Who Got The Gravy?

I've moved.

2006-10-08T10:14:00.000-04:00

I have moved to a new location.

DeVos and Anuzis Mislead on Financial Disclosure

2006-10-03T21:04:00.000-04:00

UPDATE (Oct 5, 10:00 AM): Common Cause MI came out with an opinion on the financial disclosure. Perfect timing on this bill!

Dick DeVos has refused to disclose his tax returns, an unprecedented move in modern day gubernatorial elections. Instead, he has opted to release a "financial disclosure statement". This so-called financial disclosure contains serious omissions, such as DeVos' involvement in nursing homes that allowed the abuse of patients with Alzheimers. This shocking revelation has caused many of us to ask, "what else does he have to hide?"

On the other hand, the Republicans would have you believe that DeVos' financial disclosure is actually comprehensive. To back up their claim, they cite an assessment of his disclosure by Michigan's Common Cause. This is a lie. In fact, the MI Common Cause hasn't even looked at DeVos' financial disclosure, much less commented on it.

At yesterday's debate (around the 42:33 mark of the audio file), Dick said:

My disclosure, called by Common Cause here in Michigan as the most complete disclosure of anything that any previous candidate for Governor, laying out all of the ownership interests that I have... (audio clip)

On his blog today, Saul said:

This Governor is willing to say just about anything to get re-elected. She also had the audacity to complain about Dick DeVos' financial disclosure statement when Michigan's Common Cause called it the most extensive financial disclosure of any candidate for public office...ever.

My "gut feeling" was that these statements were either somehow distorted, or completely untrue. I couldn't find anything on the subject after a quick Google search. DeVos says that his disclosure was "complete," but it somehow conveniently left out Alterra.

I decided to e-mail the chair of Common Cause Michigan, who also happens to be a professor here at U of M. While making it clear that he hadn't actually seen the disclosure and therefore couldn't comment on its adequacy, he did say that his organization had never actually reviewed it. From his e-mail:

I'm trying to track down that quote. As chair of common cause in Michigan I didn't say it. And there isn't much to the organization other than me at this point. I have a friend who is talking with campaign people to see where this came from.

I haven't seen the statement so I'm agnostic on whether it's a model or not.

There you have it -- Common Cause Michigan never said that about DeVos' financial disclosure. I find it ironic that in a post about how Granholm will supposedly "say anything to get re-elected", Saul demonstrated that he is the one that will stoop to any level to win.

If there was nothing to hide in his tax returns, they would be upfront about all of this and told the truth from the beginning. What are they hiding? More importantly, what do these falsehoods and cover-ups say about whether we can trust DeVos or not?

(cross-posted on Michigan Liberal)

Granholm / DeVos Debate on Michlib

2006-10-02T11:47:00.000-04:00

Check out WK's diary. These were my comments:

Once again, this guy is just going through his con man routine. Anyone who has run Amway for around a decade knows how to spin the heck out of anything and sound convincing. He may be a little awkward, but I can almost guarantee you that he isn't new to this kind of thing. Plus, he's got all of his expensive Amway-purchased consultants telling him what to do.
I'm more interested in seeing how this debate format goes over more than anything else. This is all assuming that the debate format is actually going to be what Skubick said it is in one of his columns ("open" format with no rules):
If its true, I'm happy to see an environment that could potentially throw them off their game and off of their scripted talking points. Will it turn into a shout match? There is clearly an incentive to try and monopolize the time / shout louder than the other person.
If the similarly formatted Brewer/DeWitt/Anuzis/Truscott debate on "Off The Record" is any indication, counter-arguments are going to be a lot more important than usual IMO. Having more counter-arguments means that you have more "stuff" to fill time with than the other candidate. This means that while you're talking, they're not. In an "open" format, this is the ideal position to be in.
Counter-arguments are also more important because a topic of discussion can continue on indefinately (until Skubick decides to force a change of subject, basically). Typically, the order is: moderator gives question, candidate 1 answers, candidate 2 answers, and sometimes afterward candidate 1 follows up, candidate 2 follows up after that, and then the subject is done. The advantage of this format is that each candidate has an equal amount of time to fully develop an argument and convey a message the way they want to. The disadvantage is that we don't get to really see how each of these messages stack up against each other. With this proposed format, we won't necessarily have an equal amount of time for each candidate or as fully developed messages, but the candidates could need more than just one or two counter-arguments if the discussion carries on past one rebuttal.
If Skubick is good, he'll also make them actually answer the question that is being asked. Normally in debates, the moderator asks a question and then the responder can say anything they want, so candidates are able to keep really "on message" and not get distracted. In this case, he can ask follow-up questions in the middle of their monologues and hopefully hold them accountable for what is actually being asked. I don't know if he's actually going to do that, but at least there is that potential.
Like most debates, it is the "spin war" that needs to be won. Most of the people actually watching are already decided anyway. What the debate really does is help to define the "story" that is told by the media.

New Republican Governors' Association Ad -- this is the best you can do!?

2006-09-29T18:45:00.000-04:00

So, the Republican Governor's association has unleashed a new ad attempting to tie Governor Granholm to Michigan's failing economy. You can watch it here (Quicktime format). Hat tip to Saul Anuzis for the heads up.

I can see what they're going for here, with the wind noises and Granholm saying that "you'll be blown away" and such. Very cute.

That being said, I think they're wasting their money here. Despite how desperately DeVos and the MI GOP have tried to hammer it in, voters simply don't accept the idea that Granholm is responsible for the current state of our economy, because they know its just not true.

Aside from their focus on a failed strategy, Granholm comes off as the best part of this ad. Her optimism, energy, and dedication all shine through in their clips. Sure, people that think she's full of hot air are going to have their beliefs reinforced by this ad. However, those people are already convinced anyway -- I don't see how this is going to help their turnout or convince any new voters.

Kos came to Ann Arbor, other updates

2006-09-29T09:59:00.000-04:00

UPDATE (6:00 PM): Matt has audio and a partial transcript on Michlib. Go check it out.

Also, here is my comment in response to another (thoughtful) post in the diary about the Kos visit:

Very gutsy comment to make here! I'm glad to see some controversy about this.

To an extent, I understand and agree with what you're saying. Kos clearly favors challengers that are "sexy" enough to tell a good story and keep his readers engaged. I think that another factor in his decision-making process is that Michigan is considered to be a "swing state," and they feel that swing states get enough attention as it is (to the detriment of the rest of the party). Kos hasn't really covered Michigan proportionately and probably doesn't have the interest in it anyway. When he does cover it, its pretty superficial and doesn't convey an understanding of what's really going on in Michigan. I also agree that MI-Gov will have a significant impact on the future of our party at the national level, and merits the full attention of national organizations.

However, I would argue that it is the role of the DNC, Democratic Governors Association, and the MDP to deal with this race accordingly, not kos. Kos doesn't work under the Democratic Party and doesn't owe anyone anything, including us. He generated his readership through his own unique approach and philosophy, and (although I don't want to speak for him) I would assume that's where his loyalties lie. That's why people like me flock to him.

Ultimately, its not kos' job to win Michigan -- its ours. Kos has a limited amount of "real estate" on his blog and can only really focus on a few races. What kos does is show us the way to affect the change we want through our own activism. I think that's part of what the "netroots" philosophy is about, and why local and state-level blogging is so important.

In that sense, I think we actually have something a lot more powerful than what kos could ever offer us -- our own organized network of progressives talking about the things we care about. A front page article on Daily Kos may give us some short-term gains, but after that its gone. On the other hand, what we do here on Michigan Liberal has substantial long-term benefits.

We methodically chip away at the MI GOP's attacks and misinformation, while supporting our own candidates and values. We have our own group of local bloggers that understand the issues that matter to Michigan and are more well-suited to talk about Michigan than what kos could ever conceivably do for us. We've networked ourselves and will sustain this infrastructure even after the election is over, which provides long-term benefits to our party and our causes. Unlike the national websites, we can maintain a constant narrative that opinion makers (like newspapers) in Michigan tap into on a daily basis for elections to come. For example, the organization that Paul Hackett and Mark Warner's supporters developed in Ohio and Virgina have continued to make gains in those areas long after the national attention from the blogs faded and these candidates personally left the scene. That's part of what kos was trying to explain to us, and I think we can help accomplish the same kind of thing here.

Personally, I don't think that having kos' attention would help us in terms of what we need to do. Especially given that the Governor's race deals with state issues, we're much more suited to understand and influence the ongoing debate. However, if we really want to nationalize our races, we need to get onto kos and start creating a buzz to make it an attractive race to talk about and get behind. The "system" is organic: we don't get attention by whining, begging, or posturing, but by conveying our excitement and enthusiasm about the race while working to support our candidate. Ironically, part of why I don't think we have that kind of presence on Daily Kos is because Michlib (and the rest of our network here) is such a fantastic venue to talk about "our" issues -- none of us have any incentive to go to dkos because our system is much more well suited for our own needs.

Maybe I was blinded because I was star-struck, but I truly believe that kos was interested in us and trying to help us. He really does value the local bloggers, and conversed with us in a way to get a better sense of what's really happening on the ground here. Yes he did talk about "his" races, but that was all in the context of what he was trying to teach us. He showed us what made those races "work," and brainstormed with us based on what we told him to try and develop our own strategy. In the end I think he gave us some very instructive advice.

So basically: Its not that kos doesn't care, but he just doesn't have the time/space to focus on MI-Gov and we didn't generate the kind of excitement to justify nationalizing our race. He doesn't work for us and doesn't owe us anything, but does take his cues from bloggers on the ground who do the work to make nationalizing an issue possible. We don't need dkos coverage because we are shaping the media coverage and working at this on a daily basis (thank you matt, wizardkitten). Despite the fact that its not his job to win Michigan for us, kos was interested in us and used his experiences to give suggestions to us about how to refine what we're doing here.

Ultimately, we have the power to lift ourselves up, and that's what the "netroots" is all about.

Hey all,

Firstly, I just wanted to apologize for the state of this blog recently. You might have noticed that I have barely posted any substantive content over the past couple weeks. I've gotten pretty busy with school and haven't been able to post like I used to -- I'm not sure if I'll be "on point" again until after the semester (and election) is over, unfortunately.

Secondly, Kos came to Ann Arbor, and it was sweet. If nothing else, it was great to chill with all the MI bloggers again. Hy Dudgeon, Cordelia Lear, John and Clint from the Granholm campaign, lpackard, matt (thanks for the beer), djtyg, David Boyle, and later emptywheel were all in the house. It was good to see others there that I knew from working at the Granholm campaign, UM Dems, and so on at Drinking Liberally. Drinking Liberally is a great concept, and I might swing by in the future.

Kos talked a lot about the stuff that's been on the front page of dkos recently -- including the Virginia, Montana, and CT races. He also touched on a lot of the same themes from Crashing the Gate (if you haven't, you have to read it). I wasn't going in aiming to beg kos to pay more attention to Michigan (that's not how it should work), but he had some great insight into how we can become more effective as bloggers.

What was more new from him was his talk about how in a race, both candidates have a chance to define themselves and their opponent, creating a narrative for the campaign. What makes an effective narrative/story is how that relates to peoples' values. I'm not explaining this very well, I don't think. A lot of what he said on the subject of winning elections was very similar to what Lynn Rivers said in a class I took on campaigns, as well as a couple books I've read (an election strategy book by Ronald A. Faucheux and a book on how to win a local election by Lawrence Grey).

Finally, kos was really down to earth. He talked to the MI bloggers for 20 mins or so before the Shaman Drum event, and was very chill at the Drinking Liberally event. I don't know how to describe it, but he just seemed so... normal. He was also very interested in what we had to say and getting a sense of how things are locally for us. It was pretty surreal -- I couldn't believe I was crammed in the same little car as kos!

Anyway, that's enough rambling for the moment. I'll try to bang something out this weekend. After I go read CTG again.

CORRECTION: Laura informs me that her car isn't "little." She is correct -- my apologies.

Kos in AA today!

2006-09-28T04:26:00.000-04:00

via Daily Kos:

ANN ARBOR, Thursday, September 28th
Shaman Drum Bookshop
7 - 8 p.m.
Book discussion and signing with Markos. Sponsored by Young People for the American Way.
311-315 South State Street
Ann Arbor, MI, 48104
Leopold Bros
8:30-10-ish
Libations and debauchery with the local Drinking Liberally crowd.
523 S. Main Street
Ann Arbor, MI, 48401

Also, don't forget to come hang with the Michlib crew.

MI-09: Nancy Skinner Liveblogging Right Now!

2006-09-26T19:22:00.000-04:00

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/9/26/19950/9241

Stop by, check it out, ask a question...see who has offered to do a TV spot with Nancy!

"Women on the Road to Victory" pics

2006-09-25T13:42:00.000-04:00

The event, a rally on the Diag (in Ann Arbor) featuring six women Senators, happened a couple Sundays ago. Sorry its been so long to upload the pics:

College Dems Chair Jamie Ruth

Amos Williams (our AG candidate... short speech, but it was very cool)

Our SOS candidate

State Representative Chris Kolb

Senator Barbara Boxer

Yes, this is the "Debbie Kills Babies" sign that caused the College Republicans to pull Morgan Wilkins from campus. As far as I have seen, this is the only existing picture of her actually holding the sign. Although it doesn't change the fact that what she did was wrong, she was very nice when I spoke with her and I feel bad about the way things went down for her.

The Michigan Daily's initial article on "Catch an Illegal Immigrant Day" eventually landed on CNN and other major outlets. You can read Howard Dean's letter to the RNC at Mojo Blog. A Daily Kos diary provides some insights to the situation as well.

DeVos at the Spartans Game

2006-09-25T02:08:00.000-04:00

Here's what DeVos had to say on Saturday at MSU.

"Priority number one has got to be getting rid of the job-killing single business tax," DeVos said. "It's driving business out of Michigan, and it's punishing job creation."

Ummm... didn't your buddies in the state legislature already do that? As usual, DeVos is being deceitful by implying that he'll work eliminate a tax that is already scheduled for termination.

It would be more useful to know how, if at all, he plans to fund the 1.9 BILLION DOLLAR HOLE that is now in our budget as a result of the policies that he's advocated. Of course, we don't hear about that because campaigns are about fooling voters, not educating them.

Also, that's really cool, talking about the SBT at a football game. I'm sure the kids were real excited to hear about that.

Tony Trupiano Live on Firedoglake

2006-09-23T14:28:00.000-04:00

Tony Trupiano is responding to comments live on firedoglake. Its an interesting read, especially in the context of how the DCCC decides which races to get behind.

MI-09: Nancy Skinner invites you to a Liveblog Strategy Session Tuesday

2006-09-23T14:26:00.000-04:00

Our opponent, Republican Joe Knollenberg, has smeared us with an attack page on his website he calls “The Skinner Files”. Are you surprised at all that this page is filled with lies and exaggerations?

On Tuesday Nancy will be doing a liveblog to counter these attacks. Stop by to ask questions. Feel free to play devils advocate and see how Nancy responds to Knollenberg’s outrageous claims. Nancy is an effective communicator, who has debated Sean Hannity and Ann Coulter on their own turf. No wonder Joe Knollenberg won’t debate her!

We want to hear from you! Nancy asked me to invite the community to an online strategy session. She loves the creativity and the open source spirit of the blogs. We’ve got some ideas, but Nancy wants to hear what you think we should do.

Joe Knollenberg is using the same old Republican scare tactics. He can afford to lie about us, and flood the airwaves with attack ads. We don’t have his massive war chest, so we have to be creative and earn our media.

Look for Nancy’s liveblog Tuesday at 4pm on Daily Kos at Nancy's userpage.

DEMAND JOE KNOLLENBERG DEBATE NANCY SKINNER

2006-09-22T21:12:00.000-04:00

I have seen the attacks on Knollenberg's website and they are disgusting. For those of you in the 9th, just wanted to pass along a diary I saw on Michlib:

Friends,
Nancy Skinner has been polite so far in her campaign against Joe Knollenberg. But Joe must be worried. He has new attacks against Nancy on his web site, Joe Knollenberg's campaign web site . Also see The Skinner Files, Joe's attack page if you really want to be mad. So, we have to take ACTION!
I believe in order for Nancy to win this race, she has to get on the same stage and debate Joe head to head. So, the question is, how do we do that. Joe has not debated at least his last two challengers.
So, here’s my plan. We hold protests at Joe’s office every week at first, then twice a week, then daily, until Joe agrees to debate Nancy.
The first protest will be held next Tuesday, September 21, 2006, at 12:00 p.m. t Joe’s office on Northwestern Highway, 30833 Northwestern. It is located just south of 13 Mile. Our goal will be to get as many people there with to support the idea Joe Knollenberg has to debate Nancy Skinner if he wants to defend his seat in Congress. We deserve no less from our Congressman.
The media will be invited and I think we can get several stories placed in local media and put pressure on Joe to debate Nancy. The soul of our democracy is at stake. We have to restore checks and balances to our government. But it’s up to you. Will you help?
If you can make our first protest, please RSVP to this e-mail address, bfealk@wideopenwest.com. The more people, the better story we are. When I put out the press release, I want to be able to say 100 people will appear at Joe’s office on Tuesday, September 26 at 12:00.
Bruce Fealk
2488-652-8781

Exclusive! Interview with Sharon Renier (MI-07)

2006-09-21T06:04:00.000-04:00

Sharon Renier is the Democratic candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives in Michigan's 7th Congressional District. I had the opportunity to speak with her at the "Women on the Road to Victory" rally in Ann Arbor this past Sunday. Among other things, we talked about the recent Republican primary in the 7th, her ground game, Tim Walberg, the Iraq war, and her prospects for victory. Read on, folks!

Nirmal: So what motivated you to jump into the race?

Sharon: Well, I ran for Congress two years ago and two years before that I ran for the State House, so its not like I'm just jumping into politics fresh. I've been very political my whole life, so this is the next step -- to actually serve your country.

Nirmal: Were you expecting Tim Walberg to win the primary?

Sharon: Yes, it was a sure thing. I told people two years ago that if you look at the numbers, 80 percent of the people voted against Joe Schwartz because it was a six way primary. Based on the numbers it was very obvious that Tim Walberg would win with just one really strong pro-life candidate in the race.

Nirmal: So do you feel that in winning the primary, Walberg is out of step with his district?

Sharon: Yes, absolutely.

Nirmal: In what ways?

Sharon: He's pro-war, we're anti-war (which is different than being pro-soldier and supporting our troops). We're on different sides of issues such as gay marriage, and other governmental intrusions. As a Reverend he should realize that these people are the children of God.

Nirmal: Do you feel that you have a chance at taking this seat because his views do not reflect the district?

Sharon: Yes. After telling people what Walberg is really about, we can mobilize support and get people out to vote. In sixteen years, he did nothing for his million dollars that he is going to get from the people of the state for his pension. No legislation passed that he offered or wrote. I think he alluded to something called the Walberg strobe lights on school buses. Which is fine, as a safety issue, but the point is he says he's never raised taxes on people. Well that cost the school districts and the people a lot of money. Again, if it's a good issue, that's fine, but don't tell me he doesn't spend the people's money.

The other thing is that he's a very ineffective legislator: I believe that 93% of the votes that he was in on, he refused to vote at all. So how do you legislate when you can't make up your mind about a piece of legislation? You're not effective. He was a lobbyist. He's all what's wrong with Washington. He ties himself to Bush and thinks that the war is okay. He thinks that its okay to discriminate against people. What do we do next -- people with blue eyes don't get to vote or something? So that's what we're up against.

Nirmal: What would it take for Democrats or Democratic organizations at the national level to get involved with this race?

Sharon: Just letting them know that we have a tremendous amount of support and that the numbers are of the last election and not reflective of what the sentiment here is in the district. Also, the fact that the Republicans don't even like this guy.

Nirmal: So there was disproportionate turnout by the extremists of the party in the primary?

Sharon: Well, see, the way it looked in the primary was that the Republicans got a ton of votes but you had a tremendous number of Democrats that crossed over and voted for Schwartz. So it shows that the votes were actually skewed. If you were to really look at the votes in the primary and you give me the votes from my opponent in the primary and you give me Joe Schwartz's votes, it would be a win. I'm a numbers person and if you looked at the primary and thought "Oh Schwartz is going to win because he's the incumbent," without looking at the numbers, you would have been wrong.

We're going to take the votes of moderates, independents, a lot of the Republicans with us, and all of the Democratic vote, and they're going to say "this is the person we want in office." I weigh all the issues and look at all of the facts and look at the U.S. Constitution first and foremost, and to me that's where we lie: in the truth.

A lot of times people will say to me that in politics people are really mean and ruthless. They ask "How do you keep doing this? What gives you the drive to keep going?" I use Ghandi's quote, "in the end, good will always win out over evil," and that concept is what keeps me going.

I know that we really need to hold onto our democracy here and it is very fragile, and that it is on the brink of being taken away from us by the people who are in power. I'm the person who needs to win this race. Otherwise, we're just going to get more of this hate, more war, more people who aren't willing to be diplomatic and talk about the issues. I can't go over next door and deck my neighbor without the cops coming over and throwing me in jail. So how dare we go and drop bombs on all these innocent people? Some people call it the war on Iraq, but I call it the invasion of Iraq, because we invaded another country.

Nirmal: So you feel that the Iraq war was unjustified?

Sharon: Absolutely. I mean if Saddam was such a bad guy why did we wait 25 years to take him out and in the meantime why did he get the key to the city of Detroit? Getting out is the question now, and we have a plan to get out. Its not enough to stay the course with people still getting killed. We need to get an international peacekeeping group in there and we need to secure the city of Baghdad so that the Iraqi citizens can get about the business of taking care of their own government. We need to have no permanent U.S. bases in Iraq and we also need to help rebuild their infrastructure and do it without the face of groups connected to this administration like Halliburton.

If we can get the Iraqi citizens to start their own companies, we can help to start their own economy going. We need to help them invest in their own infrastructure.

Nirmal: How about positions on some other issues?

Sharon: We want to repeal Bush's tax cuts for the rich. I want no taxes at all on anybody who makes under $20,000 a year. We want to take the cap off of Social Security. We need to not just have a line-item veto but we need to make sure we have a roll-call vote when we're spending money and that people put their names on them. When you're voting on something for the troops you can't attach a bill to it that says "Uh, we're going to build a swimming pool somewhere else." We can't be doing that; that's just wrong.

Nirmal: Given that the Republican primary earned national attention, what kind of visibility does the race have in your district?

Sharon: Actually, its huge. Everywhere we go people are talking about it, because its made national news and because people are really scared about this Walberg guy. Its a scary thought that this man has this opportunity to get in power.

Nirmal: So have you seen a surge of interest in your ground operation?

Sharon: Absolutely! Everywhere we go, people are asking, "Where can we sign up? Give us some signs! We have some neighbors that we're talking to and they don't want him either." Its really incredible, and it doesn't matter where we go. We've got the farmers behind us now and they're generally thought of as being very Republican. The national farm organization has endorsed our campaign and the farmers themselves are going door-to-door and neighbor-to-neighbor to their fellow farmers and talking about the issues. The groundswell is just incredible. Its incredible to me and its also very overwhelming for me!

Nirmal: How does this compare to your previous races?

Sharon: I ran for Congress two years ago against Joe Schwartz, and they spent a lot of money beating me. Given that we only spent $8,000-$9,000 dollars, or only about 1% of the money in the race, I thought that was pretty good. I was proud of that. But in this race, we've already raised much more than that, and we're just getting going.

The students are all getting on board, they're using the Facebook, they're blogging. Tell everybody to vote for us on what used to be Dean's website, DemocracyforAmercica.com.

Nirmal: Given his resources, when do you think that Walberg will go negative?

Sharon: We're wondering how negative he's going to go and what he's going to try to do to us. He went real negative on Joe Schwartz and he told a lot of lies. For somebody who is a Reverend, he should have his mouth washed out with soap!

Nirmal: Do you think that the same kinds of factors that played into the primary will matter in November?

Sharon: I think it was well-orchestrated by Walberg and it was just a matter of who got the most people out to vote.

I think that you're really going to see the anti-administration vote coming out in November. We've had a lot of people tell us, "Well you know everybody tells us that we only had a choice between Walberg and Schwartz, but we decided we had another choice, and that was Renier." That's really good to hear. People who had the guts to do that in the primary, I want to thank them, every one of them! We're going on with our plan and working on getting us elected in November!

(end interview)

Feel free to check out her volunteer, contribute, and Facebook pages (we need to join these Facebook groups!!).

Also, visit Walberg Watch for more information about Tim Walberg and his record.

Cross-posted on Michigan Liberal, Daily Kos, and Kicking Ass Ann Arbor.

Tony Trupiano on firedoglake 9/23

2006-09-20T23:50:00.000-04:00

10,000 doors!? Nice! Anyway, just passing along an e-mail:

Blogger, Friends, and those I don´t know too well...

We are in the last 48 days of the campaign and I am working like hell to make every second count. But time is precious and I need your help.

This Saturday, September 23 from 2-4 p.m. ET I will be the candidate Blogger at www.firedoglake.com. I know many of you are familiar with them and they have been instrumental in helping Progressive candidates raise some needed money and recognition. I am asking that you send to your lists, your Blogs, and anyone else you may know who would consider spreading the word on this even on Saturday.

For those of you who are not familiar with me or my campaign, please check out the site (link below). But I wanted to share some recent news as we gear up for the last six weeks:

Internal polling shows this race about even.
I was just selected by the 64 members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus to be one of only thirteen races in the country to receive their support and assistance with everything from field assistance, to fundraising assistance. This is VERY good news and will help to bolster my campaign over the last six weeks.
I have personally knocked over 10,000 doors personally
My Congressional District has the most voter contacts of any District in the state and I would put my field operation against any in the country.

Even with all this, I need your help.

Whether it´s helping me promote Saturday or something more impactful is totally up to you.

I believe that this campaign can summon the resources and bodies need to be that race that comes out of nowhere in the last six weeks and take a red seat away form a real Neo-Con in my opponent Thaddeus McCotter.

I have spent the last year of my life working toward bringing a voice of reason and hope to my District and my country. I left my career of 12 years as a Progressive Talk Show Host because I am prepared to lead with vision, courage, and hope.

As a member of Congress you will be able to count on me to be your voice. Can I count on you now?

My office number is below if you would like to call. My cell phone is 313-617-1713 as I am knocking doors most of the day and evening hours. Please reach out to me if you would to.

This is a winnable seat. Let´s win!

Thank you!

Tony Trupiano

866-209-8031 ext. 111

Paid for by Trupiano for Congress

P.O. Box 723 Dearborn Heights MI 48127
http://www.tony4congress2006.com

MI-Gov on Off the Record

2006-09-20T18:34:00.000-04:00

Just a heads up: Saul Anuzis and John Truscott go at it with Mark Brewer and Chris DeWitt on off the Record. The also do an overview of the race in general. Its worth watching.

Reason #48: He Won't Say How He'll Replace the SBT Revenue

2006-09-20T15:42:00.000-04:00

Reason #48 not to vote for Dick DeVos:

He supported the early repeal of the Single Business Tax (recently accomplished by the GOP State House). Granholm agreed that the tax had become somewhat unfair (and it was scheduled to end in 2009 anyway) but she believes it's irresponsible to get rid of it without replacing the revenue. DeVos won't even HINT at possible solutions he'd take to the rather large revenue loss, because of the election of course. Most think the solution will (or should) come in the form of another kind of business tax, but DeVos won't even say anything like that, leading many to believe he'd prefer to shift it to regular citizens AND/OR cut even more from the budget so that the revenue doesn't have to be replaced (starving the beast).

-Arbuttery

See more of my commentary and David's commentary on this issue here.

Lot going on today. Sorry there isn't more detail.

MI-09: Awesome MetroTimes Op-Ed

2006-09-20T09:26:00.000-04:00

Jack Lessenberry has a great op-ed covering our race in today's MetroTimes.

My favorite part:

"Republicans are trying to dismiss her as a carpetbagger and media celebrity from Illinois. Now 41, she did move to Chicago for a time after earning a business degree from the University of Michigan...

Her opponent is a man who, ironically, is originally from Illinois.

Knollenberg, a former insurance salesman, was born in 1933, during the depths of the Great Depression, and has voted on the side of the people ruining us ever since he arrived in Congress in 1993. Originally he said he would leave after no more than a dozen years, but later broke his promise."

Read the article, pass it on to your friends, talk it up.

Lessenberry notes the need for Skinner to raise money and get her message on the airwaves. Can you contribute at ActBlue so we can buy air time? If you act fast you get the privelidge of being our 800th online donor!

Howard Dean / Granholm webchat

2006-09-20T07:00:00.000-04:00

Governor Dean was answering questions live on Granholm's blog yesterday. He types fast! It looks like "our" Zack and Jordan both got their questions answered!

Obviously everyone wants the Governor to win, but I was also interested in how the DNC viewed the rest of Michigan. There are some congressional races that, with the right push, I think we would have a shot in (Skinner and Marcinkowski come to mind). If I had more time, I would have asked how the DNC's strategy plays into the state house races, etc. Here's what I asked (uninteresting softballs, I know... I had just woken up):

Gov. Dean, what is the DNC’s plan for Michigan’s more contested congressional races?

Gov. Dean, do you have any suggestions for how field volunteers can be more effective at identifying and persuading voters? What can we do in Michigan to ensure that we are identifying and turning the right people out to vote?

Gov. Dean, will we see the Republican machine be as effective at turning out voters on November 7 across the nation as it was in the Rhode Island primary?

Gov. Dean, can you tell us about the DNC’s voter-targeting system “Demzilla”?

Gov. Dean, what can we do to help invest in our party’s long-term infrastructure?

Much like the first Granholm webchat, my question about volunteering was the last question they used. Here's what Gov. Dean (assuming it was him) had to say:

Nirmal, I have to sign off now, but I do have one thing I want to ask before I go: We need your help. Dick DeVos has spent $20 million to try to hide his ties to George Bush and his extreme views - but you can fight back by volunteering or contributing to Governor Granholm.

She’ll only win this November with a wide and deep grassroots effort, but that obviously takes you. Signup to be a Team Raiser to raise money from your friends over the Internet, go door-to-door, send letters to the editor, and call talk shows — including conservative talk shows — and talk to everyone you know (and I mean everyone, especially those who didn’t vote the way we did last time). The number to call is 517.485.5100 or, as you know, visit http://www.granholmforgov.com/fightback.

There are 49 days left and you can also visit http://www.100actions.com for a new action you can take everyday to elect Democrats like Jennifer Granholm all over the country.

So, again, I have to go, but I thank you all. I really appreciate you joining us here tonight. Take care.

EDIT: I heard from a very trusted source that it really was Howard Dean answering the questions.

Reason #49: Dick DeVos Ditched the Michigan Board of Education

2006-09-19T21:15:00.000-04:00

Reason #49 not to vote for Dick DeVos:

After missing many meetings, Dick DeVos left his position on the Michigan Board of Education. He was two years into an eight-year term. In his two years, he advocated using public money to help fund private schools.

Via the Detroit News article, "Who Is Dick DeVos?"

DeVos' only elected public office was a two-year stint on the State Board of Education. He missed a quarter of the meetings while he was on the board, piling up more absences than any other member. He quit in January 1993 with six years still left on his term, saying his new responsibilities at Alticor didn't allow him to devote enough time to board duties.

"He abandoned the children of the state of Michigan and left six years to be served by someone else not elected by the public at large," said Barbara Roberts Mason, a Democrat who served on the state board with DeVos.

Further Reading

David's Tangled Thoughts: "He has been elected to office only once-- The Michigan State Board of Education but quit after two years. He was given an appointment by then Gov. Engler to the Grand Valley University Board of Control and once again quit. How does this make me think that he will be committed to the office?"

ICDP Dispatch: "Furthermore, DeVos, while serving on the State Board of Education (before abruptly quitting after two years of an 8-year term), advocated handing over public education resources to private corporations, thereby undermining Michigan's public schools. He personally financed the Education Freedom Fund, an organization of anti-public school advocates, by lavishing hundreds of thousands of dollars on it in the 1990s. Undoubtedly DeVos' investments in K12 Inc., an educational corporation that provides materials for private schools, would see solid returns if he could successfully undermine Michigan's public schools. (Booth Newspapers, Center for Media and Democracy, AP)"

MDP: "Dick DeVos has no plan for improving education in Michigan. There are no policy initiatives listed on his website. While on the board of education, he was a proponent of plans to undermine Michigan’s public schools, by taking millions of dollars away from your neighborhood public schools, giving them away to expensive private schools, and then raising your taxes to pay for it."

See an explanation of this series here. Please note that the Michigan Democratic Party has continued their list, as well.

Argggh! Say no to scurvy dawg Joe Knollenberg!

2006-09-19T20:56:00.000-04:00

Ahoy there! Capn' Jordan here...Arrre ye having a fun Talk Like A Pirate Day?

Did you know ourrr Representative in Congress has voted to support the war in Iraq? Then he voted AGAINST a $1,500 grant for every veterean of Iraq and Afghanistan, and voted AGAINST expanding access to health insurance for our soldiers. I be a peaceful pirate, and I'm sick of Joe Knollenberg runnin' a jig with our soldiers! I be weary of any scallywag who sends our soldiers to fight, then votes against supporting them.

But he had no problem sending dubloons to Halliburton! (Rep. Knollenberg voted to continue awarding contracts to Halliburton even if the Pentagon's own audit processes found that more than $100 million of their contractor's costs in Iraq were unreasonable.)

Joe Knollenberg also opposes stem cell research. This research could help cure diseases, and is strongly supported by voters in the 9th.

Joe Knollenberg has voted with the Bush Administration 98% of the time. Voters in the 9th overwhelmingly oppose President Bush!

Ye arrrre not being represented by Joe Knollenberg!
But come Novemberrr 7th, ye have a choice!

Vote Change! Vote Skinnerrrr!

Granholm / DeVos Debate Dates Finalized

2006-09-19T12:01:00.000-04:00

Mark your calendars! This morning's Detroit Free Press reports that dates for three debates between Granholm and DeVos have been finalized:

The first debate is expected to be hosted by WKAR, the public TV station on the campus of Michigan State University, on Oct. 2. The others are at WOOD-TV (an NBC affiliate) in Grand Rapids on Oct. 10 and at WXYZ-TV (Channel 7, an ABC affiliate) in Southfield Oct. 16.

The first and fourth debates could differ from a traditional "debate" format. According to a piece by Tim Skubick in the Lansing State Journal, the Oct 2 debate will be without any rules. Granholm and DeVos "can respond without a time clock, without restraints on the length of answers and without some red light going off."

Their fourth joint appearance on Oct. 12 at the Detroit Economic Club is more likely to be two presentations, not another debate.

Much like before the 2004 Presidential debates, both campaigns are posturing to lower expectations for their candidate so that they can call a "win" after the debate:

DeWitt acknowledged that Granholm is widely viewed as a superb communicator, but he wanted to make sure no one assumed she would handle DeVos with ease in debate. In recent months DeVos, who sometimes appears stiff on camera, "has gotten much better," DeWitt said.

Truscott, meanwhile, was lavish in his praise of Granholm's speaking skills. DeVos, he said, hopes to "hold his own" by focusing on his vision for Michigan and reminding voters about "the governor's record of failure."

Looking forward to discussing these with you all in the diaries / open threads!

Cross-posted on Michigan Liberal (fp).

Survey USA Poll: Granholm even, Stabenow ahead (Released 9.18.2006)

2006-09-19T04:25:00.000-04:00

New numbers out, courtesy of Survey USA (conducted between September 15 and September 17):

MI-Gov:

Dick DeVos (R) - 47%
Granholm (D) - 47%
Undecided - 2%
Margin of error - 3.7%

With high name recognition for both candidates only 2% of voters are undecided, showing that this is a very heated and polarized race.

MI-Sen:

Bouchard (R) - 41%
Stabenow (D) - 54%
Undecided - 2%
Margin of error - 3.6%

Unless Bouchard can raise his visibility quickly, it will become increasingly unlikely that the national GOP will intervene in this race.

MI-AG:

Cox (R) - 49%
Williams (D) - 41%
Undecided - 4%
Margin of error - 3.7%

Pretty self-explanatory. I can't imagine most voters know who Williams is yet.

MCRI:

Yes - 33%
No - 32%
Not Sure - 35%
Margin of error - 5.8%

Only 40% of the poll's participants claimed to know what the MCRI is. Over a third of voters who knew what the MCRI is don't know how they will vote on this yet, and there is a high margin of error. Nobody knows how they are going to vote on this yet. Its the same story as always: its tough to poll ballot proposals, no idea what is going to happen with this.

Overall, I trust the methodology of this poll a lot more than EPIC-MRA last week. In my opinion, IVR is preferable over traditional phone polling. In addition, they appear to try harder to get a truly random, representative sample. I'm also glad that they ask the "critical" questions right off the bat, without any leading questions. I would still like to know the number of people that they considered a likely voter for each demographic (gender, race, age, geography, and so on), so that we can determine for ourselves if it seems representative of the population.

You can view the crosstabs here. Not a lot very interesting or unexpected, though.

It is important to note that it is not enough to just try and turn out a target region or demographic. However, this information can help us to identify who and where it is generally worth spending more resources trying to turn out.

In terms of the Governor's race, Republicans support DeVos more than Democrats support Granholm. We have voters aged 50 and up, whereas DeVos is is more popular with individuals under 50. Black voters, Hispanic voters, and other minorities seem to favor Granholm. Although individuals in "Generation Y" tend to support Granholm, people in college or with some college experience favor DeVos by a wide margin (sucks for me). We have strong support in Wayne County and Urban areas. DeVos is ahead nearly everywhere else, with one notable exception: Interestingly, Granholm is within the margin of error with DeVos in his hometown of Grand Rapids.

"What I'm Thinking About Loyalty"

2006-09-19T02:15:00.000-04:00

My very good friend Craig wrote this a bit ago. I don't usually like to quote someone else's work in its entirety, especially without adding anything of value myself. In this case, I'm going to make an exception because I really feel that this should be read:

It's late at night and I'm thinking about the topic of loyalty. It seems like a sense of loyalty has caused people to do a lot of stupid things. People kill other people because they feel a sense of loyalty to their country or their religion. But I know that my country was founded on dissent and citizens' rights (and I don't kid myself that it was founded on hipocracy, too, just ask a slave or a native American). I also know that no major religion (I'm excluding violent doomsday cults) has any core belief which justifies hating someone, or taking their life. Quite the contrary, the admonition "Thou Shalt Not Kill", which by preschool age to Jewish, Christian, and Muslim kids alike, finds expression in most any faith. And yet, ever since Pope Gregory II decided that he couldn't deal with the holy land being overrun by people who consider it holy for slightly different reasons, Christians, Muslims, and Jews have killed eachother over it.

So how is it that things that ought to be good, like faith and patriotism, get turned to these monstrous ends? I think it's because we think that our politicians, our clergy, and sometimes even our friends are some kind of platonic ideal for the virtues that they claim. I'm convinced that they're not. I don't think any human is infailable, no matter what they claim to represent, and good people do bad things all the time. But really, truly awful things happen because people supress their own conscience and do what's expected of them out of a sense of "loyalty". But if we think rationally, and listen to the voice of good within us, I believe we must come to the conclusion that sometimes by being loyal to the president, we may be disloyal to our country, and by being loyal to our clergy, we may be disloyal to God.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that we should reject anything that comes from an authority figure. What I'm saying is that authority does not confer morality. Therefore, be loyal to your principles, be loyal to love, truth, justice, and peace, and examine your own actions and motivations by your own moral compass. Justifying something by saying "this is for my country", "this is for my people", "this is for my religion", "this is for my family", can sometimes prevent you from asking "Is this right?"

09.18.2006: Its raining links! Also, Howard Dean webchat

2006-09-19T00:15:00.000-04:00

I'm jacking this idea and format from Pohlitics. Zack, I hope you don't mind!

WZZM13: Survey USA: 7 weeks to go race for Governor remains a dead heat

New Survey USA out. Both Granholm and DeVos are steady at 47, with 2 percent undecided. Stabenow is still blowing Bouchard out of the water -- at this rate, he likely won't be rescued by Republicans at the national level. Gut feeling tells me that these are a lot more accurate than last week's numbers. More on this later.

USA Today: High stakes in governors' races

Covers many of the contested gubernatorial races this cycle, with MI-Gov being featured prominently.

Michigan Daily: Senate Dems rally on Diag

I was at this -- it was pretty cool. The "Catch an Illegal Immigrant" girl was there with a sign that read "Debbie Kills Babies." I've got pics and an interview, which I'll be posting up later. By far the best line was by Amos Williams, who spoke pretty briefly. While referring to Democratic women, I think he said that "they don't have hot flashes... they have power surges." That might not be a literal quote, though.

WK: MI House legalizes religious discrimination in adoption

I can't believe that Dems voted for this waste of time.

Finally, we have a couple articles on the importance of organization and field work in elections. This is a very critical topic that is too-often ignored. A MyDD post entitled "Fighting Only Half the Battle," emphasizes the need for more persuasion in GOTV efforts. The other, from U.S. News and World Report, discusses the MI GOP's use of microtargeting for MI-Gov and MI-Sen.

I have wished that Democrats would utilize this kind of "microtargeting" more extensively in the past, even if its just delivering messages targeted to particular regions in Michigan on the radio or whatever. Someone in downtown Saginaw is going to care about different kinds of things than someone in the UP, and delivering targeted messages to each region would be more effective than one generic radio spot in both places. We have a long way to go to collect the kind of demographic information and do the kind of targeting/persuasion/GOTV that the GOP does in Michigan and at the national level.

Don't be fooled by the way they're talking about Rhode Island, though. They don't have the resources to pull that kind of operation across the country.

Also, Clint over at Team Granholm's blog lets us know that Howard Dean will be dropping by the website for a webchat:

Tuesday evening, 9/19, Howard Dean will be taking questions LIVE on the Granholm campaign website. He will be taking questions on the G4G blog at 8:30PM. Feel free to submit questions in advance, or log on to the website tomorrow and post a question or comment. Governor Dean is coming to Michigan for the DNC Black CaucusÂs African American Summit this weekend. Spread the word!
Â Clint Wallace

Also, is Obama posturing himself to be the VP nominee?

Reason #50: DeVos Campaign Flag Lowering Statements

2006-09-18T20:27:00.000-04:00

Reason #50 not to vote for Dick DeVos:

The DeVos campaign criticized Governor Granholm's descision to lower Michigan flags to half staff for Michigan soldiers and National Guard members. After a public backlash, Dick DeVos retracted his campaign's statements.

The original quote:

"Dick would take a more literal approach," DeVos campaign spokesman John Truscott said. "While he certainly believes that honoring veterans who have given their lives is extremely important, lowering the flag has typically been reserved for heads of state."

Then, the retraction:

Truscott said in a phone interview that he had "mischaracterized" his boss' position by failing to "clarify" how DeVos felt on the question of lowering flags for soldiers who are killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Further Reading

wizardkitten: "Then why bring it up, Dick, if that wasn't your true intention? Question now is: Can we believe a word that comes out of Dick's (or Truscott's) mouth? Sounds like they are willing to say anything to get elected, and then we will see the mean-spirited superiority complex that really lies within."

Stone Soup Musings: "DeVos flip-flopped on this issue, pure and simple. There was no misrepresentation."

DeVos is a Dick: "Am I supposed to believe that the person who is hired to speak for DeVos -- the person responsible for knowing what DeVos' positions are on the issues -- claims that he didn't know what the Dick's opinion was before shooting off his mouth about it? Before speaking on DeVos' behalf?

It sounds to me that in his fervor to be anti-Granholm, no subject is off limits. But perhaps more importantly, if you can't trust DeVos and his cronies to get it right when talking about how to honor the dead, then how can we trust him with decisions that affect the living?"

Op/Ed: Half-staff flag is fitting tribute: "I will always be grateful to Gov. Granholm for her order to lower the flag to remember my son. It was a powerful gesture of solidarity with the loss my family suffered."

See an explanation of this series here.

MI-09: Paul Hackett wants to give Nancy Skinner A Fighting Chance

2006-09-18T15:56:00.000-04:00

I got this email today from Paul Hackett.

We have been taken down the wrong path in Washington and it doesn't have to be that way. President Bush and Joe Knollenberg have jeopardized not only the lives of the brave men and women with whom I served, but also our nation's global credibility. You can change all of that, though, and give us a fighting chance once again by helping my friend, Nancy Skinner.

Skinner for Congress

Long before most of the chattering class in Washington opposed the Iraq War, Nancy was on the radio, moving a progressive agenda forward and asking the tough questions about WMDs and the many other dubious reasons for the war the Bush Administration gave you, me and the rest of the American people. I was on Nancy's show, and I can tell you she knows her issues - - she has a plan, and she will provide the new energy and leadership we need to change the mess that has been created by the Bush/Knollenberg scheme.

I'd like to share with you an excerpt from a piece I wrote some time ago called Haditha: A Day in the Life of `K' Company 3/1.

Despite popular political rhetoric, the enemy in Iraq is smart, efficient and will exploit every opportunity and vulnerability available to them to kill Marines. Marines are acutely aware of this and plan to minimize the opportunities they afford the enemy and train to act and react appropriately when attacked. The goal is to train to the point where each Marine is able to carry out their responsibility through "muscle memory."

I think a lot can be said to compare that statement to what Democrats are going to be up against this November. Even though the "political rhetoric" is at the Democrats' backs right now, our opposition will try to exploit every opportunity they have in order to maintain their grasp of power. I think we understand this, and the more you can help Nancy, the better she will be able to "act and react when attacked."

Donate Here!

Your contribution to Nancy will not only give her the fighting chance in her own election, but it will give all of us a fighting chance in regaining control of our democracy. Let's train up now and give Nancy everything she will need to win this election.

Thank you for all you do.

Paul Hackett

KZoo Gazette Mentions Amway Guy

2006-09-17T14:44:00.000-04:00

Finally! A news article that covers some of DeVos' history with Amway! Thanks to Michigan Liberal and other related blogs, this information has been much easier to find and compile. In fact, the Kalamazoo Gazette goes so far as to refer to Dick DeVos as the "Amway Guy":

To Democrats, DeVos is the ``Amway Guy'' who ran a company that over the years has endured its share of skepticism and barbs in the popular culture. Alticor is Amway's parent company.

Even better, they even go so far as to mention the Michigan Liberal parody of Amway on YouTube.

``What is this thing called Amway?'' goes the jingle in one of many Internet movies Democratic activists have posted on YouTube.com. The film short deploys an old Amway Corp. promotional song as a soundtrack to skewer DeVos.

The article also mentions "Believe," which has been covered extensively by the blog Pohlitics. If you have the chance, check out Zack Pohl's interview with the director of the movie.

Coming to a bigger screen near you next month is Loki Mulholland's film ``Believe,'' a mock documentary that takes aim at what he says is the ``deceptive'' nature of Amway and the multilevel marketing business. It premiers in Lansing on Thursday and opens elsewhere in Michigan in mid-October. The film's marketers are using DeVos' candidacy to boost public interest for the small, independently produced satire. Mulholland, of Salt Lake City, is a former Amway distributor.

The work of Eric Janssen at Quixtar Blog also made its way into the article. Through Janssen's comments, the article actually mentions the "tools" scam that takes place in Amway.

Janssen said the core problem lies with the large, independent business owners who have become wealthy selling motivational tapes that distributors in the downline are told they need to succeed.

There's a cottage industry of Amway criticism on the Web and Janssen said it's because people ``don't like it when they're told (by sponsors) about this great opportunity and then find out they've been lied to.

Nice work, all! For more information on Amway, feel free to take a look at some of the previous entries in my "Amway Exposed" series:

Amway Exposed, Part One: The Profitability of Amway

Amway Exposed, Part Two: The "Tools" Scam

Amway Exposed, Part Three: Dick DeVos Doesn't Believe in Workers' Rights

Amway Exposed, Part Four: Amway and Free Speech

Amway Exposed, Part Five: Amway Money in Politics

Who are college students excited about?

2006-09-16T21:05:00.000-04:00

There is a new feature on Facebook (social networking website for college students) that allows members to join "groups" to show support for a particular candidate or issue in the context of the 2006 elections. For example, someone particularly enthused about "Jennifer Granholm," "Debbie Stabenow," and Global Warming can join these groups. One group, "Students Against Facebook News Feed," amassed over 700,000 members in the period of a few days.

Most college students are on Facebook. Users aren't asked to pick candidates -- they opt to join candidate and issue groups on their own. Facebook recently released an "Election Pulse" to show each candidate's performance on Facebook. The Facebook "Election Pulse" serves as a very rough approximation of excitement for candidates among college students.

As of 9/16, here are some of the numbers for Michigan's critical races:

MI-Gov:

1.	Dick DeVos (REP)
	51.79%
2.	Jennifer Granholm (DEM)
	46.51%
3.	Greg Creswell (LIB)
	1.7%

MI-Sen:

1.	Debbie Stabenow (DEM)
	57.35%
2.	Mike Bouchard (REP)
	38.26%
3.	Leonard Schwartz (LIB)
	2.35%
4.	Frank Cona (DEM)
	1.97%
5.	Brett McAtee
	0.06%

MI-08

1.	Congressman Mike Rogers (REP)
	52.94%
2.	Jim Marcinkowski (DEM)
	41.98%
3.	Dick Gach(LIB)
	3.74%
4.	John Mangopoulos
	1.34%

MI-09

1.	Joseph Knollenberg (REP)
	59.53%
2.	Nancy Skinner (DEM)
	35.81%
3.	Adam Goodman (LIB)
	4.65%

Numbers for other House Districts are available on Facebook.

Because these groups are voluntary, keep in mind that this is not indicative of how college-age students would vote (just who Internet-using college students are excited about). Because participation is voluntary, and because different students use Facebook to varying degrees, these numbers have no statistical significance whatsoever.

Still, these numbers don't look fantastic. Bouchard is only this low because nobody knows who he is yet. If you're on Facebook, please take a moment and join groups for these Democratic candidates.

Cross-posted on Michigan Liberal and Kicking Ass Ann Arbor.

EDIT: Jordan has more on MI-Dems.

UPDATE (9/17, 3:16 AM): On a completely unrelated note, thanks to MLM Liberal for plugging the Amway Exposed series. Along with being formatted very nicely, it also includes pictures and additional links.

Bring it on, Saul! 50 reasons not to vote for Dick DeVos

2006-09-16T12:03:00.000-04:00

So I finally stumbled back to my place last night, but I decided to check my RSS feeds before hitting the sack. Big mistake. I caught this on the MI GOP blog:

Shortly after the Michigan Republican Party released their Election Day Countdown Calendar, entitled: "75 Days of Broken Promises: No Results from Governor Granholm," the Michigan Democratic Party responded with their own copy-cat version of a calendar entitled "63 Reasons Not to Vote for Dick DeVos." The calendar made its debut on the Michigan Democratic Party website. After a handful of days, the calendar had been pulled. Apparently, the Michigan Dems didn't have anywhere close to 63 reasons not to vote for Dick DeVos, if they immediately pulled it from their site.

Well, that shouldn't be too hard to rectify -- I can think of 25 to 30 reasons not to vote for DeVos just off the top of my head. Consequently, I'm pleased to announce that I will be posting "50 reasons not to vote for Dick DeVos," starting on Monday until the election.

In fact, with your help, we can even make a better list than the MI GOP! We already have a vast amount of information collected here on the blogs, allowing for a truly community-driven project.

Feel free to e-mail me (nirmalkm@umich.edu)/comment here if you have a suggestion or would like to help out. The more the merrier!

Cross-posted on Michigan Liberal (fp!) and Daily Kos.

Oops

2006-09-16T07:00:00.000-04:00

Whoops. I feel partly responsible for this:

News Flash: the sample, which has a margin of error of 4%, ALSO polled 57% women!?!

I’m pretty sure that there has NEVER been an election in Michigan’s history where women constituted 57% of the voters. This poll is completely useless...flawed.

The TV stations who commissioned the poll should demand a refund!

Granholm poll, Stabenow poll

2006-09-14T21:25:00.000-04:00

The Detroit News/WXYZ-TV EPIC/MRA poll just released new information on MI-Gov and MI-Sen. Here's my election analysis based on the numbers:

Keep in mind that there are a lot of problems with the methodology of polling in general (question wording bias, bias because of the kinds of people who decide to respond, bias in phone ownership, answers differing from actual voting behavior, question order influences). On top of that, no poll accounts for voter energy and election day GOTV. Finally, remember what Mark Grebner had to say about ballot proposals.

Polls provide a "snapshot" in time, but can miss the larger context or underlying issues that could have a big influence on races in the future. Being locally based and people who have an understanding of local politics in their area can provide much more accurate and insightful information.

Also, question order is important. This poll asked several questions before it got around to asking whether the voter would choose Granholm/DeVos/Stabenow/Bouchard. Asking about whether Michigan is on the right track, about Bush, and even each of the "issues" before asking for the final descision could have skewed the results in favor of one candidate or the other.

In this particular poll, 57% females were questioned as opposed to 43% males. The fact that females were more likely to answer the poll tells us two things. It tells us that the method used to pick respondents is not representative of the population. It also explains some of the difference in favor of Granholm and Stabenow (since women tend to favor Granholm and Stabenow by a greater margin than men).

With all of that in mind, here are the numbers:

MI-Gov: Jennifer Granholm 50, Dick DeVos 42 (last month 49-42)

MI-Sen: Debbie Stabenow 53, Mike Bouchard 34 (last month 51-38)

More detailed breakdowns from the poll are available here.

The margin of error for the study is 4%. Given the sample size, the difference between Granholm and DeVos is statistically significant (this poll's data says that Granholm's lead in the results is probably not due to experimental error). Stabenow is, of course, definately ahead of Bouchard at this point.

DeVos' unfavorables are at about that of Granholm's, which means that with equal name recognition, he won't fare any better than he does now (he only has 6% unrecognition anyway). The numbers aren't going to move much from new people finding out who DeVos is, since most people already know him.

Bouchard still has 16% unrecognition, with a 16% unfavorable rating. Stabenow has 3% unrecognition, with 27% unfavorability rating. Because all of the focus is on the more heated and controversial Governor's race, Bouchard has lower name recognition and unfavorability. Look to see both of those increase as more attention is focused on the race and Dems start going negative on Bouchard (he has an interesting history, apparently).

7% of voters are undecided in the Granholm race and 11% of voters are undecided in Stabenow's race. Undecideds lean toward the challenger at the last moment.

Of course, the issue of the day is the economy.

54% of people are concerned with the economy, 66% of people think Michigan is on the wrong track, and 82% of people are unhappy with Michigan's economy. Despite this, Granholm only has a 38% unfavorable rating. Also, these results tell us that people who really like Granholm outweigh those that really like DeVos by a small margin (5%).

Therefore, while voters consider the economy to be very important and are unhappy with it, this does not reflect negatively on Granholm herself. In other words, the dishonest Republican tactic to tie Governor Granholm to our state's failing economy has failed to resonate with voters. Furthermore, Michiganders trust Granholm more than DeVos in terms of improving the economy (48 to 39). When it comes to the economy, they blame Bush over Granholm (44 to 28).

This data says that it doesn't look like the Granholm campaign's efforts to nationalize the issues to include Bush are very effective. Over 85% of people are not basing their vote because of Bush or Bush's ties with DeVos. Despite Granholm's "Gas Prices" advertisement, less than 40% of voters trust her on that issue.

On the issues, voters inherently trust Granholm more than DeVos on affordable health care, stem cells, water quality/the environment, and even having a position on abortion. This could be due to association of these issues with Democrats, Granholm's own accomplishments in these areas, or DeVos' absolute refusal to take a position on pretty much any issue.

Michiganders are notorious ticket-splitters. The fact that 60% of them think that its bad if Republicans control every branch of Michigan Government could work in our favor. DeVos doesn't mention the word Republican on any of his ads or on his website. This means that party identification in the Governor's race is very useful, if played the right way. Mention that Republicans control everything and are responsible for the condition our country/state is, throw the Democrat label on Granholm. BAM! Party ID was about even in the survey, but more Democrats identify themselves as strong Democrats than Republicans did (27-22). Especially given how energized they are compared to Republicans, using the Democrat "brand" will help to turn out those voters.

The drawbacks of political polling aside, consistent results from multiple polls can indicate trends in the way that races are shaping up. Taking a look at the last four polls not done by EPIC/MRA (also not including Zogby Interactive):

Rasmussen (8/31): Granholm 46, DeVos 48 (Instant Voice Recording)
Selzer & Company (8/30): Granholm 46, DeVos 44 (Phone)
Strategic Vision (8/27): Granholm 48, DeVos 43 (Phone)
Survey USA (8/21): Granholm 47, DeVos 47 (Instant Voice Recording)

Aside from the Strategic Vision poll (which calls a narrower lead for Granholm than today's results), Granholm and DeVos are typically within the margin of error of each other. Most recent polls did not show a statistically significant difference between each candidate's performance.

Money wise, Stabenow has about eight times as much cash on hand as Bouchard. DeVos is expected to spend at least twice as much as Granholm, but could spend much more than that if he thinks that it will make the difference between winning and losing. For him, going on the air is a matter of oversaturation, not affordability.

Interestingly, the MCRI now is up 48% to 37%, a dramatic shift from previous studies. According to their data, the MCRI would pass if voted on today. The last MCRI poll had the opposition up by 2 points, inside the margin of error (not statistically significant). Again, ballot proposals are difficult to accurately poll.

Another interesting observation, revealing the power of subtle differences in the way questions are phrased: 70% believe that Michigan's economy is getting weaker, but 24% think Michigan's economy is getting worse.

Cross-posted on Michigan Liberal, MyDD, Daily Kos, and Kicking Ass Ann Arbor.

EDIT: Thanks to Doug (from the Lynne Haley campaign) and JUSIPER.com for the plugs.

They fired Alterman, MyDD covers Michigan Races

2006-09-14T12:33:00.000-04:00

They fired Eric Alterman.

Also, MyDD updated their Governor Forecast 2006. Here's what they had to say about our favorite governor:

1. Michigan (Democrat: Jennifer Granholm). Earlier this month, earlier this summer, Democratic Governor Jennifer Granholm appeared headed for defeat, at least in part due to the weak state of Michigan's economy. But Granholm got a second wind and began campaigning hard against Amway heir Dick DeVos -- and spending big bucks. Now the race seems to be tilted in her favor ever so slightly, though it still could go either way.
Latest polling: Rasmussen Reports, DeVos 48 - Granholm 46, September 7; Seltzer & Co., Granholm 46 - DeVos 44, September 2; Strategic Vision (R), Granholm 48 - DeVos 43, August 28; EPIC-MRA, Granholm 49 - DeVos 42, August 23; SurveyUSA, Granholm 47 - DeVos 47, August 22.

MyDD also updated their Senate Forecast. Here's what they had to say about Stabenow:

4. Michigan (Democrat: Debbie Stabenow). I had taken this race off the board, but a post-primary bump for Republican Bouchard has made me put it back on. Stabenow is still up more than 8-1 in cash, and she also maintains decent leads in polls in a fairly blue state in a bad year for Republicans. While the post-primary bump has made me put this back up on the board, I don't expect it will stay here for long. That is has moved ahead of Washington should not be read to indicate a deteriorating situation here. All that means is that McGavick is crashing in Washington.
Money race as of 7/19: Stabenow $4.4M, Bouchard $0.5M
Latest polls: Rasmussen (R), August 31, Stabenow 51%, Bouchard 43%; Strategic Vision (R), August 27 Stabenow 49%, Boucahrd 42%, EPIC / MRA, August 22 Stabenow 51%, Bouchard 38%; Survey USA, August 7, Stabenow 48%, Bouchard 41%

And their House Forecast. They list MI-09 (Nancy Skinner) as a Tier 3 Race, which means that it leans Republican (according to them).

R.I.P. Tupac

2006-09-13T19:59:00.000-04:00

Its been 10 years (June 16, 1971 – September 13, 1996).

(if you're using a feed, click the link for the videos)

Granholm on Daily Kos

2006-09-13T10:59:00.000-04:00

Just a reminder, Governor Granholm will be on Daily Kos this morning from 11:15 am - 12:15 pm. That's in fifteen minutes!

Since you need to have an account and been registered for more than a day to post comments, let me know if you want me to ask her any questions for you.

UPDATE: She's on! Check out the diary!

UPDATE (11:40am): She shouted me (and many of the others) out again!

Thanks to my blogger friends

including Matt from Michigan Liberal as well as wizardkitten, WhoGottheGravy, Zack Pohl, djtyg, Hector Solon, Interrobanger, emptywheel, Dump Terry McAuliffe, gaspare, David Boyle and I’m sure others as well for helping us out in the blogosphere and encouraging me to try typing a few comments myself.

UPDATE (12:30pm): Okay how cool is this. The G responded to one of my questions:

Thanks for posting Nirmal

-- I miss seeing you in your favorite chair ; )

I'm very much opposed to the MCRI. Affirmative Action is a necessity in a global economy when we are attempting to provide opportunity for all of our citizens. All Michigan bloggers please vote no on proposal 2!

This probably requires a bit of explanation. Independently of my blogging, I was also an intern with the Granholm campaign this summer. I used to be in the office ALL THE TIME, and I would always sit in the same chair. Despite the fact that she was busy running the state and powering a critical election, she always took the time to check in with me to see how things were going. That's the kind of person she is... very kindhearted. She was also one of the first in the office to figure out that whogotthegravy on Michlib was actually me, too.

The Daily Kos thing was cool, too. Despite technical problems at the beginning and the fact that it cut out after around half an hour, plus the fact that it wasn't really publicized on DKos, there were over 150 comments and it quickly made it to the top diaries. It was pretty incredible to see, and it was also cool to have a politician actually respond to comments instead of just posting a diary and leaving (not that there's anything wrong with that).

Granholm webchat, MDP ad

2006-09-12T17:40:00.000-04:00

Governor Granholm will be answering questions in a Daily Kos diary tomorrow morning. Here's the relevant info, courtesy of Clint from the Granholm campaign:

Greetings from the Granholm campaign. My name is Clint and I do a lot of the Internet stuff for the Governor's re-election effort. As the headline indicates, she will be posting a diary late on Wednesday morning to share her thoughts on the campaign ahead and her plans for Michigan in the next four years. She has set aside one hour to answer questions in the comments. If you don't see the diary, look for the User name she will be using, which is Jennifer M Granholm.

Who: Gov. Jennifer Granholm
What: Diary on Daily Kos
When: Wednesday, September 13, 11:15am - 12:15pm EST

Here's what I had to say about it on dkos:

its really going to be her

Independent of my own blogging, I used to be an intern in Granholm's campaign office this past summer.

She reads some of the local blogs (such as Michigan Liberal) on a daily basis, and seems to be enthusiastic about the way that progressive blogs and the Democratic party will interact in the future.

The campaign had done another "web chat" on their own campaign blog, and I saw her answering questions in the office as they arrived in real time. Its pretty hardcore. I'm guessing there are probably going to be a lot more questions than what can possibly be answered in an hour, though.

These are the questions I asked at the last Granholm webchat, and what I'm planning on asking again. Last time, she answered my "how to volunteer with the campaign" question. Since you can't post comments on Daily Kos until a day after you register, let me know if there are any questions you want me to ask for you.

Governor Granholm,

Why has the immunity that drug companies are given for distributing harmful products not been repealed? What can be done to increase transparency in the drug testing process?

Governor Granholm,

As you know, the Great Lakes are an important resource that provide economic benefits, aesthetic beauty, and other benefits to our state. What has your administration done to tighten the reporting requirements for diversions and prevent large-quantity water withdrawals from the Great Lakes?

Governor Granholm,

How do you feel about the so-called "Michigan Civil Rights Initiative"? What should the role of affirmative action programs be in higher education?

Governor Granholm,

How do you feel about the mandatory sentencing of a juvenile to imprisonment for life without the possibility of parole? What kinds of preventative measures can be used to prevent youth crime?

Governor Granholm,

How do I volunteer with the campaign?

Governor Granholm,

Currently, many large Michigan employers use the Medicaid system to avoid providing coverage to their employees. This has been estimated to cost Michigan taxpayers over $100 million annually. How do you feel about a "Fair Share" health care fund similar to Maryland's system that would would require very large businesses to spend at least 8 percent of their payrolls on workers' health insurance plans?

Governor Granholm,

Identity theft has damaging consequences for Michigan families that are often difficult to recover from. Are you in favor of measures to strengthen protections for Michigan residents such as a security freeze as an optional theft prevention tool?

Governor Granholm,

Given the high number of work-related musculoskeletal disorders that affect Michigan residents every year, effective ergonomic standards are an important tool to protect our workers. What are some of the challenges that MIOSHA has encountered in addressing the problems of crippling repetitive motion injuries in the workplace?

In other news, the MDP released a new ad entitled "Provincial." You can download the Quicktime or Windows Media versions.

As many of you know, I'm not entirely comfortable with the implied "outsourcing to China" argument. Surprisingly, this ad doesn't do that. It just uses the fact that DeVos opened a factory in China in a way that is amusing and stinging at the same time. I still don't appreciate that it has xenophobic undertones (which Democrats shouldn't encourage), but despite that its easily the best ad out of the MDP or Granholm camp yet. It doesn't use all still photos either, which is a refreshing change of pace.

I'm sure Zack will have this up on YouTube at some point, so keep checking Pohlitics (happy birthday, too!).

Surprise! Kids want to go to college

2006-09-12T03:58:00.000-04:00

When I was a kid, my parents and teachers taught me a fundamental American value: Anyone can become successful in this country as long as they are willing to work hard, regardless of their background or economic situation. Almost everyone agrees that hard work should be rewarded, and that it should be possible to improve our lives and economic condition through work.

These days, this economic mobility is derived through higher education. Higher education is the key to finding a rewarding job and earning a higher income. Despite the numerous benefits to higher education, the chance that an average ninth grader in Michigan will enroll in college by the age of 19 is 38%, compared to the national average of 53% (source).

Evidence suggests that this value is not low because students do not want to go to college, but rather because they are unable to.

Thanks to something called the Kalamazoo Promise, all students who have been attending Kalamazoo Public Schools since kindergarten receive full-tuition college scholarships for Michigan schools. The Kalamazoo Promise has generated nationwide interest in their community and provided students with an opportunity to attain the social mobility that higher education provides.

According to the Kalamazoo Gazette, this was the first year that the Kalamazoo Promise went into effect. Apparently, a lot of kids decided to use it:

This year, the first year The Kalamazoo Promise college tuition guarantee went into effect, fully 78 percent of the Class of 2006 applied to take advantage of it. And that doesn't count the school district's graduates who are going to out-of-state colleges or private colleges this fall and can't use Promise money.

Over 78 percent of Kalamazoo students from the Class of 2006 took the opportunity to go to college, as opposed to the statewide probability of 38%. This tells us that high school students opt not to go to college because it is expensive, not because they don't want to.

In today's world, providing a path to the middle class means getting a good education. When this education is no longer affordable, it becomes much more difficult for individuals to improve the quality of their life and pursue the American dream.

(cross-posted on Daily Kos / fp on Michlib)

EDIT: My bro David Wishinsky has a well-reasoned response, which may be found here.

EDIT AGAIN: Jon Koller responded to David's essay over at Michigan Liberal:

but it's really a patchwork of success and failure. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. If your parents never had enough food on the table and you do, sure, the american dream makes a whole bunch of sense. But it there isn't enough food on your table, there wasn't enough food on your parents' table, or their parents.... the "American Dream" just doesn't ring as true.

While I take issue with your ROI analysis, I won't go into that here. Clearly, if you are smart enough to make the decision to attend college and graduate, you'll make lots of money. If you can't see that, your prospects probably aren't as good.

I like the idea of loans, and I like the idea of the government forgiving them if you do what they want (like stay in state and work) after you graduate. But there has to be hype. People don't go to college unless their parents tell them they should. Not everybodies parents tell them to. The media needs to get involved. That's why the kalamazoo promise is good. Not because the money, but because the newscasters and journalists that kept saying: "finally these kids have a shot" and "you can feel the hope." After you hear enough of that shit you start believing it, and isn't that really the American Dream?

Meta Gravy

2006-09-10T18:42:00.000-04:00

So you all know I try to avoid "blogging about blogging" or otherwise talk about myself and this blog, because I want to stay on topic as much as possible. However, there have recently been a couple things that I've wanted to mention. I'll try not to do too many of these in the future, though.

Firstly, you may have noticed the BlogAds advertising box on the right at the top of this page, courtesy of the folks at Michigan Liberal. You can order an ad on the pages of many of the Michigan politics blogs. Any revenue that I make from this blog will be used for two purposes: to help build the Michigan blogosphere, and to help progressive candidates win elections.

The ad box is prominently featured at the top of the page (as you can see). Getting a Hi-Rise (big) ad for three months costs $10. Currently, the estimated ad impressions for this page totals at 13,365 for three months. This means that for every single dollar you spend, you will receive over 1,300 views for your ad. Its a steal.

Also, you may have noticed "Nirmal's News Ticker" on the right here as well. This is a new addition to the blog, and was inspired by the Michigan Liberal Newscenter. I wanted a place for stuff that I want to draw attention to, but for whatever reason doesn't merit a full post. However, while the Michlib Newscenter is a collection of all of the relevant news across the state to its subject matter, this will be a little different:

If I see "breaking news," I'll throw it up there. Same for articles I find to be interesting or worthwhile reads. If there are causes I want to plug that don't fit into this blog's theme, I'll put it there. I'll even add stuff from Republicans or things that have a "right-wing" slant, if I think that its worth paying attention to or learning from (in other words, I don't necessarily endorse the viewpoints of the websites or articles that I link to in there). As a "catch all" collection of links, it will likely be updated sporadically.

Finally, "Amway Exposed, Part Five" was featured on the front page of Daily Kos in one of the open threads for diaries. Thanks to them, I broke my record for number of unique visitors in a day and also made it past 2,000 visitors. Sweet!

Amway Exposed, Part Five: Amway Money in Politics

2006-09-08T03:48:00.000-04:00

Amway has a long history of exchanging campaign contributions for political influence and favorable legislation. As Betsy DeVos famously put it, "I have decided, however, to stop taking offense at the suggestion that we are buying influence... they are right. We do expect some things in return."

Unfortunately, Amway has used its influence to achieve goals that are not in the public interest, such as securing tax breaks for itself and pushing legislation to make the execution of the Amway "tools" scam easier.

Dick DeVos is using Amway money in his campaign to become the Governor of Michigan. Therefore, an examination of the way that Amway money has been used in politics in the past is very relevant to this race, because it gives us a good indication of how this Amway-purchased influence could impact the people of Michigan in the future.

Sue Myrick

Sue Myrick, the former mayor of Charlotte, North Carolina, used Amway's substantial resources to help elect herself to the U.S. House of Representatives. She is also an Amway distributor. After being elected, Myrick sponsored bills and supported policies that directly benefited Amway. Having made money by selling motivational tools and seminars to Amway's numerous distributors (source), it is a conflict of interest for Myrick to pursue policies in Amway's favor.

In 1994, the largest soft money campaign contribution of the election cycle went to Sue Myrick. According to Mother Jones, Myrick received $295,871 from Amway and its distributors in that cycle, largely because of appeals from top-level Amway distributors to the rest of the Amway distributor network.

In 1996, Myrick received $21,072 from the "Retail Sales" industry, including $4,000 from "Amway Distributor," $3,400 from "Amway Corp," $2,000 from "Amway," $1,620 from the "Direct Marketing Assn," (which represents Amway) and $1,000 from "Yager Enterprises" (think Dexer Yager of Amway fame).

Myrick also received over $100,000 from Amway sources in the 1997-1998 election cycle (source).

Amway's support to Sue Myrick paid off in a big way. Myrick introduced a bill that specifically excluded the selling of tools from the definition of a pyramid scheme. This legislation was clearly designed to make life easier for product-based pyramid schemes like Amway, because most high-level Amway participants profit by scamming low-level distributors into buying Amway motivational materials instead of selling products to other consumers.

By changing the definition of a pyramid scheme, this bill protected the Amway system and interfered with pyramid scheme laws at the state level, such as in North Carolina. From an open letter to Congresswoman Myrick posted on Pyramid Scheme Alert:

In addition to the deceptive program of selling marketing "tools" to recruits, Amway/Quixtar is in continuous jeopardy of prosecution for operating as an illegal pyramid scheme. This is due to its practice of selling the great majority of its goods to sales representatives who do not resell the products to end-users. Rather, they are induced to recoup their investment by recruiting other investors. The North Carolina statute against pyramid schemes (N.C. Gen. Statute §14-291.2) prohibits this practice. For more than two decades the Federal Trade Commission has defined and prosecuted multi-level marketing companies operating in this manner as "endless chains" that doom the vast majority of recruits to financial loss and which must ultimately collapse.

HR 1220 seeks to redefine a pyramid scheme so as to legalize this practice and to thwart effective enforcement of state laws such as our own in North Carolina, to reverse decades of FTC policy and to supercede numerous court rulings. Amway/Quixtar is the largest and most direct beneficiary of this attempted legislative maneuver.

The Amway system relies on exploitation and false promises of profitability to be successful. In particular, product-based pyramids like the Amway "tools" system essentially force people to buy products to enter the Amway system. Amway used profits from this flawed system to help get Sue Myrick elected, who in turn sponsored legislation to make this exploitation of consumers even easier. This is how Amway money is used in politics.

Dick DeVos, Political Influence, and Free Trade with China

For the folks concerned about Dick DeVos' role in lobbying for free trade policies and his "outsourcing to China," the Mother Jones article on Sue Myrick also has a juicy bit about the importance of Amway money in lobbying for free trade with China.

Should Amway duplicate that success in China, where it is waging its greatest recruitment campaign ever, it may eventually boast a Chinese sales force of 10 million.

That's why Amway relies so heavily on a politically friendly Congress. And it's what made Dick DeVos so particularly testy in the spring of 1995, when a block of Republican freshmen fought the president's peso-rescue loan to Mexico. "I'm very concerned," DeVos told Business Week. "Among some of those [newcomers], there is an increasingly persistent tendency to reject free trade."

(snip)

...in June, Congress reaffirmed China's trading status -- with the support of Myrick and others from the Amway caucus. Now, the DeVoses and Amway can look on the bright side: In less than a year, they've recruited a reported 300,000 distributors in Guangzhou alone.

Amway and Mike Cox

Based on filings to the Secretary of State, the DeVos family has contributed $34,700.00 to "Mike Cox for Attorney General" between 2002 and 2006. Family members include Maria DeVos, Doug DeVos, Pam DeVos, Elisabeth DeVos, Richard DeVos, Dick DeVos, and Daniel DeVos. The Van Andels donated $10,050.00 to Cox between 2002 and 2006. Family members include Steve Van Andel, Cynthia Van Andel, Carol Van Andel, and Nan Van Andel. This total of $44,750.00 does not even include other Alticor interests or employees.

Although there have been extensive complaints against Amway filed with the Michigan Attorney General, Mike Cox appears to have "gone easy" on the company. According to amquix.info, a thorough complaint about Amway/Quixtar business practices was filed to the MI AG on September 29, 2003 (complaint number 2003315082). According to amquix.info, this complaint was never reviewed by the AG's office.

In fact, complaints about multi-level marketing ranked among the top ten consumer complaints of 2002. Given their history, and that Amway/Quixtar is the largest MLM (and certainly the most prominent in Michigan), it is reasonably likely that many of these complaints could be directly attributed to Amway/Quixtar. Furthermore, groups of unhappy former Amway distributors urge their members to file complaints with the Michigan Attorney General (see examples here and here), which also lends credence to the theory that a majority of the numerous MLM complaints are complaints about Amway specifically. It is difficult to say exactly how many complaints about Amway there were and to what extent they were investigated, but all of the contextual evidence points to the idea that there were a lot of complaints and very little action taken. It could be interesting to see if it is possible to FOIA for complaints about Amway to investigate how they were handled.

Mike Cox has also gone easy on Amway on his website. Given that Amway/Quixtar is the most prolific MLM in existance, Amway benefits from distortions in descriptions of MLMs. According to several blog posts in August of 2005, the Michigan Attorney General's website contained this text with regard to multi-level marketing:

Multi-level marketing is a lawful and legitimate business method that uses a network of independent representatives to sell consumer products. Commissions should be based upon the sale of goods or services to end-user consumers who may include the sellers of the product.

This is misleading because it implies that MLM is a "legitimate" model, meaning that it is theoretically workable. This implication glosses over fundamental flaws in the way MLM is conducted, such as market saturation and its reliance on exploitative relationships. All it takes is a quick Google search on multi level marketing to get a more accurate picture of what these business models entail.

To be fair, the quoted paragraph on multi-level marketing was changed sometime between August 2005 and today. The new page has a much more sobering look at MLM: It now says that "Some legitimate businesses have been successful using an MLM compensation structure" and the line about "lawful and legitimate business" has been removed completely.

Still, Cox likely ignored numerous complaints about Amway and failed to point out the dangers of MLM schemes like Amway on his website for a substantial period of time. The evidence suggests that he may have been conciously protecting his Amway-affiliated campaign contributors, and this issue certainly merits further investigation.

The "Amway Tax Break"

There is, of course, the infamous "Amway Tax Break."

Amway and its leaders gave over $4 million to the GOP between 1993 and 1997. In exchange, Newt Gingrich inserted a last-minute $283 million tax break into the 1997 budget. That's one heck of a payoff.

Gingrich himself personally benefited from the Amway Tax Break as well. As an Amway motivational speaker, Gingrich earned a hefty sum of $50,000 per speech. Gingrich personally benefited financially because he looked out for Amway's interests. What is even worse is that it is the low-level Amway distributors that foot the bill for these kinds of seminars. Amway had no problem with using the political system and exploiting its distributors in this manner.

Other fun links and connections

Information on the connections between Amway and DeLay/Abramoff

MLM Survivor: Information About the Amway/Bush Connection

MLM Survivor: GW Bush and the Yager Organization

For more information on Amway and Dick DeVos' actions as the company's President, feel free to take a look at previous posts in this series:

Amway Exposed, Part One: The Profitability of Amway

Amway Exposed, Part Two: The "Tools" Scam

Amway Exposed, Part Three: Dick DeVos Doesn't Believe in Workers' Rights

Amway Exposed, Part Four: Amway and Free Speech

(cross-posted on Michigan Liberal and Daily Kos ...both front paged!)

Also, thanks to Media Transparency for the plug on the Richard and Helen DeVos Foundation funder profile.

New Marcinkowski ad

2006-09-08T00:17:00.000-04:00

I really like the new Marcinkowski ad. Its honest, its message will resonate with those who are feeling the "pinch of the pump" (i.e. normal people), and it seems to have unusually high production values (image and sound quality). In any case, it looks and feels very polished.

It is unfortunate that Rogers has over twice the amount of money raised as Marcinkowski.

Letter to the Editor: Single Business Tax Repeal Will Mean Higher Tuition

2006-09-06T00:20:00.000-04:00

My buddy David Wishinsky, who is also a contributor to this blog, had a letter to the editor appear in the State News today linking the Republican repeal of Single Business Tax to higher tuition for college students. While Granholm has been working furiously to lower the costs of higher education, the Republican Legislature executed a plan to eliminate one fourth of our state's general fund ($1.9 billion in revenue), a policy supported by Dick DeVos.

While talking about the Single Business Tax (SBT), its important to keep a few things in mind. The SBT has been around for many years, even through Engler's tenure as Governor. Engler and the Republican Legislature never substantially restructured the tax while they were in power. More recently, it is rumored that Dick DeVos pulled the plug on plans to reform the SBT after he decided on his gubernatorial candidacy. By forcing Granholm to veto a full repeal, they can blame her for not dealing with the tax. In other words, the Republicans have been playing politics with our budget so that they can use it as a campaign issue.

The Republicans would have you believe that the Single Business Tax is the source of all of our economy's woes. This is simply untrue. By blaming our problems on the SBT, they can effectively tie the job losses in our state to our Governor to make her more vulnerable in an election. Our economy's problems are also not completely the fault of Bush's economic policies, as the Granholm campaign implies. The losses are felt everywhere, but they hit hardest because of what our manufacturing sector is going through. These manufacturing losses are due to a complex set of factors that a Governor, or even a President alone, does not have complete control over.

This isn't to say that the Single Business Tax is a "good" thing, and we must not allow the Republicans to portray us as liking the tax. We just want it to be dealt with responsibly. Their actions are not fiscally responsible.

The SBT is not desirable because it disproportionately taxes things like employee wages and health care, which reduces incentives for companies to locate in our state. A restructured tax should include incentives that reward companies that hire and invest in Michigan.

However, the Republican proposal would have eliminated the SBT entirely. Furthermore, they would not discuss where the replacement revenue would come from until after the election. One fourth of Michigan's General Fund pays for a lot of things in our state. With a complete repeal of the SBT, it is highly likely that tax increases would be imposed on other taxpayers, or we would see significant cuts to things like public safety, education, and health care.

Contrary to what the Republicans would have you believe, the Governor (unlike Engler) acted to try and restructure the SBT with a plan outlined in her 2005 State of the State address. She did this by closing loopholes in the SBT that treated companies unequally, and by bringing taxes on insurance companies up to the national average. The Republicans were the ones to refuse this plan. By not agreeing to restructure the SBT back then, they secured a campaign issue for the 2006 cycle. It matters little to them that our entire state's budget is in jeopardy because of it.

Anyway, that's enough ranting from me. Here's the letter. Like all of David's material to newspapers around the state, it is on message with that of the Granholm campaign. More importantly, what he's saying is intellectually honest and is something that students like me can relate to. I think this letter is a great model for college students across Michigan to follow:

Every student at MSU can lament our tuition costs are high. The Republican-led legislature would like to see them higher; so would Republican gubernatorial-candidate Dick DeVos.

Why? Because corporations and businesses have been paying taxes for far too long. By repealing the Single Business Tax, they would like to throw that burden on you and I: the students. They would love to see the $1.9 billion replaced by $1.9 billion that helps fund state universities and community colleges. Without this funding, MSU and every other school would be forced to pass the burden onto us: the students. Our tuition would undoubtedly rise.

DeVos never had to get a student loan, but many of us have and will in the future. We should not live a life of paying back ever-escalating debt because we are providing a tax break for Amway. Vote for Gov. Jennifer Granholm in November. She knows what it is like to be a student, she knows what it is like to work hard for things in life and she is working for us.

BREAKING: House finalizes deal on OT, minimum wage

2006-09-05T18:56:00.000-04:00

Looks like they were able to work this out. Via the AP:

The House on Tuesday also wrapped up other parts of a package designed at keeping the status quo for overtime eligibility in Michigan while raising the minimum wage.

Legislation passed by a 103-3 vote would provide a state tax credit for low-income workers. The legislation, which also is headed toward Granholm's approval, would allow a state earned-income tax credit on top of the existing federal credit. The credit would start at 10 percent in 2008 and rise to 20 percent in 2009.

MI-Gov and MI-Sen Get Exposure on National Blogs

2006-09-05T13:51:00.000-04:00

Just a heads up and brief commentary:

In an overview of 2006 Senate races, Bob Geiger rates Senator Stabenow as highly likely to win her race. I think its going to be a much closer call than what a lot of people are predicting, but I essentially agree with his assessment of the race (cash on hand, political environment in Michigan, etc).
Speaking of the Stabenow Campaign, MyDD got around to doing an "Ad Watch" for one of her recent ads. Although I am not a huge fan of the ad either, I don't completely agree with their assessment. Michigan voters are notorious ticket-splitters and I think that some of this rhetoric will resonate. I don't have any data to back it up, but that's my gut feeling.
Finally, Kos talks a bit more about a Granholm "resurgence" based on a poll that came out last night. Given that the MoE is bigger than the difference between the two, there isn't a significant difference in how Granholm and DeVos are polling. Like all polls, this doesn't account for GOTV either. No matter how the polls come out, its going to be a tough race (so get out there and work!).

EDIT: Completely unrelated, but I gotta plug this recent interview that Zack Pohl conducted. Go read it!!!!

MCRI Poll

2006-09-05T00:39:00.000-04:00

READ THIS FIRST: New MCRI polling analysis is available here.

According to yesterday's Detroit Free Press, there is only 41% support for the MCRI (43% opposed, 3.5% margin of error).

While I hope that the MCRI goes down in flames, this doesn't tell us much. There are a few reasons why these numbers are insignificant.

The margin of error for the poll is greater than the difference between the two of them (there is no significant difference between the two numbers)
Most voters generally don't read the actual language of any ballot proposal until they reach the voting booth, and they might change their mind after reading the real thing.
The "visibility" of most ballot proposals is also lower than that of races involving candidates, so a lot of people won't even know about the issue or won't make up their mind until closer to the election.
Most importantly, the MCRI is a racially charged issue and respondents behavior may differ based upon that. People might say they're opposed because they're afraid of being viewed as racist, but privately support it on election day.

The DFP ran a similar article to this back in May. Here's what voter list deity Mark Grebner had to say about polling for ballot proposals back then:

It's a mistake to rely on polling related to ballot questions. They are often wrong by 30% or more.

In 1994, Proposal A (raising sales taxes, to permit property tax cuts) was supposedly a dead heat, the weekend before the election. Actual result: 70% yes.

In 2002, in a FAMOUS screwup, EPIC-MRA polled that year's Proposal A, which was a referendum on the Republican-passed legislation to eliminate single-action straight-ticket voting in general elections. According to EPIC-MRA, the proposal was leading 77% to 21%, with only 2% undecided. Four days later, the voters rejected it, 40% to 60%. The margin of error, calculated at 5% according to the laws of statistics, turned out to be 37%.

In another post, Grebner explains the importance of context in terms of how questions about ballot proposals are asked:

As long as I stick to a reasonably neutral way of asking about DeVos and Granholm, I'll get almost the same answers from people. Consider two exceptions: if I mention that Granholm is the Democratic candidate, the responses I get will be slightly more highly correlated with partisan attitudes than if I leave it out. If I refer to "Governor Granholm", I may trigger greater feelings of deference to an office-holder, or anger about job conditions than if I refer just to their names.

Because these effects are small in the case of candidate, we learn to overlook them. Candidate A is ahead of Candidate B by roughly the same margin, no matter how we ask the question. But in the context of issues, especially ones without clear definitions, context effects can be very large.

While we're on the subject of the MCRI, there was a slanted and patronizing editorial about the "initiative" a couple days ago in the Jackson Citizen-Patriot. Its message was essentially that BAMN sucks and that the MCRI should be on the ballot, while making no mention of how supporters of the MCRI collected signatures for it (they lied about it, basically).

As a student at the University of Michigan, I am very familiar with BAMN and agree that they ultimately undermine the cause of affirmative action (Rob Goodspeed has a great overview of the group's flaws on his website). However, BAMN doesn't represent all supporters of affirmative action, and just because the Voting Rights Act wasn't violated doesn't mean that it is right to put it on the ballot. If voters were told to sign a petition by MCRI operatives in support of affirmative action when the MCRI really aims to abolish affirmative action, their actions are fundamentally wrong. Ballot initiatives require a certain number of signatures to give them legitimacy. If these signatures were obtained using deceit, it means that the ballot initiative is not legitimate.

Oddly enough, I just noticed that my good friend David today published a post about this issue entitled "Racism Will Trump Decency." I don't think that the MCRI will pass, because with both the MDP and the MI GOP opposing the initiative, its going to be much harder for them to find funding. David isn't as optimistic, largely because of the relationship between the city of Detroit and the rest of the state. Its tough to say either way -- here's what he had to say:

I do not see the optimism others have for this initiative. While I hope and pray affirmative action stays as it is such an important program to help ease the problems we have in this state when it comes to economic opportunity and the correlation of race (see: Detroit, Flint, Benton Harbor), I don't see the voters of western Michigan or Macomb County and Western Wayne county allowing this to stand. In state politics everything seems to come down to this "us vs. them" mentality of Michigan vs. Detroit. This is just a nice cover for "white vs. black" and this same attitude is prevalent in suburban Detroit. I do not think that it is as large a problem in Oakland County (though you will certainly find your pockets of it there) as it is in Macomb though where I think the vast majority of white voters may say they won't vote against it, but in the booth by themselves have no problem approving the MCRI. It will be a sad day. Hopefully we can cut our losses and reelect Governor Granholm who has found ways to fix Republican right-wing messes in the past. But mark my words people, this initiative will pass. Racism will trump common sense and decency this November 7th.

Statistics Show DeVos and ABATE are Wrong on Helmets

2006-08-30T17:32:00.000-04:00

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, a dramatic increase in motorcycle fatalities is partly due to cyclists not wearing their helmets. The NHTSA noted that of motorcycle fatalities in 2005, "almost half of the people who died were not wearing a helmet". Given that a disproportionate number of fatalities come from helmet-less riders, the statistics show that not wearing a helmet increases the chance of a motorcycle death.

This is contrary to ABATE's assertion that motorcycle helmets have nothing to do with safety. That doesn't matter to Dick DeVos, though.

Claiming that "People are free to do what they want to do," DeVos has framed this as an issue of personal choice. DeVos understands that his support of a repeal of the helmet law, no matter how non-sensical, will earn him support from voters that would otherwise not bother showing up to the polls. Seeing how recently DeVos has gotten into motorcycles, his support of ABATE is purely a political gesture.

I believe strongly that government should not intervene in the personal choices and lives of its citizens. However, the problem with a repeal of the helmet law is that its societal costs are imposed upon all of us, despite the fact that wearing a helmet should be common sense. The "personal choice" argument doesn't apply here because we all pay the price for helmet-less riders. The Saginaw News skewered legislators' repeal of the helmet law today, citing some of these costs:

Riding without a helmet is clearly a higher risk and it costs Michigan taxpayers more for catastrophic health claims -- millions more -- and insurance.

And unlike the disingenuous "personal responsibility" argument used in the helmet debate, there's no clamor in the Legislature to repeal Michigan's mandatory seat-belt law. That's because Congress ties seat-belt use in states to federal highway appropriations. So the state would lose some of its transportation funding if it repealed the seat-belt law.

DeVos has shown that he is willing to endanger peoples' lives and cost taxpayers millions of dollars in catastrophic health claims for his own political gain. On the other hand, Granholm opposes a repeal of the helmet law even though it is politically costly, because she knows its the right thing to do for Michigan. Who would you rather have as your Governor?

(cross-posted on Daily Kos)

MI-Gov: More Debate News

2006-08-30T17:04:00.000-04:00

DeVos discussed the debates a bit in a bus interview:

On the announcement the Granholm campaign accepted television-station invitations to debate, without completing negotiations with the DeVos camp: DeVos called the governor's actions "disrespectful" and "childish," but said debates likely would happen.

That's not how the Granholm campaign sees it. According to Team Granholm, DeVos was the one to unilaterally accept debate offers without consulting the Granholm campaign.

"Mr. DeVos, while accepting television debates in the Grand Rapids and Lansing area, seems to have completely forgotten about Detroit and southeast Michigan, so we are remedying his mistake by agreeing to a television debate at WXYZ-TV," explained Edelson.

The Granholm Campaign had proposed that neither side accept or reject any debate invitations until campaign representatives from both sides could meet after the party conventions. However, the DeVos Campaign ignored that request and unilaterally began accepting various debate invitations. Therefore, the Granholm Campaign decided it would also announce which debates it was accepting, two of which the DeVos Campaign had previously accepted, at WOOD-TV and on Michigan Public Television.

MI-Gov and the MCRI

2006-08-30T15:55:00.000-04:00

The so-called "Michigan Civil Rights Initiative" will be on the ballot this November. U.S. District Judge Arthur Tarnow could not keep the MCRI from appearing on the ballot because its supporters did not violate the Voting Rights Act. However, he did acknowledge the systematic voter fraud that its promoters engaged in.

Tarnow, however, said voters should be concerned by the supporters' conduct. If it passes, he said, it will be "stained by well-documented acts of fraud and deception."

The bad press is unlikely to hurt Republicans, who want nothing to do with the MCRI. Interestingly enough, even Dick DeVos has publicly stated his opposition to the ballot initiative. Ward Connerly, the California businessman behind the MCRI, has previously bemoaned the impact that DeVos' opposition to the initiative has had on his fundraising abilities. Connerly made these comments last week on "Off the Record,"

Speaking at a taping of the public television program "Off the Record," Connerly said, "People don't want to get on the bad side of Dick DeVos."

Republican DeVos has said he believes the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative goes too far, and has joined his Democratic opponent, Gov. Jennifer Granholm, in opposing it.

Connerly said potential GOP contributors to MCRI fear being on the outs with a DeVos administration if he is elected.

Given that DeVos has a clearly documented history of supporting very conservative causes and his socially conservative positions on many issues in this race, it would stand to reason that he would be in favor of the MCRI. However, this is not the case. DeVos is afraid of the effect that the MCRI will have on turnout in areas such as downtown Detroit, Flint, and Saginaw. It has often been speculated that Engler beat Blanchard in 1990 because of Blanchard's sub-par performance in Detroit. In such a close race, it is in DeVos' interests to keep Detroit from performing well for Granholm.

Thomas Bray of the Detroit News speculated today that DeVos' positioning on the MCRI and other issues may hurt his conservative credentials. In a column on DeVos' decision to criticize President Bush for not meeting with auto executives, Bray had this to say:

Nobody doubts DeVos' credentials as a Republican. But even before turning on Bush, DeVos had endorsed a higher state minimum wage, lectured oil companies to cut prices and come out against a referendum that would put an end to racial preferences in state hiring and admissions.

Maybe voters are beginning to wonder who DeVos really is. If Republicans should have learned anything by now, when voters are presented with a choice between a Democrat and a Republican who acts like a Democrat, they will choose the real Democrat every time.

As WK previously mentioned, many conservatives are likely more concerned with ousting Granholm than thrilled with DeVos.

"I think Dick still has some work to do to excite social conservatives about his candidacy," he said. "I trust at some point between now and November he will talk about the foundational values -- marriage and the protection of life."

He said social conservatives were more focused on ousting Granholm.

"I think there is more energy about removing Granholm than enthusiasm for electing Mr. DeVos," Glenn said.

Michigan Way Of Life

2006-08-30T15:07:00.000-04:00

The Stabenow Campaign has released a new ad entitled "Michigan Way of Life." Check it out!

My Friends Need Help

2006-08-29T17:02:00.000-04:00

From David:

Hi everyone,

I am writing this because I believe that the blogosphere can impact politics. It did not occue to me until today that I could use it impact issues that affect me. So I am asking for everyone's support in helping me change legislation in Washington. The issue is one, that I feel at least, should have bi-partisan support. Please read and comment and if possible contact Carl Levin's office to support them taking a position on my proposal. Let's prove that America's government can be responsive for positive change. Thank you and I thank you for your support in advance (I promise this is the one and last time I will try to advance an agenda for myself and possibly very few to no one else - thank you!)
Here is the rest from from my blog:
This is a (slightly edited from what I sent them for personal reasons) letter to Senator Carl Levin of Michigan, who has failed to respond to my questions on this issue very dear to me in the past. Ironically the only person who has replied is Congressman Joe Knollenberg but his response showed an obvious lack of understanding of the issue, or the premise of what I was writing as his 'pseudo-form letter' did not address any of my specific concerns. But Senator Levin has stated this is an issue of importance to him and so I am focusing on him.
Dear Senator,
My name is David A Wishinsky. I am an adoptee born in Canada and adopted by two Americans from New York. As I am sure you are aware, our nation's system of immigration is tedious. There are many confusing and contradictory rules and the process does not always run as smoothly as one would hope.
For me, my story with America's immigration system occured very early in life. I was born in Toronto, to biological parents whom I do not know. I was blessed to be adopted by two devoted and loving parents who were always forthright with me which is why I haven't ever not known that I was adopted. I could not have been more fortunate. I am sure that my life is far better than it would have been had the adoption not occured and this is the reason I am sure that both you and I are proponents of adoption.
My parents seeking to include me not only in their family but in their nationality also, attempted to get me American citizenship. They were routinely rebuffed because being adopted, I did not qualify in the same manner that natural born children would. After years and years of this being the case reform came in 1996 when President Clinton signed sweeping immigration reform into place that seems to have changed my circumstances - this reform has allowed my younger sister to become an American citizen. Unaware of this change care of immigration regulation confusion at the U.S. Consulate in Toronto, on April 15, 1999 I turned eighteen and unbeknowest to my family my ability to gain instant American citizenship ended as my parents still resided in Canada. Two months after this date we applied for a green card for me. It still has not been issued because my father (who is my sponsor) still lives in Toronto and is unable to be a financial sponsor.
As I mentioned earlier, American immigration law is full of pitfalls and contradictions and in my situation I found many. For example, the irony that my father when speaking with INS officials in Buffalo, NY found that he could not sponsor me financially even if he were to leave money in a trust for the US government to utilize should I become destitute. Or the irony, that I am living in Farmington Hills with F-1 status and that my parents have demonstrated the ability to pay in excess of $100,000 in tuition to Michigan State University, yet there is concern over their ability to cover my the cost should I ever require food stamps.
I am a political science student at Michigan State University, I have been active in supporting Democrat candidates within the state, as you can see in letters to the editor I have had published in both the Detroit Free Press and Lansing State Journal this summer. I was raised in a politically aware family and American politics has always fascinated me. Yet it was not until today that the idea of using my blog as a message to get my story out was a good idea. So you can find a copy of this letter at withgodallthingsarepolitical.blogspot.com also.
Your office has failed to respond to me in the past, I hope this new public plea will help change that. With immigration reform a hot issue in Washington, I ask you this: Please reform America's immigration laws so that adoptees are treated the same as natural born children. As a society we all deplore the idea of abortion whether or not we agree with its availability - everyone sees adoption as the best alternative. Yet the government then counters that with an immigration policy that says, adopted children just are not the same. I ask you to reform this policy so that I too can rejoice in my family's background because whether or not Washington recognizes me, I have been raised to be an American and identify myself as such.
Thank you for your time, I look forward to receiving your
response,
Sincerely,
David A Wishinsky

From Jordan over at the Skinner Campaign:

Michigan bloggers, are we up to the challenge? We have been severely underrepresented in the national blogosphere. The netroots is afire over Connecticut, and there are plenty of “Netroots Candidates” from the west and the south. But where is Michigan? We are a solid blue state. As Governor Granholm told us at the blogger caucus, no electoral math gives us a Democratic president but a red Michigan. We have three highly competitive house seats. That is one fifth of what Democrats need to take back the house. Three seats- few enough to concentrate our resources, but still one fifth of what our party needs to take back the house. We have a responsibility to our party to give em hell in these districts, and start laying the groundwork for a strong MI Blogosphere for the ’08 Presidential.
This is a special year, we all can feel it. MI-09 is a statistical tie, we are raising enough money to catch the DCCC’s eye in MI-08, and we have a hell of a candidate in MI-11.
We can use the national netroots to our advantage, if we organize. All of you should have accounts at the two biggest Democratic blogs: http://www.DailyKos.... and http://www.MyDD.com I am putting together an email list to build a community of Michigan bloggers who can help strengthen Michigan's blogosphere. If you would like to help Michigan and receive updates let me know: JordanWells@gmail.com There are only 70 days until the election, if you don’t take the time to read a few emails, recommend a few diaries, and post a few comments you know you’re going regret it if we don’t take the house. So participate, then we can all blame the voting machines!
Some of us have already been trying to make Nancy Skinner MI-09 a netroots candidate. Nancy is the perfect choice of our 3 targets in Michigan. Let’s face it, with 425 Democratic House candidates; the netroots has to be choosy. For example, Jim Marcinkowski in MI-08 is a great guy, and the perfect choice to take on Mike Rogers. I have one of his tshirts, and a sign for my car. However I do not see the progressive blogosphere getting excited about his candidacy.
However Nancy Skinner already has a netroots presence. She attended Yearly Kos, she has written on Daily Kos, and there are plenty of diaries and comments on Daily Kos about her. She won $2,000 in DFA’s Grassroots All Star contest, and $5,000 in Mark Warner’s Map Changers contest, and earned a donation for coming in 3rd in Russ Feingold’s Progressive Patriot contest. Votes mean supporters, and Nancy has them. This sets her apart from Marcinkowski and Trupiano. Having name-id from her talk show past and appearances on cable news and Air America don’t hurt either ;)
Besides, one thing I’ve noticed about the netroots endorsed list is that there is a lack of women. Males outnumber females 16 to 3. Nancy is a candidate pro-choice progressive women everywhere can get excited about.
So- an email list to promote Michigan related news, and a coordinated campaign to get Nancy Skinner endorsed by the netroots. If Nancy does get endorsed, money comes in from nationwide and the Michigan blogosphere can rally behind our other two candidates. Two solid first steps to building Michigan’s blogosphere and our credibility. If we get active and involved, and a Democrat wins in the 9th district, you know we are going to get some credit: the Republicans have had the seat since the 1930’s!!!
I also think we should also follow our Governor’s advice and rally behind MichiganLiberal as THE Michigan blog. Of course anyone with their own blog should write there as well, but cross posting to MichLib gives out of staters an opportunity to stay informed while only checking 1 Michigan blog- great if we want to build support nationally.
Your thoughts?

Edit: In the interest of full disclosure, I am a volunteer on Skinner's campaign. I have also offered to do the same work for Marcinkowski. The arguments I make for trying to get Nancy endorsed by the netroots are accurate, and I believe with only 70 days until the election she has the best shot of getting the endorsement because we have already laid the groundwork. As she told us at the bloggers caucus, she has spoken with Markos of Daily Kos and he said that for her to get endorsed more of her local people must promote her. Markos says now all Nancy needs is more support on national blogs. We can do that. Any other candidate would need more than that.

MDP Convention Update

2006-08-27T21:41:00.000-04:00

A bit more information regarding the convention showed up online after yesterday's post:

emptywheel, who did a superb job at the Blogger's Caucus, added a diary on Daily Kos that discusses the AG nomination extensively. From the post:

I'll tell you what. Yesterday, I was determiend to work to get Granholm re-elected. But today, I'm really excited to go tell people about our superb candidate for Attorney General.

Nancy Skinner's blog has some coverage of her speech on the second day of the convention. Someone post it on YouTube!
More discussion of the AG and SOS nomination at Daily Kos ("MI-Dems: We Just Had an Interesting State Convention")
Some more pictures are online as well. Sharonrb was nice enough to leave a comment and let me know that she has pictures of the convention. Many of these include more pics from the blogger's caucus. Also, Christine Barry has a lot more pictures from the convention, including some from the CD04 Caucus meeting.

Bloggers and the MDP Convention, Day 1

2006-08-26T22:52:00.000-04:00

My (brief) thoughts and observations from the MDP Convention today. I try to avoid "blogging about blogging" as much as possible, but I decided to indulge myself this once. Read on, folks...

The Blogger's Caucus

The Blogger's Caucus was really cool. We had a lot of candidates show up, including our Governor and Senator at the same time! Most of the candidates came in, spoke for a bit, and left. This is understandable, especially given the time constraints. It was really great to get so many candidates, but the downside is that it didn't leave much room for conversation.
Speaking of the candidates, I apologize if I leave any candidates out!
Andy Coulouris, Democratic nominee for the 94th Michigan House of Representatives, showed up to the Blogger Caucus today. I volunteered for Andy's campaign on the weekends and learned a lot about local politics in the city of Saginaw, voter ID, and GOTV in the process. He used MySpace in his campaign to attract volunteers, and he generally shows a lot of love for grassroots activists. I appreciated that he actually spent time observing the Blogger Caucus and listening to everyone, instead of just getting in and rushing out (again, not that there was anything wrong with the candidates that did that, either!)
Matt mentioned that the MI Republicans have been trying to make a Republican weblog modeled after Michlib that includes the ability to post diaries and participate with other users. Thanks to blogs like Michigan Liberal, Daily Kos, MyDD, and others, we're way ahead of them on this!
Stabenow came early on. I didn't get the sense that she reads blogs regularly (not everyone has the time for that or can make it a priority), but she was supportive enough to grace us with her presence.
Granholm "gets it" when it comes to the Michigan netroots. I already knew that she reads Michlib religiously, but it became clear that she also understands the dynamics behind blogs structured like it. I've seen her speak in a wide variety of situations, and I think that she demonstrated her understanding of the blogs through the unique way that she spoke with us. She was on message, but she used some different techniques in conveying it, and gave us some of her suggestions for how we can be more effective as a collective. She notices who posts and what they post, which was made clear through the way that she tried to familiarize herself with everyone in the room. Also, the unsolicited "I have to say hi to who got the gravy here," was sweet.
Okay, that was hysterical when Granholm realized who David Boyle was -- I worried about what might have happened. David (very cool guy) has some... creative ways of expressing his dissatisfaction with some of the Governor's policies on dkos and michlib. He also got in an e-mail argument with Dan Mulhern, which he later posted on Daily Kos. She was very gracious and appreciated his role as a dissenting voice. David was very good-natured about it too. I think its one of those things where you had to have been there. I couldn't stop laughing, though.
Nancy Skinner was great -- of all the candidates, I think I enjoyed her talk the most. It was a bit wordy and there was a lot of name dropping, but that was perfect for her target audience (a.k.a. us). Like Granholm, she's also demonstrated a clear understanding and appreciation for the netroots, particularly at the national scene. She pointed out that blogs generate buzz and help pick good candidates.
The fact that Skinner is a former radio and TV personality was clear in her messaging and the way she views the blogs, which is a good thing. She is very direct and not afraid to say what is on her mind, which is a very refreshing change of pace from the usual. She seemed to imply that blogs provide a good alternative source of information when the regular news fails to pick up on stuff. Her own blog is excellent - Jordan does a great job and her posts are neat too (like the one about her experiences with fundraising).
She didn't say it outright, but I think that Skinner wasn't completely happy with the blog coverage of her race at the local level (unhappy that coverage doesn't exist). In particular, the sense that I got was that there is a lack of representation for Skinner by locals at websites like Daily Kos. In terms of MI Congressional Candidates I've always been the most excited about her, but I'm not a resident of the district and I don't want to talk about it without fully understanding the local issues. Understandably, most of the local blogger focus seems to be on the Governor's race.
Marcinkowsi lamented the impact that advertising has on the mass media. No argument from me!
It looks like David LaGrand has an interesting race ahead of him. It would be awesome if we could take that seat from DeVos' own turf, which makes it a great race to give some attention to. He had a great story about Betsy DeVos too!
Rep. Andy Meisner swung by as well. I'm very interested to see how the House leadership race plays out.
Rebekah Warren stopped in as well -- she had a campaign blog through her primary. Ann Arbor politics fascinates me.
It was explained to us that donating online for Michigan House and Senate candidates using a system similar to ActBlue is complicated. I really wish that we'd have something like that up, but apparently it would be pretty expensive to look into it.
Appreciated the talk on how to grow the Michigan Blogosphere -- too bad we ran out of time! Be sure to check out staterootsproject.org
Finally, Matt was the star of the show. He could have easily gone in a completely different direction, but instead Matt effectively explained what makes all of this work: the community. His story was very personal and I'm sure that more than a few people in the room identified with it and were inspired to start blogging.

Convention Speeches and Other General Convention Stuff

It was neat to see some real energy and controversy over the AG nomination. We all know how its going to end, but having that floating in the background made things much more interesting.
As WK pointed out, so much paper! Most of which probably actually wasn't read.
Generally, Democrats seem to be very cheery people and open to conversation. It was exciting meeting all kinds of new random people, especially other fellow activists from Saginaw.
Very cool to see many of the Michigan bloggers all assembled in one place at "Blogger's Row."
IMO Kwame was the second best speaker next to Granholm in the main auditorium. I've seen Kwame speak and I know how good he is, but he still somehow seems to impress and surprise me every time. Regardless of what people may think of him, he really understands how to turn a phrase and work a crowd. "Some people are saying 'Amway, Amway, Amway'...we're saying 'no damn way.'"
One of the things that I found to be the most incredible about Granholm's speech was that she can effectively take anything and infuse it with energy and excitement. Instead of simply reading off a list of businesses in Michigan, she worked the crowd by simply switching up her speech patterns. I know that people didn't know what all of those companies did, but they were still hanging on her every word.
My favorite parts of the Granholm speech: "You may not have a lobbyist with a fancy suit...you don't need one. You have me." "You can buy a whole lot of blue smoke for two billion dollars...but eventually that smoke is going to clear." The A-Z thing. The crowd spontaneously chanting "four more years."
I've heard Senator Stabenow speak a few times and I like her "race to the bottom" message. It is a simple and compelling argument, and it makes for great quotes and soundbites. Still, I don't envy anyone that has to follow Granholm on stage.
Kwame introduced UM Dems own Aghogho Edevbie, who introduced the Governor. I was totally caught off guard, but I was thrilled to see a fellow College Dems member up there! I really identified with his message about Michigan being a great place to live.
Speaking of the College Dems, it was fantastic to see so many high schoolers and college students out in force at the Convention. One of the things that Kos and Armstrong touch on in Crashing the Gate is how vital it is to make sure that the next generation of Democratic activists stay involved in the party so we continue to remain strong. I definitely saw that going on today.

Bloggers, Michlibbers, and Others

I know I am forgetting some people here. Apologies in advance.

The coolest part of the convention was undoubtedly meeting the other blogger's (and Michlib regulars) that I've been reading and interacting with over the past few months. In a lot of ways it was very surreal, but the cool factor far outweighed that. Shout outs for particular people that I appreciated meeting or running into (again, not a complete list, and in no particular order):

djytd. He was kind enough to let me borrow his computer.
Jordan, the blogger from the Skinner campaign. Of everyone that I met today, I was the most surprised and impressed by Jordan. From reading his posts online, I totally thought he was thirty or something. It turns out that he's actually a junior in high school. This kid is a rising star and worth keeping an eye on. I'm excited about the day that he'll start his own blog! Also, Nancy Skinner gave him props at the Blogger's Caucus, which must have been cool for him.
Jon Koller. Given that we both go to UM, I was surprised that I hadn't ran into him yet -- I was missing out. I'd actually been reading his old blog before I ever discovered Michigan Liberal, and so today it was neat to get his perspective on how the Michigan blogosphere is evolving.
LiberalLucy. I met her before at the get-together in Lansing. She's the kind of person that its easy to feel comfortable around very quickly -- its a great quality to have.
David Boyle. I always love reading David's stuff because no matter what, I know I'm going to have some kind of reaction to it. I'm always curious about what he's going to say next. In person, David is very relaxed and pretty funny.
Wizardkitten. I ran into her real early in the morning, so I first got used to meeting someone in person after already talking to them online with her. Next to Michlib I probably read her the most, so it was great to see that she was able to make it down.
Nazgul. He's another one that I've been reading for a while (and doesn't live too far away from me in Saginaw), so it was great to finally meet him. Republicans, watch out for this one!
Hy D. From his posts and comments at the convention, you can tell that he's been watching politics for a while. He's a fellow UM guy, which is always a plus!
Ron Suarez. He's the guy who knows a lot about RSS and some of the other technical aspects of blogging, and is also from Ann Arbor. I sat next to him at the now infamous "Blogger's Row." I've heard a lot of things from the opponents of Progressives of Washtenaw, so it was interesting to hear from a POW and future City Council member!
Cordelia Lear. What a lifesaver. She put together a fantastic guide to convention logistics for us first-timers, which I kept in my pocket through the day.
Christine Barry. Her blog is another one of my favorites. One of her blog posts posts (linked from lpackard's "Build the Michigan Blogosphere" posts on Michlib) was helpful in getting me started. Also, she kept my Congressional District Caucus entertaining!
lpackard and matt. Its clear that they work really hard to grow the Michigan blogosphere, and they have had a tremendous impact. I met them for the first time at a debate between Mark Brewer and Saul Anuzis, and it was talking with them that inspired me to finally make a concerted effort to have my own blog. Once I made the decision, I went to Michlib for the resources to do it. After I started posting, I went to Michlib to share my opinions, publicize my site, and get feedback. If nothing else, I'm glad to be a part of the blogosphere just to be a more informed participant of the democratic process, and I wouldn't have made a serious effort at it without them and the site.
I think that covers it in terms of bloggers. I'd also like to shout out Clint and John from the Granholm campaign (who show the bloggers a lot of love and run a great blog of their own), the Granholm campaign volunteer coordinator Mike Griffith, and everyone else from Team Granholm!
Also, shout out to everyone in the UM Dems.

Coverage Around the Internet

In case you're interested, I've put together some links with coverage of the convention from our fellow MI bloggers. This is an incomplete collection of what information is "out there." I'm sure a video of the Governor's speech will end up on YouTube, other people have audio that they recorded, and I know that Julielyn and some others have pics that aren't yet on the Internet.

My favorite post is probably from new blogger Laura Fisher, who has a step-by-step breakdown of the Blogger's Caucus at her blog a later date. She does a great job of capturing the mood of the room and how the focus of the Caucus evolved over time.

We've got some other bloggers commenting on the convention as well. Jordan's got some stuff up at Skinner's blog. Nazgul's got some good stuff too. Let me know if I missed anything -- I'm sure we'll be seeing more tomorrow.

Pics! Christine Barry has some great pictures from the convention online. Skinner's picture doesn't really do her justice -- she was very animated but it was in tune with the mood of the room that she was working up. David Boyle has pics of Granholm at the Blogger's Caucus over at arblogger.com (why can't I think of a clever name for a blog like that!?!?!?). WK's got her own pics and commentary as well.

The Granholm Campaign has a transcript up of her convention speech. She was incredible, but the transcript doesn't do her justice. Trust me, wait for video. My sympathies go out to anyone who has to follow her on any stage.

Finally, Matt and some of the others (like Jordan from the Skinner campaign) were blogging live during the speeches. Here are the threads:

"See Dick Run" video from the convention.
Debbie Stabenow speech thread.
Carl Levin speech thread.
Jennifer Granholm speech thread.
Live from "Blogger's Row" thread.

Hopefully we see some exciting stuff tomorrow so we can do a part two! I know Jordan from the Skinner campaign, David Wishinsky, and others are planning on showing up.

Kos coming to Ann Arbor

2006-08-24T17:46:00.000-04:00

Via Daily Kos:

I'll be heading out on a short campus tour in September to promote the paperback:

University of Michigan
Ann Arbor, MI
September 29

I go to U of M, so this is perfect for me! I've been meaning to grab a copy of Crashing the Gate anyway.

HD94: Bob Blaine and Ken Horn Talk Trash... Literally.

2006-08-24T13:56:00.000-04:00

Michigan has been vulnerable to Canadian and out-of-state trash for two reasons: we have a lot of landfills and it is very cheap to dump here. Unfortunately, the influx of garbage because of these two factors has a significant impact on our environment and the quality of life in our state. Nobody wants to live or work around a landfill, which makes Michigan a much less attractive place to call home and locate businesses in.

Due to the incentives for dumping in Michigan, over 400 Canadian garbage trucks come to our state every day. According to Clean Water Action Michigan, over one third of all of the trash dumped in Michigan comes from out-of-of state sources. Furthermore, Michigan actually subsidized a large increase in the amount of space for landfills, which has made these problems worse.

Ken Horn (R) and Bob Blaine (D), candidates for the 94th District seat in the MI House of Representatives, clashed for the second time since the primary over the Canadian / out-of-state trash issue on Tuesday. From today's Saginaw News article ("Horn attacks Blaine over import trash fees"):

Horn criticized Blaine, who lives in Swan Creek Township, for advocating a $7.50-a-ton surcharge on trash to clamp down on out-of-state trash flowing into Michigan. The state charges 21 cents a ton today.

"I don't think taxing us out of problems is going to be the answer," Horn said. He said the proposal amounts to a $200 million tax increase a year on Michiganians.

"The powerful waste industry has a good friend, and his name is Ken Horn," responded Blaine, who like Horn is a veteran member of the County Board of Commissioners.

"Ken Horn is trying to keep the Canadian and out-of-state dumpers' free ride going. The only way to stop Canadian trash is to attack the economics of the trash trade. Horn and the trash industry know why trash comes to Michigan, and that is because it is cheap." (emphasis added)

Blaine takes a sensible approach to this issue. By removing one of the incentives to dump here, we decrease the demand for Michigan landfills. Given that it costs $7.25 per ton in Pennsylvania and $3 per ton in Wisconsin, our 21 cent surcharge is pretty low.

Despite all of their rhetoric about Canadian trash, the MI GOP has been completely ineffective on this issue. They appear to be unwilling to address the underlying causes of this problem. The most recent GOP trash "plan" would only stop Canadian trash if Congress gave Michigan the authority to do so (hasn't happened), and completely fails to address out-of-state trash (source). In addition, the House Republicans have done nothing to stop the increase in landfills in Michigan. Neither of these actions address the incentives for dumping in Michigan.

Based on Horn's previous statements, ("Candidates take aim at Canadian trash issue," August 18 Saginaw News) he implies that he would fall in line with his party and not address the root causes of this issue. However, he does make a compelling point about trade agreements as they pertain to Canadian trash.

"We can't stop Canadian trash, but we can't pull in Canadian (prescription) drugs," Horn said. "There's something fundamentally wrong with the trade system that we have."

While we're on the subject of HD94 (my district), it is worth taking a look at this race. Bob Blaine is pro-life, pro-gun, and seems willing to work very hard to try and take this seat. From what I hear, he has a very impressive door-knocking operation and is serious about meeting and connecting with voters. The odds are against him -- my district has an over 50% Republican base and almost always leans very Republican, but he is the perfect kind of candidate to flip the district and turn out some extra voters for Granholm. If you're in the area, consider writing a letter to the editor to the Saginaw News on this issue or contact the Coordinated Campaign about volunteering.

Finally, no post is complete without some shameless self promotion!

Numbers!

2006-08-22T21:49:00.000-04:00

Survey USA released its job approval ratings for all 50 Governors. Jennifer Granholm has a 43% approval rating and a 53% disapproval rating, which is consistent with last month and very similar to the previous two months. It is tough to tell what the impact of the Granholm and DeVos ads have been.

In terms of our Senators, Carl Levin has 55% approval and 38% disapproval, and Stabenow has 51% approval and 42% disapproval (neither of which are surprising). More details about age group, race, ideology, education, etc. are available here.

In other news, the Michigan chapter of the Sierra Club released its "Environmental Scorecard" for Michigan Legislators. Any kind of "rating" system based on voting records needs to be taken with a grain of salt because an individual's advocacy for an issue can't just be measured by a series of yes or no votes. My State Representative Roger Kahn and State Senator Mike Goschka didn't do too well, which is not surprising.

SBT letter to the editor

2006-08-21T14:49:00.000-04:00

My good friend David's letter to the editor appeared in today's Lansing State Journal. Its short, hard-hitting, and on message!

I find it amazing that the Republican Legislature has rid ourselves of the Single Business Tax in such an irresponsible manner, and I think voters should take note.

While everyone loves a tax cut, we all use services provided by taxes on a daily basis, whether they be roads, schools or the clean water coming out of our taps. The Legislature has decided to slash nearly a quarter of a budget and expects us to believe these services will all remain unhindered.

Ironically, if we are to make up the shortfall, it is now up to Republicans to raise other taxes to balance the budget.

I feel bad for Gov. Jennifer Granholm who worked so hard to pare the state's budget, only to have another Republican-created fiscal mess on her hands.

David A. Wishinsky

Farmington Hills

More Youtube Fun

2006-08-20T03:48:00.000-04:00

I now have my own racial slur, whoo!

Old news, but still hilarious.

Bill Clinton & Jennifer Granholm

2006-08-19T16:47:00.000-04:00

Bill Clinton shares his thoughts on Governor Granholm, MI-Gov, and Granholm's economic plan.

Snakes on a Plane

2006-08-19T00:37:00.000-04:00

I saw Snakes on a Plane tonight.

Best. Movie. Ever.

New Stabenow Commercial

2006-08-17T11:41:00.000-04:00

I heard that the Stabenow campaign put up its first commerical on TV today -- you can watch it at http://www.stabenowforsenate.com

My plugins are kinda screwy, so I'm waiting for it to show up on YouTube.

Amway Exposed, Part Four: Amway and Free Speech

2006-08-15T03:53:00.000-04:00

The right to free speech is one of our society's most basic values, and one of the many reasons why I'm proud to call myself an American. When groups or individuals act to keep people from speaking their mind, they undermine one of the fundamental values that we all hold dear.

So what does this have to do with Amway?

A Michlib diarist recently explained that Alticor lawyers used ethically questionable legal tactics in an attempt to bully a critic about the way that he discussed a recent lawsuit.

Regrettably, this is not the first time that Amway/Quixtar/Alticor has used these heavy-handed tactics to silence critics. Amway has a long history harassing its critics and taking other extreme measures to keep negative information about themselves from reaching the public.

Let's take a look at a few examples:

Free Speech and Internet Criticism

Amway politely requested that a website owner remove negative information about Amway from his site. When this website operator refused to change anything on his website, they came back and threatened him with trademark infringement. These threats had no basis, and appeared to be aimed scaring the website owner into taking down his website (so that this negative information about Amway would no longer be available to the general public). This happened under Dick DeVos' watch at Amway.
Another website owner critical of Amway was served an illogical subpoena by Amway to determine whether he had a relationship to Proctor and Gamble, who Amway was engaged in a legal battle with. In a similar case, a District Court judge ruled that Amway's search of a critic's hard drive was a "burden" and "irrelevant" to Amway vs. Proctor and Gamble.

The site operator was forced to choose between giving over his hard drive or paying over an estimated $3,000 in legal fees. In the end, he felt that it was easiest to just give his hard drive to Amway. It turned out that there was no link between the website owner and Proctor and Gamble, contrary to what Amway accused. This ordeal, which lasted over two years, is detailed in full here. It seemed to be little more than Amway's attempt to harass one of its online critics, and happened under Dick DeVos' watch at Amway.
Amway openly slandered another online critic on its website.
MLMSurvivor.com explains how, in the face of increasing criticism on the internet, Amway changed its policies to allow its distributors to talk about Amway on their own web pages. The rules about what could be discussed on these pages were strict, and their aim was to drown out the negative information regarding Amway available on the 'net. It also details how Amway attempted to secure information off of the hard drive of another critic to look for possible causes of action against that critic. In other words, they wanted the critic's hard drive so that they could punish him for speaking out about Amway. This happened under Dick DeVos' watch at Amway.
As mentioned previously, Amway used unfair arbitration agreements to unfairly silence their critics. This happened under Dick DeVos' watch at Amway.
An overzealous Amway Diamond made a death threat to a potential critic. While Amway didn't do this itself, it is astounding that they created an environment that could lead to this kind of behavior.

"Google Bombing"

This is related to suppression of Internet criticism in particular. Amway made a concerted effort to push websites critical of Amway very low on the Google PageRank, so that they would show up much later in search results.

From USC Annenberg's Online Journalism Review, "Companies subvert search results to squelch criticism":

To put it simply, Quixtar enlisted various people to help create dozens of Weblogs that linked to each other and were filled with positive stories and key words. The idea is to help put these newer blogs at the top of search results for phrases such as "Quixtar success" and "Quixtar opportunity," while more critical sites such as Quixtar Blog and Amquix.info would drop down.

From Juicee News Daily, "What Is Google Bombing?":

Amway Quixtar leaders told members that the company had "hired geekoids who were spending their time Google bombing positive info about Quixtar so that the negative sites would be buried way down at the bottom of the Google list when a prospect types in Quixtar [in a search engine]. Nobody will even be able to find the negative sites anymore."

Other coverups

A former Amway distributor tells us about how Amway refused to put a warning label on its dangerous Amway metal cleaner product. Amway's representatives attempted to bully the victim into not going forward with his case and refused to put appropriations warning labels on their products. This happened under Dick DeVos' watch at Amway.
Amway acted to prohibit its distributors from selling their old motivational tapes. Interestingly, Amway did this despite the fact that they neither manufacture nor endorse these tapes. Given that the tapes are an essential aspect of the Amway system and have cheated Amway's distributors out of millions of dollars, it is no surprise that Amway would want to prevent their circulation. It is unfortunate that Amway distributors were deprived of their right to sell their own property in the process. This happened under Dick DeVos' watch at Amway.

Finally, you may be interested in an article on MLMsurvivor.com entitled "Amway's Vendetta Against Critics." It has a great summary of some of the things that Amway has done to keep negative information about themselves from getting out to the public. Here's an excerpt:

Has it never occurred to Amway that there is a reason, found in its own behavior and business conduct, which opens the door for all the criticism? Even a cursory examination of the lawsuits, past and present, filed by distributors against Amway and their upline shows an obvious pattern of impropriety, deception, outright fraud or illegalities perpetrated by "big pin" distributors and ignored by Amway Corp.

(snip)

Neither would Amway's critics -- myself included -- have any reason to maintain these sites if Amway would clean up its own Augean stable and stop trying to blame us for being the messengers.

I agree. The only reason that anyone would engage in this kind of unethical behavior is if they had a history that they wanted to hide. Regardless of the legality or illegality of Amway's behavior, their actions say a lot about Dick DeVos' sense of ethics and his respect for free speech.

(cross-posted on Michigan Liberal... front paged!)

Skinner for Congress Needs Interns/Volunteers!

2006-08-09T21:54:00.000-04:00

I got this e-mail, and it looks like a great opportunity. Figured I would pass it along:

The Skinner for Congress team is looking for full-time and part-time
interns for the Finance, Political/Field and Communications
departments. Our preferred goal is to bring aboard ten (10) full-time
interns who will be asked to do more than just answer phones and stuff
envelopes (although you will do that too).

These interns will be assigned and trained in the respective
departments based on their availability of time and their interests.

Finance – (2) Working with the Finance Director to implement and
support all aspects of our finance plan including Internet, Events,
Direct Donor and Mail. The positions are a great way to learn the
fast paced management of finances which are skills good for any other
profession.

Communications – (2) Working directly with the Campaign Manager in the
areas of mainstream media as well as internet and blog communication
and outreach. These interns must posses strong writing skills and
working knowledge of surfing internet news and blog websites. They
must also demonstrate an ability to monitor ongoing and breaking news
and bring those to the campaign manager with ideas of how to use them
to advance the campaign.

Political/Field – (6) These interns will work directly with the
Campaign Manager and the Field Director in an aggressive political
leadership outreach program. These individuals will be trained and
assigned to a specific role within the department and will be required
to engage in public events and activities of a political and community
nature on behalf of the campaign.

Any an all interested candidates should email Daren Berringer at
daren@joetrippi.com

DeVos Ducks Mercury Contamination Position

2006-08-05T14:51:00.000-04:00

From the AP:

Republican Dick DeVos, who accuses the DEQ of over-regulating business, has not said if he will retain the 90 percent standard if he unseats Granholm in November. He probably won't take a position until after the election, spokesman John Truscott says. (emphasis added)

We all know what his stance on mercury contamination really is. It is unfortunate that he won't come out and say it, and that nobody is calling him out on it. What kind of campaign refuses to talk about their candidate's position on the issues?

I think that action on mercury contamination is long overdue, anyway. The fact that so many lobbyists have been rushing to tell us that mercury contamination is not a problem has worried me even further (reminds me of the global warming "debate"). The day that I read an opinion piece in the Saginaw News from a lobbying group in DC affirming that mercury contamination in fish is not significant became the day I stopped eating tuna sandwiches.

(cross-posted on Michlib... front paged!)

Amway Exposed, Part Three: Dick DeVos Doesn't Believe in Workers' Rights

2006-08-04T03:58:00.000-04:00

Dick DeVos not only allowed the exploitation of Amway/Quixtar IBOs during his tenure with Amway and Alticor, but he also used unfair arbitration agreements to silence unhappy distributors and prevent them from seeking justice. The Business Support Materials Arbitration Agreement, or BSMAA, forced unhappy distributors into arbitration sessions administered by hand-picked, Amway-trained mediators instead of allowing them to go to court. In other words, Amway distributors were forced to sign their rights away if they wanted to participate in the system.

Since 1998 (while Dick DeVos was the President of Amway), Amway told its distributors that they had to sign the BSMAA if they wanted to keep their downlines. Remember those tools we were talking about? By signing the agreement, distributors waived their right to take complaints about the tools business to court and instead agreed to arbitrate disputes through the "Amway Arbitration Rules". From the text of the agreement:

Binding arbitration. At least 90 days after the notice referred to in the paragraph above is received, or after the conclusion of the Amway conciliation process, whichever is later, any remaining controversy or claim, including any claim a party to this Agreement may make against any publisher, author, speaker, distributor, manufacturer, seller, reseller or marketer of Business Support Materials, or against Amway Corporation or any of its officers, directors, agents or employees, shall be settled by binding arbitration in accordance with the Amway Arbitration Rules contained in the Rules of Conduct for Amway Distributors (emphasis added)

I HAVE CAREFULLY READ AND UNDERSTAND THE BUSINESS SUPPORT MATERIALS ARBITRATION AGREEMENT, AND IN EXCHANGE FOR THE RIGHT AS AN INDEPENDENT AMWAY DISTRIBUTOR TO BUY, SELL, DISTRIBUTE, RECEIVE, AND USE BUSINESS SUPPORT MATERIALS, AGREE TO ABIDE AND BE BOUND BY THE TERMS SET FORTH HEREIN AND TO ARBITRATE ANY DISPUTES UNDER THE AMWAY ARBITRATION RULES. (emphasis added)

Given all of the problems with the "tools" aspect of the Amway business model, it is unsettling that Amway newcomers would be required to sign these agreements. It seems even more unfair that already existing Amway distributors could either sign their rights away with this agreement, or give up years of hard work developing their downlines. However, after examining another portion of the agreement, it becomes more apparent why these agreements were required:

Confidentiality. Once a notice of claim has been sent, the dispute resolution process, including conciliation and any binding arbitration, shall remain confidential. No party to the claim shall disclose to any person not directly involved in the conciliation or arbitration process (a) the substance of, or basis for, the claim; (b) the content of the testimony or other evidence presented at an arbitration hearing or obtained through discovery; or (c) the terms or amount of any arbitration award.

Much like the DeVos campaign's recent endeavors, it appears that Amway just couldn't stomach all of the negative press that they were getting about the hidden tools business. Although Amway touted the agreement as a superior way of resolving disputes, in reality their BSMAA seems aimed to avoid the negative attention and costs that came from frequent lawsuits over the Amway tools. As amquix.info notes, if their arbitration system were truly the most effective way to resolve disputes, they would give their distributors a choice about whether they wanted to use it or not.

Shockingly, Amway's supposedly neutral "arbitrators" aren't even actually neutral. Amway contracted out to an alternative dispute resolution company called JAMS to handle its arbitration. These arbitrators were required to attend an "Amway Cultural Training" before dealing with any conflicts. On top of that, Amway reserved the right to decide whether the arbitrators got to keep their jobs or not. Its no surprise that most cases were resolved in favor of Amway. As LawBlawg notes:

What kind of company would do business this way? Seriously. They include an arbitration provision that requires absolute secrecy and confidentiality to protect a business (tools) they claim NOT to be in and claim NOT to be endorsing. The arbitration is rigged because the company's rules allow the people who run the tools businesses to choose the arbitrators and meet in secret with them for "training." And then they pass the BSMAA off as something they've done to "help" their distributors. What are they hiding?

Thankfully, the BSMAA was eventually seen for what it really is. In an antitrust case brought against Amway by "tools" manufacturers outside of the kingpins, here is what U.S. District Judge Richard Dorr said about the BSMAA:

Although this court has found that none of the Plaintiffs have submitted to arbitration, the court also finds that, in the alternative, arbitration with pre-selected JAMS arbitrators as presently set up by Defendants is unconscionable.

While there can be basic education of arbitrators regarding specialized subject matter, there is a point where basic education can be extended to subtle manipulation on issues which could be expected to be considered by the arbitrators. This limit has been passed by AmwayÂs preparation of the arbitrators at JAMS. While JAMS may be a respected organization, the Defendants have called the neutrality of this particular arbitration arrangement into question. Also telling is the fact that Defendants have never lost in arbitration, with the exception of a few counterclaims. (for more information, see a September 20, 2005 article entitled "Judge declines to dismiss Amway case" in the Kansas City Star)

It is possible that Dick DeVos was so oblivious to the inner workings of his company that he didn't realize that this was going on. More likely, he knew about this immoral agreement and allowed the exploitation of Amway distributors to occur anyway.

Mark my words: If elected governor, Dick DeVos will work as hard as he possibly can to destroy measures that protect employees in Michigan. Through these arbitration agreements, DeVos has shown that his own image and his company's profits are more important to him than the welfare of the countless distributors under the Amway/Quixtar system.

(cross-posted on Michlib... front paged!)

Wikipedia/traffic update, Granholm poll

2006-08-03T21:53:00.000-04:00

READ THIS FIRST: Newer Granholm polling data and analysis is available here. Please disregard this old post.

Anyone been following the Colbert/Wikipedia war? Its pretty hilarious.

Amusingly, it appears that my post on Dick DeVos' campaign editing DeVos' Wikipedia page has ended up as a link on Dick DeVos' Wikipedia page itself.

That, combined with cross-posts on Michlib, Google searches for Dick DeVos-related topics, Google searches for Amway and other MLM-related stuff, Google searches for both of these topics together, this post (where there are apparently a lot of lurkers), and Blogger searches for all of the above have lead to a drastic increase in traffic.

It isn't Michlib's 1000, but I'm happy with my 22 visitors/day (according to Sitemeter).

Plus, mad props to Psychology of Compliance & Due Diligence Law for helping to expose the truth about Amway (and linking to me).

In unrelated news, Rasmussen shows Dick DeVos having a 6 percent lead over Governor Jennifer Granholm.

Additionally, efforts by the DeVos campaign to build awareness of the candidate have apparently been paying off: DeVos is pulling support from 86% of GOP voters and 16% of Democrats. Granholm can claim 78% support from Democrats and only 8% crossover appeal among Republican voters.

I trust their methodology more than other polls because they match responses with demographic data for a better measure of how the vote on election day would actually end up.

When looking at these numbers, we need to keep in mind that DeVos has already defined himself and to an extent, already defined Granholm to voters. On the other hand, the Granholm camp really has yet to define themselves and DeVos to the general public. It will be tough to tell how this race is going to turn out until we have a chance to see how both of their messages will resonate with the public.

Replacing the SBT

2006-08-02T19:44:00.000-04:00

Oakland County executive L. Brooks Patterson was successful in his drive to put the issue on the ballot. This means Michiganders will be able to vote to eliminate this often derided tax. Furthermore should the Republican-dominated legislature opt to vote in advance on its elimination, it will be eliminated by the end of 2007 (currently it is set to expire by the end of 2009) and there is nothing that Governor Jennifer Granholm and her veto pen can do about it. No one in Michigan likes the SBT, Governor Granholm included. But, it is important to remember it is a major source of state revenue and as such it would be inappropriate to eliminate it without having the funding put in place from an alternate source. Furthermore a key part of this debate is this, Michigan's business climate is far from as dire as Dick DeVos or Republicans in Lansing like to proport it to be.

Naturally many things go into the decision of where to locate your business. Convienience, availability of resources (both human or natural), and so on. This is why agriculture is a big deal in Nebraska and not Alaska or why major investment firms are located on Wall Street and not in Winter Haven. Republicans though would have you believe that the only concern is taxation. Yet does this seem to match the facts? Let's see...

The worst five states to do business in are: New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Ohio and Vermont (in that order). Yet, if we look at the state gross state product we see that these states don't seem to be hurting for economic activity as New York (#2), New Jersey (#8) and Ohio (#7) are all doing relatively well. While Rhode Island and Vermont are 44 and 50 respectively they also are far smaller than their counterparts and in per capita rank a much better 22 and 36 respectively.

So we should see that the best five states are doing wonderfully shouldn't we? But Wyoming, South Dakota, Alaska, Florida and Nevada are a mixed bag. Wyoming (#48), South Dakota (#46), Alaska (#45) and Nevada (#31) are not impressive. Yet the four states other than Florida do all perform admirably in per capita, they are tiny states for the most part.

What this goes to show is it is more than just a tax climate that encourages investment. Otherwise we would see far more Fortune 500 companies in Wyoming (zero) or South Dakota (zero) than we do in New York (54) or New Jersey (21). Despite these hard facts, the bluster still exists that Michigan's business climate is so horrid that we are stuck in (those infamous three words) a "single state recession".

In an article in the Wall Street Journal from Dec. 12, 2005 they declared: "the current U.S. expansion has lifted the fortunes of nearly every state in the country, with the notable exception of Michigan, which is busy reclaiming its 1970s's title as home of the rust belt. Sad to say, politicians in both parties are only making things worse." The line I took away from this piece though (which also was critical of Governor Granholm, though I disagreed with their assessment) is this: "but if you think the Republicans in Washington have bumbled things, take a look at the muddle in Michigan." The problem is that Republicans want to rid themselves of the SBT thinking it will be some cure-all for Michigan's economic woes. Republicans are clear in their distaste for the SBT:

Dick DeVos: "In order to turn the economy around we need to send a clear message that we are willing to work with job providers not penalize them with a job-killing tax... In a DeVos administration, we will not shift the burden to individual taxpayers, instead, we will make the decisions necessary to reduce wasteful spending and give businesses the tools they need to grow and expand so our residents can get back to work," source . Thank you Dick for your specific plans on replacement.

Leon Drolet (R - Clinton Twp): "The SBT is a known job-killer with a trail of company corpses,” Drolet said. “I have listened to hundreds of witnesses around the state and their testimony is consistent – the SBT has left a wake of economic tragedy. We, the representatives of the people of the state of Michigan find the SBT tax guilty of being the worst tax in the nation and sentence it to death on Sept. 30, 2007... Too many of our best and brightest are leaving Michigan for jobs and opportunities in other states. By eliminating the SBT, and creating one of the best business climates in America, we will attract the entrepreneurs and investment we need to create thousands of new jobs for Michigan workers," source . Again we see a vast amount of specifics on replacement.

Yet when it comes to replacement their pronouncements enter the realm of ambiguity:

Dick DeVos as reported in the Detroit News: "GOP gubernatorial candidate Dick DeVos supports the SBT repeal, but has not offered many details on what a replacement tax should look like and how much it should raise."

Craig DeRoche (R - Novi) again from the Detroit News: " "We want to send a message to businesses that we are serious about this," DeRoche said. DeRoche said replacing the SBT revenue is a complex process and that lawmakers will be thorough in their review."

I appreciate the complexity with replacing a tax , yet I have only heard one solution to replacing the SBT that makes any sense at all. One that has a clear message (we want to remove the tax), one that has a clear concept of budgeting (need to provide alternate funding) and one that Michigan voters should find sensible after John Engler's decade of overspending: Governor Jennifer Granholm's opinion on the SBT is the correct one (also care of the Detroit News): "The governor believes lawmakers should not vote to eliminate the SBT unless they also guarantee that individual taxpayers won't end up footing the bill in higher taxes and devastating cuts to health care, education and public safety," Granholm spokeswoman Liz Boyd said."

What a novel idea, cutting or eliminating taxes after accounting for potential budget problems. I wish President Reagan understood that. I hope Michigan Republicans do too before we have another fiscal mess on our hands. The Republican philosophy of the past has been as follows: making tax cuts forces us into making cost-cutting moves. It doesn't work that way, we need to make decisions regarding our budgets first and then find funding or seeing how much taxation we can eliminate. Regardless, cutting taxes isn't everything. Balancing budgets though is essential to any government and Michigan is no different.

Friends don't ask friends to sell Amway

2006-08-01T11:20:00.000-04:00

I normally don't just refer to an article without talking abuout it, but this was just too good to pass up...

From statesman.com, via Daily Kos:

The voice was familiar. "Hi, Mary Gordon, this is Barbara. Call me back."

Although she hadn't left a last name in her phone message, I recognized which Barbara it was immediately.

Barbara, my college roommate.

At first, I didn't wonder why she had called and assumed that she just wanted to touch base. But after playing phone tag for a few days, I had narrowed down her reasons for calling: 1. Barbara was coming to town and wanted to get together; 2. Barbara wanted me to speak at her district's back-to-school convocation.

I was delighted with either prospect, especially with the one of making money.

I was sitting in my car when my cell phone rang. I heard that familiar, sweet voice. "Oh, Barbara," I said, "I'm so glad we've finally connected!"

"Me, too," she replied.

"What's up?" I inquired, just waiting to hear those words, "I'm coming to see you," or "You're hired!"

(SECTION I: Part A) "Since December," Barbara began, "I've had a home-based business, and I'm pleased to tell you that it's going really well."

"That's great!" I replied. "I'm pleased for you. Are you still a principal?"

"Oh, yes," Barbara answered. (SECTION I: Part B) "But this home-based business is amazing."

(SECTION II: Part A) "I'm supposed to contact creative and outgoing people about my business, and I know you fall into those categories!" Barbara continued.

She was right. After all, I was Miss Friendly of Brownwood High School. I was pleased that Barbara had described me in such positive terms.

(SECTION III: Part A) "What I'd like to do," she continued, "is to send you something about my business to review and then call you to discuss it."

"Barbara, do you want me to review your business plan?" And then it dawned on me. "Or are you trying to sell me something?"

Barbara laughed that girlish, nervous laugh that I remembered from college.

"Barbara," I asked. "Are you selling Amway?"

(SECTION III: Part B) "Absolutely not. I am, however, working with some amazing products. In fact, my (grown) daughters are so impressed that they are involved." (Back to SECTION II: Part A) "I was thinking," Barbara continued, "that you and your daughter would want to be a part of this wonderful business, too."

"Barbara," I replied, trying to mask my irritation. "I can't tell you how not interested I am in being a part of this. In fact," I continued sweetly, "I can't think of anything that I'm less interested in than selling products or being a part of this business. I'm happy, however, that you and your daughters are so happy."

(SECTION IV: Part A) "You know, I felt the same way when I was first introduced to this business." Barbara's speech had become more mechanical. "But it didn't take me long to see how amazing the products are. And . . ."

I cut her off in mid sentence. "I'm not interested, Barbara."

(SECTION IV: Part B) "Well, maybe I'll go ahead and send you the materials, and you can pass them on to your friends who would like to make some extra money." Barbara delivered this without hesitation.

"Barbara," I replied as nicely as I could, considering the temperature in my parked car was 110 degrees, and I was boiling inside, "I'm not interested."

Surely, Barbara had gotten the message by now.

So, I changed the subject and inquired about her family and her life. And then I ended our conversation.

"It sure was good to talk to you, Barbara," I said. "But I've gotta go now."

"Bye, MG," Barbara replied sweetly. (SECTION V: Final Part) "Now, don't forget to keep this wonderful business in mind as you see your friends. And I'm sure your daughter would love to do this."

Just to make certain that I hadn't shortchanged my daughter — the one who works about 60 hours a week, volunteers at Children's Hospital, freelances as a writer and does good deeds for her family and friends — I called her when I got home.

"Hey, Darling," I said. "I want to tell you about a little home business that my college roommate thinks you might be interested in."

"Is it Amway?" My daughter doesn't miss a beat.

"Absolutely not. Barbara is working with some products that are amazing," I said, trying to sound serious.

"What section is that from, Mom?"

Democratic Activists: Why I Believe in Jennifer Granholm

2006-08-01T03:23:00.000-04:00

Many progressive activists, including myself, have been talking about Dick DeVos' significant flaws and the horrors of Amway's business model at great length. This is important -- the average Michigan voter is subjected to a barrage of one-sided portrayals of Dick DeVos, which we can help to rectify through grassroots, netroots, and other people-powered efforts that engage voters in a more direct dialogue.

However, we must not give into the temptation of merely trashing DeVos without talking about what we stand for and our unique vision for the future of Michigan. In this light, I want to explain why I find fulfillment in doing everything I can to re-elect our Governor. In doing so, I hope that you will consider donating your free time to both the Governor's re-election effort and equally important efforts to take back the state legislatures.

A good candidate is much more than someone who happens to have the "right" yes or no answers to a variety of policy questions. I believe passionately that Jennifer Granholm is the right choice for Michigan not just because I agree with the vast majority of her policies, but because I see in her the qualities that every elected official ought to have.

Ultimately, Governor Granholm shows a kind of empathy for her fellow citizens that I have rarely seen in my other elected representatives. So many people in positions of power seem to become so wrapped up in their own worlds that they lose touch with the realities that most people face every day. People don't care about political campaigns, attack ads, squabbles between Democrats and Republicans, or the latest polls. They care about whether they can pay for their home heating bills and car insurance. They wonder about whether they have enough money to pay for gas to make it to work and back. They grapple with the difficult choice between paying for food or much-needed medicine. People wonder about whether they'll be able to put their kids through college so that they can find rewarding jobs and grow up to raise their own families.

Governor Granholm has a proven record of being responsive to these issues. When watching her speak with people, I can't help but feel that she understands exactly where they are coming from because she's been there too. For example, I'm a college student. Even though going to college is a fantastic investment, I know firsthand how overwhelming tuition really is. I have faith that Governor Granholm has been working to deal with the the rising cost of tuition because she knows college is really expensive too -- she used student loans to put herself through college, and understands their tremendous value. Try asking Amway Guy about that!

Granholm has shown us that its not just presidents and dignitaries who deserve our respect and appreciation, but ordinary Michiganders too. She has shown us that it is possible for anyone to change society, one youth at a time if their heart is truly in it. Jennifer Granholm has shown us that one person with enough enthusiasm and determination can overcome overwhelming odds to become the Governor of Michigan.

It takes a truly exceptional Democrat to overcome the challenges of working with a Republican State Legislature, Republican state courts, Republican Congress, Republican Secretary of State and Attorney General, Republican Supreme Court, and a Republican President. Governor Granholm has overcome these significant obstacles to extend affordable prescription drug coverage, increase access to higher education, and prevent large-scale water diversions from our Great Lakes.

With all of this in mind, I understand that nobody agrees on every single issue. For example, as an avid video game player, I feel that my fellow gamers and I have been neglected equally by both sides of aisle. However, I refuse to let a single issue control me to the extent that I base all of my decisions on that one issue. We must not allow differences of opinion on individual issues to obscure our commitment to Democratic principles. We all believe in a society that provides an equal opportunity for every child, woman, and man to succeed. We all believe that by looking out for each other and making Michigan a better place to live for everyone, we can improve everyone's lives as individuals.

We are fighting for nothing less than the survival of these values and the future of our state. Despite a failing economy (not her fault) and an obstructionist State Legislature, Jennifer Granholm has stood proudly by her principles to provide a future for Michigan. Governor Granholm has worked to create a setting that will bring the best technology jobs from across the world to our state. She has worked to make us the pioneers in the adoption of alternative energy in spite of all of the challenges from Republicans. However, these changes take time, and cannot be evaluated in such a short period of time. In order to keep our state on the right track, we must win this election.

Its going to be a tough race, and we are looking at the most volatile electorate that we have seen in years. This is why it is more important than ever to go door-to-door and campaign for Michigan Democrats like Jennifer Granholm. We are in a unique position to deliver localized messages to our friends and neighbors in our communities, and we need to be the infrastructure that delivers for our values. This means not only taking a stand against DeVos, but taking a stand for Granholm.

This post was prompted by a discussion with my buddy Chris. Happy birthday bro!

(cross posted on Michigan Liberal... front paged!)

Also, thanks to Zack Pohl for the plug.

My new favorite website

2006-07-29T13:53:00.000-04:00

I think I've got a new favorite website. Its called The Disembodied Head of Dick DeVos, and its pretty much the funniest thing I've seen all week. It refers to Michlib as the "Michigan Branch of the Communist Party of America" and features images like this:

The blogger sarcastically plays the "character" of former Amway head Dick DeVos. It is clear that a lot of thought, detail, and creativity went into making this. From hovering the mouse pointer over the blogroll, their comments on some of my favorite MI blogs:

christinebarry.com - Communist from Shiawassee County, Michigan
Devos is a Dick - Devos HAS a dick, girly man
Michigan Liberal - I think I just threw up in my mouth
Pohlitics - Sticking your name in the blog title?? LAMER!!
Voice of Mordor - You know who got a raw deal? Saruman, that's who
Who Got The Gravy? - No idea - I ordered the lobster!
Wizard Kitten - L is for LIBERAL!!

The website also put me on to an amusing video on Youtube mocking Dick DeVos' ties to Amway. Reminds me of those Flash movies that kids make on Newgrounds, except a lot scarier.

Also, I got a chance to meet matt, lpackard, and LiberalLucy from Michlib a few days ago. They were pretty cool.

Not-So-Safe Republican

2006-07-28T18:48:00.000-04:00

By David: The New York Times generally has little good to say about the people of Michigan. Sitting high a top their "East-Coast" bias tower they view us flyover staters and interesting every four years when we decide who becomes President. The Times has a fascinating Election Guide 2006 on their website, but they obviously do not delve greatly into the races here in Michigan. For example my congressional district, the "Fighting 9th" is listed as "Safe Republican". Finally, this year it seems this is not the case. Despite the fact that the 9th voted for Bush twice, despite the fact that Republican tax cuts favor a district with a median income of $65,358 our district is changing. The issue of abortion is altering our viewpoints of Congressman Knollenberg and it is about time.

What may have once seemed safe is now under assault. Congressman Knollenberg doesn't have to just contend with Nancy Skinner in the November 7th election, but also with a primary opponent who is gaining steam, Pan Godcheaux. The Detroit News highlights the differences between Knollenberg and Godcheaux as such:

She's for abortion rights, opposes the war in Iraq, is a strong environmentalist and, as a former teacher, education is her staple issue. Knollenberg opposes abortion, supports the war, takes pride in his many votes to cut taxes and scores high on the national pro-business agenda.

Godcheaux likely won't win, but her presence really does bring up the issue. Is Knollenberg more conservative than the district? I think the answer is a clear yes. But more so than that, Knollenberg has stopped representing Michigan's 9th and only represents the Republican Party. In the same Detroit News article this following question was posed (and following is Knollenberg's response):

Detroit News: What do you think the federal government ought to do to help the struggling domestic auto industry?

Knollenberg : The federal government needs to improve the overall regulatory environment for manufacturers, reduce the cost of health care by cracking down on frivolous lawsuits, and promote alternative fuel technology like E85. We also need to ensure that the Japanese automakers are not gaining a competitive advantage by manipulating their currency rates. Finally, we need to get serious about enforcing intellectual property rights and cracking down on counterfeit manufactured goods. Counterfeiting is rampant in China and it's a problem that costs the auto industry hundreds of billions of dollars. I recently authored a new law that strengthens our domestic laws against counterfeiting. We now need to demand that China do the same.

Whether or not the government actually does have a responsibility to assist the domestic auto industry is a matter of one's own opinion, but Congressman Knollenberg represents suburban Detroit. If the government wanted to throw money at the automakers he should support it regardless. As Godcheaux answered the same question:

Godchaux: The federal government could at least put the resources into the auto industry that go to subsidize the oil industry, as we pay them to drill wells and lease public right-of-ways at giveaway prices. We should support the U.S. auto industry with capital to expand research on alternative fuels and more fuel efficient cars and invest in public transportation, at a time when U.S. auto companies have little capital to take chances.

While I do not support Godcheaux's candidacy over that of Nancy Skinner, she certainly is more in line with the district than is the irresponsible Knollenberg. This issue is indicative of Knollenberg's contempt for the people who elect him, and his blind loyalty to the Bush administration who in response to General Motors' alledged possible bankruptcy said that GM could not expect the same treatement Chrysler received under President Reagan, as he said at Fort Meade, MD in January, "I have been very reluctant - I'm mindful of the past where at one point in time, a predecessor of mine was faced with that same dilemma. I would hope I wouldn't be asked to make that decision [to facilitate a bailout]...And I haven't been asked by any automobile manufacturer about a bailout...I think it's very important for the market to function," (i.e. General Motors you are out of luck, thanks Michigan for not voting for me twice). Knollenberg's signing onto a Bush platform that would have a huge impact upon his district (yes, they don't vote for you but Pontiac is in your district Congressman Knollenberg, as are some plants of that aforementioned General Motors), he is saying party loyalty trumps the needs of constituents. This is just further evidence of Knollenberg's being out of touch.

Nancy Skinner is in tune with the district, and her ideas are bright. She acknowledges situations at hand while looking at the future. Her website, describes her energy polcy as "we must move toward a sustainable energy policy using American ingenuity and innovation. Meanwhile, we must expand our gasoline refining capacity." This is correct. The future is alternative energy, but in the meantime we need to expand the resource we use. This is the sort of thinking we need in Washington, vision and pragmatism, not Knollenberg's assinine assertions that benefit Toyota and conservatives in the Mountain West.

Hey Joe, its not so safe out in the ninth district...

DeVos Campaign Gets Dirty With Wikipedia

2006-07-28T02:37:00.000-04:00

Members of Dick DeVos' campaign team inappropriately modified a non-partisan encyclopedia article by attempting to remove factual information about DeVos that may be perceived negatively. A Wikipedian using DeVos campaign computers removed and modified information about his background. From the article discussion page:

Envix, protests to the contrary, has edited from a network range associated with the DeVos Campaign. I have banned the range for the next six months, which puts us safely past the November election. Whether he is actually on the payroll or is merely a fellow-traveler is beside the point; he's using DeVos campaign equipment to influence an encyclopedia article. This is completely unacceptable.

Ouch!

The specific changes by the DeVos campaign include:

Removed links to websites dedicated to Dick DeVos if they were negative or had negative connotations.
Replaced relevant Amway/Alticor history with flattering Alticor PR.
Removed information on Dick DeVos' reluctance to release his tax statements, despite the fact that this section contained arguments from both Mark Brewer and John Truscott.
Added more flattering images to DeVos' page.

The "biographical" information was added from the Asian Symposium on Direct Selling, which the editor from the DeVos campaign claims to hold the copyright to. Because of this, it seems reasonably likely that whoever was in the DeVos campaign office is also involved in the "direct selling industry in China (i.e. Amway in China)." I don't find the "China" argument to be particularly compelling in comparison to other aspects of DeVos' history, but this should be interesting to anyone who does.

The individual from the DeVos campaign complained that the Granholm page didn't contain similar information about her. This person is missing a key point -- the information listed relevant biographical information and a part of Dick DeVos' history. Granholm does not have a similar background, so demands that biographical information be removed about DeVos because Granholm doesn't have similar history are unreasonable.

It is unfortunate that the DeVos campaign feels that they must stoop to this level of partisan hackery. Oh well -- if nothing else, its good to know about what they're worried about.

Amway Exposed, Part Three coming Monday.

(cross-posted on Michigan Liberal... front paged!)

EDIT: Thanks to Christine Barry for the plug on this, and the first two parts of the Amway series.

all in the questions

2006-07-27T16:48:00.000-04:00

wizardkitten points to a poll that puts Granholm 3 points ahead of DeVos.

I don't trust polls unless the methodology is clearly documented and available to the public. I remember reading a poll that asked "Do you think that Michigan's economy has suffered under the stewardship of Jennifer Granholm?" That's a leading question -- people think that the MI economy sucks, and are of course going to say yes. Even though their questions are factually correct, by adding some additional pro-Granholm info and negative DeVos background, it should be expected that the poll would swing the other way. These numbers don't really mean anything.

Regardless of the polls now, its going to be an uphill battle in November -- its important to not get too caught up in this and focus on the long term (and this is coming from someone who might want to become a pollster).

This does help us take a look at what will be effective for us to talk about, and what the DeVos campaign will want to avoid. Its pretty obvious anyway, IMO.

Amway Exposed, Part Two: The "Tools" Scam

2006-07-25T01:33:00.000-04:00

Continued from yesterday's post on the potential for making profit in the Amway system.

Despite the lack of opportunities for profit from Amway, someone has been making a lot of money from the Amway system. According to various accounts, including the Dateline investigation, approximately 20 "elite" distributors have tapped into a multi-million dollar market outside of the traditional Amway product distribution system. While most of these high-level distributors refuse to release their income statements for fear of showing where the actual money comes from, the distributors have accumulated millions of dollars through techniques that are not available to the vast majority of IBOs.

So what's the trick to making all of this money? The lucrative "tools" business, which includes books, monthly meetings, larger seminars, and motivational tapes. These "tools" are sold at the expense of Amway distributors that have been fooled into the system.

Official Amway policy states that the motivational "tools" aren't required to be a successful distributor, and this probably helps them escape some of the criticism over the way the Amway system is structured. While the tools aren't explicitly endorsed, the Amway system creates a culture that encourages the exploitation of distributors through the purchase of these "tools." Amway distributors are told that these tools are essential to success:

"Do you want to be wealthy in Amway? Do you want to stand on the stage and claim victory over your life..and claim it that you overwhelmed whatever challenge you had?... Do you really want to do that? You'll have to come to a dream weekend. You'll never make it without a major function." Louie Carrillo Tape DBR659 - Power of a Dream (source)

"I am so thankful that we listened to them (our sponsor) from the start, because that's got us to where we are today. I see so many people struggling with why do I need tapes, why do I need books? Why do I need all these things? And it's because the people that are getting you in the business want you to be successful. They are not telling you for any other reason. It's for your own good. Everything that you hear, you should do. And you know Jim and I all along have said "if Tim and Cindy tell us to do it, we are never going to question it." Jim & Tricia Richardson Tape "Stories to make you smile" PN2161 (source)

'Nonstop' pressure to buy

Chip Minto, a former distributor from Philadelphia, said he spent as much as $800 to $1,000 a month on the motivational events and materials. He was earning, on average, $85 a month.

"It gets ridiculous," he said. "And it's nonstop. You're paying for something at least once a week. If you didn't have something to do (a business seminar) on a weekend, you were lucky." (From the Grand Rapids Press - e-mail me if you would like the full article.)

We know that most Amway products are not sold to consumers outside the system, but rather within Amway distributors themselves. You are now also aware of the "tools" business and the kinds of pressures on distributors to buy in to these "motivational" materials. The relevancy of the "tools" business compared to that of actually selling products to consumers becomes even more clear when looking at the way that the Amway elite make their money. According to an examination by John Hoagland, Emerald and Diamond distributors get a cut from the sale of the motivational tools. In his examination of one Diamond's 1099 form, the Diamond made nine times as much money from the "tools" as profits from his Amway downline.

The Dateline investigation came across a different figure, but the difference is still staggering:

But what he did let slip when he didn't know the camera was rolling was that one of the elite distributors we saw on stage is making most of his money from the motivation business.

Fredericks: Probably three quarters of it. [emphasis added]

Sandler: And that's from seminars -- holding seminars?

Fredericks: Seminars, rallies, functions, motivational tools, tapes, books, speaking engagements, appearances.

Finally, Dexter Yager himself attributed 2/3 of his income to his "tools" sales.

All of this ends up hurting the little guy. The less than stellar income reports from average Amway distributors don't even include the costs that push most IBOs into negative numbers, such as the costs for travel and the aforementioned "tools." According to a "Time Out" feature on Amway:

Colin and his wife would go out showing the plan four or five nights a week, often driving hundreds of miles to see potential prospects. Although their network and sales volume grew, they still found they were spending far more on petrol, telephone calls and other expenses that they were making.

Then there was the cost of the 'system' itself. "We'd get a tape each week and a book each month. Then we'd be expected to attend weekly training meetings and monthly rallies and seminars. Although it was only a few pounds at a time, it really did start to add up.

There are emotional costs associated with the tools too. From the personal experience of one former IBO at a seminar:

It really is pathetic. I remember seeing downline distributors on the front row at rallies throwing their fists into the air screaming and crying how they're going diamond someday. Every single one of them TODAY are not in Amway anymore.

This focus on the "tools" and the "motivational" aspect of Amway rather than the products themselves emphasizes a fundamental truth about the viability of Amway as a business model. Given that the incentives for high-level Amway elites are much greater to get their distributors to buy their tools rather than to actually go out and sell products themselves, it stands to reason that the tools are emphasized and the products aren't actually sold. Hoagland arrives at a similar conclusion:

As a side note, the same people who are making money off the tools are the same people pushing their distributors to purchase more tools. The idea is that if the distributors want to be a Direct themselves, they should purchase more tapes, attend more meetings, etc. At the same time the distributors are doing this, the upline makes more money. It makes you wonder if these distributors are really in the illegal tools-moving business rather than in the legal product-moving business?

Regardless of the legality of this system, the bottom line is that the vast majority of IBOs go into the system thinking that they are going to make lots of money, and come out having spent more money on "tools" and operational costs than what they brought in from their sales of actual products.

Ultimately, the profitability of Amway and its hidden tools scam is very relevant to the discussion people are having across Michigan. In his efforts to become governor of Michigan, Dick DeVos asserts that his business experience makes him the best candidate to turn Michigan's economy around. If DeVos says that his business model is the recipe for Michigan's success, Michiganders must know about the Amway business model. His claims and history need to be examined so that voters can make an informed decision about their choices this November.

There is nothing about the Amway business model that bodes well for the rest of us. DeVos touts his business experience and economic development abilities as the reason to vote for him, but he made his money by allowing his business' participants to be cheated through the "tools" scam. By his own logic, this is the kind of government we should expect from a DeVos administration -- one that doesn't care about ordinary people.

There's a lot more from where this came from. Stay tuned, kids.

-Nirmal

(cross-posted on Michigan Liberal)

Update: Front paged! Also, thanks to Pohlitics for the plug and a thank you to whoever submitted me to the Cult News Network.

Edit Again: Thanks to Stone Soup Musings for the plug. Read the rest of the post too, its really good.

Amway Exposed, Part One: The Profitability of Amway

2006-07-24T03:49:00.000-04:00

Amway is a scam. Participants put something in (usually time, money for motivational materials, travel expenses) and get nothing in exchange. While Amway is legal, there is a fine distinction between directly paying into the system (illegal) and being coerced into paying for the motivational “tools” that participants are told are required for success. Amway does not provide an opportunity for its distributors, and there is nothing ethical about their business model.

From a buddy that's in the business, here's the basic premise behind Amway: Each distributor gets a percentage cut from every Amway product that they sell, which is their profit. As they start to recruit other distributors, the original distributor gets their own bonus from selling things themselves, plus a cut of the profits from all of the distributors “under” them. As the new distributors in the original IBO's “downline” recruit their own distributors under them, the original distributor gets a cut of the profit from the products sold by everyone involved.

The actual numbers get complicated, but the basic idea advanced by Amway is that their Independent Business Owners, or IBOs, will eventually make so much money from their downlines that they won't need to work themselves. Since the means to making a lot of money with no work is by getting other people in your downline, the biggest incentive for distributors is to recruit others, not to actually sell products themselves. This dynamic has had a significant impact on the way that Amway and its top distributors have made a profit, as well as the profitability for the average Amway distributor.

Let's take a look at some of the statements about the profitability of Amway told to potential distributors, and see how they contrast with reality:

From the 2004 Dateline investigation on Amway:

Greg Fredericks: “If you're somewhat serious, all I mean by somewhat serious -- if you invest maybe, say, 10 to 15 hours a week in your business. This is your own business -- you could generate in the next 12 to 18 months, an extra quarter of a million.”

Tim Sandler [Dateline producer]: “I'm sorry. How much?”

Fredericks: “A quarter million.”

Sandler: “You're making more than $250,000 -- quarter of a million?”

Fredericks: “Umm hmm.”

In another case, Amway recruiters have told potential members in Hungary that the minimum income for participants is $9,000 a month.

If reading about it isn't enough, listen to a clip of a speaker from a motivational tape telling prospective Amway distributors that they can reach an income of $50,000 a year in one year.

Unfortunately, all of these claims are less than accurate. Doing the math, “if 'the pitch' at an Amway meeting were even moderately accurate, in something like 18 months Amway would be larger than the GNP of the entire United States (source).” In fact, the Federal Trade Commission “requires Amway to label its products with the message that 54% of Amway recruits make nothing and the rest earn on average $65 a month (source).”

Interestingly enough, Amway itself has acknowledged that distributors may not make any profit for the first few years of operation:

From 1996 SA-4400: Gross Income: The amount received from retail sales of products, minus the cost of goods sold, plus the amount of Performance Bonus retained. This does not include deductions for business expenses that, of course, will vary according to the manner in which each individual distributor operates his or her own business. There may be significant business expenses, mostly discretionary, that may be greater in relation to income in the first years of operation (source).

Not great odds, especially when you consider that most Amway distributors sell primarily to themselves and have other costs not counted for in these calculations. According to a 1991 Forbes report, the typical Amway distributor sold only 19% of their products to non-Amway consumers. In other words, Amway distributors as a collective only make money from one out of every five of their sales.

Quixtar, or Amway over the Internet, isn't much better. According to a 2001 Forbes article, “By joining organizations like Quixtar, you're more likely to fill your shelves with bottles of shampoo than to fill your bank account with cash (Forbes).”

This statement seems to be corroborated by the evidence available to the public. As we will see, one of the ways that participants are hooked into the Amway/Quixtar system is through stories about the lives of Quixtar “Diamonds” that gain financial independence from their downlines. However, the math from Quixtar's own statistics show that there are only 57 Diamond-level distributors out of hundreds of thousands of participants (LawBlawg).

The “two to five year” promise to becoming a Diamond level Amway distributor is completely unsubstantiated. Even after putting an incredible amount of time and effort into the Amway system, most distributors don't even come close to reaching Diamond. Furthermore, members that qualify as Diamond often don't make kind of money that is promised by Quixtar. After years of hard work, one Quixtar member qualified for the coveted Diamond classification by making little over $35,000 a year from direct Amway profits (source). There's no real money in the Amway distribution system, even for the supposed cream of the crop of distributors.

Does this sound familiar at all? It should – the Amway system preys on the weak, promising them the answer to all of their problems (money). As we will see, the only people that benefit are the people at the top of the pyramid. This is not unlike the promises from Dick DeVos in this gubernatorial race. He tells people what they want to believe (that he will bring jobs and economic growth), but there are no practical specifics behind his rhetoric. The Amway promise has proven to be false, and it is clear that people are going to be disappointed with the DeVos promise as well.

-Nirmal

P.S. Look for part two, on the “tools” business and the real money makers of Amway tomorrow.

Examinations of the lives Amway has ruined, the favors Amway has traded with prominent Republicans such as George Bush and Mike Cox, Amway's attempts to suppress the free speech rights of its critics, the behavioral control methods used to manipulate Amway distributors, the rest of the Amway family, the potential for an MLM-styled GOTV effort, Amway's similarities to cults and the mafia, Amway's legal troubles, and other unethical Amway behavior are coming soon.

(cross-posted on Michigan Liberal)

EDIT: Front paged! Also, thanks to Pohlitics for the plug.

ziggy discovers the wonders of...

2006-07-21T00:30:00.000-04:00

There's a lot of stuff I could be talking about, but things have been real busy lately. Got some fun stuff coming soon, though. Stay tuned...

With God, All Things Are Political

2006-07-17T13:29:00.000-04:00

My bro David recently started a blog, With God, All Things Are Political. Go check it out.

Also, he's got a great opinion piece in the State News on DeVos. We need to get more of these things out there.

We have an election coming up, and one of the candidates has a magical object. This candidate is Dick DeVos.
He has a political Magic 8 Ball — it provides answers to all of Michigan's problems. Floating inside is a triangle. Each side reads, "We need to put people back to work." How do we fix Detroit? (Shake, shake) "We need to put people back to work." How do we help the uninsured? "We need to put people back to work." How do we lower tuition rates? "We need to put people back to work." How can the Lions win the NFC North? "We need to put people back to work."
What DeVos really needs is to put real plans to work, get real numbers and specifics to work.
He hasn't done this. Gov. Jennifer Granholm has. If you attend MSU and plan on having a job when you graduate, put your ballot to work and re-elect Granholm. Her plan isn't a Magic 8 Ball — her plan is working.

David Wishinsky
political science senior

(cross-posted on Michigan Liberal)

07.13.2006 Letter to the Editor: DeVos, Amway, and Vouchers

2006-07-13T19:53:00.000-04:00

My letter to the editor about Dick DeVos appeared today in the Saginaw News. Here it is:

As a lifelong Michigan resident, I have some serious reservations about Dick DeVos' legitimacy as a gubernatorial candidate.

It is true that Michigan is hurting because of recent losses in the manufacturing sector. However, it is a little disingenuous to hail DeVos as Michigan's savior and expect him to solve all of our problems, as his ads imply.

As the former president of Amway, DeVos made similar promises to the people of Michigan. These promises turned out to be untrue. Despite the fact that 99 percent of Amway "distributors" (victims) never made a profit, Amway tantalized prospective participants with promises of early retirement and instant wealth.

Since there is virtually no demand for Amway products outside of already existing Amway distributors, the Amway business model closely resembles an illegal pyramid scheme. The reality of Amway is that most of the money is made by only a few individuals that sell "motivational" materials to the rest of the Amway distributors. Through Amway, Dick DeVos has already scammed countless Michiganders.

In fact, DeVos' regard for Michigan residents is so low that he continues to fund organizations pushing for school vouchers despite public opposition. Michigan voters recognized that school vouchers would cripple our public schools and overwhelmingly rejected this initiative in 2000. Afterward, DeVos still donated millions of dollars to organizations that aim to undermine public education and advocated using bullying and stealth to keep pushing for vouchers in a 2002 speech.

Dick DeVos has already spent over 7.1 million dollars trying to buy a better image for himself on TV. Given his history, DeVos' attempt to buy our votes is frightening and undermines the idea of a democratic process. This is why I won't be voting for DeVos in November.

Nirmal Mankani

(cross-posted on Michigan Liberal)

EDIT: Front paged! Thanks guys.

Saul, Google, and other random thoughts

2006-07-13T01:22:00.000-04:00

A few quick thoughts from the past few days:

Saul Anuzis continues to irresponsibly pin the woes of our state economy on the SBT and Governor Granholm. While the SBT is poorly structured, it is the Republicans in the legislature that have obstructed Granholm's proposals for reform. On the other hand, they want to do away with it entirely, but won't tell us where the extra money for the General Fund is going to come from until after the election. It is irresponsible to blame the woes of the economy on Granholm or the SBT alone, when really it doesn't matter who the Governor has been the past four years, we would probably be in the same position. We need to focus on restructuring our economy so that we aren't completely dependent on manufacturing, which has been the real issue for us.
In this light, the Google announcement is great news, and a validation of the Governor's approach to restructuring our economy. These are the kinds of jobs that we need to keep kids in state after they graduate. Its a shame that the MI GOP has been trying to trivialize this success.
Share why you're voting for Granholm/Cherry.
I had a chance to sit in on a couple of the committee meetings on the budget -- everyone seemed to be content with it for the most part. I don't anticipate much controversy in session. With stuff in the State House winding down, that should bring more of focus onto the gubernatorial race.

granholm webchat

2006-07-05T19:15:00.000-04:00

Governor Granholm is responding to questions live on her blog. Go check it out!

Attacks on "leaks" and the erosion of our democracy

2006-07-05T02:16:00.000-04:00

Republican politicians continue to attack the news media for publishing details of a secret program to track terrorist financing, despite the fact that details of the program have been discussed by the administration many times.

Dean Baquet and Bill Keller, editors of the Los Angeles Times and the New York Times, defended the recent disclosures of their papers and made a broader case for a press that holds government accountable in a recent op-ed piece.

Government officials, understandably, want it both ways. They want us to protect their secrets, and they want us to trumpet their successes. A few days ago, Treasury Secretary John Snow said he was scandalized by our decision to report on the bank-monitoring program. But in September 2003, the same Secretary Snow invited a group of reporters from our papers, the Wall Street Journal and others to travel with him and his aides on a military aircraft for a six-day tour to show off the department's efforts to track terrorist financing. The secretary's team discussed many sensitive details of their monitoring efforts, hoping they would appear in print and demonstrate the administration's relentlessness against the terrorist threat.

Personally, I find it troublesome when our government engages in torture and domestic surveillance, and maintains secret prisons without judicial review in the name of "national security." They'll tell members of Congress, but they can't tell us about it because of "national security." If a journalist leaks this information, they're slandered and pressured to reveal their sources. On the other hand, they'll selectively declassify information when its to slander a critic or for their own political advantage.

Representative James McGovern (D) characterized the attacks as a cheap way to energize the demoralized Republican base, and also emphasized the hypocrisy of fair-weather leaks:

``Let's be honest: We are here today because there hasn't been enough red meat thrown at the Republican base before the Fourth of July holiday," McGovern said. ``The administration and its allies have no problem with leaks to the press when those leaks advance their political agenda. But if a leak contradicts their agenda, suddenly they call it treason."

On a related note, Kentucky's governor Ernie Fletcher (R) restricted access to a blog critical of his administration for over 34,000 state employees.

Late Night Update: Net Neutrality, Alternative Energy, and Other Fun Stuff

2006-06-30T04:11:00.000-04:00

Net Neutrality: The net neutrality amendment failed to be added to the telecommunications bill on its way to the Senate. This older Slate article does a great job of breaking down the competing interests, some of the problem's ideological puzzles, as well as what it all means for the consumer. While many aspects of this issue have been discussed extensively, many people don't mention (or realize) that the reason why the telcos are in their position is because of regulation establishing their status as a "common carrier." This basically means that they are subject to different laws and regulatory models -- for example, they aren't liable for the nature of the content that is being transmitted. This is why its hypocritical for them to talk about leaving everything to free market system -- they are benefiting from entitlements that other content providers don't get! If they can trample on net neutrality they shouldn't be able to keep their status as a common carrier either, because in a true "free market" system they wouldn't be able to have it both ways.

Alternative Energy: According to the CS Monitor, lawmakers are scrambling to remake our energy policy to address environmental concerns and reduce our dependence on oil. Still, The Guardian asserts that U.S. cars account for almost half the CO2 pumped into the atmosphere from exhaust pipes, because our cars are less fuel-efficient and are driven for longer distances. The full report from Environmental Defense can be accessed here.

Media: Eric Alterman disputes the notion of a "bounce back" for Bush as being hailed by the punditocracy. Alterman does a great job of comparing last week's message to... reality.

Electronic Voting: Andrew Gumbel explains why electronic voting systems could cause massive complications in Ohio's gubernatorial race. Elsewhere, it turns out that one person with the right technical know-how could swing an entire Presidential election.

Odds and Ends: Finally, Juan Cole takes a break from the usual in a neat little piece on recent attempts to slander "Kos" of DailyKos. It normally pisses me off whenever bloggers go at great lengths emphasizing their own importance, but he does a great job of explaining what differentiates a distributed form of communication from what we're used to, and how that plays into the attacks we're starting to see.

Michigan House Democrats Combat Deadly Drugs

2006-06-30T04:07:00.000-04:00

Everyone knows that the FDA just doesn't have the resources to test drugs as thoroughly as they need to be. Thanks to Governor Engler and a Republican-controlled legislature, in Michigan manufacturers of harmful drug products are afforded complete immunity if their product was approved by the USFDA. This ultimately means that drug companies are not held accountable for knowingly selling harmful products. Thankfully, the House Democrats remember that this affects real people, and today reaffirmed their commitment to fighting for the disclosure of drug test results in the face of criticism from the Michigan Chamber of Commerce. I think this picture says it all.

The Jackson Citizen Patriot has more on the increased awareness of the issue. As usual, the Michigan Chamber of Commerce claims that the issue is "about trial lawyers" and that reversing the immunity will kill jobs. What about the idea of consumer protection? The fact is that most Michigan residents would rather be protected from products that are known to be harmful, and favor having some kind of recourse so that companies think twice before engaging in this kind of behavior. Given that we're the only state that grants this immunity for just one particular industry, I don't see how this is an issue of being business-friendly.

(cross-posted on Michigan Liberal)

Redistricting and the "Culture of Life"

2006-06-29T01:34:00.000-04:00

It looks like a House Resolution sponsored by Rep. Gosselin, which establishes March 31, 2006 as "Terri's Day of Remembrance & Celebration of the Culture of Life Day," is on the agenda for tomorrow (err... today now). According to the May 30th Gongwer, the resolution declares official support for the "Schindler Schiavo Foundation," which advocates a so-called "Culture of Life." According to the piece, "Culture of Life advocates say the movement opposes abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide, gay marriage and stem cell research."

The MI GOP supposedly prides itself in its advocacy of limited government and keeping the state from intervening in an individual's life. It is completely hypocritical for them to support a resolution that implicitly condones the most egregious intrusion of our government into the life of an individual that we have seen in recent history. I wish our State Legislature spent its time trying to fix our state instead of coming up with new holidays and hot air resolutions.

As everyone has heard by now, the Supreme Court O.K.ed the Republican Congressional redistricting in Texas, meaning that redistricting could happen anytime the sides switch in a state legislature or it is convenient to do so politically. While this can't be good for Democrats in the short-term, I don't see it working out for our democracy at all even if Democrats were the ones that benefited from this. Elected officials are supposed to be held accountable by their constituents, and shouldn't be removed from office because of the political considerations of a completely unrelated body.

For example, Candice Miller's district was carved out for her after the 2000 Census -- she didn't win because of her qualifications as a candidate, but because her district was handed to her on a platter by Michigan Republicans. The Republicans were also able to knock off a couple Democrats by forcing popular incumbents to either battle in the primaries against each other, like in the case of Dingell and Rivers, or force one candidate to take a step back, such as with Barcia and Kildee -- what's to stop them from doing this whenever they want?

We could all benefit from a redistricting system like Iowa's. Iowa's system is cool because nonpartisan staff define proposals for the borders of districts without election data or such as the addresses of incumbents. Some aspects of their system, such as determining geographic boundaries, are actually done before the Census collects or reports population information.

(cross posted on Michigan Liberal)

hello world

2006-06-28T02:25:00.000-04:00

This is going to end up as yet another abandoned project.

Ah well, here goes nothing!