To say things are bad for teachers in Michigan is tragic understatement. Layoff notices are being issued around the state (per union contracts) for the coming school year. The most significant was announced this week: Detroit Public School teachers union members get pink slips Detroit Public Schools administrators have mailed layoff notices to the 5,466 members of the teachers union […]

We had a couple of really nice, sunny days last weekend and the president of the Eclectablog Fan Club enjoyed it, too. Like us, she’s been waiting, not so patiently, for the warm weather to finally arrive. Here she is, ladies and gentlemen: Hara! Her expression says it all, don’tchya think? (Photo by my lovely wife with her iPhone.) I’m […]

Seriously, who are these people and what have you done with my Democrats? These people appear to have a clue about how to effectively deliver their message with a *punch* and succinctly frame the debates of the day. Here’s Congressman Joe Crowley of New York. You won’t want to miss this. Here’s the message in total: LAST FALL THE AMERICAN […]

It’s beginning to become a bit of trend here in Michigan: tea partiers have a rally that is dwarfed by a liberal/Democratic/labor rally. This week was no exception. Yesterday, the biggest protest rally yet by union members on the steps of the State Capitol building drew an estimated 4,500 attendees. Thousands rally at Capitol against Michigan budget, cuts to education, […]

Fer cryin’ out loud, I thought these guys were tax freaks? House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, a guy who steeps himself in tea party rhetoric with every breath and oozes tea from ever pore, is, apparently, so completely out of touch with the everyday lives of average Americans that he doesn’t even know when Tax Day is this year. Leader […]

Senator John Kyl is a liar. This has now been established. Last Friday he said this on the Senate floor: “Everybody goes to clinics, to hospitals, to doctors, and so on. Some people go to Planned Parenthood. But you don’t have to go to Planned Parenthood to get your cholesterol or your blood pressure checked. If you want an abortion, […]

Today I’m announcing a new hashtag: #33seniors. It comes from President Obama’s budget/deficit speech yesterday: [The Republicans have] a vision that says even though America can’t afford to invest in education or clean energy; even though we can’t afford to care for seniors and poor children, we can somehow afford more than $1 trillion in new tax breaks for the […]

First of all, if you haven’t seen it already, this is worth the 44-some minutes to watch: Transcript HERE. President Obama didn’t pull any punches today in his speech on the nation’s budget and our path out of the massive debt and deficit we face today. Fully one-third of our budget is deficit spending yet only 12% of it is […]

File this one in the “Are You Effing KIDDING Me???” file: [D]uring a fourth grade teacher’s lesson on the Civil War, students were separated by race. White students on one side and African American and mixed-race students on the other, who were then offered up for auction… What the hell is the matter with some people??? I’m just sayin’…

Over 80 bus drivers in Detroit got the “flu” today so they could join the We Are the People protest rally happening at the Capitol building in Lansing. Extra delays of 30 minutes or more for city bus riders will be the norm today after more than 80 Detroit Department of Transportation drivers called in sick to join protests in […]

In May of last year, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Environment (MDNRE) denied a permit for the Wolverine Power Supply Cooperative, Inc. to build a new coal-fired power plant in Rogers City, Michigan. Celebrated as a WIN for environmentalists fighting climate-changing greenhouse gas emissions and for those pushing for Michigan to adopt cleaner energy sources, the celebration has […]