Jack Lessenberry

This has been a bad year for Matty Moroun, the billionaire owner of the Ambassador Bridge. In January, he was thrown in jail overnight, for failing to comply with court orders to live up to an agreement he’d signed to finish a road project near his bridge.

There’s no doubt that the Michigan labor movement badly blundered by spending millions in its failed effort to get a constitutional amendment protecting collective bargaining on the ballot this year. The amendment went down to a stunning defeat.

Worse, as could have been predicted, the labor movement’s enemies in the legislature are now calling for the enactment of a so-called right to work law, which would outlaw the union shop.

On Weekend Edition,  Rina Miller talks with Michigan Radio's political analyst Jack Lessenberry about some of the biggest news stories of the week. This week they discuss election turn out, how marijuana laws have been eased in some cities in the state, and the possible change to how public defense attorneys are appointed in Michigan.

Matt Robb is a 27-year-old from the Leelanau Peninsula, who believes in trying to make this a better world. He was a golf star at Michigan State University, but instead of turning pro, chose to become a high school teacher. After a few years in charter schools, he is now a teacher at Cody High School in Detroit.

On election night, at the precise moment Mitt Romney was making his concession speech, a man wearing a ski mask and a long coat approached Matt’s truck parked in his apartment’s garage.

He took out a can of spray paint and wrote the N word on his truck, followed by the word “lover.”  He was captured by a security camera, writing these two words over and over.

I really don’t envy anybody, with the possible exception of my dog, who is going to spend his day napping while I run around Detroit. But part of me would like to be David Curson for the next few weeks.  Dave just got himself unexpectedly elected to Congress.