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Jocelyn Benson

Many people disagree over the expanded use of Michigan’s Emergency Financial manager law under the Snyder-Dillon administration.  According to a recent Detroit Free Press poll, 42 percent support it and 45 percent want to see the law repealed.

Those in support of the law allowing a state appointed manager to assume the major oversight responsibilities for a city or school district, including the expanded power to terminate collective bargaining agreements, generally argue that state oversight is the only way to ensure localities on the verge of bankruptcy implement difficult fiscal decisions, cuts and layoffs that are necessary to ensure solvency.  Opponents counter that the state-appointed managers, which assume the power and authority of local elected officials, are a direct affront to the democratic voice and power of citizens.

But nearly everyone agrees that something must be done to aid our failing cities and public educational institutions. From Flint to Benton Harbor and most recently in Detroit, there is widespread consensus that agrees that a municipality in fiscal crisis hurts everyone.

That’s why those opposing the Emergency Financial Manager law must not only collect signatures in support of an initiative to overturn the law.   They must also propose an alternative solution to ensure that our localities are financially strong.

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Herman Cain

In a sea of negativity and distractions in the race for the Republican presidential nomination, I decided to throw my support behind former Speaker Newt Gingrich because I can now see much clearer distinctions between President Obama and Newt than I do between Governor Mitt Romney and the president.

These distinctions are between Obama’s hodgepodge of foggy small ideas, which he talked about in his State of the Union address, and Speaker Gingrich’s clear and bold solutions for solving the crises we face as a nation. And yes, my bold 9-9-9 tax reform plan is a serious consideration for Speaker Gingrich, which is why I accepted his invitation to co-chair his Economic Growth and Tax Reform Advisory Council.

The polls do not agree with my assessment of Speaker Gingrich, and it appears that the so-called political establishment does not agree. But remember, I’m Mr. Unconventional, and the ability of the Republican nominee to highlight distinctions clearly in the general election campaign will be critical to achieving the ultimate mission of defeating President Obama.

My decision was not based on the political pundits’ attempted labeling of the candidates as conservative, most conservative,moderate, liberal Republican, not a true conservative, not a real conservative or any other of the concocted labels by which they try to pigeonhole candidates.

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Dan Calabrese

Look out, Cleveland, Pittsburgh and Raleigh. You could be next.

After touting the outcome of his decision (actually George W. Bush regrettably got the ball rolling) to bail out the Big Three, President Obama told the nation on Wednesday night that it doesn’t have to end there!

“What’s happening in Detroit can happen in other industries,” Obama beamed. “It can happen in Cleveland and Pittsburgh and Raleigh.”

Leaving aside for a second that he also declared “no bailouts, no handouts and no copouts” (we will leave that aside because he certainly did not mean it), let’s consider what is happening in Detroit – and whether this is really what we want to see on a widespread basis across the nation.

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Gregory D. Lee

This week, the New York Times breathlessly reported in its New York Region section that the New York Police Department had committed a politically incorrect felony by using a film, The Third Jihad, to train its officers on the hidden agenda of many Muslims residing in the U.S. That hidden agenda is the destruction of the United States.

Apparently, the Times doesn’t realize that some Muslims in and out of this country want to harm New Yorkers and other Americans. The article says about the film: “Ominous music plays as images appear on the screen: Muslim terrorists shoot Christians in the head, car bombs explode, executed children lie covered by sheets and a doctored photograph shows an Islamic flag flying over the White House.

“This is the true agenda of much of Islam in America,” a narrator intones. “A strategy to infiltrate and dominate America. … This is the war you don’t know about.”

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Robert Laurie

Throughout the 1980s and early 1990s, Detroit bore the stigma of being the most dangerous city in America.  Then, things seemed to get slightly better.  For a while, Washington D.C., New Orleans, Chicago and Los Angeles tossed the “most dangerous” title back and forth like a hot potato.  Not to be outdone, last year Motor City criminals reclaimed their crown.  In 2011 Detroit was once again the U.S. city in which you are most likely to be murdered.  So far, in 2012, things are getting worse.  Crimes like robbery, rape and non-lethal assault are down, slightly, but still far ahead of most cities.

So the city has taken the bold step of cracking down – on the victims.

Earlier this month, to combat auto theft, Detroit police banned parking on certain streets in the downtown entertainment district.  Violators who chose to park in normally legal spaces had their vehicles towed away, at their expense.  In short, the city banned parking in public parking spaces, because the vehicle owners might be the victim of grand theft auto.

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David Karki

Thank you, South Carolina! On Saturday, you administered a most-needed beatdown to Mitt Romney and put the lie, once and for all, to the twin myths of his “inevitability” and “electability.” The sheer scale of the wipeout clearly showed just how much Romney is disliked by and will never win over the conservative base, notwithstanding denial-driven emotional protestations by the media and GOP beltway establishment.

So, with the battle now fully joined and what looks to be a long Romney vs. Gingrich primary battle serving as a proxy in the war for the soul of the GOP between the Tea Party and the establishment, we move on to Florida on January 31^st. And while this was a most satisfying victory for both Gingrich and the heretofore quiet conservative base which finally found its voice and deafeningly roared, neither should read more into it than is there or rest on their laurels.

Romney still has a big money and organization advantage, which is no small thing in an expensive state like Florida. He’s been running ads for two weeks and many early votes have already been cast, prior to the big turnaround in South Carolina. So he has a bit of a head start. Rick Santorum will bleed votes away, especially as the establishment uses him as a stalking horse, propping him up as long as they can.

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Brett Noel

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James Melton

While it is fashionable these days to engage in vitriol and vilification of the political “other side,” I am having a hard time thinking of Willard Mitt Romney as truly evil. Really.

Sure, I cringe when I think about having a private equity guy in the White House. I know enough about that business to realize that it can be creative and helpful or deeply cold-blooded and destructive. Romney’s work at Bain Capital apparently included plenty of both kinds of deals. That makes me uncomfortable. But it’s a big jump from knowing that to believing that one can divine what’s in a man’s soul. People are complicated, Romney more so than most.

Along with his shortcomings, Romney has some very good qualities – as a candidate and as a person – that make him by far the best Republican in the presidential field. None of those qualities make me want to vote for him in the fall, for reasons I will explain shortly. But even so, it’s worth noting some of them:

• Romney is no ideologue: Like Ronald Reagan, Romney has a strong pragmatic streak. As governor of Massachusetts, he was willing to pair spending cuts with revenue increases by raising fees and closing loopholes in the state tax code. That does not endear him to Tea Party activists. But a “cuts only” approach to fixing the Massachusetts budget would have been a nonstarter. Mitt chose to get things done.
• He made health care a priority: “Romneycare,” seen as Romney’s biggest vulnerability in the primaries, was actually a ground-breaking achievement. It is not the approach I would have chosen to provide near-universal health care in Massachusetts. But, for the most part, it worked and provided a template for the national Affordable Care Act. Read the rest of this entry »

Eric Baerren

The big news today coming out of Lansing is that the city government of the Capital City will ink a deal with a tribe from the Upper Peninsula to expand casino gambling. I’ll spare you the predictable joke about legalized gambling in the state’s capital city, at least until the next paragraph.

Monday morning, Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero lauded the agreement as a way to anchor downtown Lansing and stimulate economic activity. He even said it will be built with a union workforce, a feather tossed to construction workers who during the mayor’s tenure have had no love lost for him (rumblings from within held that during the 2010 gubernatorial race they preferred Bernero’s Democratic opponent, Andy Dillon, a milksop of a House Speaker who is now state treasurer).

If plans go forward, the casino will be a few short blocks from the Capitol, giving lawmakers on marathon sessions gambling the state’s future on ideas that have never held up when put into practice – we call this fiscal conservatism – an opportunity to legally wager away yet more taxpayer dollars at the poker tables.

At least it will keep them out of the downtown bars.

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