Democracy Begins Its Death in Michigan

[muffynbear]

http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/04/05 ... ose-video/

Michigan is one of several Republican run states that is severely restricting voter rights. They are trying to strip unions of bargaining rights.

Michigan’s constitution allows for 90 days between the passage of a bill and its implementation. The reason is twofold. It gives people and businesses who would be affected by the law a chance to make any necessary adjustments. It also allows time to appeal the law. The constitution also allows for emergency situations, allowing the law to have immediate effect. However, for a law to have immediate effect, it requires a 2/3rds vote in the Legislature.

Republicans do not have a 2/3rds majority, but nonetheless, they have passed over 500 bills under “immediate effect.†How does that work? As Maddow shows, they aren’t even counting the votes. That’s right; Democrats’ votes are not even being counted.

Anyone here from Michigan care to weigh in?

ETA: This video is infuriating. First, the Republicans are ignoring the state's Constitution. Second, a non-elected city manager has been given free reign to do whatever he pleases (i.e. shut down schools, seize property). Third, Democrats' votes are not being counted. WTF is going on in our country?

[Lillybee]

I watched Rachel tonight, what is happening in Michagan is scary.

[SayNoToMullets]

Holy shit. That is blatantly unconstitutional, and nobody's doing anything about it?

[jlbturtle]

If true, we aren't hearing very much about it here. I think most of the consensus is that Gov Snyder is doing a good job (for the most part) he has worked to create a budget surplus and helped improve our economic situation (and gotten rid of our ridiculous Michigan business tax). Is he perfect of course not I normally don't vote republican but he has been good for Michigan I feel thus far.

[asinglevoice]

It's a sad state of affairs when I have to hear about what's going on in my own state from Rachel Maddow (nothing against Rachel, of course, but it is a national news show, not local!).

We haven't heard much about it at all - as in, nothing on my end. And I consider myself to be a pretty politically-conscious person. WTF is up with my state!? Scratch that, what's up with my COUNTRY?

[CanadianHippie]

If true, we aren't hearing very much about it here. I think most of the consensus is that Gov Snyder is doing a good job (for the most part) he has worked to create a budget surplus and helped improve our economic situation (and gotten rid of our ridiculous Michigan business tax). Is he perfect of course not I normally don't vote republican but he has been good for Michigan I feel thus far.

No reason to let him get away with blatantly flaunting the state's constitution though.

[dawbs]

well, there's the current petition to at least give public employees the right back to unionize...which will get rid of the health-care bill that's going to give me a 30% pay cut right now...

I think Snyder is NOT doing a good job...he's using public dislike for teacher's unions (not teachers, their unions. People forget they're connected) and the like to union bust. He claims to trim fat...but oly in the already underpaid parts of the public sector--not in the areas wehre there's actually fat.

Of course, I'm a public employee who signed his recall petition, so I"m obviously not unbiased. (nor am I with it enough to give good opinons right now--whee coldpills!)

[asinglevoice]

Count me in as another Michigander who thinks Snyder is NOT doing a good job. If your approach to governing is to ignore everyone who disagrees with you and to seek to nearly disenfranchise all of them entirely, you're no one I want in charge of my state. I, too, signed his recall petition. Cannot wait to get this man out of office - assuming that as a woman, lesbian, and teacher I'm still *allowed* to vote by then. Good grief.

[eaglemom]

This is so frustrating. I learn about this through facebook mostly, the news has been shockingly silent as republicans strip this state of our democracy. I think it has gotten this far because the only cities that have been taken over by a city manager so far are 1) predominantly african-american, 2) very poor. The perception is that these people don't deserve to vote b/c they screwed up by not having more money. Dems need to find a good, electable democrat to run in the next election, otherwise our courts will fill up with Snyder appointees, there will be no checks and balances, and Republicans will turn this state into a oligarchy.

[rwoods]

As a Detroiter I have been mostly consumed with our financial crisis and have barely paid attention to anything else going on in the state. It's all a sad state of affairs!

[shesinsane]

Democracy started dying in Michigan when the governor began replacing elected officials with his pals (see Benton Harbor). This is just kicking a coma patient.

[FloraDoraDolly]

If true, we aren't hearing very much about it here. I think most of the consensus is that Gov Snyder is doing a good job (for the most part) he has worked to create a budget surplus and helped improve our economic situation (and gotten rid of our ridiculous Michigan business tax). Is he perfect of course not I normally don't vote republican but he has been good for Michigan I feel thus far.

I agree. Governor Snyder has a TOUGH job. The two previous governors (one GOP, one Dem) were awful. Gov. Snyder has to repair twenty years of damage and neglect, on top of dealing with the national economic crisis.

[muffynbear]

More fuckery in Michigan:

Michigan government unleashes armed raids on small pig farmers, forces farmer to shoot all his own pigs

http://www.naturalnews.com/035585_Michi ... raids.html

Michigan Department of Natural Resources has, in total violation of the Fourth Amendment, conducted two armed raids on pig farmers in that state, one in Kalkaska County at Fife Lake and another in Cheboygan County. Staging raids involving six vehicles and ten armed men, DNA conducted unconstitutional, illegal and arguably criminal armed raids on these two farms with the intent of shooting all the farmers' pigs under a bizarre new "Invasive Species Order" (ISO) that has suddenly declared traditional livestock to be an invasive species.In anticipation of the DNR arriving on the scene, one farmer engaged in what can only be described as a heart-wrenching task of shooting his own pigs, one by one, including baby piglets before the DNR arrived. This was to avoid being arrested as a felon.

I wonder what else will soon fall under the "Invasive Species Order"?

http://www.michigan.gov/documents/dnr/I ... 4173_7.htm

Michigan Begins Heritage Hog Slaughter

http://www.motherearthnews.com/the-happ ... ghter.aspx

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder signed the DNR’s “invasive species order,†or ISO, in December 2011. The ISO went into effect April 1, and was enacted, the DNR said, to protect Michigan’s hog farms from diseases spread by so-called feral hogs, as well as protect landowners from damages caused by wild hogs.

You can read the ISO here. Its scariest sentence: "Other characteristics not currently known to the MDNR that are identified by the scientific community."

In other words, the Michigan DNR can seize your hogs by changing the rules whenever it wishes.

A couple of things smell fishy here.

First is that the DNR’s own website says that fewer than 700 wild hogs have been seen or killed in Michigan over the last 10 years. Officials of the Michigan Pork Producers Association (MPPA) confirm that there have been no reported cases of pseudorabies spreading from wild hogs to domestic ones.

The second concern is that the ISO outlaws swine on the basis of their phenotype – how they look – not on their genotype or their DNA. Virtually no kind of pig except the few breeds raised in CAFO hog farms can pass the nine phenotype descriptors laid out in the ISO — and virtually no heritage hog can pass it. The ISO says that such hogs are illegal, whether they are securely fenced in or not, and that farmers who keep them will be charged as felons. The ISO allows DNR officers to come onto a farm and kill the offending animals — and to do so without compensating the farmer whose stock they destroy.

The third fishy stinker is that the DNR is charged with managing wildlife — not farm animals.

[muffynbear]

This is from Oak Park, MI. This happened less than a year ago. A woman faced 93 days in jail for planting a garden in her front lawn.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/1 ... 99723.html

Prosecutors in Oak Park, Mich., have dropped a misdemeanor charge against Bass, who until yesterday was staring down a July 26 court date and potential 93 days in jail for planting and refusing to remove a vegetable garden on her front lawn.

The Bass family vegetable garden generated a national media stir as the family battled city prosecutors who claimed that cabbages, peppers and tomatoes were not "suitable" for the front yard.

In the past weeks, the city threatened Bass with a warning , ticket and finally, the misdemeanor charge, none of which persuaded Bass to dig up the garden.

A MISDEMEANOR for planting a garden?! :shock: