A Reminder to Legislators

Several points from February's bi-partisan, Emergency Financial Advisory Panel report titled Michigan's Defining Moment:

"...A convergence of forces has brought about the most serious financial crisis in many years for Michigan’s state and local governments. This is a structural challenge, not simply the result of an economic downturn...We will not economically grow our way out of it. We cannot solely cut or tax our way out of it. Fundamentally, Michigan must reform its spending and taxing and must reinvent the way state and local governments deliver services to be more efficient and productive..."

"After careful study and considerable discussion, this bipartisan panel believes that Michigan

• needs fundamental reform of both spending and taxes;
• must create a modern tax structure that abandons the focus on the economic system of the 20th century and looks to the developing economy of the new century;
• must end the disinvestment in education and those other assets that define the quality of life that knowledge-based workers seek—cultural offerings, natural resources, and vibrant cities; and
• must develop a fiscal plan that includes a combination of revenue increases, spending cuts, and reform of how public services are delivered."

That was the memo from February: a bipartisan plea to work together on behalf of our beloved state. To make cuts and increase revenues. To cut spending and raise taxes. It's not an either /or situation. It hasn't been for months. End the obstruction and get the process moving, please.

1851 Was a Great Year in Michigan

"Michigan has five Colleges, one of them a State University, without fee for tuition, and connected with it a free medical department, with free lectures to all that will attend. An ample University and School Fund, with organized school districts all over the State, and district libraries."

"Michigan was never in a more prosperous condition than present--never more inviting to the farmer, the mechanic, the business man; in short, to occupations of all classes."

From Matters in Michigan, New York Daily Times, September 23, 1851

It seems that good libraries and public education with a shot at free tuition to University were a drawing card for business of all sorts. Hmm...

Our Michigan versus My Michigan

If Michigan were a person, she'd be unable to get a mortgage or car loan. She's the only state with a negative credit outlook, according to Jim Weimken of Standard and Poor's. Next month, she may be shutting down government offices, due to lack of funds. Her children are shoeless and hungry. If only she could increase her income. Relocating to find more lucrative work is out of the question.

If she were a person, she could get a second job or ask for a raise. She isn't one person, though. She is ten million; we are all Michigan. The Republicans, the Democrats, the unions, the car companies, the prisoners, the police, the teachers and students, the Walmart greeters, the intellectuals and the wrestling fans, the artists, the tool and die makers, the banks and the homeowners facing foreclosure, the political activists and the couch potatoes--we are all in this thing, everyone of us complicit. There is no "them" only "us."

Even so, there are people in Michigan who despise government. Schools should be privatized, artists should find market support, poor people should quit complaining and get jobs. And the homeless? Well, faith-based initiatives can help them find redemption in a bowl of soup with a side of scripture. According to this model, government enables those too lazy to help themselves. Michigan is filled with hapless slobs unwilling to do an honest day's work and looking for a hand out. (Well, except for the people who hold this opinion!)

Such we/they thinking is the fallacy that created our present mess. Our state police, our schools, our social services, our natural resources, our infrastructure, our arts, our economic development--all hang in the balance. For the sake of Our Michigan, reach out to your legislators and urge them to get mature, look across the aisle and see "us" in each other.

Administrative Matter

Recently, I have begun to moderate comments. And my first efforts have been clumsy. You will see several deleted thus far. These were either duplicate comments or spam. Thanks for your understanding.

When Ann Coulter and I Were Children

Ann Coulter and I are just one year apart in age. We grew up in the same United States, she on the east coast and I in the midwest. I was taught that our government was created of, by and for We the People. That the Constitution protected our freedom to worship or not worship a god. I was taught that the United States is fundamentally a pluralistic society. That with the exception of native Americans, if you dug far enough, we were all transplants to this amazing land and owed a debt of gratitude to the people who were here first and to the land itself. That unity in our diversity of belief, practice, and origins was our source of strength even as bloody conflicts played out between various groups (north vs. south, management vs. labor, second and third generation citizens vs. new immigrants).

We were a democratic republic with a free press, free speech, freedom of religion, and freedom to make as much money as you could. I trusted my teachers and parents and came to embrace that vision for my country. Turns out, Ann and I didn't really grow up in the same country.

Ann came to embrace a wholly different vision for the United States through the life experiences that formed her. Her vision is one with distinct winners and losers. One where losers deserve to lose because of their own stupidity, weakness and mistakes. To her, our inevitable cultural conflicts reveal the worthy and the unworthy, the leaders and the wimps. If you do not win, you are a moron. She has mastered an inflammatory recipe for bestselling books and guaranteed national media coverage. She has maximized her Michigan Law training in adversarial sparring to convey her vision to the world.

But here's the critical difference in our vision and approach: she lacks heart. Her intellect is shiny, fast and nimble; but lacks awareness of its own humanity. It is assertive, but lacks humility. It is purposeful, but unkind. It is creative, but immodest. Diligent, yet merciless.

She's a winner. I am human.

People, animals and the land

"We shall never achieve harmony with land, any more than we shall achieve absolute justice or liberty for people. In these higher aspirations the important thing is not to achieve, but to strive." Aldo Leopold, Round River.

Apparently, Leopold was right. In Michigan, we are still struggling to coexist with creatures who do not consent to participate in our economy, yet inhabit land we claim as a resource. Take the pregnant coyote in Detroit for example. She was released into the "wild" of northeast Oakland County. Oakland County has wilderness? Up north, where elk-vehicle collisions happen, the Michigan Department of Transportation is making an effort to reduce accidents by replacing deer crossing signs with elk crossing signs. But, does changing the image on the warning sign really improve the odds for the elk crossing the road? Elk and coyote are native to North America. But feral swine are a problem of our own making.

Feral swine have been reported in 32 Michigan counties. According to the piece linked below, the animals ranging about today are "escaped or neglected domestic swine, Eurasian wild boar originating from farms, and privately owned breeding and shooting operations." Kudos to the Departments of Agriculture and Natural Resources for recommending a ban on all recreational shooting of swine behind fences, and prohibiting the sale, importation or transfer of swine for recreational purposes. Unfortunately, these are just recommendations, not yet laws.

Here is an assortment of news stories from the last month featuring our uneasy relationship with animals and nature in Michigan.

4/5/07 Successful hunters agree, Turkeys not as dumb as they seem
3/25/07 Michigan DNR still figuring out UP Moose count
3/28/07 Elk crossing signs coming, Elk overpass deemed cost-prohibitive
4/18/07 Coyote found in Detroit is pregnant, released in the wild to give birth
4/19/07 State recommends aggressive action to eliminate feral swine

"When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world." John Muir

U.S. Supreme Court Denies Michigan's Effort to Protect Consumers

Wachovia wins. Consumers, beware.
From Reuters coverage: "The U.S. top court ruled on Tuesday that states cannot regulate lending by mortgage subsidiaries of national banks, blocking Michigan's efforts to enforce strict consumer protection laws on these subsidiaries."

All 49 other states supported Michigan's effort on behalf of consumers.

And here's a surprise from the dissenting opinion.
"It is especially troubling that the court so blithely pre-empts Michigan laws designed to protect consumers," Stevens wrote. He was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Antonin Scalia.

Virginia Tech Event Incomprehensible

I was determined not to write anything related to yesterday's shooting. But I found a time line of school violence in North America--the United States and Canada from the London Free Press in Ontario. Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine suggested that such violence was unique to the United States, but this long list demonstrates otherwise.

In fact, youth violence is a global problem.
3/27/07 France: Youth violence throws major Paris train station into chaos
4/10/07 New Zealand: Youth violence increases by 10%
4/26/02 Germany: School Shooting Leaves 17 Dead
6/4/06 Britain: Knives rule the playgrounds as inter-racial violence soars

Health organizations the world over are working on this.

The World Health Organization "World Report on Violence and Health" (2002) begins,"No country or community is untouched by violence. Images and accounts of violence pervade the media; it is on our streets, in our homes, schools, workplaces and institutions. Violence is a universal scourge that tears at the fabric of communities and threatens the life, health and happiness of all of us."

The Pan American Health Organization links gang activity in the Americas to lack of employment and education.

The Centers for Disease Control, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control organize youth violence risk factors by categories: individual, family, peer and community. Among their list of risk factors--authoritarian child rearing, history of victimization, low parental involvement, social rejection by peers, high emotional distress, diminished economic opportunities.

The CDC funds numerous activities aimed at mitigating youth violence using a public health approach: "define the problem, identify risk and protective factors, develop and test prevention strategies, and assure widespread adoption of prevention principles and strategies."

What happened yesterday is incomprehensible and complex. It cannot be reduced to a handy single cause--weak gun laws, bad parenting, mental illness, cultural alienation. It is beyond comprehension, a source of immeasurable suffering at once local and global.

U. of M. Study: Chimps More Evolved than Humans

Rings true.

Here is the press release from University of Michigan.
Check out coverage in this article from the Times Online.

“Our results show that the number of positively selected genes is substantially smaller in humans than in chimps,” said Jianzhi Zhang, who led the study. “These observations . . . refute the anthropocentric view that a grand enhancement in Darwinian selection underlies human origins.”

Hope for Howell

Children are our future...The Howell High School Environmental Club will be hosting the 2nd Annual Livingston County Earth Day/Arbor Day Celebration on April 21, at the Howell Courthouse. Earth Day, founded by Senator Gaylord Nelson, was first celebrated in 1970.
Show support for the progressive youth of Howell and visit their event.

That's Entertainment: Coulter in Livingston County

Is Coulter being brought in as a lecturer or an entertainer by the Livingston Economic Club and Cleary University? And does this distinction matter?

Here is a troubling hybrid: verbal abuse and propaganda merge with news and entertainment. And there you have the Imus problem, the Coulter problem, the O'Reilly problem, and more.

This communication approach presumes a single correct point of view for any issue and is utterly repulsed by dialogue. It has no use for other view points than to be foils for its own aggrandizement. If it really is entertainment, it aims to satisfy our demons not our better angels. Its central deceit is to portray hateful words and attitudes as playful articulation of beliefs held by a reasonable, but silent majority. (Glenn Beck does us the courtesy of self identifying,"Hey! I'm just saying what we're all thinking.") You all know who you are, apparently. And a number of you have already bought tickets for the Coulter event.

So, Coulter seems still to be commercially viable and politically useful.

From the Cleary website: "We at Cleary University have a strong past and proud tradition as a specialized business university and we remain committed to the enhancement of society through the many successes of our alumni and their employers."

Maybe for Cleary bringing in Coulter is an object lesson titled "Profitable Controversy: Hateful Sound Bite as Unforgettable Hook."

U. of M. Speaks; Wall Street Reacts

Stocks Drop on Consumer Confidence

No, they don't just interview Michigan residents.

From the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia website:

"Consumer confidence surveys measure individual households’ level of confidence in the economy’s performance.
The monthly Survey of Consumers is a nationally representative survey based on approximately 500 telephone interviews with adult men and women living in households in the co-terminous United States (48 states plus the District of Columbia). For each monthly sample, an independent cross-section sample of households is drawn. The respondents chosen in this drawing are then re-interviewed six months later. A rotating panel design results, and the total sample for any one survey is normally made up of 60 percent new respondents and 40 percent being interviewed for the second time."

Interestingly, "Exclusive distribution from Reuters - Effective January 1, 2007, Reuters has the exclusive right to distribute the headline survey index numbers through its news and media services, reaching an estimated 1 billion people a day. Additionally, Reuters is offering a more in-depth view of this important consumer opinion data exclusively to its customers, building on the strong base of current subscribers. The new media partnership and distribution model via Reuters establish a stable source of funding for this important survey and also provide greater transparency and disclosure of the survey results."

So really it is: Michigan Speaks; Reuters Distributes; Wall Street Reacts.