One of the biggest liabilities a politician can have is a paper
trail which opponents can follow until they find something to exploit
for their own political gain.
GOP candidate for Attorney General Bill Schuette has trails all
over the joint and not all of them are Happy Trails if you remember the
old Roy Rogers theme song.
The Midland Republican has a ton of votes he cast in Congress and
a bunch when he was a state senator and take this to the bank, it's
only a matter of time before Mike Bishop, who also wants to be A.G.,
uses some of this stuff in an attempt to deny Schuette the nomination.
This one would be on the top of any list: Schuette supported the
largest salary increase every granted to Michigan lawmakers and this
came when Schuette was one.
The headlines were all over the state: Michigan Senate refuses to
vote to reject a 36% pay boost, and according to the Ludington Daily
News, Schuette supported the raise.
Unless somebody doctored the newspaper, Schuette is said to have
seen the hefty raise as a means to "make sure qualified candidates will
interrupt private careers to run for office." He did favor reviewing
the manner in which the salaries were set.
To this day, citizens still remember the 36% pay hike even though
it is a ten-year old story.
Now you might ask what does this have to do with being Attorney
General? On the surface the answer is nothing, but go beneath the
surface and you can see how Bishop could exploit this in a GOP
convention. In that convention will be all sorts of folks who think
government is too big, that lawmakers make too much money and anybody
who supported that raise might be in deep you know what.
The issue is ripe for plucking and betya Mr. Bishop knows how to
pluck.