Articles of Interest 3-30-07
MORNING UPDATE:
A week of little more than political rhetoric from the Democrats and the Governor. Senate Republican have passed both SBT replacement bill and a balanced budget proposal WITHOUT raising TAXES!
What fiduciary responsibility does the Governor and her budget folks have to follow the constitution? They spent $70 million more than they had last year…they have borrowed $HUNDREDS of millions already this year??? And now they are trying to “blackmail” the legislature into passing a tax increase.
Now we are threatened with shut downs, loss of services or a tax increase.
There has to be something illegal, unethical or just completely incompetent about this?
Speaker Dillon’s “plan” starts to “leak” out…don’t call them taxes…but we’ll raise everyone’s utility rates…taxpayers won’t catch that one???
But, Governor Granholm appoints Mark Fox to the Board of Ethics, the same lawyer who represented her in front of the board on ethics charges?!?
On the federal level, San Francisco Democrat Speaker Nancy Pelosi promised 5 day work weeks and a “new” way of running Congress…so far, we’ve seen neither. Now as they get ready to leave for spring break without passing emergency funding for our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Pentagon worries about serious disruption for the military.
Taxpayer Teabag Protest on April 18th…but the Governor has her own surprise, unions will be lobbying for more money for “education”…not for the classroom, raising the amount of dollars that actually go to teaching our kids would be bad. Join us.
THE REST OF THE STORY:
-We finished the week with little leadership and no results from our Governor and the Democrat Majority in the legislature. While the Democrats should be given their kudos for political gamesmanship and demagoguery, they put forward NO votes, NO proposals that had any votes and NO solutions for the people of Michigan.
Republicans managed to fight back the Democrats attempts to raise taxes and demanded that we address the fundamental structural problems the state faces.
Now it was the Democrats who said they would have “another” plan that will come out next week. Maybe this one will have some Democrat rank and file members who will actually support it?
Michigan’s Constitution says you have to have a “balanced budget”. Those of you with a checkbook get the concept…income/revenues in…expenses/”investment” out. When all is said and done, you have to have a “balanced budget”.
Put another way…$41,500,000,000 in….$41,500,000,000 out.
The Governor and her team overspent last year by some $70 million dollars. We are now finding out the state is involved in “short term” borrowing in the tune of some “several hundred million dollars”. That’s called a “taxpayer’s liability” that you and I are going to have to pay off.
Special interests, her union supporters and others who benefit from getting taxpayers dollars are getting in line to back the Democrats plan to “save the day”. The old saying comes to mind: “if you rob Peter to pay Paul, you can always count on Paul’s support”.
If there isn’t something illegal, unethical or just completely incompetent about how the Governor has handled the budget…her attempt to blackmail the legislature into a tax increase is the worst political gamesmanship we’ve seen in a long time.
-Democrat Speaker Andy Dillon asked people not to pre-judge his plan until it’s fully released, but if it walk like a duck, quacks like a duck and looks like a duck…I think it’s a back handed way of raising taxes?!?
The Democrats believe if they raise utility rates…but let the Public Service Commission (appointed by Granholm) actually pass the “rate hike”, they will have sufficiently hidden this form of taxation from the people of Michigan. Oh, I don’t think so….so we’ll wait for the details, trade offs, backroom deals.
How about dealing with our “spending problem”??? We have over $41,000,000,000 dollars in revenues coming into the state…and we can’t run the state on that? I don’t think we have a revenue/tax problem…I think it’s a spending/Democrat problem.
-Governor Granholm appoints Mark Fox to the Board of Ethics, the same lawyer who represented her in front of the board on ethics charges? So much for setting “higher ethical” standards…we wouldn’t expect anything less from the Democrats these days.
-The Politico Newsletter reports that Defense department needs funding by April 15th or else they would have begin cutting back on equipment, pre-deployment training and facility upgrades for our troops. Even in Washington the Democrats play budgetary games with taxpayer funds.
San Francisco Democrat Speaker Nancy Pelosi promised 5 day work weeks and a “new” way of running Congress…so far, we’ve seen neither. Now as they get ready to leave for spring break without passing emergency funding for our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Pentagon worries about serious disruption for the military.
REMINDER: A group of taxpayers are organizing a Taxpayers Protest Day on April 18th on the steps of the Capitol at 11:00am. Taxpayers from across the state will be gathering to send the Governor and the legislature a message. If you want your voice to be heard, consider showing up.
More details to follow. Info will be posted at www.mitaxpayers.org. as the Taxpayer Tea Bag Protest rally grows and develops. EVERY taxpayer should consider participating…our voices need to be heard.
P.S. The Governor has organized her “union friends” to be there to counter protest the taxpayers. Um, paid day off by union employees (taxpayer paid) to counter a citizens protest for paying too much in taxes…any irony there???
Saul Anuzis
STATE STORIES
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/POLITICS/703300389
Granholm budget cuts pass House
Reductions fall heavily on pensions, day care, higher education; tax, fee increases considered.
Gary Heinlein and Mark Hornbeck / Detroit News Lansing Bureau
LANSING -- Lawmakers Thursday eliminated one-third of the state's $940 million budget problem with final passage of Gov. Jennifer Granholm's executive-order cuts in state spending for the current fiscal year.
The order was passed by the Democratic-controlled House Appropriations Committee 24-6 -- a full House vote is not required. The Republican-controlled Senate adopted the spending reductions last week.
The cuts fall on state funding of employee pensions, State Police auto theft prevention efforts, computer services, day care and burial aid for the poor and state payments to colleges and universities.
Before approving the executive order, committee members questioned the wisdom of several other reductions, including funding for foster care services, a $20 million cut to a $26 million forest products development project and less support for a domestic violence prevention program.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/OPINION01/703300306/1008
Opinion: How would DeVos have solved budget crisis?
Saul Anuzis
I n the budget crisis, I am asked daily what the Republicans would do differently from what Gov. Jennifer Granholm is proposing. It got me thinking: If Dick DeVos had been elected governor, you would see a much different message coming from the Executive Office.
Here is what I think DeVos would have done:
Immediately freeze all new state spending, including hiring. Until we have the crisis figured out, the state will not spend a penny more than it spent last year and will look for ways to cut costs dramatically.We can figure out how to live within our means in a $41.5 billion budget.
Issue an executive order that state employees can no longer receive both a pension and a state salary. Along these same lines, he would have eliminated all unnecessary government positions. He would conduct a thorough review of each state department, looking for duplication and waste.
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/NEWS06/703300437
STATEWIDE
Utility tax electrifies opposition
Critics say fee would show up on people's power bills
March 30, 2007
BY CHRIS CHRISTOFF and KATHLEEN GRAY
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITERS
LANSING -- House Democrats' plan for a new tax on utility companies that would net $500 million to help balance the state budget stirred the political pot Thursday, as Republican reaction ranged from wariness to outrage.
House Speaker Andy Dillon, D-Redford Township, said his plan would not allow utilities to pass on the entire cost of the tax to their customers. He said details were incomplete as he announced plans for House committees to meet during the usual spring break next week to finish a budget by the end of April.
Attorney General Mike Cox blasted Dillon's plan as a hidden tax on Michigan homeowners, renters and businesses and a gift to the two largest utilities.
"Every ratepayer in Michigan would end up paying more," he said.
The Free Press reported Thursday that the plan could produce as much as $1 billion in revenue, but Dillon said the net revenue would be less in order to hold down customers' electricity bills.
Analysis: House Dems make big promises on budget fix
Friday, March 30, 2007
By Peter Luke
LANSING -- A proposed tax on utility bills that could generate $500 million annually is just one piece of an ambitious April agenda being assembled by House Democrats.
Finishing up their first three months in power, Democrats are mulling sweeping changes in how Michigan is governed and taxed. They're even addressing health care.
Having canceled a two-week spring break, House lawmakers intend to pair solutions to Michigan's budget and cash woes with long-term solutions designed to bolster the state's economic standing.
"There will be reforms that will affect state government, local government and education, and there will be new revenues in the House plan as well," House Speaker Andy Dillon, D-Redford Township, said Thursday.
The goal will be to produce comprehensive change by the end of April on a bipartisan basis. "There's going to be a lot of moving parts to this thing," Dillon said of the plan.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/OPINION01/703300322/1008
Editorial
Dump new tax schemes in favor of real reforms
The Detroit News
Michigan residents are clear that they don't support tax increases to fix the state's budget deficit. But for some reason that hasn't sunk in with some state Democrats, including House Speaker Andy Dillon and Gov. Jennifer Granholm.
Dillon, D-Redford Township, said Thursday he is working on a plan to shave about $500 million of the state's $940 million budget shortfall by fundamentally changing the state's utility market. Two major components of the plan, which Dillon says is still being drafted, include taxing utility companies and eliminating the competitive market that now exists.
Stability in the market, Dillon says, would provide incentive for utilities to build new base power plants, which ultimately could reduce costs. Ultimately, consumers will bear the burden of utility tax increases, despite Dillon's protests.
"It would be incorrect to assume that there would be an automatic pass through to consumers," Dillon says. "There would be for some, but not all."
http://www.mlive.com/news/annarbornews/index.ssf?/base/news-22/117517923723340.xml&coll=2
1,000 AAMG jobs on the line
Granholm plans pitch to Citigroup
Thursday, March 29, 2007
BY STEFANIE MURRAY
News Business Reporter
In an attempt to save more than 1,000 ABN Amro Mortgage Group jobs in Michigan, Gov. Jennifer Granholm has a telephone call arranged on Friday with an executive from Citigroup, the financial services company that bought the Ann Arbor area-based mortgage lending business on March 1,
According to Ann Arbor Spark, the governor is expected to make a case for why Citigroup should retain its Michigan work force as it absorbs AAMG's business into its mortgage lending arm, CitiMortgage.
AAMG employs 3,000 people, including 950 at its Pittsfield Township headquarters and some at an office in metro Detroit. CitiMortgage has 8,700 employees and is based in St. Louis. It has a large office in Southfield.
http://www.thealpenanews.com/stories/articles.asp?articleID=4205
Editorial: Get budget issues cleared up now
Published: Friday, March 30, 2007
It’s both disturbing and frightening to think the state’s budget problems has come to a possible shutdown. Wednesday, the Associated Press reported Gov. Jennifer Granholm has asked department heads to tell her what programs might be affected and the steps to take if the state runs out of money, including a potential government shutdown.
‘‘The money issue is real. This is not a fabricated crisis,’’ Granholm spokeswoman Liz Boyd said Wednesday. ‘‘The governor has made it clear for months the emergency we’re facing.’’
House Minority Leader Craig DeRoche said the governor’s talk of a government shutdown isn’t necessary and claimed, “Maybe it’s a scare tactic aimed at the House of Representatives leadership.’’
Scare tactic or not, the state budget issue appears to be one that isn’t going to change any time soon and some cuts that are happening will have an immediate effect on the state.
Among the departments affected is the Michigan State Police, which announced the closing of two posts Thursday — Calumet in the Upper Peninsula and Hart, which is on the west side of the state. Already it has been reported that personnel with the MSP have taken reductions in rank, including in Alpena, where Lt. Mike Caldwell said it is likely he will take a demotion.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/OPINION03/703300321/1008/OPINION01
Frank Beckmann
Political storms cloud out a ray of hope
T hinking out loud about this week's developments:
· Why does United Auto Workers President Ron Gettelfinger sound as though he has a personal ax to grind with Delphi Corp. and its chief executive, Steve Miller, who is trying to guide the corporation through bankruptcy and back to profitability? Gettelfinger threatens to "shut them down" if the company voids its union contracts in court.
The UAW boss may want to lower his blood pressure. Gary N. Chaison, professor of industrial relations at Clark University in Worcester, Mass., told me that will never happen because Delphi is in stronger financial shape with settled union contracts than without the UAW.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/METRO/703300437
SEMCOG economic outlook
Michigan's pain far from over
Mike Wilkinson / The Detroit News
Dramatic losses in the domestic auto industry will keep Metro Detroit mired in an economic crisis, fueling continued population declines and harsh changes in the job market for at least a decade, according to a bleak forecast released Thursday.
The report, issued by the Southeast Michigan Council of Governments, predicts that, for the first time ever, the Big Three's U.S. market share will fall below 50 percent next year and that an auto-borne regional recovery is unlikely.
Unlike the recoveries in the 1970s, '80s and '90s, the days of waiting for the Big Three to pull the region out of recessions are over, as car prices have remained stagnant, costs have gone up and the domestic automakers have continued to lose market share.
State budget battle features competing plans
By TIM MARTIN
LANSING, Mich. (AP) -- As Michigan's state budget teeters toward bigger trouble, the list of suggested options to fix it grew Thursday.
But none of the ideas, including House Speaker Andy Dillon's preliminary pitch to tax utilities, appears to be generating much consensus among state government's competing political interests.
Several House committees are expected to meet through the Legislature's two-week spring break, which was supposed to start Friday. It's a sign that state leaders still have a long way to go to reach an overall solution to the estimated $940 million budget deficit for the fiscal year that started Oct. 1.
An even bigger deficit looms for the next budget year.
"We will get it fixed," Granholm said Thursday during a speech to the Downtown Detroit Partnership annual meeting at the Detroit Marriott Renaissance Center.
http://www.hometownlife.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070329/OPINION01/703290714/1201/NEWS13
TOM WATKINS: Michigan's Budget Crisis: Opportunity For Real Leadership
There is great angst and anxiety in Michigan today. Seems that every economic indicator one looks at is heading in the wrong direction. Home foreclosures, bankruptcies and unemployment are up, home sales (if you can sell) and personal income are down and the domestic auto industry and auto suppliers are shedding jobs like many of us wish we could peel off a few pounds. And the very jobs that we believe are our future and salvation are pulling up stakes and leaving town as well. Comerica is heading west, Chrysler may go east to China, while Pfizer's departure from Michigan has many of their employees, and local and state government officials heading to the medicine cabinet.
No job sector or region of our state is immune from the rapidly changing, disruptive information and technologically driven, flattened world in which we exist.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/METRO/703300399/1003
SEMCOG Economic Outlook
Health care job shortages loom in thousands
Health care officials have long known their field is the fastest growing sector in Michigan's economy, but the need for workers will become especially acute as the baby boomers get older, placing added pressure on the health care system to meet their needs, they say.
Already, health care is the state's largest private-sector employer, with more than 478,300 direct care workers, exceeding Michigan's agricultural, educational and automotive manufacturing sectors, according to a report issued in June by the Michigan Medical Society.
"Health care is bigger than the auto industry," said Dave Fox, medical society spokesman.
But shortages and strains loom in the near future as the over-65 population doubles, according to a SEMCOG report issued Thursday.
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/BUSINESS06/703300388/1019
Not enough nurses to fill state's growing need
March 30, 2007
BY JOHN GALLAGHER and PATRICIA ANSTETT
FREE PRESS BUSINESS WRITERS
As Michigan struggles to attract jobs to offset auto industry declines, the state cannot train enough people to fill current openings in the surest growth area -- health care -- let alone the thousands of workers needed in the future, experts said.
Even as nursing jobs remain unfilled in Detroit, and thousands of Canadians pour across the border to help meet demand, Michigan nursing programs turned away 2,000 qualified applicants in 2005, according to the Michigan Department of Community Health, in part because there weren't enough people to teach them.
By 2035, southeast Michigan's health care jobs will nearly double, to more than 500,000, even as automotive manufacturing jobs dwindle, according to the Southeast Michigan Council of Governments' jobs and population forecast released Thursday.
The growing need for health care workers means metro Detroit will face a growing problem that is the reverse of today's automotive layoffs -- critical shortages of trained, working-age people in various health care fields, especially nursing.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/METRO/703300398/1003
SEMCOG Economic Outlook
Career futures veer away from manufacturing
The days when you graduated from high school on Friday and went to work for the Big Three on Monday are over.
Economists for the Southeast Michigan Council of Governments believe that manufacturing jobs are in an unstoppable descent, draining the region of the jobs that have meant comfortable lives without a higher education.
Future job growth will center around health care, and to a lesser extent the service sector, such as the food industry. And most new jobs will require more education.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/METRO/703300397/1003
SEMCOG Economic Outlook
Fate of revival may rest on school funding
Josh Cline's seven years on the Ford assembly line didn't ensure job security.
So when the auto company offered buyouts, Cline, 27, traded it all for nursing classes at Macomb Community College.
"Working for the auto industry is great for some people," said Cline of Rochester, whose buyout will pay $15,000 annually for four years of school. "But I wanted to do something more with my life."
Changes such as Cline's are critical to Michigan's transformation, according to a SEMCOG report, but those forces mean challenges for education.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/METRO/703300396/1003
SEMCOG Economic Outlook
State, cities face further service strains
A 10-year decline in Metro Detroit's population means further strain on municipal governments and services, not to mention a long-term drag on the state's budget, experts suggest.
Communities may have difficulties paying fixed costs such as employee health care, utilities and facility expenses while coping with less tax revenue, said Deputy Oakland County Executive Robert Daddow.
If regional population declines happen as predicted by the Southeast Michigan Council of Governments, those who remain will pay more, he said.
Adding to municipal woes could be already large legacy costs -- pensions to be paid to a growing number of retirees.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/METRO/703300311/1003
SEMCOG Economic Outlook
Home builder counts on suburban buying trend
Mike Wilkinson / The Detroit News
The effects of the economic downturn are apparent to most Metro Detroit homeowners -- and to anyone trying to sell a home.
"There's a lot of supply out there," said Tim Stapleton, division president of Centex Homes, one of the largest homebuilders in the region.
With predictions that good-paying jobs will continue to decline, along with population, many fear that home values will continue to decline. Over the short term, that could happen.
But Stapleton is a bit more bullish, saying growth will likely slow, but folks will still seek bigger houses in the suburbs. And those moving out of smaller homes will be able to sell, in some cases, to first-time buyers.
"The population is dwindling, but home ownership is going up," he said.
http://www.michigansthumb.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=18142854&BRD=2292&PAG=461&dept_id=476227&rfi=6
No time for politics
The Huron Daily Tribune
03/29/2007
The Associated Press is reporting that Gov. Jennifer Granholm is exploring a government shutdown if May rolls around and the state is out of money.
So far Granholm’s proposal to tax services by 2 percent has been shot down by Senate Republicans. They did, however, pass $600 million in cuts and other adjustments and accept Granholm’s order to cut $334 million in spending. But many of the Senate Republicans’ proposed cuts face a tough fight as they want to cut school funding this year and make cuts to local government and health care, among other areas.
Here’s what we think. The state needs to check its own house first. We agree our state government is leaner than ever before. But we would bet that it can be leaner still and maintain efficient services. We suggest our leaders do what the rest of Michigan businesses and households have been forced to do for some time — when you think you’re as lean as you can be, rethink it. Retool. Reinvent. Leave no proverbial stone unturned. State officials owe that much to those they serve.
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/NEWS01/703300366
Prosecutor wants Detroit schools official in jail for driving drunk
Worthy: Finish sentence or face trial
March 30, 2007
BY JENNIFER DIXON
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER
Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy says she wants Detroit school board member Jonathan Kinloch to serve a jail sentence as agreed upon after a third drunken driving conviction in 2005 -- or she'll seek a felony trial.
Worthy decided to push for the jail term after learning from a Free Press report last week that Kinloch never completed the 30-day sentence that was part of a plea deal in which the drunken driving charge was treated as a misdemeanor. A judge decided to waive the jail time after being assured Kinloch had turned his life around.
"Mr. Kinloch must either complete 30 days in jail or we will revoke our plea offer and proceed to trial," Worthy said this week. Prosecutors said they would file court papers today to force the issue.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/OPINION03/703300348
Daniel Howes
Pressure is building on DPS
Tough times for Detroit schools are making radical change more attractive
M ayor Kwame Kilpatrick's push for charter and private schools as one remedy to Detroit's deepening education woes isn't political whim -- it's a core recommendation of his NextDetroit Transformation Team and no surprise to Detroit Public Schools.
The team's education subcommittee, whose members included DPS President Jimmy Womack, former Superintendent Bill Coleman, Skillman Foundation CEO Carol Goss and University Preparatory Academy Superintendent Doug Ross, urged the mayor to "pursue the creation of 50 small, themed and personalized high schools in the city of Detroit," their confidential report says.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/SCHOOLS/703300440/1003/METRO
No word yet from chosen DPS chief
Connie Calloway has not accepted school board's superintendent offer.
Jennifer Mrozowski / The Detroit News
DETROIT -- It's been three weeks since the Detroit school board made an offer to Normandy, Mo., Superintendent Connie Calloway, but she has yet to formally accept and sign a contact.
Calloway's attorney acknowledged that she received the contract proposal, according to Detroit school board President Jimmy Womack, but the school system has not received her written response.
Cozy Marks III, board president in Normandy, said Calloway hasn't given her resignation, but Detroit board members expect she will accept the job here.
"We look forward to her coming on board and joining the district," said board member Jonathan Kinloch, chairman of the human resources, policy and legislative affairs committee. "We have no indication that she will not accept."
Detroit core is ripe for stores
Louis Aguilar / The Detroit News
City leaders are wielding a new crop of data -- showing downtown Detroit is more affluent and populated than previously thought -- to aggressively lure more stores to the area, said Roger Penske, the auto magnate and chairman of the Downtown Detroit Partnership.
"There are more people living downtown, they earn more money than previously thought," Penske told 800 business and community leaders Wednesday at the Downtown Detroit Partnership Luncheon. "And guess what? The surrounding neighborhoods are hungry for more retail and service opportunities."
Among the facts: The $59,300 average income of downtown residents is 33 percent higher than shown in previous census data. Penske also noted that three market studies show downtown and adjacent neighborhoods have far more economic potential than census data indicates.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/POLITICS/703300382/1022
Capitol report
Lottery ad budget at risk
Critics say $10M cut approved by Senate would reduce ticket sales for Michigan games.
Charlie Cain / Detroit News Lansing Bureau
LANSING -- A plan to slash the Michigan Lottery's advertising budget by more than half could wind up costing the state's public schools tens of millions of dollars, officials are warning.
Trimming the ad budget by $10 million, as the Republican-controlled Senate voted last week, likely would depress ticket sales at the Lottery, which last year generated an all-time record of $688 million for K-12 schools. The Lottery is one of state's government's success stories, setting record sales and profit margins in each of the past three years.
Under the Senate plan not yet addressed by the House, $10 million would be taken from the Lottery and deposited directly into the School Aid Fund. Lottery profits go into that fund.
But Lottery Commissioner Gary Peters says the lottery is a big business ($2.2 billion in 2006 sales) and already is underfunded in how much it can spend to promote sales
.
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/COL06/703300448
TOM WALSH
Casino vote gives union momentum
March 30, 2007
BY TOM WALSH
FREE PRESS COLUMNIST
'Detroit," the Rev. Jesse Jackson proclaimed, "has shifted from an automotive base to a casino base for its economy, gone from solid jobs to Lotto and luck as a base of survival."
When I heard those words in September 2005 I thought, gee, that's vintage Jesse Jackson, hyperbolizing to make a point, punctuated with his usual rhetorical flourish.
Today, I'm thinking that perhaps Jackson wasn't exaggerating.
Consider the state of the UAW, long regarded as perhaps the most powerful industrial labor union in the world. The UAW is celebrating a big organizing victory, after 82% of dealers and simulcast employees at the Caesars Atlantic City casino voted last weekend to join the union.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/POLITICS/703300383/1022
Detroit to host Dems' debate
But anger at Fox News could make it difficult to attract presidential hopefuls to Sept. 23 event.
Gordon Trowbridge / Detroit News Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON -- Detroit would host a Democratic presidential debate Sept. 23 under a plan announced Thursday by Fox News Channel, but the network's unfavorable reputation among Democratic activists may make it difficult to attract the party's 2008 candidates.
Fox and the Congressional Black Caucus Public Education and Leadership Institute announced the debate just weeks after protests forced the cancellation of a similar event planned by Fox in Nevada. Less than an hour after Thursday's announcement, a Web site run by influential African-American activists denounced the event as "dancing with the devil."
Chrysler suitors rush to make bids
Blackstone could make offer as early as today; rest expected by Wednesday.
Bill Vlasic / The Detroit News
Three potential buyers for the Chrysler Group were said to be finalizing bids Thursday in hopes of getting the inside track on an acquisition of the U.S. division of DaimlerChrysler AG.
No formal bids had been received as of late Thursday, but people close to the process said offers are expected from private-equity giants Blackstone Group and Cerberus Capital Management as well as the Canadian auto supplier Magna International Inc.
Blackstone, which is teaming with Centerbridge Partners, was preparing to present its bid as soon as today, people familiar with the situation say.
All of the bids likely will be received by DaimlerChrysler's investment banker, J.P. Morgan Chase, before the German automaker convenes its annual shareholders meeting Wednesday in Berlin.
http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/METRO/703300439/1003
Tuskegee Airmen get heroes' welcome
WASHINGTON -- Richard Macon of Detroit recalls flying his fighter plane in World War II into a German "wall of fire," which tore off a wing and flipped his aircraft, leaving him temporarily paralyzed and staring up at two Nazis with machine guns.
"I suffered a broken neck and a broken shoulder and was paralyzed for a couple days. And I was a prisoner of war for nine months and 15 days," said Macon, 86.
Macon was one of several hundred Tuskegee Airmen, including dozens from Michigan, who were awarded the Congressional Gold Medal on Thursday.
They were the first black pilots in the U.S. military and served during World War II in segregated Army Air Corps squadrons that flew combat missions over North Africa, Sicily and Italy.
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/NEWS06/703300468/1008
Despite GOP report, Knollenberg plans run
March 30, 2007
BY TODD SPANGLER
FREE PRESS WASHINGTON STAFF
WASHINGTON -- The White House might have been under the impression that Rep. Joe Knollenberg might not run for re-election, but it seems to be a surprise to him.
This week, as the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee looked into practices at the federal General Services Administration, a document surfaced indicating Knollenberg, an Oakland County Republican, might not run in 2008.
Not true, Knollenberg's staff says.
The document -- part of a presentation apparently made by Scott Jennings, an assistant to White House aide Karl Rove, in late January -- indicated seats the GOP wants to protect, including that of Knollenberg, Vern Ehlers of Grand Rapids and freshman Tim Walberg of Tipton.
Two of the names -- Knollenberg and Ehlers, both 73 years old -- had asterisks next to them indicating "member may not seek re-election."
http://www.journalgroup.com/Canton/3698/legislator-hopes-to-reduce-state-department-costs
March 29, 2007
Legislator hopes to reduce state department costs
As the state House enters negotiations to craft a plan to deal with the $940 million state budget deficit, Rep. Phil LaJoy (R-Canton), hopes it’s the right time to deal with an issue he’s raised before: bureaucratic waste and redundancies.
LaJoy planned to introduce legislation this week to create the “$2K Commission,” so-called because the nine-member body would be appointed to analyze how the roughly $2,000 the average taxpayer sends to Lansing is spent.
“We’ve never looked at state government, that I’m aware of, from A to Z,” said LaJoy.
http://www.mlive.com/news/grpress/index.ssf?/base/news-35/117517956146350.xml&coll=6
'Right charge' made in Secchia crash, cops say
Thursday, March 29, 2007
By John Tunison and John
LANSING -- The woman who allegedly caused a crash that injured former U.S. Ambassador Peter Secchia, his wife and two friends, was cited Wednesday for careless driving, DeWitt Township Police Chief Brian Russell said.
The civil infraction, carrying three points and up to a $240 fine if found responsible, comes after Clinton County prosecutors last month decided Susan Gae Cole, 55, of Owosso, should not be criminally charged because she was not under the influence of alcohol or drugs at the time of the crash.
A police officer at the time of the Jan. 14 crash on Int. 69 also opted not to write a ticket.
http://www.ednews.org/articles/9435/1/A-Program-to-Handle-the-Crisis-of-Competence/Page1.html
A Program to Handle the Crisis of Competence
By Barry Stern, Ph.D. Senior Fellow of the Haberman International Policy Institute in Education
Published 03/27/2007
FOLLOWING IS A COMPOSITE STORY OF STUDENTS IN LOS ANGELES, DETROIT, FLINT AND OTHER CITIES WHO IMPROVED THEIR WORK AND COLLEGE READINESS THROUGH AN INTENSIVE, COMPUTER-ASSISTED, TEAM TAUGHT PROGRAM CALLED "FAST BREAK".
By Barry Stern – March 26, 2007
Juan Martinez and Celeste Johnson were very concerned about their future. Both of these young adults were living at home with their low-income families. Although Juan had graduated high school six months before, he had no idea what he wanted to do with his life. His minimum-wage job was barely keeping him in spending money, and saving enough to go to college was a farfetched dream.
Celeste, 24, was a high school drop out; she was functionally illiterate, reading at a fourth-grade level, with fifth-grade math skills. She lacked self-confidence and was in need of remedial help.
Juan and Celeste decided to apply to FAST BREAK, a computer-assisted employment training program. Entry requirements included:
* Pass reading and math tests at least at the eighth-grade level (or Level 3 of WorkKeys)
* Commit to eight-hour days for eight weeks
* Work or go to school upon graduating
Juan and Celeste liked the idea of a short program that led to a job paying more than minimum wage and were enthused about using computers several hours a day. They both looked forward to classes with lots of individual attention and interaction between classmates.
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NATIONAL STORIES
http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/news/20070329/oppose29.art.htm
Things are looking up
Setting a deadline for withdrawal would guarantee defeat in Iraq.
By Joe Lieberman
Two months ago, the Senate voted unanimously to confirm one of our most decorated generals, David Petraeus, to take command in Iraq. Gen. Petraeus promised a fundamental overhaul of U.S. strategy — with a new plan that would at last correct the many mistakes we have made in this long and difficult war.
Since taking command, Gen. Petraeus has been true to his word. The result? Sectarian violence is down in Baghdad. The radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr has fled. The Mahdi Army, which terrorized Baghdad last year, appears to be splintering. And the Iraqi government — its spine stiffened thanks to our renewed support — is taking the critical steps for political reconciliation.
Amazingly, however, just at the moment things are at last beginning to look up in Iraq, a narrow maj