Jack Lessenberry

The newspapers are full of stories about Kwame Kilpatrick’s conviction today. That makes sense. This is a major story. Never has a former Detroit mayor been convicted of so many felonies on so many charges, though he is not the first or even the second to end up in jail.

But what doesn’t make sense is the media’s continuing obsession with him. When Kilpatrick resigned his office in disgrace, George Bush was still president, Jennifer Granholm was still governor, and the auto bailout hadn’t yet happened. That was nearly five years ago.

More than three years ago, Mayor Dave Bing told me that he had a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach every time Kilpatrick was back in the newspapers. Every reminder of Kwame’s existence made his job that much harder. Yet every time Kwame moved, it seemed to be front-page news. His seemingly interminable trial went on for months.

About 15 years ago, someone told me that a man who was Billie Holiday’s alter ego, and had ghostwritten her classic memoir turned movie, “Lady Sings the Blues,”  was living in a little blue house in the Detroit area. That sounded interesting, so I went to see him.

His name was Bill Dufty, and I found out that not only was all that true, he also turned out to be the last husband of Gloria Swanson, the silent film star. What’s more, virtually nobody in the media knew about him. The Dalai Lama knew him, and so did Yoko Ono. But the media did not. His life was worth a book of its own.

Why did nobody know this fascinating man was in Detroit? Well, it‘s largely because as hard as we try to pretend otherwise, the news media are, in large part, stenographers for society’s institutions. Unless you run for office, commit a crime, get dragged into court, put on a concert or do something to call attention to yourself, you may never end up being “covered” in the news media.

I’ve spent most of my life in the Detroit area, and know there are countless other fascinating people beneath the radar. That’s why I wasn’t shocked by the Oscar-winning movie, “Searching for Sugarman.”

Each Saturday, Rina Miller and Jack Lessenberry look at some of the top regional news stories of the week.

Carl Levin won't run for re-election

We got a political bombshell this week when U.S. Senator Carl Levin (D-MI) said he won't run for re-election next year. But Lessenberry says this wasn't entirely unexpected. He expects a lot of people to run for Levin's seat including Congressman Gary Peters and Congressman Mike Rodgers.

Detroit prepares for an emergency manager

The Detroit City Council says "not so fast" when it comes to the governor’s appointment of an emergency manager. Mayor Bing says it's too late to resist the appointment. It's just going to happen. Lessenberry says the City Council may well appeal, but he doesn't expect the Governor to reverse his decision. "They are doing a pro-forma thing mainly for political consumption."

A challenge to Michigan's same-sex marriage ban

The discussion of same-sex marriage in Michigan was put on hold after it looked like a federal judge might make a ruling on Michigan’s constitutional amendment. Lessenberry says "no one can really fault U.S. District Judge Bernard Friedman for doing this because the U.S. Supreme Court is going to rule on a case in California on a similar law."  He says that way Friedman can craft a ruling that isn't in conflict with the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling.

Jack Lessenberry is Michigan Radio’s political analyst. He joins us Saturday mornings to review the week’s top news stories.

When I heard yesterday afternoon that Senator Carl Levin was not going to run for reelection, the first  thing that popped into my mind was a line from Macbeth.

"Nothing in his life became him like the leaving it."

That doesn’t exactly fit here, though the way in which he chose to leave the Senate was as classy as his spotless  career.

Some years ago, when the Green Party in Germany first had a chance to join a coalition government, there was a tremendous battle within the party between the purists and the pragmatists. The purists, who were nicknamed the “fundis,” felt that would be selling out. The practical politicians, called the “realos,” thought that by joining the government they could influence events and at least get some of their agenda enacted.

Bill Ballenger, who has been watching politicians in Lansing for close to half a century, had an interesting survey last week in his biweekly newsletter, Inside Michigan Politics.

He decided to find out how many members of the legislature are members of each religious denomination, something he does every few years.

What struck me as most interesting is that some people didn’t want to be pinned down as to what religion they were.

That was, he said, because some politicians prefer “to give the impression that the legislator could be affiliated with any number of faiths with whose parishioners she or he might actually worship from time to time.”

It's Wednesday, the morning we speak with Michigan Radio's Political Analyst Jack Lessenberry about what's going on in state politics. 

Governor Snyder plans to appoint an emergency financial manager to run the city of Detroit. He announced last week that a financial emergency exists in the city. Detroit City Council can challenge the decision. If it does, there will be a hearing next week on the issue, but the council is divided on what to do. Jack Lessenberry says "the odds of any appeal being successful are pretty small."

Pretty much everyone knows that our roads are in terrible shape, and need to be repaired.

However, at the same time, pretty much everyone also doesn’t want to pay to fix them.

We think somebody else should pay.

So far, Governor Rick Snyder has been the closest thing to a grownup on this issue. He reasons that those who use the roads, people otherwise known as drivers, should pay most of the cost.

That cost is pretty steep: Just to bring our existing roads back to acceptable condition will require $1.2 billion a year for at least the next ten years.

The governor proposes increasing the gas tax by nineteen cents a gallon on diesel fuel, fourteen cents on gasoline. This would be done at the wholesale level, which means the fuel companies wouldn’t necessarily have to pass them on to the consumer.

Okay, well, you’re allowed to laugh.

Snyder would also raise car registration fees by about 60 percent, and heavy truck plate charges by 25 percent.

Well, that plan seemed to bring people together: Everybody hated it.

Yesterday, when I learned that the governor would come to Detroit today to announce his decision, I felt sadness and relief.

Everyone had known for weeks this was coming. Most of the politicians, including all the current candidates for mayor, remain opposed to the idea of an emergency manager.

But all or nearly all knew this day was inevitable, and even a few of those publicly denouncing the governor’s decision must be secretly relieved. The other shoe has finally dropped.

Difficult times are coming. But at least we are going to see change in the city, drastic changes in the way business is done.

Yesterday, Governor Rick Snyder finally filled the vacancy on the Michigan Supreme Court created when disgraced Justice Diane Hathaway resigned last month, just before pleading guilty to felony bank fraud. His pick was a mild surprise; David Viviano, the young chief circuit judge in Macomb County.

Later that afternoon, I was pleasantly surprised that the governor called me to explain the process by which he made this appointment. I suspect this was because I have talked and written a lot about the Michigan Supreme Court, which didn’t have the highest reputation, even before the Hathaway scandal.

Twelve years ago, I went to talk to Geoffrey Fieger, Michigan’s most flamboyant attorney. Fieger told me he was thinking about running for mayor of Detroit, and wanted to know what I thought.

I told him I thought it was an absolutely brilliant idea with only three fatal flaws. “What do you mean?” he said. “Well, first of all, you don’t live there,” I said. Fieger told me he could buy a house anywhere. I didn’t dispute that.

But there was a second problem. I told him, you aren’t going to get elected because you aren’t black. Detroiters aren’t ready to vote for a white mayor. “You’re wrong,” Fieger said. “They love me.”

This week in Michigan politics, Christina Shockley and Jack Lessenberry discuss the idea of increasing sales taxes on services to help fund road improvements in the state, how sequestration could affect Michigan, and why a Detroit City Council meeting to discuss how to avoid a state takeover was canceled.

It’s supposed to snow tonight. I have a late meeting in downtown Detroit, and that worries me. Not because I am going to be in Detroit at night, or because I may be driving in snow. It’s because I may not be able to see the potholes going home. Years ago, I lost a wheel to one on the Lodge Freeway at midnight, and one experience like that was enough.

Governor Rick Snyder has proposed a plan to fix Michigan‘s disgracefully deteriorating roads, a plan that makes as close to sense as anything politicians ever propose.

Our roads will need a lot of investment over a long time -- at least $1.2 billion a year. The governor is proposing the fair and rational idea that the cost of fixing the roads should be paid for by the people who use them. He would raise the wholesale gas tax by 14 cents a gallon, a little more on diesel, and also raise car registration fees.

There was an epic battle last week to see who would become the next chair of the Michigan Democratic Party. In the end, longtime apparatchik Mark Brewer threw in the towel before the state convention vote, and conceded victory to Lon Johnson, a newcomer with ties to the White House.

What was most surprising is that Brewer waited so long. Every member of the party’s Congressional delegation was calling for him to go, as was the leadership of the United Auto Workers and Teamsters’ unions. It’s hard to understand how he could have hoped to function as chair with all those arrayed against him, but the job had become his life. He hung in there till it was clear to him that he didn’t have the votes to succeed.

Democrats, are, however, a fractious group used to fighting among themselves. This battle is unlikely to do them any harm, especially if Lon Johnson can revitalize the state party.

This week in review, Rina Miller and Jack Lessenberry discuss the second attempt to overhaul Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan, the great potential of Detroit getting an emergency manager, and debates over what control the Detroit Public School board has when they are under the control of an emergency financial manager.