Grand Rapids Pundit

Contortionist Logic and Proposal 2

Posted by: GRPundit on Monday, 13th Nov, 2006

An article from the Daily Californian today has some more detail on the lawsuit(s) filed to try and stop the adoption of the anti-racism Proposal 2, which was passed by a 58% to 42% margin last week. We don’t even know what to call the lack of logic detailed in the article, but here are a couple of telling quotes:

“For minority students on these campuses without affirmative action, it’s a degrading experience and that cannot be a reality for any more students,”

What? In other words, minority students who do not receive preferential treatment just because of the color of their skin are somehow feeling degraded? Do they understand the contortion of logic it requires for that to make sense? The person who is quoted is an alum of the University of Berkeley and someone who has joined the lawsuit. She is implicitly stating that minorities are incapable of succeeding without preferential treatment, and that by not receiving that preferential treatment, they are humiliated. That is racism!

What we’re seeing here is the true color of those who have been supporting affirmative action. They are the latent racists because it is clear that they do not think minorities can succeed without preferential treatment. They want people treated differently, based solely on their skin color - a little bit of DNA.

Another gem of lunacy:

“Prohibiting affirmative action in Michigan means that people all over this country are subjected to discrimination that comes into play.”

That’s according to Luke Massey, a co-chair of By Any Means Necessary (BAMN), the violent and racist organization which is trying to block the implementation of Proposal 2. So ending affirmative action, which is in itself a form of racism and discrimination, results in discrimination? Proposal 2 makes it illegal to engage in race discrimination! What planet do these people come from? Do they have a grasp of the meaning of words in the English language?

Nevertheless, these lawsuits will fail because they always have in other states. They are just trying to save their old ways of set-asides and preferential treatment. We know that whenever the status-quo is threatened, we’ll be subjected to threats of doom and a falling sky by those who benefited from such a system. But, it’s no more. We finally have a color blind government in Michigan.

Who Paid for Proposal 5? You Did!

Posted by: GRPundit on Friday, 10th Nov, 2006

We did some reseach on who backed Proposal 5 and, to our complete and utter lack of surprise, the far majority of the money came from the National Education Association, aka, the teachers union. How much? $3.4 million. If you’re a teacher, I hope you rest well knowing that so much of your dues money was wasted.

The Michigan Education Association contributed $496,000. All told, the teachers union funded Proposal 5 to the tune of about $4 million. That’s out of about $4.1 million total that was raised. There is no question as to who wanted this proposal to pass and who it would benefit.

But another interesting side note is how two publically-funded organizations, the Michigan Association of School Boards and the Middle Cities Education Association also contributed money. Both these organizations charge dues to school boards across the state. In other words, the taxpayer dollars we contribute to pay for schools are then paid to these two organizations as “dues,” and then those dollars were spent to back a proposal to extract even more dollars from us. Our own tax money was used against us. This should be criminal.

GR Pundit Election Wrap-Up

Posted by: GRPundit on Thursday, 9th Nov, 2006

GR Pundit would like to express contentment with the outcome of the elections in Michigan this year. We have been in favor in a split government, that’s why we weren’t very big fans of a DeVos election. The re-election of Jennifer Granholm will ensure that continued split, with the addition of a Democrat-controlled State House. We just hope that the legislature and governor can get together and see the light about really turning Michigan around. Pet economic development plans won’t work - and when government picks economic winners and losers, we all lose. It’s time to make Michigan friendly to all businesses, not just a few that the governor likes.

As for the proposals, we are very pleased about how they turned out.

Proposal 1 - Ensuring that state park funds are actually spent on state parks - Passed

Proposal 2 - Banning racist hiring, admissions, and contracting practices by any unit of government in Michigan - Passed

Proposal 3 - Allowing morning doves to be hunted - Failed

Proposal 4 - Banning eminiment domain for economic development purposes - Passed

Proposal 5 - Setting up mandatory funding levels for K-16 education - Failed

We were most worried about Proposal 5 passing because it would have caused the most economic damage and would have done nothing but protect the bloated public education bureacuracy and continue the lack of accountability of education in Michigan. Now it’s time to lift the cap on charter schools - which cost less than traditional public schools and do a better job. Parents desperately want and need the choice.

Proposal 2, which we were also hopeful would pass, did so handily. Michigan, and any unit of government in Michgian, will no longer be able to engage in racist hiring, admissions, and contracting practices. We now have true equality in Michigan. Of course, groups such as By Any Mean Necessay (BAMN) have filed lawsuits trying to overturn the passage of Proposal 2. This just shows their complete contempt for the will of the people. In addition, their lawsuit invokes the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment in trying to argue that creating a color-blind government somehow creates unequal treatment.

Let the gnashing of teeth begin.

End State-Sponsored Racism - Vote YES on Michigan’s Proposal 2

Posted by: GRPundit on Sunday, 5th Nov, 2006

Proposal 2 (the Michigan Civil Rights Iniative), which will be on the ballot next week, will end racist hiring, contracting, and admissions practices in Michigan if it passes. In short, it will end all state-sponsored racism and sexism. Equal means equal, so we’re voting YES on 2!

Don’t Bankrupt Michigan - Vote NO on Proposal 5

Posted by: GRPundit on Sunday, 5th Nov, 2006

Proposal five, which will be on Michigan’s ballot on Tuesday, is a union-sponsored and funded campaign to dramatically boost funding for teacher pensions. The proposal basically creates a madatory annual increase for school funding, based on the rate of inflation. However, what the proposal’s backers don’t tell you is that the majority of this money ($700 million in the first year alone) will go to teacher pensions, not the classroom. That money will either have to come from cutting other government services or raising taxes, because there certainly isn’t that much extra money in the state’s general fund. Voting yes on five does nothing more than line the pockets of the teacher’s union - none of the money is mandated to go to the calssroom. That’s why at GR Pundit, we’re voting NO on Proposal 5.

Granholm Campaign has Jumped the Shark

Posted by: GRPundit on Thursday, 12th Oct, 2006

It’s official, the Granholm campaign has jumped the shark. In their desperation to find one thing that Amway manufactures in China, they’ve found it - tissues.

According to the Detroit News, the Chairman of the Michigan Democratic Party, Mark Brewer, says that he is in possession of a packet of facial tissue from Amway, manufactured in China. The only problem is that it was manufactured in 1989. That’s the best they can do.

The governor’s campaign is in serious trouble if this is all they can come up with to counter DeVos’ campaign. It seems as though the issues aren’t really part of the discussion. Both candidates need to answer these questions:

Granholm - What have you done for the last four years? No one we ask seems to know.

DeVos - What will you do that’s better?

So far, even though we’re not DeVos fans, DeVos seems to be answering the necessary questions better than the governor.

DeVos: Intelligent Design is a "viable alternative theory."

Posted by: GRPundit on Thursday, 21st Sep, 2006

The pandering has begun in the Michigan gubernatorial race. Dick DeVos, as reported in the Detroit News, has stated that he thinks schools should have the choice of teaching Intelligent Design (creationism) as an alternative to evolution.

Simply giving schools the choice, it could be argued, isn’t a bad thing. After all, 99.999% of science teachers would ignore Intelligent Design for what it is, a mess of ludicrous “theories,” with no scientific backing whatsoever. However, he divulges his personal view, one based on ignorance.

From the article:

“I would like to see the ideas of intelligent design that many scientists are now suggesting is a very viable alternative theory,” DeVos told the Associated Press during a taped telephone interview on education. “That theory and others that would be considered credible would expose our students to more ideas, not
less.”

Oh boy. The fact that no serious scientist with any credibility considers ID as “very viable” or even slightly viable not withstanding, advocating the teaching of anything non-scientific in science class is reckless and ignorant.

May we suggest to the possible Governor DeVos, in addition to Intelligent Design, that the theory of the Flying Spaghetti Monster also be taught in the classrooms? After all, who determines what is credible when it comes to pure conjecture?

Time to Repeal SBT

Posted by: GRPundit on Wednesday, 1st Mar, 2006

L. Brooks Patterson, the executive of Oakland County, announced during his state of the county speech last month that he was initiating a fundraising drive to get a repeal of the Single Business Tax on the ballot in November.

It was announced today that he had raised enough money to begin the drive. The Detroit News has an article on it here. A web site on the ballot initiative has been set up at www.RepealSBT.com.

This is great news. The SBT is the most onerous business tax in the nation. It is one reason why businesses will not locate here. The tax needs to be repealed, with nothing to replace it, in order to get businesses looking at our state again. We have the worst economy in the nation and one-off tax breaks and state speculative investments won’t fix this long term, structural problem. It is one step in the direction of making Michigan attractive to business again.