They could have asked US…

The New York Times published a rather fawning review of Michigan Governor Rick Snyder on Saturday that suggests he’s a centrist leader who basically isn’t afraid to piss off and on anyone, no matter what their political persuasion. And, while it’s true that there are those on both the right and the left that are less than happy with the Tough Nerd, the NYT piece is noticeably free from some of the essential facts about his governorship.

My friend and fellow Michigander Marcy Wheeler from emptywheel has an elegant fisking of the article. It’s so good, rather than write one of my own, I will simply highlight some of the better parts of her essay, “The Gray Lady Falls Off the Balance Beam”, and point you to it to read the entire thing. Which you absolutely should do.

More after the jump.

Hard to believe we STILL have to fight the War on Women

the Republican War on Women in full swing, including an anti-women Republican Vice Presidential candidate Paul Ryan, Planned Parenthood is launching a Women are Watching battleground state bus tour to educate and mobilize voters in 11 states over 17 days.

The tour with their iconic “Big Pink Bus” lands in Canton, Michigan TOMORROW, Tuesday, August 21, 2012. It’s no surprise. Women are under attack more profoundly in our state than in most others. Republicans in our state legislature are on a course to roll back nearly every gain in women’s reproductive freedoms that we’ve made.

Details after the jump.

This is what happens when you vote Republican

Today, the Michigan Court of Appeals ruled against Democratic legislators and dismissed a case around unconstitutional use by the GOP of the “immediate effect” rule. As has been widely reported, including by Rachel Maddow (video and my previous coverage HERE), Republicans in the House have been implementing “immediate effect” on newly passed bills without a roll call vote. A ridiculous number of bills have been passed with less than two-thirds of the legislators voting for it. However, they go ahead and call for a voice vote and then instantly gavel it as passed, even though they need two-thirds of the lawmakers’ votes for that to happen.

Today, the three members of the Court of Appeals that heard the case voted to send the case back to the lower court with an order that they dismiss it. Their justification is that they can’t tell the Legislature what to do and House rules allow for a voice vote.

Thanks, Thad. Allow us to clean up this huge mess you left behind for you.

When last we left the Thad McCotter MI-11 Trainwreck, Republican Kerry “Reindeer Farmer/9-11 Truther” Bentivolio had $300,000 dumped into his pocket by a Ron Paul SuperPAC, while the Michigan GOP desperately tried to save face (and the House seat) by scrambling to run former state Senator Nancy Cassis as a write-in candidate.

Meanwhile, on the Democratic side, Dr. Syed Taj, Canton Township Trustee, former head of medicine at Oakwood hospital and all around good egg, could nary believe his good fortune by seeing his campaign–which was already solidly run and raising some decent money ($200K in the spring quarter)–suddenly go from a longshot against 5-term incumbent McCotter to reasonable odds (if still an underdog) in an unexpectedly open, and very confusing seat.

Well, there have been three major developments since then.

You’ll find them and more after the jump.

You gotta admit, the dude’s got chutzpah

As I wrote about yesterday, disgraced former Republican Congressman Thad McCotter has now been found to have fraudulently falsified nominating petitions not only this year but in 2010, as well. The Detroit Free Press now reveals that the fraud goes back EIGHT YEARS when McCotter filed photocopied and cut-and-paste copied signatures in 2008, too. In fact, if the two-year statute of limitations hadn’t run out, McCotter could be looking at jail time.

Details after the jump.

A long history of corruption

As Michigan Republicans work to suppress voting rights in our state under the guise of “election reform”, one of their own, disgraced former Congressman Thad McCotter, has had long history of election fraud. After being busted for submitting fraudulent nominating petitions THIS year, MIRS news service is now reporting that he did the same in 2010.

Details after the jump.

When you can’t win on the issues, you have to cheat

Earlier this year, Republican Secretary of State Ruth Johnson decided to add a citizenship checkbox to the voter registration slip you have to fill out to vote. This entirely unnecessary step was seen by many as just one more attempt to freak out voters and dissuade them from voting. Governor Rick Snyder vetoed the legislation that required it but the checkbox was still on the slips, creating mass confusion.

Just what the Republicans wanted.

That and more including the frisking of voters in Detroit by a man wearing fatigues after the jump.

“He’s dead, Jim…”

Earlier today, I wrote about how Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette is trying to resurrect the Zombie Emergency Financial Manager Law, PA72. I showed how he’s using circuitous logic to arrive at that conclusion. But, it’s pretzel logic at it finest.

He says first that MCL 8.4, which prevents the resurrection of a dead law, doesn’t apply because PA4 is only suspended, not repealed. Therefore, it’s still on the books and MCL 8.4 doesn’t prevent them from resurrecting PA72.

Then he says that, because PA4 is gone, its repeal of PA72 doesn’t exist so it is able to rise from the dead to walk the earth among the living.

I put together this easy-to-follow flowchart to help out AG Schuette who seems to lack the ability to grasp simple, common sense concepts. It’s so basic that even Mr. Schuette should be able to wrap his simple mind around it.

(Psst! It’s after the jump.)

Dude, you are NO Democrat

In my piece last week about fake Democrats, non-Democrats running as Democrats in Michigan, I declined to characterize Cody Bailey as a fake Democrat. However, the more I have dug into his campaign in Michigan’s 11th State House District, the more I have become convinced that he is, indeed, a solid Republican, running as a Democrat in the 11th District simply because a Democrat is more likely to win. In my opinion, the clear choice for progressives in that district is his opponent David Knezek.

My justification for this change after the jump.

Let’s take a closer look at this, shall we?

By now, most Michiganders know about the revelation that Michigan House Speaker Jase Bolger engaged in monumental election fraud. Although the Republicans are hoping beyond hope that the voters in this state will forget all about the fraud and that the issue will die before they return to work in mid-August, many of us are determined to ensure that this decidedly does NOT happen. An assortment of outlets including Eclectablog and Tony Trupiano of the First Shift with Tony Trupiano radio show are keeping the issue very much alive.

Joining that effort is Progress Michigan and We Are The People Michigan. This week, they filed a Freedom of Information Act request for more information on the investigation of Bolger and Rep. Roy Schmidt conducted by the Michigan State Police.

Help a bloggah out?

It has come to my attention that there are a number of Republicans running as fake Democrats across the state. I’m not talking about conservadems or Blue Dog Democrats, conservative Democrats that are “Democrats in Name Only” (DINOs.) I’m talking about dyed-in-the-wool Republicans pretending to be Democrats.

I already have identified a small handful but I need your help finding the rest. I want to publish this piece no later than Wednesday so time is of the essence. I need proof that these people are, in fact, Republicans. It could be information from their website, emails they’ve sent, Facebook page screenshots. Whatever you have, I’m asking you to send it along.

This post is going to be a bit of a reverse-voters guide; an attempt to identify as many of these liars as possible and expose them for who they are so that people don’t accidentally vote for them, particularly in next week’s primary.

So, if you know of a fake Dem in Michigan, I’d like to hear from you. You can contact me by clicking HERE.

Thanks.

– Chris