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Tea Pasrty Awakens
All of a sudden the sleeping giant, known in some circles as the Tea Party, has awakened from its winter hibernation to get back in the political game.
In the space of a couple of days, media email bins were over flowing with T.P. missives which is in stark contrast to previous months when you never heard a peep from them. Most surprisingly, they said nothing about the tax hike the governor imposed on some seniors.
The datelines were Washtenaw County, Alpena, Onaway (where the heck is that?) and Cheboygan where the "Tea Party leaders" were calling on the governor and their local salons to pass a Michigan Right to Work law.
Don't these folks read the papers?
The governor says this is not a top priority for him and although he has said he would sign such a bill if it got to his desk, he is not pushing for it to get there.
Undaunted the press releases suggest it is "Un-American" to not have this law.
House Republicans have made noises about working on this bill but up until now the governor has prevailed in asking them to hold off while he works on reinventing Michigan.
Impatience may be growing among the more conservative and Tea Party leaning Republicans to move on it soon to wit the news releases now.
The T.P. gang from Newaygo County (is that any where near Onaway?) fired off a news release calling on the governor to knock it off with all this bridge stuff. The folks up there don't want their tax dollars going into another span between Detroit and Windsor.
Don't these folks read the papers?
The governor says their tax dollars will not go into the project, but the owners of the Ambassador Bridge disagrees and looks like the T.P. gang is going with the Morouns and not Mr. Snyder.
Maybe the Morouns have volunteered to buy them a boat load of tea?
posted by Tim Skubick at
1:13 PM
12 Comments:
Skoop,
As a Tea Party member, I have been working on efforts to help this wonderful state climb out of an extremely deep hole. Tens of thousands of us have been diligent and secretive in our efforts, and are not concerned by media reports that we died or fell asleep at the wheel. While we were influential in the elections of the November past, and pleased with the Guv's direction and apparant success in achieving a taste of fiscal sanity, we don't necessarily agree on the timing or priority of solutions to the multitude of factors that have contributed to our state's longterm dysfuntional minefield of taxes, regulation, waste and adversarial labor relations. The citizens of every state enjoy the birthright to pursue life, liberty and happiness. Michigan's landscape has proven to be considerably less conducive to success, and we aim to change that. While emotions vary about forced-unionism, the facts remain the same year after year. In the 22 states that prohibit forced-union membership, the economy, standard of living, personal discretionary income growth, and resistance to recession all out-perform the states that don't require unions to earn their keep with their members. It's understandable that the Guv would want to use the fear of Right To Work as political leverage as long as possible in order to get other items on his agenda, but that doesn't mean that we must follow his lead or that he doesn't agree with the importance of our goal to free Michigan from the shackles of forced unionism. It just means that we feel the pain from the shackles much more intensely than he does.
Skubic is predicably ucerbic and condescending in this article. Perhaps he needs to get out of Capitol City and visit Onaway and Newago of Cheboygan and discover that there are real people out there and our former American system of free speech encouraged the governor to listen to (not preach to) his subjects. That is what the first Revolution was all about. Time for Freedom To Work!
Dude, if your tone on the Tea Party is that "these people" are a bunch of illiterate hicks who don't read the papers...you might want to spell check that title. "Tea Pasrty Awakens"? You might also want to use this other newfangled technology called "Google Maps" if you're ever confused about our state's geography.
I'm sorry, are the citizens of Michigan supposed to wait for permission from "the paper" before they engage their representatives? Shame on those tea party folks for not believing everything in "the paper."
Tim,
The Right to Work train is coming through Michigan, bringing prosperity and opportunity for everyone in the state, from Alpena, to Onaway and Zeeland.
And I'll have pastry with my tea, thank you!
Well, I hate to say we don't believe politicians too often when the words "won't cost taxpayer money" flow from their lips, but, you know, history repeats itself and all that. Are you serious? We do read the paper, and that's why we have blogs, so we can get the truth. The bridge is not a priority. Pulling Michigan out of the tarpits is. And the RTW numbers don't lie. Every RTW state is prospering while forced union states are mired in a never ending recession. Ours even started well before the rest of the nations. The Republicans are showing their usual lack of backbone by putting it off, knowing full well it's the priority of everyone who put them in office. This is why we have a Tea Party (yes even in the beautiful county of Onaway (perhaps you should visit). If the GOP would do their job, we could stay home and enjoy our freedoms. Instead we have to fight for them. Thank God a few of us still care more about our state and country more than who was last voted off American Idol.
Good ol' Tim Skubick-- the Louella Parson's pundit of Lansing. The only thing missing is a prominent chapeau or two.
In a previous newspaper dirge Tim S. carries on about whether or not Gov. Snyder attends regular church services (I'm really loosing sleep worrying about it - NOT) -- and now on his latest blog he makes smarmy comments about those supporting a 'Right to Work' state as well as the concerns of many regarding the push for the State of MI financing a Detroit River bridge. Shame on us for wanting all the facts and figures in black and white presented for all to see.
Mary - MI
What the heck is a "Tea Pasrty"? Before you attack the literacy of the Tea Party, you might want to spell check your own blog title there Skoopie.
So sad, Skoop. You were very close to reporting a real story, but you decided to sneer down your nose instead. Perhaps if you came down out of the ivory tower, you might actually learn something about that sleeping giant because it's way bigger than a little Tea Party missive. When this thing finally breaks, it will be the biggest story in Michigan politics in a long, long time in terms of collaboration between right-left/tea party-establishment/union worker- business owner. There's still time for you to be on the right side of history here kiddo.
Mr. Skubick:
Conservatives, libertarians and tea party members will agree with the Governor when he is right and disagree with him when he is wrong. There are those of us who believe that money from the federal government is not free--it actually comes with attachments. There are also those of us who believe the Gov is doing us great harm by not joining other GOP governors to support the repeal of Obamacare.
We also believe it is the fundamental right of workers to choose whether or not they pay union dues and seek union representation. There are actually 22 of 50 states who have right-to-work laws--are the citizens of these states radicals? It's kind of difficult to argue that union labor mean higher wages anymore, when the new entry level UAW wage is $14 an hour. It's also kind of difficult to deny the 800,000+ new jobs added in Texas (#1 for job growth) since 2009 and the 600,000+ jobs lost in Michigan (#50) in the same time frame.
Governor Snyder has the right idea when it comes to leveling the tax code and moving away from the Granholm model of corporate subsidies for favored industries. He is also right to demand accountability from our educators.
The Governor said he would sign a right-to-work bill should it be brought to his desk. Mr. Snyder is enough of a savvy businessman to know that right-to-work would be a gamechanger in terms of attracting capital to our state.
The Tea Party people I know do read the papers and have a sound understanding of what policies can bring prosperity to our beloved state. Many of us have also read Fredrich Hayek, Henry Hazlitt and Milton Friedman....have you?
What Michigan Tea Party(ies)?
Isn't Scott Hagerstrom the Director of American for Prosperity in charge of Michigan Tea Party stuff? He says he is, and the Mackinac Center people have been out at every one of these events, in some cases 'running things' as a MSU journalist student put it back in February.
The content you describe coming from "Tea Party" sources sounds like AFP agenda and activities (like working for Matty and pushing "right to work"). Step inside a meeting or a rally and talk to these people, and don't forget to ask who is paying the bills too. Not hard, and worth 5 mins of anyone's time too. The veil is thin.
Hypocrites.
Snyder has massively raised taxes on a large swath of Michigan's population--and you teaparty people say you're "pleased"?
You didn't elect anyone. The independents and crossover dems who were stupid enough to believe the lies (and don't they regret it now), elected these clowns.
And that mistake isn't going to be repeated.
So you just keep your mouth shut on the massive tax hike and then go red herring on RTW.
Some of us do have brains, though. So don't expect your idiocy to stick this time.
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