Snyder Snippets: Auto Manufacturers "regret" their move to Right-to-Work States

Just in case he's thinking of forgetting things he might have said, here are the statements made by Rick Snyder on Feb 8, 2012 in reference to Michigan workers and Right to Work (for less).

"We (Snyder and team) were meeting with some of the auto companies at the auto show (who) say that their companies regretted being in the southern part [of the country, where right-to-work laws are common] because they weren't getting the SKILLED WORKFORCE the same way that they would in MICHIGAN."

-- Stateline Online

See the complete INTERVIEW with Snyder in "Seven questions for Michigan Governor Rick Snyder" conducted by Melissa Maynard and Jim Malewitz, Stateline Feb 08, 2012

Important Snyder Snippets:

STATELINE: Do you think the research is clear on whether right-to-work would help improve Michigan's economy, political considerations about the fights over getting it passed aside?

SNYDER: No. Actually I think if you look at some of the labor agreements out there, there are some really competitive ones. And if you look at productivity overall, we actually had people when we were meeting with some of the auto companies at the auto show say that their companies regretted being in the southern part [of the country, where right-to-work laws are common] because they weren't getting the skilled workforce the same way that they would in Michigan and the flexibility. They were having people taken away for other lower wage situations versus having the right talent at the right place.

SNYDER: This is not something people should overreact to. In many respects when people say right-to-work, it's like one of those red flag kinds of issues where too many people just sort of have a visceral reaction and say "ok, here's my position and I'm not open to listening to anything else." That's not how good government should operate. I want to listen and hear it and work on it.

STATELINE: What about the state's labor relations with its own employees?

SNYDER: We had successful collective bargaining with our own employees at the state level. I want to give credit to [UAW President] Bob King. It was literally a case where the UAW took the lead and he had great people working for him, but Bob and I got on the phone and we actually met a couple of times to sort of hash through issues. WE GOT THINGS RESOLVED. In the end IT WAS GREAT that when we hit a loggerhead we just sat down and talked and got a good agreement done. (emphasis added)

For all of those of you with limited legislative experience or knowledge of Michigan's political history: Former Gov. John Engler often said, "Michigan's autoworkers are world-class!"

FULL TRANSCRIPT of Rick Snyder Interview with StateLine.

Original.

Tricky Rick & His 'Nerd Herd' Play Dangerous Economic Game in Michigan

"Re-invented" Michigan is headed in a disastrous economic direction: Feed the Corporations & Business Buddies v. Starve the Poor, the Elderly, and Shank Our Children.

How Truly Nuts Is This?

Snyder's slick 2 billion dollar tax increase/shift means: Less sales taxes, less commercial, fewer new customers and other diminishing business activity and expansion of small businesses. These are the direct results of headstrong, stone-hearted Tea-Publicans in Michigan's Super Majority Legislature having pushed through 2011 massive tax hikes on the poor, having stolen promise and limited savings from retirees, and having upped the daily survival expenses of vital public sector workers.

READER: "Titanic shift in Lansing" by Judy Putnam on February 25, 2011 at the Michigan League for Human Services


Herd of Robber Barons during turn of the century Age of Greed

All of this Snyder CEO inspired "harvesting" of nearly $2 billion in new taxes was raised to blatantly treat the Nerd's business buddies with a massive and excessive business bail-out/gift. Tax hikes of this magnitude will impact directly consumer demand and sales across the state. Less sales taxes, less commercial, fewer new customers and other diminishing business activity, as well as fewer small business successes will be the result.

Exactly how much of a cut-in-demand will result from Snyder's massive new taxes remains to be seen. But unavoidable reductions will gut the joy of the Michigan State Chamber of Commerce (now luxuriating in its power to strip monies away from the poor, the retired on limited incomes and pensions, children, and public servants) is headed for a rude awaking.


Snyder and a few of the political gaggle following the Nerd Herd, Signing Business Tax Cuts June 2011 (Official Photo)

The new Michigan Income Tax hit on investment income will dull and diminish the draw Michigan has had with retirees who have husbanded a personal portfolio intended to care for themselves to the end of life. Given the very nature of the radical shift from reasonable taxes on business and industry (sectors that utilize the common spaces and infrastructure as a means to produce profit and trade) to those whose working days are over is especially off-putting and repulsive to elders who can easily move themselves and their "kitty" to a friendlier state. Start subtracting retirees from drug stores, restaurants, retail stores, and from doctors and hospital care, then see for yourself what a terrible blunder the Nerd herd has committed. Seniors with their carefully stashed savings are a huge, stable financial asset to any community.

Add to the Nerd's negative tax scenario the hard facts about jobs in Michigan reported by Susan Demas:

"While Michigan added 63,500 jobs in 2011, it could have been more. Why? Well, the private sector grew, as University of Michigan economists reported. There were 77,500 private-sector jobs added. But the overall number of jobs added was brought down by the decline in government sector jobs.

CALCULATION: 2011 Lost 14,000 or is it 17,000?

And that's one reason why Michigan's economic recovery hasn't been as robust as downturns past. 'It's been brought down because government jobs are declining,' economist George Fulton.

That trend is set to continue in the future. Private sector jobs are projected to rise by 35,300 in 2012, 35,500 in 2013 and 52,000 in 2014. But government job declines will offset growth in all three years, according to the U of M forecast, bringing the overall projected total for the state to 26,000 jobs in 2012, 28,500 jobs in 2013 and 46,800 jobs in 2014.

And Michigan's unemployment rate isn't projected to slip below 9 percent, on average, until 2014.

So while the right-wing economic argument -- that has practically become accepted as fact -- is that government doesn't create jobs, the reality is that it does. And cutting government has a real economic impact, and it's not always positive." (emphasis added)

This is the Michissippification of Michigan, plain and simple.

READER:
Poorest families hit 1,000 times harder than rich by Michigan tax changes (Rob South Feb 1, 2012) and Report: Tax Changes Hit Low-Income Families the Hardest (MLHS Feb 2012)

See Also: Michigan Republicans say Taxes are a Sin. But Taxing the Poor to Prop Up, Bail Out, Corporate Cronies Isn't?  -- Discover Michissippi’s (Michigan's) Corporate Bosses: The Elites Who Now Run Snyder & the GOP Super Majority Legislature  -- The Free Fire Kill Zone: Snyder’s War on Michigan’s Real People

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Rick Snyder’s Relentless Positive Action (RPA) Has Devolved Into Pitiless Regressive Aggression & Trespass (PRAT)

Rick Snyder has untiringly attempted to put a "positively" false face on his complete failure to bring any semblance of REAL positive action to Michigan:

- No Jobs / High Unemployment

- Crushing New Taxes / "Business Buddy" Bailouts

- Un-conscionable Attacks on Public Ed & Teachers

The Word Twister's Work Exposed:

"He who dictates and formulates the words and phrases we use, he who is master of the press and radio, is master of the mind. Repeat mechanically your assumptions and suggestions, diminish the opportunity for communicating dissent and opposition. This is the formula for political conditioning of the masses." 

-- Joost Meerloo

The Nerd hopes he can continue to DECEPTIVELY TWIST the frame that displays his tenure and strives to succeed with clever word-play BELYING THE ACTUAL TRUTH, THE FACTS concerning his runaway, destructive administration.

More on Rick Snyder in the Gazette.

Original.

Absolute Michissippi : All Business/Profit All The Time

Absolute, peat tinged 18 yr old Scotch Whiskey, and Cuban Cigars...

It's all Celebrations on elite, remote Mackinac Island this coming week for the "business bail out" victors. Gov. Snyder will arrive with the Brinks horse drawn lorries laden down with nearly $3 billion in booty, a neatly gift wrapped taxpayer bailout bundle, to be laid dutifully into the hands of his biggest backers and contributors.
Business trumps the little guy once again.

A huge new tax is forced on the seniors and elderly, cuts to the tune of hundred of millions to public schools serving our children, heartless cuts to the unemployed by removal of a quarter of their access to unemployment benefits, the imposition of new and more draconian powers to the Emergency Finance Managers, and many other detrimental steps in the Nerd Herd's downward spiral of quality of life now being inflicted on the ordinary family and the workers here in Rick's Michassippi.

Served by smartly dressed Jamaicans and sporting designer polo shirts, the kings and princes of Michissippian business elite will prowl the green, green grass of the manicured greens at the Grand Hotel, howling with glee and fattened with assurance of a nearly 3 billion bailout for their bottomlines in the Snyder Budget for the next 2 years.

It's the Michigan Chamber of Commerce on parade on the island. We won! We Won! At long last, we've reeked revenge on our perennial political opponents and have now we've spoils of this battle all to ourselves. Snyder and crew have just fattened the pot, swilled the trough, and stoked the pokey for business-at the huge expense of the common man and woman here in Snyder's re-invention, Michissippi.

But there is more to the story. This windfall, product of pure partisan blitz-legislation, has a viper's sting in its very soul. Huge new taxes were raised. Many, who had pledged to Grover Norquest et. al. never to raise "new taxes," are trying to hide behind their political-speak Speedos the fact that (what they would love to see stick in the minds of voters was a "tax shift" is), will always be, a humungous new "tax hike." Got that, A HUGE NEW TAX HIKE. Inevitably, the naked truth is out.

Across the state names are being outted: Republicans, both Senators and House members, are showing up on recall lists. Who's sponsoring these recalls? The True Believers. The rock-ribbed Tea Party advocates, who are purists and determined to see that these who betrayed the cause of lower taxes, smaller government, and more local control pay the ultimate political price-a ignominious defeat, recall from office!

Puff, Sip and Swill-on Chamberites. Your victory party is soon over. Look sharp for the proverbial handwriting on the wall. You've won, but at an incalculable, exacting cost.  

Original Post.

Make My School A Prison: An important letter from Snyder’s trash bin

"Please provide for my students in my school district the same way we provide for a prisoner. It's the least we can do to prepare our students for the future."

The following is the content of a letter sent to Gov. Rick Snyder concerning the negative impact of Michissippian TeaPubulican cuts in per student funding as per the Snyder Budget.

Dear Governor Snyder,

In these tough economic times, schools are hurting. And yes, everyone in Michigan is hurting right now financially, but why aren't we protecting schools? Schools are the one place on Earth that people look to "fix" what is wrong with society by educating our youth and preparing them to take on the issues that society has created.

One solution I believe we must do is take a look at our corrections system in Michigan. We rank nationally at the top in the number of people we incarcerate. We also spend the most money per prisoner annually than any other state in the union. Now, I like to be at the top of lists, but this is one ranking that I don't believe Michigan wants to be on top of.

Consider the life of a Michigan prisoner. They get three square meals a day. Access to free health care. Internet. Cable television. Access to a library. A weight room. Computer lab. They can earn a degree. A roof over their heads. Clothing. Everything we just listed we DO NOT provide to our school children.

This is why I'm proposing to make my school a prison. The State of Michigan spends annually somewhere between $30,000 and $40,000 per prisoner, yet we are struggling to provide schools with $7,000 per student. I guess we need to treat our students like they are prisoners, with equal funding. Please give my students three meals a day. Please give my children access to free health care. Please provide my school district Internet access and computers. Please put books in my library. Please give my students a weight room so we can be big and strong. We provide all of these things to prisoners because they have constitutional rights. What about the rights of youth, our future?!

Please provide for my students in my school district the same way we provide for a prisoner. It's the least we can do to prepare our students for the future...by giving our schools the resources necessary to keep our students OUT of prison.

Respectfully submitted,
Nathan Bootz
Superintendent
Ithaca Public Schools

Original Post.

Rick the Trick Behind the Stick

There is a snide mistruth that underlies the concept of Snyder reversing the state's exemption of pensions from state income taxation.

The concept is the oft used mantra of the Tea Party as applied here: Whose money is it? . To wit: "It's our money." Now Snyder and Engler-holdovers and that political corporatist chameleon, Andy Dillon have put forth the new BIG GOVERNMENT KNOWS BEST redefinition into the mix; "The retirement pensions are OUR MONEY and WE MAY TAKE OUT OF IT WHAT WE WANT because we are the judges of "fairness."

What about Snyder's oft repeated assertion that he's the arbiter of total "FAIRNESS" for all.
Snyder's over 300% tax increase on seniors s not about fairness.

It's about securing the state's largest shift of seniors' personal money to corporations in the history of Michigan. If the people of Michigan allow this MONEY GRAB will it will indeed be "unfair" to the corporate contributors to Snyder and his cronies? Though you may agree with Tricky Rick that it would be simple and efficent.


SNYDER CLAIMS TO HAVE A BIG SOFT SPOT IN HIS HEART FOR POOR SENIOR CITIZENS, YET BEWARE !

If some folks, for elective reasons or out of tough economic circumstances, or other necessity (supporting grown children in financial difficulty) are still at work in places like Wal-mart or McDonald's past normal retirement age, we the BUREAUCRATS OF LANSING now proclaim that unfortunate condition, if out of necessity, is so tragic that we must FORCEFULLY LEVEL THE PAYING FIELD by instituting a whopping new 300% tax increase on those seniors with earned the right to it, and/or were promised delayed compensation/pensions as part of the condition of their willingness to render services.

So ill-prepared and under-calculated is Snyder's scheme that Rick's beancounters ignored and/or overlooked the fact that SOME SENIORS HAVE NO SOCIAL SECURITY AND DEPEND STRICTLY ON LIMITED PENSION FUNDS FOR THEIR LIVING, DRUGS AND MEDICAL CARE, AS WELL AS OTHER LIVING EXPENSES.

Gov. Snyder admited this omission; and promised earlier this week, during a statewide telephone-townmeeting, (held seeking public input and pressure on the legislature to pass his budget package) that he would look into that omitted class of pensioners' dilemma.

The corporate-serving Snyder Team would have us believe that removing $900 million in pension funds piped directly into the business community's cash flow is good for Michigan. NOT SO, NOT SO AT ALL!

Those lost pension dollars pulled from the economy equal a huge loss in broadly spread business opportunity and employment in Michigan. Keeping this money in circulation is now more important than ever, it's ceertainly a big part of the state's service sector.

PAY CLOSE ATTENTION: Every pension dollar in Michigan's pensioner hands spent on goods and services produces $6.49 in economic activity in commerce and business. 

How important are pensions to the Michigan Economy. According to the National Institute on Retirement Security: Michigan's "state and local pensions also supported more than 45,000 jobs that paid nearly $3 billion in wages and salaries, nearly $7 billion in total economic output, and nearly $970 million in federal and local tax revenues."

THAT FOLKS IS A REAL CHUNK OF CHANGE !

Cutting into Michigan's retiree pension revenue by $900 million (to fund a corporate tax break) as Rick Snyder has demanded) could result in a stunning loss of economic activity in Michigan in the range of tens of billions of dollars!

Who best knows how to spend their own money: Retirees on limited/capped incomes or BIG GOVERNMENT out of Lansing; Rick Snyder's intent on funneling this LEGISLATED BILLION PLUS WINDFALL to favored business interests?

GOP State Senator Brandenburg (the Harrison Township Republican who chairs the Senate Finance Committee) said of Snyder: "I want to work with him, I do, but I can't because he (Gov. Snyder) has a $900 million money grab in there, and there's no guarantee that the tax cuts for businesses will generate a lot more jobs."

News reports reveal: "The governor acknowledged that levying the standard income tax on retirement income has very little support among fellow Republicans in the House and Senate."

Perhaps being a beancounter and "one Tough Nerd" leaves one out of the realities of the real world. The Michigan Views Daniel Howes column touched on the heart of Snyder's problem in this regard: Snyder may be a University of Michigan Wunderkind-turned-CEO-turned venture capitalist and he may be a trained accountant, but it's increasingly clear he skipped the communications classes that turn business executives and politicians into their own kind of rock star."

However, again, to frame Howes' phrasing, there are thousands of Michiganders who are out-of-step with this Tough Nerd: "...And they each have their own version of what fresh kind of hell Snyder's Michigan would visit on everything from schools and city halls to economic development and the environment."

It will take more than some "factual concoction of dashboard indicators," using campaign-speak to get the citizens of this state back on the track. "Fairness (as any seasoned union or management bargainer could tell you) is in the eye of the beholder," opines Howes.

"FAIR" for Rick is largely slanted toward his predisposition to favor business and money over people and children's well-being. Nothing fair there! Just the fact that Snyder would turn over 800,000 poor into the vacant space of neglect is stone-cold.

Now, regrettably Snyder is now so far mired the muck of political misrepresentation and mendacity concerning the underlying reasons for his programs and his involvement with the urber-corporate/Koch Brothers/Mackinac Center's "legislative force-feeding of Lansing Tea-Publicans via A.L.E.C. that it may not be possible for him to successfully lead the state.

Rick is way behind the stick.


Original Post.

Nerdonomics Equals Fairness? Duh! Kid’s & Working Families: the Retired Elderly Get Clobbered With Both Cuts & Higher Taxes

Who's Piggy Bank Gets Bashed?

Our Children, ordinary working taxpayers, certainly the elderly-especially pensioners; and oh yes; all those teapartians who brought this on us and themselves; We will ALL get hurt, but NOT business.

What In God's Name Is The Nerd Thinking? 

Low and moderate-income households and families lose the Michigan Earned Income Tax Credit, seniors lose part of the homestead property tax credit and MANY WILL BE COERCED to pay taxes on what is often a meager pension: many struggling parents who will lose the $600 per child state income tax deduction.
My God, pray how can this be?

Adding salt to the open wounds: THE STUNNER - TAX INCREASES WON'T OFFSET THE "BUSINESS FIRST"-NERDONOMIC REVENUE CUTS.

SHORT FALLS PUSH A HEAD UNABATED: THAT'S $1.4 BILLION IN CUTS DESPITE A $1.7 BILLION INCREASE IN INCOME TAXES.

Check the Facts Here 
The consequences of irresponsible Snyder Budget Proposals and cuts (expanded below) are liberally drawn and expanded from the work of Senior Policy Analyst Joanne Bump, who has worked in Michigan state government for over 30 years including 9 years with the Office of Revenue and Tax Analysis coordinating the Michigan Tax Expenditure Report, the Economic Report of the Governor and the Michigan Economic Review and Outlook. She's a degreed expert in these areas.


1.) Schools are legislatively shorted $470 per pupil cut, thus robbing children of educational opportunities. This while the competing private, for-profit, Republican favored "Faux Public" academies. It would lift the present legislated "cap" on further expansion. Once lifted more tax-eating storefront and quasi-religious operators are loosed to take in millions more scarce public tax moneys with no direct public control or taxpayer accountability.

Nuts? You Bet.

2.) Universities take a meat cleaver chop at 15%, with a direct impact on students attending; hardships inflicted by Teapartisans in multiple ways; those who are on very limited allowances or work/study regimens are thrown off food coupons.

Skinflint? It's a direct blow; the way to far less graduates, fewer high-skilled/professional new hires.


3.) Local revenue sharing that helps pay for local services will be CUT AND CASH STARVED; THEN POTENTIALLY SUBJECT TO THE WHIP BY PLUNKETT & COONEY'S SUITED LEGAL HOUNDS (should their unit run short on revenue)and also to be ORDERED ABOUT BY THE SHADY ANDY DILLON top-down. Local officials caught in this bind HAVE A CHOICE: they can resign now; in full anticipation of the coming impact or face the possibility of being attacked and DISENFRANCHISED FROM ELECTIVE OFFICE FOR YEARS TO COME; if their units come under "financial emergency" provisions control is out of local hands. The State takes over!

Threats to Take Over Local Units Are In H.B.4215, 2011

Is such force pro-active, the right way to recovery and bring future harmony between Lansing and the locals? NO!

IT'S A BRUTAL TEAPUBLICAN DEVISED SYSTEM OF PLANNED FAILURE, AND POLITICAL USURPATION THAT TARGETS AND UNDERMINES LOCAL CONTROL. Heads up: this situation is totally without precedent in our state's heritage and despoils our former high honor; we diligently maintained LOCAL control-where neighbors know best how to allocate and expend their tax dollars-for all the past years.

Do you find this all hard to believe?

Call your state officials or the backroom bosses at the Mackinac Center in Lansing; check this out. Ask a Teapartiasn how this can be.

4.) 12,600 of the state's poorest families MANY WITH NEWBORNS OR CHILDREN will lose what little public assistance grants they receive; Will they even survive (if at all) with out private charity? All this suffering comes at a time when jobs continue to be scarce, unemployment at very high levels.

Will there be heartbreaking consequences for an est. 14,000 additional children pushed into poverty? Wait for the 2013 and following for heart-rendering, Dickensian TV news stories to find out.

The sad, sad tag line:
All of this in Snyder's very first days as a political apprentice in a statesman's office. Snyder presses on goaded by the undermining pol trio of Gingrich, Engler, and Norquist; Knowing the state is not agreeing with him. Because, when polled, voters have three times (by upwards of 3 to 1) favored increased taxes to cover the revenue shortfall in the present state structure.

And voters again, most recently, made it clear that they the "voters do not favor this titanic shift from businesses to working families by ending the Michigan EITC."

Are you listening Rick.? Are you listening? WHAT WILL IT TAKE TO MAKE YOU LISTEN?

Original Post.

When Is Totally Insane Nerdonomics Not Totally Bonkers, Way Beyond Crazy?

Nerdonomics: Gov. Rick Snyder's wide-ranging proposals have made it shockingly evident what's at risk for citizens of this state. 

Many services and essential state functions are dangerously at stake here in Michigan.

Truth be told: Businesses will realize more than a HUMONGOUS 80% DECREASE IN TAXES.

Nerdonomics demands, not a reasonable 10 percent cut, not a generous 20 percent or even half 50% cut; nor does it call for a temporary cuts to tide the state over (WWMD-What Would Milliken Do)"but a FULL 82 PERCENT DROP IN BUSINESS TAXES.

Michigan's Business Tax now generates $2.1 billion in revenue to help pay for vital services such as education, help for abused kids, and public safety, etc. as business' share of civic responsibility.

Under NERDONOMICS THAT WILL PLUMMET to $392 MILLIONS IN FY 2013; first full year of the tax changes are in effect. House Fiscal Agency Director Mitch Bean this week used a different base in his accounting to compute an EVEN BIGGER DROP - 86 PERCENT.

THIS WILL OCCUR AT THE EXACT SAME TIME PERSONAL INCOME TAXES WILL CLIMB A WHOPPING 31 PERCENT. That will not be shared equally. In fact those at the high end of the economic ladder (THE VERY WELL OFF, THE ECONOMIC ELITES, MANY OF WHOM WILL HAVE ALSO SEEN THEIR BUSINESSES SKIM UP TO AN 86 % GIVE BACK FROM NERDOMOMICS) will see the biggest TAX REDUCTION WINDFALL as the income tax rate shrinks from 4.35 percent to 4.25 percent.


Original Post.

Gov Rick Snyder Budget Robs Corner Grocery & Stiffs Local Health Care

Snyder Tax Cuts Kill Jobs & Undermine Michigan's struggling economy!

Wrote a Michigan political observer:

"Most thinking adults understand that public spending in a mixed economy does drive economic activity. Unthinking adults instead yell and shout and demand that public institutions be torn down as a symbol of all that is evil in the world."

When applied to Michigan; this fact portends a very real negative impact. Public workers do vital work; firefighters put their lives on the line for victims of house fires. Police race to save the lives of crime victims. Corrections officers keep felons in line who sometimes attempt to kill or abuse them with unspeakable acts of subhuman abomination. School teachers do their sacred work. And there are many more services and skills included in the public sector services we all enjoy.

All these individuals, professionals, contribute to the "greater good;" their incomes purchase goods and services in the local communities, where they reside all across our state. Those benefits state and public workers receive support dentists and hospitals; doctors and medical technicians in hospitals; and accrue to balance the books helping offsetting those who have no provisions for health insurance (who cannot & do not pay), thus supporting the financial well-being of medical and health care in the farthest reaches of the state and across the U.P.

Cut Off Your Nose to Spite Your Face The selfish wish of business and such grudging propaganda mills as The Mackinac Center (now organically close-knit to the Detroit News on its new "The Michigan View") have ridden a decades' long bitter campaign to take huge bite out of public sector employees, appealing to the baser greed of some (Teapartisans) who join the anti-civil curmudgeon (in dutiful service to the greedy selfish elites) Grover Norquist; who would crudely drown the public's necessary government-shrunken down into a bathtub of red ink.

Rick Snyder's cuts in public compensation will result directly in hundreds of millions of fewer dollars making the all important revenue cycle that local salaries and benefits provide in vital support of a "needy" Michigan consumer economy. 
__________________

Business-headed, bean-counter Rick Snyder sees his role as demanding taxpayers "gift" his business buddies with hundreds of millions, while he insists on "takings" from your neighbors who are in daily and often dangerous service to you and your children.

Small business people, who are organized in the commercial sector "union" we know as the Chamber of Commerce, are wrongheaded in seeking "enrichment" from Gov. Snyder and their "new commercial sector zealots" in the hostile and aggressive Teapartiasn majorities domineering in both the Michigan House and Senate. These "newbees" are seeking to go too far.

Teapublicans are ginned up by Newt Gingirch, darling of the hardcore ideologues, who frequently visits Michigan and who has used his wily skills to cuckold the National Republican Governor's Association into a "do or die" war with the providers of our vital services all across America.

Pray for our country. Delusion and confusion are the enemies of our future. Resist those who want to profit from massive regression and risk the real threat of a 21st Century Great Depression.

Right now unspeakable social tragedy can happen if Norquist and Gingrich prevail in their rampage & false leadership; calling out to find a slavish following in the nations' many State Houses. 

Let Michigan beware!


Original Post.

Snyder Picks & Chooses: Business wins, Retirees Lose

Highly unfair, not-so simple, highly inefficient corporate-style Snyder tax plan goes for the low hanging fruit.

Those communities that have cultured a highly attractive retirement setting, cultural events, great health care, transportation, high grade housing and custodial care/end of life care (were needed), supplied with supporting volunteers and places of worship: these places in Michigan (which surprisingly, in spite of harsh winters, attract numbers of former professionals and retirees many from other states) continue to flourish. Such Michigan retirement locations are at high risk under Rick Snyder's plan to tax public and private pension income. The state income exemption is a key reason sernors chose to stay in Michigan or come from other "pension taxing" locations. This vast source of personal resources, vital to Michigan's economy and healthcare facilities will be shipping out, others are busy cancelling plans to come to Michigan. All no thanks to Snyder's giant tax mistake.

Prudent seniors invest and, if they can, secure at a minimum, in these highly volatile times, a steady, predictable 5% return on their life savings and /or have a pension-based stipend based on decades of loyal and quality public service they must protect. They now face a battery of distinct cuts (cultural programs, libraries, etc.) and new tax increases. The harshest "hit"; Snyder's new pension tax of 4.25%.

Snyder's bifurcated remarks on Channel 7, Detroit Feb. 18th reflect his callous disregard for the prudence, planning ahead, and careful husbandry of personal resources by seniors. These are citizens who have no intention to be a burden to society in their maturity.

Rick Snyder calls them out, making them "losers" saying because they have these savings and have planned well, he has political provocation to see their promised exemption cut off. Those seniors who did not save, could have laid aside, but didn't; those who didn't render public service as a policeman, fireman, judge, or teacher; must pay Michigan income taxes while they must continue to work.

Snyder insists: Pensioners should have their exemption rescinded, to be fair to those without pensions. Snyder is pitting one group of seniors against another.

Snyder fanes to "feel the pain" of those seniors who are still working past normal retirement pay and continue to pay Michigan income taxes on the pittance they earn......that's nonsense. The pensioners are being put in a highly unfair position-Snyder chooses to make them LOSERS in his scheme.

Snyder's million dollar quote to Channel 7, 2/18/11, "I still DON'T WANT TO MINIMIZE" (my new $900 million tax on pensioners is a financial "hit") "It is a burden on people."

AARP calls it: "War on the elderly."

From the Snyder Interview:

Snyder: its typically Senior couple, if they have the average SS, average homestead (have) exemption, they would be making more than over $40K before they pay a dollar of MI income tax. Which again, I still DON'T WANT TO MINIMIZE ( "It is a burden on people.") but the other part we have to remember is, not all seniors have a pension. And if you look at the future trends, a lot fewer people are going to have pensions, and those people who are still working after they become a senior. They are paying income the Michigan tax today so you have a real equity question between the people who worked hard and are fortunate enough to have a pension....(and those who don't have one.)

Egalitarianism is not the "real" Snyder goal, except for as he argues for his pro-tax the pension plan: Tax "Haves" and acknowledge the "no-pension Have-Nots" are still working and paying taxes but do nothing to elevate that burden on them.

In Snyder's increase sales pitch he's off the Tea Party line of defense; "NO NEW TAXES"; leastwise he also upsets the Neo-Libertarian Detroit/MacCen News that despises the thought of "total equality."
How could this paper allow new taxes by whose are advocates coercing "losers"(pensioned seniors) to bear the budget burden, while allowing the less fortunate senior "winners" to go on working and paying and not provide a state income exemption for them move ahead with such a flawed plan?

With the bulk of the make-up to cover an over-generous business tax give-away placed on the seniors and public servants, where's the statewide "shared sacrifice" so touted by Snyder? The "fairness?


Original Post.

Will Calabrese Clarify His Boast: Snyder Told the “Cold, Hard Truth” About Raising $900 Million in New Taxes From Michigan Pensioners

Response to Dan Calabrese Op-Ed “Rick Snyder: Leadership is found in thestatehouse, if not in the White House” in the Northern Star National on February 18th, 2011

Calabrese doesn't believe that he's misrepresenting Rick Snyder when he says in his recent column: Snyder is "Leading!" by the means of his honesty. "We have not had governors willing to do what Snyder did yesterday, which was to deal with cold, hard facts and tell the people of the state the cold, hard truth about where we are and where we need to go."

Dan genuinely values "the cold, hard truth."

So we ask:
Our Response (in the following parody dialog with Dan): Dan, let's see if you understand the basic facts of Snyder's budget proposal. Did Rick Snyder propose a new tax on anyone in Michigan? A simple "yes" or "no" is sufficient.

Dan: ...(Snyder) told the truth.

Our Response: Is that a "yes"

Dan: ...that's a "yes."

Our Response: Let me refresh your memory.

Here's the exact verbatim answer Snyder gave veteran reporter Tim Skubick, on FOX 2, Detroit, right after Snyder left the Senate Committee Room; having just presented his proposed budget to the state:

Skubick's Question: Some people are going to pay more to the state...Aren't they?
Snyder dodges the question: We are decreasing revenues this is not a net tax increase. When you look at all the numbers.
[Skubick stays on his question: Some people will pay more!]
(Again evasive and un-answering to Skubick's direct question concerning his proposed huge new tax increase.)
Snyder: But it's really based on the premise of a net tax decrease...
Skubick: Your pension tax is very controversial (it) raises $900m. Is that number correct?
Snyder: It's not a pension tax. It is actually removing a tax expenditure. We are actually reducing your tax rate. Our individual rate tax rate... [Skubick breaks in, still dead-on for an honest Snyder answer]
Skubick: It raises $900m? Correct?
Snyder: It generates $900m in revenue.

Our Response: Dan, there you have an honest answer given after an honest inquiry about the facts and following a lot of evasiveness and double talk from Snyder.

Snyder is raising taxes on pensioners by 9 tenths of a billion dollars and concurrently removing that amount, and more, from select businesses supporters in the state.

The "Leader" in Snyder said on the campaign trail repeatedly and very clearly to his audiences all across the state including pensioners: "My objective is not to raise revenue in the budget."

Our Response: "What part of "no new taxes" does Snyder's post-election budget proposal keep? Did he keep his pre-election promise not to "raise new revenue"? Did Snyder tell the truth about his new taxes?

Dan: If that's what Snyder's doing...could I have a moment to think over my answer?

Our Response: Take all the time you need, Dan. We all know how much you value moral absolutes like the "truth."
 
Original Post.

2/17 (February 17, 2011) will live on in Michigan History as a very dark day: The Day Gov. Snyder Robbed Kids & Grandparents

"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.

Gov. Snyder gets beaned by the Mackinac Hardball Meanies

Snyder Budget Score Card Results

No surprises here. Hands Down: "Mac Mean" wins over "Thoughtful/Independent Nerd" 11 to 0- NOTHING !

Listed below are the items projected as possible Mackinac Center demands acquiesced to by Gov. Snyder and Snyder's actual list of "budget bombs":

1.) Mackinac Center Demand: Eliminate the Michigan Business Tax- replace the money it raises with cuts in government spending. Snyder's Budget Bomb Sez: - Eliminates the Michigan Business Tax and replaces it with a flat 6 percent corporate income tax on major corporations.
2.) Mackinac Center Demand :Pass Right-to-Work legislation. There may be no greater single economic development policy that Michigan could adopt.
Snyder Budget Bomb Sez:- Let's see what the Republican Majorities in the Legislature can enact as a way to bring down costs - Some things are being held for the second half of this legislative session.
3.) Mackinac Center Demand Rein in the Department of Environmental Quality. (Maintaining Michigan's high standards, means businesses) "won't be doing business or creating jobs in Michigan, period. It's a 100 percent tax rate:"
Snyder Budget Bomber Sez: Eliminate the dairy farm inspection program in the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development.
4.) Mackinac Center Demand: (Stop) the state promising millions of dollars in targeted tax credits or subsidies to "slick operators in sexy industries" who promise to "create" jobs.
Snyder's Budget Bomb Sez: - Eliminates business credits awarded for films, brownfield redevelopment, the Michigan Economic Growth Authority, etc., although current commitments will be honored. Sets aside $25 million for film credits from the 21st Century Jobs Fund. Cuts future credits for: battery tech & production, Green Energy including wind generation, and similar fields as these credits expire
5.) Mackinac Center Demand: Bring public sector employment benefits in line with the private sector (Using the tools honed and revised by MacCen as to that "private sector" benchmark is.):
Snyder Budget Bomb Sez: - Mandate a cut of up to $180 million from state employees through higher health care premiums and other changes. This matter is referred to the Republican controlled Legislature for immediate action.
6.) Mackinac Center Demand: Make public pay equal to "private" pay: Michigan Public vs. Private "hourly" compensation:
Snyder Budget Bomb Sez: - The "emergency" powers in proposed legislation now being fast tracked will handle this problem, schools and governmental units will be coerced into compliance with sharp reductions, or face State dictatorial take-overs.
7.) Mackinac Center Demand: Resend Gov. George Romney's signing of the Michigan Public Employment Relations Act, eliminate collective bargaining for public employees:
Snyder Budget Sez: - Let's see what the legislature will do with H.B. 4215 and its provisions in this regard
8.) Mackinac Center Demand: Cut state government work force:
Snyder's Budget Bomb Sez: - Eliminates 300 field worker positions in the Department of Human Services. And - Closes the Shawono Center in Grayling, and cuts 20 beds in capacity at the Maxey Training School in Whitmore Lake- Reduces the number of Michigan State Police posts
9.) Mackinac Center Demand: Change state revenue-sharing formula:
Snyder's budget bomb Sez: - Eliminate statutory revenue sharing payments for cities, villages and townships in FY 2012 The change impacts 509 local units of government with cuts totaling $92.1 million. Snyder will force villages and townships t to comply with tough teapartisan rigid standards or face penalties.
10.) Mackinac Center Demand: Let private firms run some prisons:
Snyder's Budget Bomb Sez: - Close one prison to be named later this year and privatize food service and prison stores operations in Michigan prisons, then throw in downgrading resident care aide services at the Grand Rapids Veterans' Home with competitively bid workers.
11.) Mackinac Center Demand: Eliminate the earned income credit:
Snyder's Budget Bomb Sez: - Eliminate the state Earned Income Tax Credit for low-income workers and take back welfare benefits and support altogether after 48 months.
12.) Mackinac Center Demand: Allowing for income tax exemptions for government retirement benefits, including pensions and proposed extension of those exemptions to private sector pensions is "unfair" as viewed by LaFaive.

Snyder's Budget Bomb: - Eliminates the state income tax exemption for pensions, Social Security benefits will continue to be exempt.

Score Card Results: The Beanie Nerd's Independence & New Re-Inventive Agenda - 0
The Mackinac Center "Meanies" -11 That's a trouncing @ (11 for 11)


Hands Down: "Mac Mean" wins over "Thoughtful/Independent/CEO Nerd."


It's very clear Rick "The Nerd" Snyder needs to learn how to play political "hardball" before he goes up to bat again !

Original Post.

Who guessed Snyder & TeaPublicans would brazenly put Michigan into further Depression

The "big" budget crisis in Michigan is not at all what it appears. It's capitalize on hard times, take maximum partisan advantage. There's a concerted effort across many states to achieve certain long-sought goals of the far right: Union Busting, elimination of public employee benefits & pensions, cut & shift the tax burden to ordinary people, cut welfare and unemployment, and unbridled attacks on public schools & more. Michigan has had budget deficits in the range of this one before, but never has it been mishandled as it is now! Michigan is being cut down, to achieve certain selfish objectives.

There's "big" trouble alright, it's a "big manufactured" crisis; hype piggybacked on the national crisis brought on by George W. Bush and cohorts-who singlehandedly brought down to near ruin this nation financially. TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS were ruthlessly harvested from working folk. And today much of THE LOOT sits on the sidelines UNAVAILABLE navailable to small businesses who desperately need it.

To do the kind of "blitz" legislation that is found in the current rush to pass House Bill 4215 (which literally disenfranchises communities governments and schools, puts in place DICTATORIAL CONTROL and throws out the vote of the people) and passes it on to the governor has another purpose. It's dirty politics: Revenge and Reprisals.

When the full scope of the Draconian "Cuts only" budget are announced by Rick Snyder, many of the Tea Party supporters want to know that there is in place (passage of H.B. 4215) A STRONG MECHANISM TO PICK UP THE PIECES WHEN DOZENS OF SCHOOL DISTRICTS & LOCAL UNITS OF GOVERNMENT " WHICH WILL GO UNDER DUE TO SNYDER'S DRASTIC & UNPRECEDENTED CUTS having their direct debt-creating effect: A 33% cut in revenue sharing, with a harsh punishment factor to undercut pensions and benefits in units affected.

Raising taxes, if only for a short period, to get out of the state's crisis will look more than golden compared to the slaughter house/meat axe Snyder is about to apply across our state.

In the enumeration of the communities mentioned in the details of H.B. 4215 (now being steamrolled through the legislature on party-line votes) one finds these targeted "financial failures" are mainly minority/Black communities, some would say "who cares?" That's as it stands today. However, under the proposed legislation's sweeping new powers vested in Snyder Regime's complete control, by way of managers and "firms" appointed under Andy Dillon, could be bring down many other locations-both rural and urban. The axe will fall on many shocked and unsuspecting units.

Time to have more input concerning H.B. 4215 is desperately needed. The rush is the "bums rush" to mickey the public out of the entire process and achieve a Quickie: A huge partisan victory for those who ultimately favor "bankruptcy" for states.

How historically dangerous are these Know-Nothings; servants to Grover Norquist? And really who is Citizen Norquist that he should have command of our America?

Original Post.

Gov. Snyder: Stand & Deliver Your Budget Cuts LIVE & IN PERSON

Commentary on Gov Rick Snyder State of the State and Michigan Budget Cuts.

Let the Governor make his announcement of "bomb" like impact on TV, live. Let us see how much he shares in the grief and pain he is delivering to people of this state. This man who has skipped out on debates and has hidden his intentions quite nicely until now needs to be seen delivering the "pain and suffering" in person. We need to search his face and see his eyes, is he with us or is he somewhere up there over us doing what corporate bosses do all the time, handing down the edicts and the hardships and then driving off to cocktails and after glow with Neo-Engleresque advisers.

Snyder must follow his live announcement with a lengthy news conference, so that the public, who can not be there to receive Snyder's "destruction of the state message" and immediately respond, can at least read about it in greater detail the next day, or see on the 11 pm news an accounting for this historic infliction of unprecedented "pain."

Everyone should be allowed to look very, very closely at that gallery populated by the Mackinac Center operatives and be ready to see if any of their "sacred hogs" are cut or slaughtered by the cutting of the Snyder Team. If the Mackinac Center is high-five-ing that's a very negative signal. These "budget hawks" are driven not by the fear of those who elected Rick, but are totally beholden to those aggressive Corporate interests who "own them".

MacCen is in league with those TeaPublican Legislators who strode into Lansing full of rage and revenge against parts of government and society they dislike and now are bullheadedly pushing citizens out of the People's House, the state capitol; hardhearted pols locking out many: elderly, poor, unemployed, into that cold night.

Original Post.