I continue to observe the behavior of the Michigan Legislature and Gov. Rick Snyder with apoplectic astonishment. I also continue to be depressed that too few people seem to share my outrage.
What will it take for the citizens of this state to rise up in righteous indignation and show these bozo legislators the door? Time and time again they have ignored the wishes of a majority of the electorate to consolidate the power of their party and advance the well being of their richest supporters.
I submit that anyone running for state office on the Republican Party ticket in 2016 should be sent back home because they all march in lockstep on these ridiculous laws they’ve passed, which are downright anti-democratic and against the will of the people, whom they apparently think aren’t paying attention.
OK, I’ve railed against these legislative stooges before, but the grievance list continues to grow.
Their latest fiasco is a gag order on librarians and school officials over sharing information about upcoming ballot elections. What is this, the Soviet Union?
It has outraged librarians from all over the state:
One librarians’ newletter has asserted, “If SB 571 becomes law, librarians would be sent to jail for sharing factual information about elections with their communities. Library boards would be fined thousands of dollars of sending out a newsletter if it shares information about what is on your local ballot. We need honest and transparent elections. SB 571 is ridiculous. It is both anti- free speech and anti- good government.”
Gov. Snyder and the State Legislature: How else do I despise thee? Let me count the ways:
- Emergency Manager Law — short-circuits democracy, ignores the will of voters and gets results like the Flint water disaster, for which Snyder should be impeached, recklessly endangering the lives of children in order to save money.
- An obnoxious fireworks law — disturbs the public peace, frightens dogs and veterans to promote sales and boorish, childish noisy behavior.
- The GOP majority couldn’t get its act together for a roads funding package for years, but rammed through both chambers a Right to Work law in just 24 hours.
- Motorcycle helmet law — How can children take us seriously about use of seat belts when we let bikers not wear helmets for safety?
- Medical marijuana implementation — The law was passed in 2008 by 63% of voters statewide, but the Leggie insisted each municipality pay for attorneys to craft their own ordinances.
- Eliminating straight party voting, though twice voters statewide said otherwise and it makes voting at polls more cumbersome and time consuming. It’s very simply an attempt to discourage the unwashed masses, the riff-raff, working people, from voting.
- The coverup of the scandal involving Tea Party lawmakers Todd Courser and Cindy Gamrat while permitting the two unfairly to fire whistleblowing staff members.
- Finally passing a law supposedly to fund roads that will rob other departments in the general fund and won’t do anything for roads until past 2017.
Gov. Rick Snyder and the woeful State Legislature told us five years ago they were setting out to “reinvent Michigan.” I suppose they have succeeded. They have remade a once proud state into a quasi-totalitarian state, rated the worst among the 50 states in transparency and open government.
I hear tell that city and township clerks all over the state, besides librarians, are upset with our legislators and senators. How can veterans, dog lovers and every day working stiffs continue to support politicians who vote against the peoples’ interests and against democratic principles themselves?
This is a call to throw the rascals out next year, all of them with the letter R next to their names. Make them pay for what they have done to us.
