Jobs lose round one in fight to bring DRIC bridge to a vote

It appears Ambassador Bridge owner and GOP sugar daddy Manuel "Matty" Moroun won round one on Tuesday when House Bill 4961 that would authorize Michigan to enter into a public-private partnership with Canada to build the Detroit River International Crossing (DRIC) bridge failed to be discharged from committee to the Senate floor fro an up or down vote.

Sen. Ray Basham, D-Taylor, has been championing the effort to build the new DRIC bridge to replace and expand the aging Ambassador Bridge, but the discharge motion was withdrawn when it appears he did not have the necessary 19 votes to bring it to the floor for an up or down vote.

“The reason this issue should be discharged is this is probably one of the most single most issues we can deal with in this state to No. 1, create jobs; No. 2, protect this state and this country with homeland security; No. 3, to be able to have some redundancy when it comes to infrastructure crossing our international borders,” Basham said. “There our 26 international border crossings in this country and 24 of them are publicly-owned; the busiest border crossing in this country happens to be in Michigan, and it is privately-owned.”

Basham knows it is a long shot, but he aid he still plans to try again on Wednesday or on the last day of the lame duck on Thursday. There are 10,000 to 35,000 jobs at stake.

The discharge vote has crated massive media interest in Canada, and if the DRIC bridge is not built, no bridge will be built because the Canadians will never give Moroun a permit to land it in Canada because they do not want a multi-lane bridge with heavy trucks empting into downtown Windsor.

“This is a jobs issue, a commerce issue, an issue of trade between Michigan and its largest trading partner, Canada,” Basham said. “This is an issue that has to be dealt with it. It has to be dealt with sooner than later.”

The DRIC study began a decade ago in 2000, but the Moroun financed GOP Senate caucus still wants to delay and kill it so Moroun can keep his monopoly. There were some rumors that Governor-elect Rick Snyder may have had something to do with the decision to ask for a postponement of the vote on Tuesday, but Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop, R-Rochester, - who reneged on a promise to being the bill to a vote back in May – denied that.

"Rick Snyder has been very clear to me that he does not wish to intrude upon this Legislature," Bishop said in subscription only Gongwer.

That’s simply not true, and he was in the Capitol yesterday, and he weighed in on funding the Pure Michigan campaign and the autism bills.

Only under a Democrat is TSA security a violation of civil rights

One thing we have learned in the last two years is that any idea or action proposed or implemented by President Obama the right will say is awful or disastrous, even if it’s their idea.

The recent enhanced security at airports implemented by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) involving new full-body scanners and pat-downs has got Republican talking heads going crazy and screaming about the violation of civil liberties.

It’s ironic that the testing of body scanners at airports and the implementation of widespread use began during the Bush administration, but the really ironic part is we had no problem with this kind of security the many times the Bush Administration shredded the Constitution.

It was just a few years ago that any one who complained about security after 9/11 was called a traitor or a terrorist who had something to hide. Its’ also ironic that to get out of the extra security, they want us to truly violate other peoples’ civil rights and use racial profiling; something the courts have clearly said is a violation of civil rights. They want to do it even though there is no reliable profile of a terrorist.

But the Rude Pundit really said it best, so I will let him say it. This has always been a PG rated blog, but the Rude Pundit uses language that may be offensive to some people; that is, after all, why he is called the Rude Pundit. So, if you are easily offended, stop reading.

“Well, welcome to the privacy party, motherfuckers. Come on in to the constitutional protections rave. What took you so long to get here? Oh, yeah. Holding people indefinitely without charges? Who the fuck cares. Wiretapping Americans without a warrant? Oh, blow us. Torturing confessions out of innocent people? Sometimes ya gotta spill a little blood to make security stew.”

It’s clear that if this was a Republican Administration doing this, we would be told to man up. In this environment, what else can we expect? Other countries have been doing similar procedures for years. If someone has a better idea to ensure the safety of airlines, let’s hear it. I’m not crazy about it either, but I can only imagine how much screaming we will hear from the right if an airliner is brought down because of terrorism.

“Yep, all it took for some of the citizens of this country to actually make a stink about civil rights was a black president, a Democratic-controlled Department of Homeland Security, and the fear that barely-trained, underpaid airport security people will see what your Mama's tits look like in a government-ordered x-ray body scan. Or, even worse, that if you refuse having your dick or slit on display, you'll get an "enhanced pat down," as it's being called, just like the extra-special interrogation techniques used at Gitmo or a special new cereal, like corn flakes but now with nuts.”

Discharge vote on DRIC bridge expected

LANSING – When the final three days of the legislative session – at least in the Senate – get underway on Tuesday, the biggest issue to come out of the lame duck may be an attempt to discharge a bill from committee that would authorize Michigan to enter into a public-private partnership with Canada to build the Detroit River International Crossing (DRIC) bridge.

Sen. Ray Basham, D-Taylor, told the News Herald last week that he will try to discharge House Bill 4961 from the Senate Transportation Committee to the full Senate floor. Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop, R-Rochester, has been carrying water for Ambassador Bridge owner and Republican sugar daddy Matty Moroun, and earlier this month Bishop said the bill would not get a vote, reneging on a promise he made earlier this year in May.

The Moroun family has been fighting tooth and nail to keep their monopoly on the aging Ambassador Bridge, the only privately owned border crossing in North America. With that in mind, the Moroun family has contributed nearly $400,000 this year to political action committees (PAC) and candidates controlled by Bishop that helped Senate Republicans, Bishop's unsuccessful attorney general campaign or directly to Senate Republican candidate committees

The DRIC has widespread, bipartisan support, including the last three Michigan Governors, including Democratic Govs. Jim Blanchard and Jennifer Granholm and Republican John Engler, as well as Republican Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson. It even has the support of the Detroit Regional Chamber of Commerce, long a GOP supporter.

If the DRIC is not built, no bridge will be built at all, and that could cost 10,000 to 35,000 jobs.

The bill would need a two-thirds vote – 26 votes – to be discharged. The bill was approved by the House in May, and the Senate Transportation committee held hearing on the bill in the late spring and early summer. Based on those hearings, the Chair of the Transportation Committee, Sen. Jud Gilbert, R-Algonac, worked with the various groups to come up with a bill that is acceptable to all parties.

After various versions, he was expecting a vote until Bishop killed it. That is the bill Basham will try to get a vote on.

Another study proves secondhand smoke kills

Another study, this one worldwide, reinforces the more than 20 year-old scientific fact that secondhand smokes kill non-smokers and causes numerous diseases and ailments.

Last week an international research study by the World Health Organization found that secondhand smoke kills more than 600,000 non-smokers and millions more get sick each year from secondhand smoke.

The study was based on data obtained from 192 countries and was published last week in the British medical journal The Lancet. The good news for Michigan, and the more than 37 other states with workplace smoking ban, is that the proper enforcement of smoking bans worldwide would greatly eliminate the risk of secondhand smoke in places such as bars and restaurants by 90 percent.

This news comes on the heels of a Detroit Free Press story trying to blame
a 25 percent drop in attendance and revenue at bingo parlors and charity card games in the most recent quarter on the popular workplace smoking ban that went into effect on May 1 instead of the real drop in disposable income.

The fact remains that there is no credible evidence or study that indicates a workplace smoking ban hurts business. In fact, the opposite is true. There is, however, plenty of antidotal evidence supported by nothing, like the observation of George Saroki, 63, of Commerce Township, who mistakenly thinks he has the right to light up anywhere he wants to.

“Saroki said he has to leave the poker room and walk outside to have a cigarette, a trip that could take five minutes.”

Wow. Five whole minutes. Well then, I can see he has a right to endanger the health of the 80 percent of non-smokers.

But Don Wawrzyniak, who runs the most lucrative charity poker room in Michigan at Snooker's in Utica, has never allowed smoking at the table and has seen no drop in business.

“Wawrzyniak said players never were allowed to smoke at the card tables and had to be a few steps away to light up anyway. Since the ban, they now walk about 50 feet to the front door, where they can smoke on the sidewalk out front.”
"We've got more families coming in now," Wawrzyniak said. "So far this year, we've raised $1.2 million for charity."

Ensure a peaceful Thanksgiving with the DCCC Cheat Sheet

Tomorrow on Thanksgiving Day, families all across Michigan and the nation will be gathering around the TV to watch the Lions, visit with family and loved ones, eat turkey and give thanks for an improving economy, but there always that one kooky, right-wing uncle in every family who spouts false information gleaned from hours of misinformation and lies from Faux “news” and hours and hours of 30-second TV political ads

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) is coming to the rescue with an antidote to that rightwing blow hard to ensure a smooth, family Thanksgiving with its annual “Thanksgiving Cheat Sheet” that offers a few basic and quick answers to shut them down so you can get back to eating, football and socializing. The best antidote to any right-winger is facts, and that usually shuts them up. This free survival kit offers some easy and quick antidotes.

Granted, there are a lot more lies to combat this year than ever before, but the Cheat Sheet will arm you with the real facts so you can answer back with the truth as soon as your Republican relatives start sounding like Sarah Palin or the numerous hate mongers polluting the nation’s airwaves.

The DCC is the official campaign arm of the Democrats in the U.S. House, and you can download the guide today. Do it now, and enjoy the silence, peace and a Detroit Lions’ victory.

Happy Thanksgiving

Livingston Democrats choose new leader

The Livingston County Democratic Party has a new leader after the Executive Committee chose Hartland resident and University of Michigan grad Jordan Genson to succeed Judy Daubenmier at the county convention on Nov. 18.

The committee also chose Genoa Township resident Kelly Raskauskas as vice chair, and rounding out the officers are Annette Koeble as treasurer; Mary Evergreen, secretary; and Judy Volk, vice president for membership.

Judy has done an excellent job in the more than two years she has served as chair. She has planned some unique and inexpensive fundraisers to energize the surprising number of Democrats in the county – like the movie nights and ice cream socials, and she has honored the party’s core values with community events like blood drives, supporting area food banks, helping children and honoring veterans.

She also helped recruit a near record number of quality candidates for political office, and she served as a successful watchdog on the all-Republican County Board of Commissioners.

I don’t know a lot about Jordan Genson, but I’ll venture a guess that he is one of the youngest chairs the party has had in some time. I sat next to him on the floor at the Michigan Democratic Party Endorsement Convention in April, and I am looking forward to the energy he will bring to the job.

Kelly Raskauskas was an energetic county commissioner candidate this election cycle, and I see her at every party function I have been able to attend. She brings lots of energy and knowledge to the position, and she has done some excellent research on the mistakes and gaffes of the board of commissioners. She also has one of the most impressive resumes I have ever seen.

Raskauskas holds a Master’s in Public Policy (MPP) from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and a BA cum laude in International Relations from the School of International Service at American University. Raskauskas serves as the President of the Friends of the Brighton District Library, a non-profit group that supports programming, special events and equipment for the BDL throughout the year. She is also a volunteer at the Greenhills School in Ann Arbor.

County Democrats will get a chance to meet the new officers, as well as enjoy one of the great events I talked about, with the best food ever, put on by the party with the annual a holiday potluck set for 6:30 p.m. Dec. 10 at party headquarters, 10321 Grand River Road, Suite 600, in Green Oak Township. All you need to do is to bring a dish to share and a donation for Gleaners Food Bank of either cash or food. I can personally attest to the fact that the food is phenomenal.

In addition to the potluck dinner, the party is also looking to help those in need in the community this holiday season. The party is looking for volunteers to help shop for winter clothing for needy children through the Warm the Children program sponsored by annarbornews.com. The program finds the needy children and provides enough funds to purchase $90 in winter clothing for each child. We provide the volunteers willing to help the families shop for the clothing at Target. If you would like to help, please contact Pam Green, coordinator the county’s Blue Tiger programs, at pgreen1210@sbcglobal.net.

The party is also participating in the Salvation Army's Adopt-a-Family program. We will be buying gifts for a needy family selected by the Salvation Army. If you would like to make a donation to the program, you may mail a check, made out to "Cash," to party headquarters. Contact Pam Green for more information, as well as to volunteer to help with the shopping.

Columnist makes case for letting the Bush tax cuts for the super rich expire

It appears that the real winners in the Nov. 2 election are the super rich, but isn't that always the case?

New York Times columnist Frank Rich in his Nov. 13 column called “Who Will Stand Up to the Superrich?” really makes the case for letting the Bush tax cuts expire for the top 2 percent.

“The superrich who have gotten spectacularly richer over the last four decades while their fellow citizens either treaded water or lost ground. The top 1 percent of American earners took in 23.5 percent of the nation’s pretax income in 2007 — up from less than 9 percent in 1976. During the boom years of 2002 to 2007, that top 1 percent’s pretax income increased an extraordinary 10 percent every year. But the boom proved an exclusive affair: in that same period, the median income for non-elderly American households went down and the poverty rate rose.“

Rich said it will be the very top earners, “not your garden variety, entrepreneurial multimillionaires, who will be by far the biggest beneficiaries if there’s an extension of the expiring Bush-era tax cuts for income over $200,000 a year.”

It’s clear the tax cuts for the super rich will increase the budget deficit, but Rich thinks that’s not the biggest problem we face as the rich get richer. We have already seen where that means the United States now arguably has a more unequal distribution of wealth than traditional banana republics like Nicaragua, Venezuela and Guyana.

“The bigger issue is whether the country can afford the systemic damage being done by the ever-growing income inequality between the wealthiest Americans and everyone else, whether poor, middle class or even rich. That burden is inflicted not just on the debt but on the very idea of America — our Horatio Alger faith in social mobility over plutocracy, our belief that our brand of can-do capitalism brings about innovation and growth, and our fundamental sense of fairness. Incredibly, the top 1 percent of Americans now have tax rates a third lower than the same top percentile had in 1970.”

We Democrats have been accused of fostering class warfare and other ridiculous charges, but it’s simply not true.

“The most constant refrain is that small-business owners who file in this bracket would be hit so hard they could no longer hire new employees. But the Tax Policy Center found in 2008, when checking out similar campaign claims by “Joe the Plumber,” that only 2 percent of all Americans reporting small-business income, regardless of tax bracket, would see tax increases if Obama fulfilled his pledge to let the Bush tax cuts lapse for the top earners. The economist Dean Baker calculated that the yearly tax increase at the lower end of that bracket, for those with earnings between $200,000 and $500,000, would amount to $700 — which “isn’t enough to hire anyone.”

One of the favorite rightwing talking points is, “has a poor person ever given anyone a job.” True, but it appears the super rich are not either. Rich makes the factual argument that while the super rich had the benefit of the full Bush tax cuts, we lost millions of jobs every month, so why would extending them to the top 2 percent change that?

“American companies seem intent on sitting on trillions in cash until the economy reboots. Meanwhile, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office ranks the extension of any Bush tax cuts, let alone those to the wealthiest Americans, as the least effective of 11 possible policy options for increasing employment.”

District attacks teacher in the media

The Howell Public Schools Board of Education and Superintendent Ron Wilson are taking the low road and attacking a teacher in the media because he is bringing unwanted media attention to the school by fighting his suspension.

Last month Howell High School teacher Jay McDowell, who just happens to be the president of the Howell Education Association (HEA) that represents the teachers, was suspended for one day without pay because he sent two students to the office for disrupting his class. The incident occurred Oct. 20; the day people all over the country wore purple to support the end of anti-gay bullying that led to a rash of suicides by gay teens. Apparently, McDowell asked a student wearing a belt buckle sporting the Confederate flag to remove the symbol of racism, slavery, white supremacy and treason.

McDowell, rightly, has protested the suspension and the attack against him, and it has gained support of people all across the country. They have shown up at school board meetings to support McDowell, and that led Wilson to make the false claim that the media is to fault and that the only people supporting McDowell are outside the Howell community.

That’s simply not true, and as a Howell resident with grandchildren in the district, I’m happy to have a teacher at HHS who will not tolerate bigotry, hate and injustice. Last week Wilson and the school board took the rare action of attacking McDowell in the media by releasing selected statements by students in the class, but the statements released were the only ones that shed McDowell in an unfavorable light.

The district has gone as far as to accuse McDowell of bullying by refusing to accept bad behavior from a student.

One such student who defended McDowell was 14-year-old Graeme Taylor, an openly gay student from Ann Arbor, who came to McDowell's defense at a recent school board meeting. He talked about his traumatic experiences at a school where being gay is much more accepted than at Howell, yet Wilson and school board members want to dismiss it because he is not an HHS student. The video of his speech spread like wildfire, and he will appear on the Ellen DeGeneres Show today.

The HEA defended McDowell on Friday, and the HEA specifically singled out Wilson, school board President Debi Drick and board Trustee Wendy Day, “saying the aggressive nature with which they are attempting to malign McDowell's character is deeply troubling.”

I have to agree. The board has a pronounced anti-union bias, and Day has both a rabid anti-union and anti-gay bias.

In fact, it was Day’s anti-gay bias that brought her the attention she craves. No one had ever heard of her until her and her partner, Vicki Fyke, formed an anti-gay hate group known as LOVE (Livingston Organization for Values in Education) because the HHS diversity club dared to tolerate gays. That attention helped her win a seat on the school board where her rhetoric divided the community and gained the district even more negative national press with an unsuccessful book-banning crusade.

Her anti-union stance is well known, and she conspired with the late rightwing anti-union activist Chet Zarko to embarrass the union with a witch-hunt for emails to embarrass union leaders. On her “blog” – although it can no longer be called a blog because she no longer allows anyone to question her warped views - she calls for McDowell to be fired. Of course she would love to see the president of the hated union go down, but she reveals her real reason for her hatred of McDowell.

“Once again our community is at the center of the culture war,” wrote the person who has embarrassed this community more than anyone since KKK Grand Dragon Robert Miles. “It is time the good people of this community stand up and fight back against the social progressive agenda.”

The district wants to blame the media for doing its job, but they are making sure the local media has their side of the story. Today, the latest wrinkle is that Wilson has turned over e-mails he perceives as threatening to area police.

According to the Daily Press & Argus, “Wilson last week said the district has received more than 1,000 e-mails since Oct. 26 from people outside the Howell community. He said he feels it's ironic the people who say they oppose violence and bullying are using these same tactics to intimidate district elected officials and staffers.”

Wilson continues with the false theme that it is just people from outside the district who support McDowell. There is also no way anyone can interpret the emails as threatening. Are they threatening to blow up or shoot up the school? No, they are simply telling the school t stop discrimination.

In fact, even Wilson admits the emails are not illegal, yet he clings to the fairy tale that they “felt threatened by the tone and content of the e-mail.” One email threatened to publicize the district's discrimination.

Wow, they should feel scared.