Tagged: michigan politics

Consider this. We’ve still got more than a week left of March, and it looks like April and feels like August. Yesterday it was eighty-six in Ann Arbor, and two people think they saw a cougar -- a mountain lion, not the other kind -- on north campus.

We’ve got presidential candidates waving Etch-a-sketch toys instead of talking about Iran and inflation.

In other words, it’s not a normal year, and I want to make a suggestion to further radically change our world.

I want all of us -- the media, the politicians, the culture -- to give up sex. Not entirely; I don’t want the human race dying out.

Yesterday, I was listening to Rick Santorum attack Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney for supposedly being willing to take more moderate positions in the general election campaign.

Well, there’s something to be said against being a flip-flopper, changing with every new opinion poll. But there is also something more to be said for recognizing reality.

Today would have been the birthday of a man who did exactly that, who was one of the greatest Republicans in Michigan history, a man who himself might have been president. His name was Arthur Vandenberg. He was born and died in Grand Rapids, and served for more than twenty years in the U.S. Senate.

Bishop Thomas Gumbleton probably won’t vote in the primary today, though he spends his life doing work that’s greatly affected by the political world. Nor does he seem impressed that Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum are fellow Roman Catholics.

Actually, he seems pretty appalled by them.

Many voters suspect politicians are corrupted by money. Campaign contributions and cozy relationships with lobbyists make voters wonder if their elected officials have their best interests at heart. That’s led to attempts to fix the problem in Michigan, but observers say sometimes the ‘fix’ makes the problem worse.

Politicians need money to run campaigns to win elections. And often that money comes from the rich and powerful. But what do those politicians get in return?

Remember that scene from Frank Capra’s 1939 film Mr. Smith Goes to Washington? A mover and shaker lets the Jimmy Stewart character, a naïve new Senator, know if he cooperates with a deal the guy’s  got going, he can write his own ticket.

With the passage of so called right-to-work laws in Indiana, some Michigan lawmakers are now calling for those laws in Michigan.

Lawmakers in support of right-to-work laws say they’ll make Michigan a more business friendly environment.

Opponents call it union busting and an effort to weaken unions’ political power.

Michigan Radio’s political analyst, Jack Lessenberry gives us a historical perspective.

Last week I had occasion to mention the famous author Upton Sinclair, and his now-forgotten campaign for governor of California in 1934. Afterwards, a friend told me, “I’ll bet that’s the last time you bring that up for about ten years.“

More likely, 20, I thought. Well, guess what. Here we go again. The reason I mentioned Sinclair was that his campaign was one of the first examples of moneyed interests spending lavishly to destroy a candidacy with outrageously false advertising, something we‘ve seen happen many times since.