I've had enough

This is a real American hero

 It's not Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer's fault that her predecessor, Rick Snyder, poisoned thousands of Michigan children and had an administration that was so mired in corruption that Whitmer won election in a landslide.  It's not Whitmer's fault that Donald Trump is going to go down as the worst American President in our nearly 250 year history and is on pace to lose this year's Presidential Election in an historic landslide.  It's not her fault that the Trump administration was completely inept in its response to the coronavirus pandemic and left Michigan such a complete mess that Whitmer had to take drastic measures to clean it up.

And yet here we are, with Covid Donnie once again making threats against our Governor, who frankly has more courage in her pinkie finger and Donald Trump and all of his supporters have combined.  Any decent person, in light of the terrorism being waged against Gov. Whitmer in the name of some false sense of freedom (my freedom to not get COVID-19 is just as important as theirs to not wear a mask, and quite frankly is actually more so), would at least not stoke the flames of hate.

But the plain truth of the matter is that Donald Trump, and all of his supporters, are not good neighbors, are not good friends, are not good Americans, and certainly are not good human beings.

In fact, I've become of a mind that they're not human at all.

224,000+ Dead Americans

Donald Trump,

emaycee

And the horse you rode in on

Thanks, but no thanks, Gov. Snyder

It's kind of surprising, in light of our primary elections here in Michigan this past Tuesday, that no pundits are noting that on the republican side, GOP voters soundly rejected our current Governor, Rick Snyder.  Despite all his supporters claims of a Michigan comeback led by Snyder (dubious, at best), his hand picked successor, Brian Calley, barely topped 25% and fell woefully short of republican nominee and Trump sycophant Bill Schuette's 50%.

But when you poison thousands of children in a major city, hire companies that feed maggots to our prisoners, and raise taxes on the elderly to give tax cuts to corporations to create non-existent jobs, and your state's roads remain among the poorest in the nation, it probably isn't so surprising that your heir apparent fares so poorly amongst the electorate.

Here's hoping that in November's general election plenty more Michiganders see through the republican bullshit and send Schuette packing as well--Governor Gretchen (Whitmer) has a nice ring to it.

Fuck Donald Trump,
emaycee

Governor Albatross

Thanks but no thanks--eight years of republican boobs is enough

Michigan's next election for governor is just a little more than seven months away and current Lt. Governor Brian Calley has just released his first ad featuring our current Governor, Rick Snyder...who, despite claims of a Michigan "comeback," will most be remembered for poisoning Flint's children, feeding maggot infested food to our inmates, and allowing Detroit Public Schools to deteriorate so badly that fungus in the school's bathrooms flourishes better than Detroit's students.

Right wing nutjob and our current Attorney General, Bill Schuette, was quick to denounce the ads, but one seriously has to wonder why--Snyder's approval rating is underwater and in the age of Donald Trump, one can't imagine the republican base being interested in pantywaists like Calley and Snyder.

Still, good times for Democrats--the Snyder administration's incompetence isn't quite up to the Trump administration's standards, but it should be enough to at least give us a chance in an off year election this November.

Fuck Donald Trump,
emaycee

Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come...

Republicans have made us so proud...

...anywhere but fucking Michigan, apparently.

Because this is the legacy of the republicans who have held all the power in Michigan over the last eight years:  the state of Michigan poisoned the water of thousands of children in Flint and it is currently embroiled, in the Larry Nasser child molestation at Michigan St., in the biggest sex scandal in American history.

The next time any republican in Michigan says anything about protecting our children from anything, I think the rest of us should be allowed to give them a boot to the head.

Or even two.

Fuck Donald Trump,
emaycee

I live in DeVos

Strangled by the mitten...

I used to live in Michigan.  Now I live in DeVos.

Our capital used to be Lansing.  Now it's DeVos--that's right, our legislature legislates in DeVos, DeVos.

We used to have a State House of Representatives and a State Senate.  Now we have the Lower DeVos and the upper DeVos.

Our Governor--terrible as he is--used to be called Rick Snyder.  Now he's Governor DeVos.

We used to have a republican party and a Democratic party here.  Now we have the DeVos party and the Democratic party.

People may think I'm being overly dramatic but I am not--our state has all three branches solidly controlled by republicans who are in turn solidly controlled by the DeVos family.  Whatever the DeVos family wants, they get.  And without the slightest hint of dissent--no republican member dare question them lest the DeVos family set up a well-funded primary challenger in a heartbeat.

I mention all of this because the Senate approved Betsy Devos--a woman who has no qualifications whatsoever and appears to have received her appointment due to her family's bribing of republican Senators--as our next Secretary of Education.

And anyone who doesn't think the DeVos family wants to do to America what it did to Michigan is absolutely kidding themselves.

And there's no more perfect pawn than Donald Trump.

Fuck Donald Trump,
emaycee

First they came for the kids

Apparently not content with running the state of Michigan, the DeVos family is now setting its sights on the entire country as family matriarch Betsy DeVos today was nominated to be Secretary of Education by Donald Trump despite having no qualifications for the job other than being rich.

For those not familiar, the DeVos family is known for being virulently anti-union and big supporters of the privatization of our kids education (this piece by Mother Jones is truly eye-opening--you're probably safer with Charles Manson as your next door neighbor than with the DeVos family located anywhere within 100,000 miles or so of the United States).  They're also known for having the cleanest asses in the state--Governor Rick Snyder (you probably know him better as the man who oversaw the poisoning of thousands of children in Flint) and republican members of the Michigan Legislature have their lips locked permanently to the butt cheeks of each individual DeVos family member.

Our governor is currently being sued by seven children in Detroit because his wonderful emergency manager plan has failed to fund education so miserably that they have no other recourse but to sue just to get educated.  Governor Child Poisoner's response?  Kid don't have a constitutional right to an education, even though our state constitution expressly grants them that right.

For those wondering what else your kids are in store for under Hitler's choice for Secretary of Education, the city of Detroit currently has a 47% rate of illiteracy, the city of Pontiac has a 34% rate of illiteracy, and the city of Southfield has a 24% rate of illiteracy, all of which are a direct result of republicans running the state of Michigan (they've held the governor's mansion for 18 of the last twenty-six years and both houses of the legislature all but four of those years) with their usual policies surrounding we don't give a shit about you if you're poor.

Do not underestimate the disaster this is for our kids education.

By the way, it also signals that the institutions of our government are now officially for sale to the highest bidder (which ain't you and me).

Fuck Donald Trump,

emaycee

Money, it's a gas

About the only thing I miss from subscribing to The Detroit Free Press are the columns they used to run regularly featuring Leonard Pitts.  For those not familiar with Pitts, he's an exceptionally good op-ed writer for The Miami Herald who has a genuinely unique take on the state of America and isn't afraid to share it, consequences be damned.

As is Pitts' wont, he had a slightly different take than many on the Flint water crisis this past week.  Pitts said for all the hoopla over it being just another in a long line of racism run amok in America, what the poisoning of Flint's children is truly about is poverty.  Pitts points to the city of Morgantown, West Virginia where whites outnumber blacks and those living beneath the poverty line is near 40%--and says he can easily imagine a similar situation as Flint happening there, but not so much in the Hamptons or Orange County, or any number of wealthy communities across America.

And Pitts is exactly right.

And again I ask:  what does it say about a nation when the needs of the privileged few take precedence over the many?  Isn't that in many ways what the Pilgrims first came to America to escape?  And so many immigrants after them?

Remember this?  "We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity...."

Somehow when the Founding Fathers wrote those words I don't think they envisioned a nation where children would be poisoned for a lack of money.

They wanted us to be better than that.

And so should we.

Peace,
emaycee

Snyderly whiplash

Is there a lamer Governor in America than Michigan's own Rich Snyder?  I mean Scott Walker  and Paul LePage are outwardly bigger assholes, and Rick Scott and Pat McCrory are equally as incompetent, but for sheer buffoonery, it's impossible to beat Snyder.

For those who may have missed it (and lucky for you if you did), Snyder has courageously volunteered to drink Flint water for the next month.  Leaving aside that I'd be willing to bet all I own and then some that Snyder (or more likely, his minions) pour it down his gold plated sink before it gets anywhere near his lips, what the Snyder administration didn't so courageously tell you is that Snyder has yet to do shit to fix the pipes in Flint--zip, zero, nada, nothing.

Let's see...drink some water or actually fix the problem?  Which do you suppose would do the most to help Michiganders?  And which is nothing more than a half-assed spectacle?

Snyder proves once again that republicans are quite adept at being little more than circus clowns--they can stage a show, but unfortunately it's not funny in the fucking slightest.

Creatures from the white lagoon

Ever wonder how average Donald Trump voters are created?  I have the answer!

I don't watch much local news--actually I don't watch any local news, but this morning while I was getting dressed for work the Beautiful Girl had our local Fox News affiliate on so she could get the weather report for today.  The first three stories I saw--one, two, three!--were about a) a local African-American man accused of corruption, b) a local African-American man accused of sexual deviance, and c) a local Muslim man suspected of being a terrorist.  All stories delivered by lily white reporters in that shocked yet condescending way that Fox News does so well.

Never mind that our very white Governor, Rick Snyder, has presided over the poisoning of thousands of our children in Flint.  Never mind that our very white republican dominated Michigan legislature is slowly chipping away at Democracy in the Wolverine State.  The main problems we have here are all because of what brown people do!

It's like raw meat for lions.

Peace,
emaycee

Placing blame where it belongs

In lieu of the poisoning of thousands of their children, new reports are showing that the residents of Flint have lost their trust in government.

It would behoove the Democratic Party to explain to these beleaguered folks that the problem isn't government, but rather republican leadership of it.

Peace,
emaycee

This is what happens when you vote republican, Part I

Well lookee here:  seems that in Michigan, after our republican leaders poisoned Flint's children in an effort to "save" money, amid new allegations that a veteran's home which was privatized wasn't providing quite the same care as the union nurses Governor Snyder's minions fired, and the maggot infested food that Aramark (contracted by--who else? our republican leaders) fed to the state's prisoners, some republicans, off the record, are admitting that perhaps running the state of Michigan like a business hasn't worked out all that well.

Ya think?

I've said it before and I'll say it many more times until enough people stop believing republicans' bullshit free market mantra:  There is absolutely nothing the government can do that the private sector can't do a lot worse while charging us a lot more money.

Peace,
emaycee

You break it, you buy it

Predictably, republicans in Michigan have begun trying to find someone/anyone to blame for their utter ineptitude in response to the water crisis in Flint.  They're trying to blame the Flint City Council (good luck with that--ninety percent of the journalists in Michigan covering the crisis have already refuted it--and the 10% who haven't are republican trolls).  They're also attempting to blame the EPA, and while the EPA response was not perfect, the vast majority of the blame belongs to Gov. Snyder and his "team."

What interests me most about this is republicans all too familiar tactic of trying to deflect blame from their failed policies.  They're all about personal accountability (especially with regard to America's social safety net) until it comes to themselves.  Listen:  if you preach and want limited government than fucking own it when your amateur hour worldview fails.  And make no mistake, the republican failure in the Flint water crisis is a direct result of their limited government policies.

They wanted to save money and walk away, but it's not so simple when you poison children in the process.

Peace,
emaycee

They really don't care

At the end of Sunday's Democratic debate, Hillary Clinton sent some serious (and deserved) venom toward Michigan Governor Rick Snyder's handling of the water crisis and the poisoning of children in Flint, saying that Gov. Snyder "...acted as though he didn't really care."

News flash:  He isn't acting.

The candidate currently running third nationally in the republican primary circus, Marco Rubio, admitted that he hasn't been briefed on one of the nation's biggest stories of the past month, but was still pretty certain in his ignorance that the federal government should butt out.

And this is and has been the republican M.O. since Ronald Reagan was elected in the 1980's--an utter lack of empathy combined with a complete lack of understanding concerning ordinary Americans.  And the poisoning of children in Flint, Michigan is just the logical outcome of their core philosophy.

If you aren't white and wealthy, they really just don't care about you.

Peace,
emaycee

Water everywhere and not a drop to drink (safely)

I live about a half hour south of the city of Flint, Michigan which this week had to declare a state of emergency because the number of children in their city with above average levels of lead in their bloodstream has doubled since 2014 when the state of Michigan switched their source of water to the Flint River, from it's original source, the city of Detroit.  Flint's mayor, Karen Weaver, is declaring the emergency in the hope of getting federal funding to help with the developmental issues that are sure to rise in Flint's children in the years ahead.

Michigan Governor Rick Snyder, in typical republican fashion, has already begun blaming the victims, as a spokesman released a statement this week saying the water was safe but the problems are arising because of lead in certain citizens' water pipes--without ever explaining what exactly it was that caused the lead in their pipes to suddenly appear in their water after the changeover to the Flint River, but not when the water was coming from Detroit.  A lawsuit has been filed alleging that Snyder and his minions knew about the toxicity in the water before the switch but went ahead with it anyway.  Considering that Snyder hired a private contractor that served food infested with maggots (among other creatures) to Michigan prisoners, it doesn't come as much of a surprise.  An old businessman himself, Snyder knows that in today's Michigan, profits come before people.

In the end, though, one wonders how much longer we as a nation can afford to tolerate republicans' disdain for spending the money necessary to improve our dilapidated infrastructure.  It's hard to not believe that this tragedy in Flint could not have been prevented with the proper care of both the Flint River and its water system.

But that's the republicans world--if poisoning our children is the price we pay for tax cuts for millionaires, so be it.

Peace,
emaycee

Now wait just a minute

"It is the natural outgrowth of the Republican Party's longstanding flirtation with bigotry, its turn away from the civil rights movement, its electoral "Southern strategy," which relied on racism and bigotry to win national elections, its abandonment of affirmative action, its widespread skepticism and disdain for immigrants and immigration. Decades of the GOP walking the line of racist discourse have given Trump permission to espouse and promote outright bigotry."

This today from an editorial in The Detroit Free Press which castigated Donald Trump for his call to ban Muslims from entering America.  Later they lament Michigan Governor Rick Snyder for being one of umpteen republican governors to refuse to welcome the women and children refugees from Syria, and calls out both of them for giving voice to hatred.  It ends with a plea for us to all stand together as Americans.

What the Free Press doesn't say, though, is that they endorsed Rick Snyder for our governor, not just once, but twice, knowing full well that everything in this post's lead paragraph is true.  The republican party has been run by its radical faction since Reagan's two terms and expecting Snyder to behave any differently than he has in light of the republican party's history since the 1960s is either willful ignorance or the height of stupidy.  In its endorsements of Snyder, the Free Press is every bit as guilty as Trump and Snyder in legitimizing hatred.

So forgive me if I don't stand with the Free Press--we are reaping what they sowed with their lack of courage in calling out the republican party for its decades old bigotry until today in the interest of some misplaced sense of fairness toward the two parties.  Bigotry is bigotry, and no, both parties do not partake in it.

Peace,
emaycee

From the No Shit Sherlock Files

Rick Snyder, our not so courageous nor very successful governor this week became only the second republican politician (Willard Romney being the other) to announce he would not be seeking the party's nomination for the Presidency in 2016.

Considering that the record he would be running on would be bad jobs, bad roads, and bad policy (rape insurance, right to work for less) and that Snyder has all the charisma of a sandy piece of driftwood, this really isn't all that surprising.

In fairness, though, none of the other candidates has much to offer, either:

Ted Cruz--Let's turn America into a theocracy
Rand Paul--Let's pretend we're not racists
Marco Rubio--Anybody got a bottle of water?
Ben Carson--I'm fucking nuts
Carly Fiorina--I failed at business and I can fail at government, too
Mike Huckabee--Let's keep hatin' on the gays

And never is heard a discouraging word....

Peace,
emaycee

And then it's too late

There was an excellent post today in The Daily Kos about how the 2016 Presidential Election isn't about who is going to be our next President, but rather about the future makeup of our Supreme Court--most likely as to whether we get a Court friendly to Wall Street or to Main Street.  And whether we like Hillary or we love her, it's going to be necessary to get our voters to the polls to prevent an even worse Court for everyday Americans than the current Roberts Court.

All too often we don't see this until it's too late--just witness the war on workers and the war on women orchestrated in Michigan and Wisconsin, where nominally blue states managed to let a republican Legislature and a republican Governor come to power and watched their people power disappear.  And it isn't coming back anytime soon.  Now imagine this on a national level--because right now Barack Obama is the only thing standing between us and the annhilation of unions and abortions being performed in back alleys by charlatans.

And if there is any one message we need to get to our supporters in 2016 it's this one:  either get out and vote for our candidates or kiss even the minor victories of your way of life goodbye.

Peace,
emaycee

Take it from us

As Wisconsin republicans move closer to legislating a right to work for less law in Wisconsin, foks here in Michigan can tell them exactly what this law will mean:

It will not create any jobs.  It will not attract businesses to your state.  It will not increase anyone's wages.  It will not increase the state's standard of living.  It will not keep college graduates in your state.  It will not attract highly skilled individuals to your state.  It will not improve your kids education.

On the other hand, it will decrease wages.  It will lead to a lowered standard of living.  It will send your kids to other states that are more friendly to workers.  It will lead to an exodus of college graduates.  It will mean that fewer people want to teach in your state and your kids education will suffer.  It will lead to people abandoning your state in droves--who the hell wants to freeze their asses off for six months out of the year to work for peanuts?

It will also mean that your state, just like your neighbor to the east, is on the fast track to being as culturally, politically, and economically irrelevant as the Dakotas.

Probably should have followed the lead of your neighbor to the west, Minnesota.  Seems they elected a Democratic governor who raised taxes on the rich and raised the minimum wage--and now they have one of the best economies in the United States.

Too bad your governor, Scott Walker, chose to bury his nose in the Koch brothers asses, much like our governor, Rick Snyder, chose to bury his nose in the DeVos family's asses.  Funny how that works, isn't it?  He gets to run for President while you and your family get to survive on less and less money.

It's enough to make a man want to grab a pitchfork....

Peace,
emaycee

Governor Gutless caves again

Kudos to our own Governor Rick Snyder for caving once again to the far right fringe here in Michigan and signing a bill which will convene a yearlong test program in three counties to perform drug tests on those who are receiving welfare benefits.  As the link notes, drug testing the poor has proven a colossal failure in Utah, Tennessee, and Florida--but far be it from Governor Gutless to actually do the right thing instead of kiss Tea Party asses as he wastes more and more  precious Michigan taxpayer dollars.

Actually, I'm anxiously awaiting Governor Snyder's signature on a bill that will require his corporate cronies to be drug tested for the corporate welfare they receive from Michigan's fine citizens.  There's actually a chance he'll catch more than he will of the poor--at least his corporate benefactors can afford them.

Peace,
emaycee

Rag, mama, rag

Rape insurance for Michigan's wives and daughters.  Right to work for less laws.  The privitization of our prison food system, which resulted in maggots in the food and drugs sold by Aramark's employees.  The shutting off of the people's water in Detroit.  Taxing the pensions of retirees.  Tax breaks for big business that resulted in zero improvement in our economy.

And yet, and yet, our supposedly Liberal big city newspaper, The Detroit Free Press, has once again endorsed Rick Snyder for Governor over Mark Schauer here in Michigan.

They said it was a close call, but that they believed Governor Gutless would somehow grow a pair in the next four years and stand up for all that is right and good and buck that tea party dominated Michigan legislature. And that--all evidence to the contrary--he would grow Michigan's economy.

And when I wake up tomorrow morning, I'm going to flap my arms and golly, gee, I'll be able to fly.

God, I am so glad I cancelled my subscription--for fuck's sake, any idiot can see we could elect my son's fucking cat and it would be an improvement over Snyder, except for apparently, the idiots on the Free Press  editorial board.

Peace,
emaycee