Topic: Presidential Campaign 2008
Presidential Primaries: Don't Forget Michigan! Iowa and New Hampshire are getting the media attention and candidate visits. The two major parties are more concerned about keeping power than attending the needs of Michigan citizens.by Bob Nightingale
(libertarian)
Saturday, November 24, 2007
With the approval ratings of both the White House and the Congress in the toilet, it may be time to figure out a better way to elect our presidents and vice presidents. The two-party system encourages apathy among most voters until November 2008. It's a rotten system. It's not in the Constitution. It should be scrapped, in favor of something more representative of ALL the states. The primaries don't even give us a choice about the Vice President. The parties don't trust the people to choose their president.
I have nothing against the fine folks in Iowa and New Hampshire. But as a resident of Michigan, I'm proud that our governor and legislature moved up this State's primary to January 15. This action is also supported by the Democratic and Republican parties in Michigan. Although we incurred the wrath of both major national parties, it was worth it. Our issues are dire and are representative of all that is hurting the nation. Maybe we'll get attention for that one week after New Hampshire gets its say.
(If you want a scorecard of which states will have their primaries when, how many delegates, etc., bookmark www.TheGreenPapers.com. Otherwise, I would have had to put a dozen links below to that site.)
Unfortunately, most of the country isn't going to hear about Michigan's problems. The major parties don't want you to. In order to keep control of the Primary process, each party has taken steps to penalize any state that moves up its primary before February 5th. Even New Hampshire is going to be hit. Of the Republican Party's 2,380 delegates, Michigan can only send 30 delegates now instead of 60 before the date change. New Hampshire's delegate count was reduced from 24 from 12. South Carolina, Wyoming, and Florida have also lost half their delegates.
On the Democratic Party side, Michigan has 156 of the 4,207 delegates. So far the national party hasn't penalized the state yet, but has threatened to strip about 128. Four presidential candidates--Biden, Edwards, Obama, and Richardson--have withdrawn. Senator Clinton's pledge of not campaigning in Michigan, nor spending money in the state, but remaining on the ballot, is about as sincere as my kids' pledge to give up seaweed for Lent. Senator Levin (who will be running for reelection in 2008) was honorable and called the action against Michigan, "a gun to the head" in a letter of rebuke to the DNC. Senator Stabenow took the easy route by endorsing Senator Clinton. Pass the seaweed.
Without Edwards and Obama on the ballot, you might as well just hand those remaining delegates to the New York Senator. She doesn't have to campaign with her own money. The national media is doing it for her. The remaining candidates on the ballot--Dodd, Gravel and Kucinich--don't even get out of the margin of error of 4.9% in a recent EPIC-MRA poll. The Michigan Democratic Primary will be more of a contest for the US Senator, district US House members, and local officials. The Democrats might be better off switching to the Republic side for this primary, if they are more interested in having a say in the presidential race. It really depends if your county issues are more important than the next President.
In that same poll, it's a close race for the Republicans. Giuliani and Romney are virtually a tie at 28% and 25%, respectively. Thompson and McCain are battling for third at about 12%. From September 1st to now, Huckabee has gained from 3% to 9%. The rest are in the margin of error. Mitt Romney's father George W. Romney was Governor of Michigan from 1963 to 1969. George Romney was a presidential hopeful in 1968, but lost to Richard Nixon. Giuliani is probably high in the poll numbers from being Mr. 911. I hope to see the Republicans here five minutes after the New Hampshire polls close.
So what do I think the Michigan voters have on their mind?
Unemployment. Michigan's unemployment rate is now 7.7%. Of the seasonally adjusted 4.2 million payroll jobs, Michigan has lost 75,000 in the last 12 months. Obama and Edwards both said they were friends of labor in the Democratic Debate held in Soldier Field in Chicago last August. The labor statistics roster for unemployment is the map of Michigan. The cities with the highest unemployment rates are also those that manufacture cars and car parts. The Democratic candidates have placed party loyalty over the needs of union members in places of the highest unemployment, like Flint (8.3%), Detroit (7.7%), Jackson (7.7%), Muskegon (7.3%), Saginaw (7.1%), Battle Creek (6.8%), Bay City (6.7%), and the Niles-Benton Harbor area (6.4%), and Monroe (6.3%), to name afew. After the recent UAW deal with Chrysler, some jobs had to be cut to save the company, again. Shipping our jobs overseas with NAFTA and WTO didn't help us. They need to face us on these issues, at least.
Debt and Taxes. The State of Michigan is broke. Unlike the federal government, Michigan can't print its own money. It needs to borrow. The current budget deficit is approaching $920 million dollars. Its debt is about $1.6 billion. The state Republicans and Democrats are deeply split on the solution. Republican want to hold down taxes and the Democrats want to save essential services. I think the solution will be somewhere in between. I got big tax increases by the state and the county this year. Although I bought a house last year and it looks fairly calculated, I'm not happy about it. The state debt problem brings focus to the federal debt, at $9 trillion total and a budget deficit of $800 billion per year. I don't like it when politicians play Santa Claus with my taxes. At least when I voted for the county drain, I can see that my back yard won't get flooded as often. There's got to be a lot of optional spending that needs to go. In the short term, it's going to affect funding for education, road maintenance and state police pay.
The War in Iraq. You've got different ways of handling that war, depending on who the president will be. Paul, Kucinich, and Gravel want the troops out now. Biden and Obama have redeployment plans of 12 and 16 months, provided that the situation improves. The rest say we may be there for a very long time. We have some candidates advocating a nuclear strike in Iran--even without proof of a single nuclear missile! These policy issues will decide if our kids get drafted or if WWIII starts. It isn't strictly a Michigan issue. But escalating the war may provide more manufacturing jobs. During WWII, car manufactures were ordered to build airplanes and tanks. I'd rather keep the production mainly civilian. The next president needs to define and make happen "Mission Accomplished."
Illegal Immigration. I had trouble finding exactly the number of illegal immigrants in Michigan. The state's population is about 10 million. Statemaster.com puts Michigan's illegal immigrant count at 70,000 and the Federation for American Immigration Reform estimates it closer to 200,000. In order for a farmer to stay in business, he needs a reliable, cost-effective labor pool. Migrant shacks are part of the landscape in any farming community here. It's the federal government's failure to streamline the bureaucracy and secure the border. A zero tolerance policy will mean bankrupt farmers. Open borders will mean no security and no protection of jobs for native-born Americans. Whoever the next president will be, he or she will have to enforce the laws and find a permanent solution. In the mean-time, the state is on its own.
Healthcare. With Michigan being broke, a state-based single payer solution isn't possible because you can't get blood out of a turnip. The federal government may help or hinder the work that is already done locally, which steps on Tenth Amendment issues. Socialized Medicine may be an evil term for the President, but we already have various forms with Medicaid, Medicare, and Veterans benefits. This issue is very complex. Done wrong, it could become very expensive. The quality of care and patient choices could decrease. The proposals are all over the map. Unfunded mandates by Washington, like No Child Left Behind, could push the state closer to bankruptcy. The automakers had to set up a new way to pay for retiree health benefits.
Environment. Although Global Warming is getting a lot of press, what's more specific to Michigan is natural resource management. It's tourism! We want people to spend their vacations here. We want clean air and water, and highway rubbish collections. We want people to drive their big SUV's (made in Michigan!), to Michigan to enjoy the lake sports, skiing, fishing, hunting, camping and whatever floats your boat, literally.
Energy. The CAFE fuel standards will probably have a negative impact on Michigan's manufacturing business. Washington shouldn't tell us what to manufacture. The consumers will do that. We have engineers and line workers who make really good cars and trucks. It's a supply and demand issue. Although some candidates are switching to Hybrids, they won't drive them in Michigan. We got six inches of snow the last 48 hours. A golf cart isn't going to get my wife to work. Making war with oil producing nations seems like a sure way to drive the price up, eliminate supply, and make the dollar worthless. I want to hear about energy programs that don't include the phrase "billions of tax dollars".
Race Relations And Human Rights. I was too young to remember the martial law imposed in Detroit during the 60s. The race riot that burned five house in Benton Harbor in June 2003 is still fresh to those who live there. Today the Arab population in Detroit is significant. Profiling might be an effective tool for investing crimes, but it paints a very wide stroke and ignores the assumed innocence of the individual. Law enforcement at every level needs to back up its claim with proof. I've written about the plight of Ibrahim Parlak on my blog. How we treat foreigners and those accused of crimes really says a lot about us as Americans. We need a president who will protect the rights of all Americans, as well as foreign nationals. It's a bad sign when a presidential candidate doesn't know what torture is.
I'm going to stop for now. Unless there is proportional representation, the views of the people aren't represented. Unless the primaries are held all on the same day, states like Michigan are ignored. Michigan got penalized when it tried to assert itself.
George Washington, the only president not to belong to a political party, warned in his Farewell Address of 1796 of the "baneful effect" of parties in a freely elected government. What would he think of a country that eliminates choice by the people to only one candidate per each of two powerful, permanent political parties?
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