Michigan Senate and the Friday Night (Environmental) Massacre

This just arrived from the Sierra Club of Michigan. The Repubs seem bent on wrecking the environment just as they wrecked Michigan’s economy under Engler. If you live in Senator Cropsey’s district (which includes Isabella County), let him know this is making Michigan a laughing stock in this era of environmental crisis. 

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For more than a year, a bi-partisan group of lawmakers in the House worked to develop legislation to dramatically change energy policy in Michigan. Some elements of the package were good, some were bad. But on balance, most agreed that the House bills would move Michigan forward by requiring investment in the cheapest forms of energy.

The House package wasn’t perfect, but it was a step in the right direction. The bills contained a modest 1% Energy Efficiency savings standard per year, and a requirement that utilities provide 10% renewable energy by 2015 (a combined standard of 15.85% by 2015). Taken together, these policies would provide Michigan with affordable energy and take the first critical steps toward addressing global warming, while creating good-paying jobs.

Although Senate Republicans talk about clean energy and protecting ratepayers, their votes on Friday told a far different story. During the late night Massacre, they rammed through a completely irrelevant package of energy bills, which includes expensive and polluting coal as a renewable resource (no kidding!) and eliminated anything that could be construed as clean energy.

Under the Senate energy bills, Michigan will get more coal-fired power plants, skyrocketing energy costs, more pollution, more global warming, and few (if any) new jobs. Their combined standard for renewable energy and energy efficiency is 7% (Michigan already has almost 5%!) In short, the Senate energy bills are a joke. Whats even more appalling is that no one asked them to change the House bills!

The House bills passed their version of the energy bills with strong bi-partisan support and had the blessing of virtually every major interest group. There was no reason for the Senate to muck up the package. If they can’t improve the House bills, they should pass them intact, so that Michigan doesn’t end up a national laughing stock. 

Its time to let Senate Republicans know that they should lead, follow or get out of the way. Please send an email Senator Cropsey letting him know he got it wrong and needs to try again!

His contact information is: 

senacropsey@senate.michigan.gov, 

phone: 866-305-2133 

fax: (517) 373-8661

When is protecting our troops “anti-troop?”

Here is a question for you: if a member of your family was about to be sent to Iraq, wouldn’t you want him or her to have the best available equipment? Of course you would. This is why Representative Jack Murtha (who is a Vietnam veteran) is pushing a plan in Congress that prohibits President Bush from sending more of our sons and daughters to Iraq if they are not well-equipped.

Strangely, the Republicans in Congress are calling Murtha’s plan “anti-troop.” Anti-troop? Hmmm. By this reasoning, putting our children in car seats to protect them shows that we are anti-automobile. Or inoculating them against childhood diseases means we are anti-God (after all, we might be interfering with God’s will).

Either the Republicans have lost their ability to reason, or they value ideology over the lives of our sons and daughters. You might call Representative Dave Camp (his toll free numbers is: 1-800-342-2455) and ask him what he values most: the lives of our troops or sticking with the President‘s failed policy.

(This post also appears on www.therealdavecamp.blogspot.com)

No Misspelling Left Behind

The consequences of inadequate education funding will be seen for decades.

Debate Over Bush’s “Surge”

This is, as Yogi Berra said, "This is like deja vu all over again." Writing as a Vietnam vet, what is going on in Iraq bears an uncanny resemblance to the fall of Saigon. Bush wants to send in more troops to prop up the puppet government, but can’t say how he will tell if the surge succeeded or not. I suppose it will succeed because he will say that it has. Maybe he can land on that carrier again and announce “Mission Accomplished” one more time.

When I was in Vietnam, my buddies and I often said that Nixon could end the war by saying that he had won, then just leaving the country. He more or less did indeed do this a few years later, during which time a few thousand American lives and untold Vietnamese lives were lost. Bush is in the same position in Iraq.

What nobody seems to be talking about is where he plans to get the 21,000 additional troops. All branches of the military–excepting the Air Force and Navy perhaps–are already stretched to the breaking point. There are very few new bodies to be had. Soreserves are being put on alert, some after having just returned home after tours of duty that were extended by months or years. There are reports of troops in Afghanistan having their tours involuntarily extended and being told that they will be part of the surge in Iraq.

All of this for what reason? Bush will get his “surge,” the situation will remain as it currently is, or more likely worsen, and then what? Because neither he nor his Republican lads in Congress have any clear plans, they drag out the tried and true charges of lack of patriotism, “if we don’t fight them there, we’ll be fighting them here” (which is one of my favorites), and the laughable concern that we will lose credibility with our allies and the nations of the world. As if the administration and Republicans are not already the laughing stock of the world.

What about a failed state in the Middle East? The Republicans like to shake that skeleton. The nation of Iraq was a construct of the British after WW I, and like every other construct, it needed a ruthless dictator to hold it together. Enter Saddam Hussein. What country buttressed Hussein's power for decades? The U.S. What has happened to every other nation constructed of warring tribes who are forced to live together by a foreign military? They fall apart. So there is already a failed state in the Middle East: Iraq. Who caused it to fail? All the presidents who supplied the dictators with their military power-base. George II is not bright enough to know that by removing the dictator who held the country together was tantamount to pulling the central thread from the garment. He's been watching Iraq unravel ever since, and our valiant troops have paid the price for his arrogant stupidity.

For the U.S., the concern should be how to spare any more American casualties and yet leave some shred of hope for the weak central government, but historically, puppet governments rarely have lasted once the U.S. has left unless the U.S. left the country in the hands of a military dictatorship (this is what happened at the beginning of the 20th century in the Dominican Republic, Cuba, and Haiti). There is no strong Iraqi military because the Bush folk got rid of the generals and officers who controlled Hussein's military because they were Bathists. That was one of the first blunders they made. But I digress.

So will Bush get his “surge?” Probably. Will it make any difference in the level of violence or make the Iraqi government more capable of surviving after we leave? Probably not. If the U.S. withdraws our troops, will the government collapse? Of course. Will the government collapse if we withdraw quickly? Yes. Will it collapse if we withdraw slowly? Yes.

Fast or slow, the troops must come home. The sooner, the better.

Note to Land, Cox, and Camp: Michigan is watching

The Michigan Democratic Party has unveiled a newly expanded GOP Watch section of its website - a treasure trove for anyone looking for dirt on Secretary of State Terri Lynn Land, Attorney General Mike Cox, Congressman Dave Camp, and the 2008 Republican presidential candidates.

Among the highlights: Camp voted against expanding stem cell research, raising the federal minimum wage, and fixing Medicare and our energy policy. Michiganders' records are at risk of being stolen due to Land. And the unethical Cox won't protect consumers.

With both Land and Cox considered potential 2010 gubernatorial contenders, it will be interesting to see what else the MDP can dig up on them.