Food fights, line 5, SCOTUS, and special guest Mel Larsen

July 1, 2019
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Michigan Policast for Monday, July 1, 2019

Segment One:  Governor Whitmer vs Lansing Republicans

“No one in any other field is allowed to go on vacation before they get their work done ... they’re expected to work, to stay on the job until their work is done.' ~@govwhitmer #FTDR @mi_republicans @misenateClick To Tweet
It’s been crickets when it comes to an alternative plan to actually fix this “dangerous” infrastructure crisis. ~ @govwhitmer #FTDRClick To Tweet

Chatfield and Shirkey have not committed to the idea but had asked the West Michigan Policy Forum to look into ways to finance additional road repairs without the 45-cent-a-gallon fuel tax hike proposed by Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.

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The concept quickly met conservative opposition from Patrick Anderson, founder and CEO of the Anderson Economic Group and a former state deputy budget director in the Engler administration. Anderson argued it could violate the Michigan Constitution, break trust with pensioners and is “also a really dumb idea” from a taxpayer perspective.

Segment two: AG Nessel follows through on her campaign promise to shut down line 5

.@govwhitmer tried her best to reach an agreement that would remove the pipelines from the Straits on an expedited basis, but @Enbridge walked away ... Once that occurred, there was no need for further delay.” ~@MIAttyGen @dananessel @flowforwaterClick To Tweet

… an April 2018 anchor dragging incident – which ripped through several inches-thick steel cables – brought that threat home in a very real way.  Although Line 5 was damaged – not ruptured – in that incident because the anchor hit a section lying directly on the bottomlands, if the anchor had dragged across the bottom of the Straits in an area where Line 5 is elevated, the likely result would have been a complete rupture of Line 5.

Michiganders are fed up with the threat of an oil disaster in our precious lakes, and @miattygen action is one piece of what is needed to end the threat of #Line5 for good ~ @MichEnvCouncil @conansmith via @BridgeMichiganClick To Tweet

For several months the attorney general has indicated she would use her independent authority to seek to shut down the dual pipelines through the Straits if Enbridge did not reach an acceptable agreement with the governor. Today, the attorney general followed through on her promise by filing a separate action. 

 

Segment three: Presidential primary debates

Any system that Donald Trump can worm his way through with D-list insults and 120 seconds of attempted memorization should be fumigated and then burned. The fact that it remains intact speaks to the extreme laziness and boundless cynicism of that system's architects, who evidently don't mind that the worst people can win the game they've created.

Segment four: SCOTUS strikes the citizenship question from the US Census

Maryland U.S. District Judge George Hazel wrote earlier this week that files found on deceased Republican operative Thomas Hofeller’s hard drives painted a “disturbing picture” and “potentially connects the dots between a discriminatory purpose” and the Trump administration’s decision to add the citizenship question.

“Taken together with existing evidence, it appears that Dr. Hofeller was involved in the creation of the pretextual [Voting Rights Act] rationale and worked with [Mark] Neuman, Secretary Ross’s ‘trusted advisor,' to drive the addition of a citizenship question.”

The files revealed that Hofeller was hired in 2015 by the Washington Free Beacon, a conservative news outlet owned by billionaire Republican donor Paul Singer, to study how to implement political maps that only looked at U.S. citizens of voting age, rather than a state’s total population.

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Hofeller wrote that implementing these maps without adding a citizenship question to the 2020 census would be “functionally unworkable.”

Segment five: SCOTUS says gerrymandering best left to the states

Interview: Attorney Mark Brewer on SCOTUS gerrymandering decision

The court conceded that there was political #gerrymandering going on in the cases before them, but they decided that the federal courts have no place deciding these cases. ~ @MarkBrewerDems @MiVoterPower MichiganDems Click To Tweet
The model for @MIGOP is .. Arizona .. they’ve sought to impeach commissioners, defund the commission, and TPTB who have benefitted from #gerrymandering for the last 20 years are not going to give up power. ~ @MarkBrewerDems @NotPoliticians Click To Tweet

Interview: Former State Representative Mel Larsen

'Daisy Elliot carried that civil rights bill around for 6 yrs and could not get a Republican co-sponsor until I was elected in 1973.' ~ Mel Larsen #ElliotLarsenCRA #CivilRights Click To Tweet
To be honest, the #CivilRights movement was about being black, and everything else around it was secondary. the understanding of the #lgbt community was not well known, and that was very evident. ~ Mel Larsen #ElliotLarsenCRA #EqualityClick To Tweet
To get that bill passed it was one terrific fight .. the #LGBT were not directly included, but they were not excluded in saying that you had a right to discriminate against them. ~ Mel Larsen #ElliotLarsenCRA #EqualiyClick To Tweet
Jim Dressel was a wonderful guy, good legislator, he introduced an amendment to include #lgbt community, and was defeated in the next election. ~ Mel Larsen #ElliotLarsenCRA #Equality Click To Tweet
Every day that goes by that they don't put #LGBT in #ElliotLarsenCRA is another day that they discriminate against citizens of Michigan. ~ Mel Larsen #Equality Click To Tweet
Supporting #LGBTQ workers would strengthen Michigan’s economic position with more job commitments, better workplace relationships, increased job satisfaction, and more. ~ @WilliamsPolicy @GovWhitmer #ElliotLarsenCRA #Equality Click To Tweet

Other stuff:

 

 

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