Shri Thanedar, Congresswoman Debbie Dingell, Bill Cobbs, Gretchen Whitmer, and Abdul El-Sayed, photo by Anne C. Savage This past weekend, the Washtenaw County Democratic Party hosted a gubernatorial forum for the top four candidates for governor in the 2018 election cycle: Bill Cobbs, Abdul El-Sayed, Shri Thanedar, and Gretchen Whitmer. The event was so popular that we had to stop […]

I have largely avoided writing about Michigan’s gubernatorial this cycle. We interviewed both Gretchen Whitmer and Abdul El-Sayed on The Sit and Spin Room podcast early on but I have been watching the primary unfold without saying much. Partly because it’s so early and partly because I haven’t been “wowed” by any of the campaigns. However, this week, the campaign […]

In his groundbreaking novel Infinite Jest, David Foster Wallace (R.I.P.) extrapolated the concept of naming stadiums and arenas after their corporate sponsors to the annual calendar. He called “Subsidized Time“: In the book’s future, advertising’s relentless search for new markets has led to a world where, by O.N.A.N. dictate, years are referred to by the name of their corporate sponsor. […]

It doesn’t take much digging to understand why top officials at Michigan State University seem to be so willfully ignorant of the sexual violence being perpetrated against its students. All you have to do is look at the rhetoric coming from its Board of Trustees and a major donor. Joel Ferguson, the Vice Chair of the Board of Trustees made […]

Over the past week, 159 women gave victim impact statements during the sentencing hearing of the notorious serial rapist, Larry Nassar. The 159 women represent just those who volunteered to come forward. Given this, it’s not hard to fathom that Nassar sexually assaulted over 200 women over the past twenty years. He did this when most of them were young […]

When Republicans in Congress passed the Trump Tax Scam, one of the things they did was to raise taxes on citizens at the state level. In Michigan, that increase in taxes amounts to $1.5 BILLION, something even Republicans have been forced to admit. Democrats, who have been trying to enact an increase in the personal tax exemption for years, today […]

Last year in a rare exhibition of bipartisanship, the Michigan state senate voted unanimously and the House voted 89-11 to pass a new rule involving the taxation of a purchased vehicle when someone trades in another vehicle in the transaction. Under a 2013 law, buyers initially could exempt the value of the trade-in vehicle up to $2,000 from the sales […]

The Trump Tax scam is likely to result in a fair number of us seeing a tiny bit more money in our paychecks starting next month. It is, of course, a scam. You shouldn’t get used to the extra funds because some time in the next 8-10 years, they’ll go away. The extra money that the über wealthy are going […]

There’s no question that Donald Trump is working around the clock when he’s not golfing at one of his many golf clubs using millions of our tax dollars to dismantle our country’s democracy, our institutions, and the laws and policies we have in place to protect ALL Americans, not just those at the top of the economic food chain. On […]

The following essay is by Michael Andrade, a friend who sent it to my wife as a Facebook message. It was powerful enough that she read it to me and I thought it was a perfect piece to run today on Martin Luther King Day, particularly as we approach the one year anniversary of Donald Trump taking office as the […]

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. quote on the King monument in Washington, D.C. Photo by Chris Savage. Many of us will celebrate Martin Luther King Day by visiting a museum, participating in a community volunteer event, or by watch a civil rights documentary. These are all, of course, perfectly appropriate ways to celebrate the life of our country’s preeminent civil […]