders, the middle class, and the poor is "not a net tax increase." Thus, in Nerd Speak, those who are being hit with paying a whopping new state income tax increase are delusional. Go figure!

The Nerd is being classically the "nerd" we all are familiar with: A quirky personality with a one track mindset, one who relentlessly and "positively" pursues his own version and vision of things, to the utter exclusion of all true facts or reality.

Rick Snyder, in self-labeling himself as a "Nerd," sent a signal that was clearly misread by the public. This nerd is out of control, as is his legislative Super Majority of tax hating wing-nuts. Theirs is a world of unreality and economic disaster for all of Michigan.

Michigan voters have THE RIGHT OF RECALL.

The recall paperwork is filed and approved.

O.K. LET'S ROLL....


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