P & A’s tradition of Rogers’ cheerleading moves on to another Rogers

The Livingston County Daily Press & Argus is living up to its name as the Rogers Newsletter, and it has shifted its kid gloves coverage to anointer Rogers, freshman state Rep. Bill Rogers, R-Brighton.

In his five terms in the U.S. House, the newspaper has been the biggest cheerleader for U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Livingston County. The paper’s reporters and editors have not asked many tough questions of Rogers. I, unfortunately, was also guilty of that when I covered politics for the P & A. The only reporter I know of who was ever tough on Rogers - actually more on Press Secretary Sylvia Warner - was Jon Zemke. The Rogers camp complained, and he was reassigned. To be fair, every single beat was changed, and I don’t know if they were related.

A few weeks ago the newspaper editorialized that Mike Rogers should run for governor, simply because he’s from Livingston County. Why?

“Because having a governor from Livingston County would obviously benefit the home folks.” So why Rogers shouldn’t put his hat into the ring? “The Howell High School grad is as qualified as anyone else considering a run.”

The facts don’t bear that out. At best his record is thin, and at worst anti-child; voting against the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). Can anyone point out a major accomplishment or even something he has done for the 8th Congressional District? His biggest accomplishment is his ability to raise money for the GOP.

Last Sunday there were four articles that mentioned Mike Rogers, but the most blatant cheerleading piece was a column from metro editor Buddy Moorehouse, a former Republican state House candidate. He predicts Rogers will run and most likely win.

“Furthermore, if he does run for governor, I think he'll have a good chance of winning. A very good chance.”

The only thing I do agree with is when Moorehouse says, “I've never seen a better campaigner. Ever.”

If he decides to run, the task for Democrats will be to force him to run on his record and not on his ability to work the room.

The kid gloves treatment has now shifted to an elder Rogers. Now, Bill Rogers is really a nice guy, but that does not make him a good lawmaker. His predecessor proved that. In Friday’s edition of the newsletter, it basically reprints a press release outlining Roger’s legislative agenda. If you ever need an example of uncritical reporting here it is. In fairness, I’m sure if some of it has to do with overworked reporters doing more with less.

The press release that came out on Jan. 22 says, “Rogers today began work on that agenda by introducing legislation to immediately repeal the job-killing Michigan Business Tax surcharge.” It also said, “The lawmaker's MBT surcharge legislation now goes to a House committee for review.”

The only problem is the bill was never introduced; not by any state Representative. On Jan. 22 there were 119 bills introduced in the House, but not that one. The only bill Rogers introduced was House Bill 4082, the “Hardesty Law” that bars a candidate who loses in the primary from running as a write-in candidate in the general election.

The press release also says, “Along with ending the MBT surcharge, Rogers also will introduce legislation to reduce state legislators' pay if they do not attend session in Lansing.”

There is only a small problem with that. Rep. Paul Opsommer introduced House Joint Resolution (HJR) A that cuts legislative pay and reduces lawmaker’s pay when they miss votes. HJR D, introduced by Rep. Marty Knollenberg, also reduces lawmaker’s pay when they miss votes. Rogers is a co-sponsor, but that is not much more than ceremonial. Lawmakers like it when they have cosponsors from the opposite party to demonstrate bipartisan support. But the sponsor and the other two co-sponsors are all Republicans.

Rightwing editor continues with false accusations against LIVCO Dems

Rightwing Livingston County Daily Press & Argus editor and columnist Buddy Moorehouse has, not surprisingly, come out in a column agreeing with the chair of the Livingston County Republican Party that the county Democrats appearance in the Melonfest parade last weekend “wasn't appropriate.”

He can’t be serious?

The manufactured controvsary started when Allan Filip, the disgruntled chair of the Livingston County Republican Party, wrote a letter-to-the-editor full of false accusations that Democrats carried handwritten signs with hateful messages in the parade through downtown Howell on Aug. 18. Both I and Livingston County Democratic Party Chair Matt Evans put an end to that myth by actually posting what the signs said.

Thwarted by that truth, Moorehouse had to admit the signs were not hateful, but then he makes the ridiculous statement that it was not an appropriate place for the signs. Perhaps he should tell Filip, who was marching in the parade for always absent U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Brighton?, and state Sen. Valde Garcia, who was also in the parade, that it was inappropriate for them to be in the parade.

The whole issue is ridiculous.

“The Democrats have every right to carry their signs anywhere they want. Nobody's disputing their right to free speech, and nobody's saying they didn't have a right to carry those signs in the parade. They did. They had every right to do so.
I just feel it wasn't appropriate for the occasion.
If you've ever been to the Melon Fest parade, you know that it's a festive, happy, family-friendly affair. Last Saturday, the parade was filled with marching bands and Girl Scouts and gymnasts and tons of kids, and they were all smiling and waving and having fun.
And then you had the Democrats and their signs.
It was a jarring sight, and they seemed totally out of place in the parade.”

If they were not hateful - which they were not - and the Democrats had a right to appear in the parade then why is he complaining and bothering to write this column? Since when is the truth hateful or inappropriate? The first time the Democrats heard that their appearance was considered "hatful, jarring inappropriate” by anyone was with Fillip’s lie-filled letter, despite having a booth at the two-day festival within sight of the Republican’s booth. I did notice Filip was rather lonely when I saw him in the booth on Saturday. Perhaps that’s the real reason for the letter.

Moorehouse does, to his credit, point out that he was “once a Republican candidate for state representative, but I'm trying hard not to let my political leanings get in the way of my opinion on this.”

He failed miserably in that effort, and he left out some of the story. He was a candidate for the open seat in the 47th District in 2002 that was just created by redistricting. The Republican primary, which determines the winner, was flooded with six GOP candidates, some very well known and respected. The goal was to out conservative the opponents, and Moorehouse did a pretty good job of that coming in third in the close race that saddled us with Rep. Joe Hune by just two votes. Moorehouse had to quit his job as an editor at the paper to run, and the Press & Argus management said publicly Moorehouse would never work at the paper again. Apparently they misspoke because they needed these fair and balanced opinions from him.

I didn’t see anything “jarring,” and I saw some friends of mine having fun. I have been to many Melonfest parades over the years, and this is the first time an unfair attack has ever been launched against the Democrats.

You have to ask why do people and companies march in this parade? The answer is the same reason the Press & Argus was in the parade or, radio station WHMI, Art Van Furniture, karate schools, gymnastic schools, churches and all the other participants in the parade who were also passing out coupons and ads along the parade route: to promote their business and cause.

Why was the P & A passing out newspapers during the parade? Why wasn't that considered inappropriate? If he wants to talk about what’s appropriate for a family parade, perhaps he should mention the display by the people promoting the Slaughterhouse and Corn Maze. It scared a few kids, including my granddaughter. That might be the only thing that could possibly be considered “jarring,” but they had every right to be in the parade. It was in good fun, just like the Democrats who were showing the flag in the parade.

“There's a time and a place for protests like that, and I don't think the Melon Fest parade was the time or the place. And I think I'd feel the same way if it had been the Republicans carrying signs blaming Gov. Jennifer Granholm for the state's horrid economy.”

First, It was not a protest, and I have no doubt you would never write a column if the Republicans bashed the Governor in any parade. Second, there was nothing stopping the Republicans from being in the parade, but apparently they could not find enough of them. Perhaps Moorehouse could have helped them out with something other than his writing and marched with them? Third, blaming the governor for the “state's horrid economy” would be a lie.

“If you're the only negative, angry entry in a parade, you might stand out, but it's not necessarily in a good way. I doubt they won many converts last Saturday.”

Sorry to disappoint both Moorehouse and Filip, but we did win converts. That’s why the angry letter and column. The Democrats were neither angry nor negative. In fact, they were the exact opposite. They were full of fun and friendly, and more importantly, truth.

Both Filip and Moorehouse owe the county Democrats an apology for their false accusations.

State GOP puts blogger and political operative in charge of communications

Subscription only Gongwer is reporting GOP dirty trickster and Livingston County resident Bill Nowling has been named director of communications and research for the Michigan Republican Party. With party chair Saul Anuzis’ reputation for dirty tricks he Nowling should fit right in.

Nowling is also a blogger, operating the rightwing blog the Lunchbox Conservative. He was most recently the director of media relations for the political consulting firm Sterling Corporation. Nowling was previously press secretary for former Senate Majority Leader Ken Sikkema, deputy speechwriter for former Governor John Engler and he worked for former state Sen. Mike Rogers. But Livingston County residents might remember Nowling from when he briefly worked as a reporter for the then weekly newspapers the Brighton Argus and the Livingston County Press when he was between political jobs after moving to Michigan. That’s when I briefly met him when I took over the position at the newspaper he was vacating in 1998.

He got the job through his friend, then managing editor Buddy Moorehouse, who briefly had to quit his job after the newspaper went daily in order to run as a conservative Republican candidate for the 47th District seat in the state House in 2002. So much for the liberal media myth/strategy.

I came in contact again with Nowling around 2002 when I was covering politics for the Livingston County Daily Press & Argus, and Nowling was working for a political consulting group called Persuasion, Inc. The Rogers camp claimed Nowling - who at the time was representing a large telecommunications company, At & T, I believe- tried to blackmail Rogers, now a U.S. Congressman. The Rogers people claim Nowling said if Rogers didn’t vote for a telecommunications bill the group’s client wanted passed there would be hundreds of the company’s employees picketing in his office the next day. Now, Nowling claims it never happened, and he says he and Rogers are now buddies. But the Rogers people sure made a big deal out of it at the time. Either Nowling is lying or Rogers Press Secretary Sylvia Warner, who I have a lot of respect for, was lying gin 2002.

The release said he will “head up the party’s communications and research efforts through the 2008 election cycle.” That fact, coupled with the recent GOP poll tax that requires showing a photo ID to vote, it will be an interesting election, and we will have to be especially vigilant for dirty tricks, voter intimidation and fraud.

The race for Livingston County’s two term limited House seats begins

Although the primary election for the Michigan House is still 16 months away, the jockeying the seats has already begun with both of Livingston County’s two House seats term-limited in 2008

The Livingston County Daily Press & Argus is reporting Republican County Commissioner Steve Williams, 45, is running for the 66th District seat that will be vacated by Chris Ward, R-Brighton. The district includes the townships of Brighton, Genoa, Marion and Oceola, and the city of Brighton in Livingston County and Milford Township in neighboring Oakland County.

Williams has only been on the board since January 2005, but this will be his third attempt at the 66th District seat. He nearly unseated incumbent Rep. Judy Scranton as an unknown in the Republican primary in 2000, losing by only 721 votes. He ran again in 2002 when the seat was open because of term limits, but he dropped out before the primary when the military intelligence officer was recalled to active duty.

Williams is very conservative, and he really played on that in his race against Scranton, a rare moderate Republican and an even more rare pro-choice Republican. It’s rare in Republican-dominated Livingston County that a Republican incumbent is challenged, and Williams is the only one I can recall in the past seven years.

It’s ironic that when Ward, then the chair of the Livingston County Republican Party, ran for the open seat in 2002 there was not even a primary challenge for the seat, knowing that a primary win almost guaranteed a general election win. Some quality candidates began falling out of the race as the primary approached, including Williams, Rick Chrysler – the son of former U.S. Congressman Dick Chrysler - and former Brighton Mayor Kate Lawrence. What we got were six years of questionable ethics.

When Williams first ran for the seat, the 66th District included almost all of Livingston County. A few townships in the western part of the county were in the 67th District then held by Republican Paul DeWeese. But following the population growth in the fastest growing county in the state and the gerrymandering by the GOP, a new seat was carved out of Livingston County. Instead of making the two districts a logical east/west split of the county which most people already identified with Republicans carved out the 47 District seat by illogically cutting a big C in the county with the inside of the C being the 66th District.

When the 47th District was created, we saw a six-person primary that had a few well-known candidates that peoples knew, such as Hartland Township Supervisor Greg Bogdanski, Hamburg Township Supervisor Howard Dillman, Chair of the County Board of Commissioners Dave Domas, Daily Press & Argus editor Buddy Moorehouse, John Sheppard and Joe Hune. The unknown Hune won the primary by just two votes over Domas.

This goes back to the question of why an incumbent is never challenged in this county like they are in other places where one party dominates. Domas was well respected and able to work with a wide-range of people, and in a county that offers very little services he actually implemented a discount prescription drug program. Despite losing by a mere two votes and Hune’s very thin legislative record, Hune has never been challenged in the primary.

At this point, Williams is the only candidate that has publicly announced his intention to run, and he is the only person even rumored to be considering a run to date.

LC’s own LL knocks em dead on OTR

Hats off to Julielynn Gibbons (Liberal Lucy of Liberal, Loud and Proud) and Marcy Wheeler (emptywheel from The Next Hurrah) for the excellent job they did representing liberal bloggers on “Off the Record with Tim Skubick.”

They appeared with rightwing bloggers Nick DeLeeuw (“Rightmichigan”) and Bill Nowling (The Lunchbucket Conservative) on the half hour show to discuss the effect of blogging on Michigan politics. They did an excellent job doing that, and they lent credibility to what we bloggers do. This is one of my favorite shows, and usually the panelists are political reporters from the mainstream media that cover the Capitol, but this time we had people who are much more involved in covering the Capitol.

I know this is all over the blogosphere by now, but because a lot of what I write about is politics where I live in Livingston County I wanted to point out the special connection to Livingston County.

Liberal Lucy grew up here in Livingston County’s Green Oak Township, and her proud parents still live. Although she now lives in Lansing, many local Democrats know her from her work to improve the Democratic net roots presence here in the county.

Bill Nowling also lives in Green Oak Township, and he was once a reporter here for the Livingston County Daily Press & Argus when it was still a weekly newspaper. After moving here to his wife’s hometown, fellow Republican Buddy Moorehouse, then the editor of the former Brighton Argus, got him a job with the paper until he could get into Michigan Republican politics, hooking up first on the staff of former Gov. John Engler and for then former state Sen. Mike Rogers.

After going to work for a PR firm, he made news when he allegedly threatened to blackmail Rogers after Rogers was elected to the U.S. House if he did not vote for a telecommunications bill one of the clients Nowling’s firm was representing wanted passed.

Ann Arbor resident Marcy Wheeler is the author of “Anatomy of Deceit” about the Plame CIA leak case. She was the only blogger to receive a press pass for the Scooter Libby trial where she live-blogged during the trial.

DeLeeuw operates one of the more slimier blogs around that’s long on accusations and short on facts. He recently took the Governor to task for daring to take a lunch hour and spending it with her teenage daughter on her birthday. His latest baseless attack is accusing Michigan House Democrats of taking a bribe because DTE’s political action committee contributed $15,000 to the House Democrats' political action committee, making the ridiculous claim it was for the proposal to revamp state regulations to return monopoly status to utilities such as DTE that could raise $500 million toward the budget shortfall. Like all of his “reporting” the real story is what he leaves out, like the fact that DTE has also given $11,500 to Senate Republicans.

You can see the show online, or you can tune in tonight at 9 p.m. on WKAR in East Lansing or 11:30 p.m. Sunday. The show is on most state PBS stations.

Newspaper has great things planned for Rogers

To show you the kind of conservative media bias we have to overcome here in Livingston County to unseat Mike Rogers, take a gander at a Sunday opinion column by Buddy Moorehouse, the metro editor of the Livingston County Daily Press & Argus.

Now, Moorehouse has been with the newspaper since the early 1980’s, except for a brief period he left to run for political office in 2002. He is a part-time comedian, magician and apparently a politician. As such, his columns are generally funny and entertaining. This commentary is not a knock at Moorehouse, but it’s simply pointing out a fact.

In 2002 he made a run at the state House for an open seat that was just created because of redistricting. He was one of about six conservative Republicans making a bid for the 47th District seat, and he came in third place for the seat in his first attempt at public office. Surprisingly, Joe Hune won by just two votes to beat some well-known people in the county.

At the time, Moorehouse had to resign as managing editor of the newspaper to make his run, and the management publicly said he would never work there again. Maybe they had their fingers crossed when they said it.

But back to Sunday’s column. The column is called “Sending out wishes of holiday joy,” and in it Moorehouse sends out holiday greetings and good wishes to everyone from his family to our newly elected judges. Nothing wrong with that. However, with the budget crisis facing the governor, it would have been nice for him to send out a greeting and good wishes to her. She could use all the help she can get.

He did have a greeting for his fellow Republican, U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers.

“Rep. Mike Rogers, our congressman, who is destined for something much, much bigger. Mark my words.”

To me, U.S. Congress is very, very big. Maybe he can enlighten us on what bigger things the newspaper has planned for Mr. Rogers. This newspaper, with the largest circulation of any newspaper in Livingston County, has had a far too cozy relationship with Rogers since he began his political career. Is it any wonder why Jim Marcinkowski did not get the endorsement of this newspaper?

This is why we have blogs like this.