Just like with Obamacare, the key is playing offense The Environmental Protection Agency is going to release rules next week limiting the amount of carbon dioxide pollution that can be released from power plants. Amidst a lot of worry about the impact this will have on Democrats in an off-year election, apparently the optimistic take on this among Washington Democratic […]

This week politicians and politicos from around the state gather on Mackinac Island for the Mackinac Policy Conference. This morning, attendees will receive a copy of the newspaper “The Mackinac Island Tipsheet”, a parody publication published by the Michigan Democratic Party. The Tipsheet has articles with titles like, “Rick Snyder’s Economy Not Working”, “Wall Street Execs, Political Cronies Cash In […]

After the Republican-led House Government Operations Committee passed a terrible substitute to S.B. 934 that only raise the minimum wage to an insulting $8.50/hour and strips out indexing the minimum wage to inflation, the full House passed a version (pdf) that is much closer to the original bill passed by the Senate this afternoon on a 76-34 vote. Shortly thereafter, […]

NOTE: this story has been updated HERE. The Republican-led House Government Operations Committee passed a substitute to S.B. 934 that reduces the final minimum wage to $8.50/hour and strips out indexing the minimum wage to inflation, ensuring that, if it is passed, workers will not keep up with the shrinking value of the dollars they earn. $8.50/hour means that full-time […]

If you want to know just how extreme Republicans in Jackson, Michigan are, the fact that they chose Allen B. West as the keynote speaker for Lincoln Day fundraising dinner last week tells you pretty much everything you need to know. Besides being one of the most intentionally outrageous tea partiers in the country, West recently attacked the patriotism of […]

So what happens to the 259,000 Michiganders whose insurance you want to void, Terri Lynn Land? The GOP Obamacare repeal fantasy is falling apart and the media seems content to let Republicans pretend it still exists. Marking the the four-anniversary of the Affordable Care Act becoming law in March, GOP candidate for U.S. Senate in Michigan reiterated her pledge to […]

Enjoy a great evening on June 20 to benefit a great organization. MICHUHCAN has been championing health care justice in Michigan since long before the Affordable Care Act (ACA) became law. There’s still plenty of work to be done, and MICHUHCAN needs your support. Michigan Universal Health Care Access Network (MICHUHCAN) is a state-wide network that promotes comprehensive health care […]

Efforts by the Koch brothers front group Americans for Prosperity to scuttle the Detroit bankruptcy settlement were shot down in flames as the state legislature overwhelmingly voted yesterday to contribute $194.8 million toward the deal. This was the amount needed to ensure that the deal did not collapse and which saves the Detroit Institute of Arts’ priceless art collection while […]

Always nice to see Republicans take a break from voting against veterans funding to criticize the VA There’s no doubt that reports that veterans are dying while waiting for adequate care from VA hospitals is a genuine scandal. But it’s a complex scandal that’s decades in the making. It’s a scandal in which Republican rhetoric doesn’t match their voting record. […]

This family is brought to you by Loving v. Virginia, Windsor v. United States & now Whitewood v. Wood #DecisionDayPA pic.twitter.com/bIgQ8TJYUo — Sarah A. Newman (@westenismydog) May 20, 2014 In their decisions striking down same-sex marriage bans, judges have been trying to outdo each other with definitive statements calling the injustice that has been done LGBT couples, and America’s sense […]

Detroit Bulk Storage has been denied a permit by the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) to store petcoke on the banks of the Detroit River. As you may recall, they were storing giant piles of the toxic byproduct of tar sands oil refining by Koch Carbon, an energy company owned by the billionaire Koch brothers. Last year, the piles were […]