Michigan protesters and Detroit’s new unelected czar Kevyn Orr. Nice democracy while it lasted.
Do you want to know why I worry far, far, far, far less about the influence of unions in politics than about anti-union actions? It’s because I don’t want California to go the way of Michigan. Michigan has peeled back the mask and now we get to look at the full anti-union agenda in its natural reptilian form. It turns out that it does not give a damn about democracy, period. From “EclectaBlog,” a progressive Michigan blog, from which I’ve snagged a full half of the article with only implicit permission (click the link to see more):
Today Michigan becomes 24th Right to Work state, Emergency Financial Managers become Emergency Managers
The fight to reclaim our state in 2014 starts TODAY
Today Michigan, the birthplace of the labor movement, becomes the 24th Right to Work state in the USA. It’s also the day that PA 436, the Emergency Manager law Republicans passed to thwart the wishes of Michigan voters, goes into effect. PA 436 transforms all Emergency Financial Managers to Emergency Managers (EMs), giving them powers above and beyond financial matters as they are the sole rulers of the schools and municipalities over which they have complete power.
Right to Work is being challenged by at least three different lawsuits. The Rev. Al Sharpton will join Rev. Charles Williams, President of the Detroit National Action Network (NAN), and other local community leaders to file a lawsuit in federal court in Detroit. A silent vigil is planned at the State Capitol building, as well.
The switch from Emergency Financial Managers to Financial Managers is being heralded in by action by Roy Roberts, the EM for Detroit Public Schools (DPS). He has announced that he will be firing DPS superintendent, John Telford.
Roy Roberts, the state appointee who runs the Detroit Public Schools, announced in a letter dated today that he will fire the superintendent that the school board hired and reverse decisions the board made since it acquired academic powers in August. {…}
Lamar Lemmons, the board president, said Wednesday that he was not surprised at Roberts’ first actions under the new law.
“We are essentially spectators,” he said of the board.
This action is a key component of PA 436. It allows the EM to assume control over academic decisions. In other words, a man with no experience or training will be running academic programs and usurping the power of the elected officials. Here’s a bit from his biography:
Roberts, former Managing Director at Reliant Equity Investors, has decades of managerial, financial and organizational experience, having served as the highest-ranking African-American executive in the U.S. automobile industry as Group Vice President for North American Vehicle Sales, Service and Marketing of General Motors Corporation (GM). He also served as Vice President and General Manager in charge of Field Sales, Service and Parts for the Vehicle Sales, Service and Marketing Group of General Motors Corporation.
He’s a finance and marketing guy. Nothing in his resume qualifies him to run academic programming in the DPS.
It’s a bellwether day for us in Michigan. It also marks Day One of the battle to reclaim our state from the misguided, drunk-with-power ideologues that are working so hard to crush unions, destroy our public school system, set women’s rights back decades and to privatize anything not nailed down to for-profit businesses that bankroll their campaigns.
If you aren’t actively engaged in replacing these Republicans in 2014, you should be seriously considering how you can get involved NOW. Everything we do between now and November 4th, 2014 should be aimed at that single goal. Get involved.
They got rid of elected officials and replaced them with what Republicans in other circumstances have liked to call “unelected czars.” Detroit’s schools are now in the hands of a car salesman. Michigan itself is not in the hands of, in effect, an elected government turned into a junta.
“Paradise!”, I suspect some here in Orange County would say. Well, say it out loud, folks. We’ll take notes. And if any Republicans — as well as, I hope, Democrats and others — would like to denounce this, right now would be a really good time to do it. Is this what Orange County Republicans really want?
I’m in favor of sending both Democratic and Republican elected officials to prison if they deserve it. (Sadly, the law seems to go after the former aggressively and disproportionately and only selectively and grudgingly after the latter.)
Do you think that the desire to ensure that we don’t elect Democrats who might go to jail justifies eliminating elections altogether? (And why does the Governor who appointed the emergency managers get a pass in terms of suspicion?)
So you wouldn’t have elections at all, because you think that the natives aren’t “wise” enough to choose the right people?
Congratulations — you have have just invested “auto-colonialism”!
“They got rid of elected officials and replaced them with what Republicans in other circumstances have liked to call ‘unelected czars.’ “
Did any of these “unelected czars” actually have this much power?
If we don’t see a positive turn-around for Detroit/Michigan in 3 to 4 years you can have it back. But if we do ……..
At this point, it wouldn’t be difficult to see a degree of positive change, even in this scenario. There’s not much of anywhere to go for Detroit, except up. Hell Skally, even YOU could probably do some good.
That said, this is a very troubling way to run public institutions. Hopefully, it’s not a trend.
Skally would start up the STEEL industry, make Detroit the next Pittsburgh, wouldn’t ya?
Positive turn-around by whose standards?
More to the point, exactly why is rioting inappropriate in a situation where power is removed from elected officials? I’m just trying to get clear on the theory here. Can we have the Democratic Governor and Democratic legislature do this to Orange County and put the Governor’s appointee in charge of the County and local governments due to corruption here?
(Hey … Hmmmm! … I have to make some phone calls… — thanks, skally!)
If OC was as fucked up as Detroit – then yeah go for it.
In our own way, we are. Detroit didn’t kick off the housing bust, for one.
I could be wrong, but as I recall the housing bubble was caused by Demoocrats like Barney Frank and others pushing the mortgage lenders to make loans to people who were not qualified under previous standards. Bad loans were made to individuals and speculators by the lenders and then when they defaulted, the bubble popped, prices dropped like a rock and FHA, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae had to pick up the foreclosed loans? Additionally, this fiasco happened all over the country and not just in Orange County. The good news is, property values in Orange County seem to be making a reebound although it will take years to get back to the highs previously held. This is assuming of course that the Feds keep their nose out of it this time and lenders maintain the tight loan requirements people have to meet. Anyone want to bet that the Feds will not get involved?
You are indeed wrong. Highly and characteristically wrong.
Here’s a blog called Calculated Risk, a favorite of those stalwarts who chronicled the bustathon in your fair city and Irvine Housing Blog. Please go read the past 6-1/2 years or so worth.
Here’s How The Community Reinvestment Act Led To The Housing Bubble’s Lax Lending
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/the-cra-debate-a-users-guide-2009-6#ixzz2P2DTv62w
Here’s an interesting tidbit. There is absolutely no provision for institutionalizing the changes any of these “emergency managers” make. As soon as they leave, the city councils or school boards can undo everything they did–right, wrong, or indifferent–they next day. There was an article in Governing magazine on Michigan’s use of EM’s a few months ago, and several elected officials made it clear they had no intention of sustaining the changes some of these guys made. So the whole thing is pretty much a sham prone to abuse by either side of the political spectrum.
A VP of GM? Is that really a stellar recommendation for anyone?!? A former icon of American industry reduced to begging for a bailout? The problem is government never was intended to be run like a business. To begin with, there’s no direct relationship between what your pay and the services you receive. You can’t offerer to pay more taxes and have the cops show up faster when you call. Business, properly, is about making money and providing servicese in relation to cost. Imagine dialing 9-1-1 and being told “Our records show you’ve already called twice this year, and you’ve exceeded your account–the taxes you pay–so we’ll need a credit card number before we put your fire out.” And holy crap–what’s so great about the way business does business anyway? Anyone who’s dealt with a bank, gone to a big-box hardware store, or tried to get service from a cell phone company might have some strong opinions about the quality of business these days. Geez, even the freaking DMV guarantees to call you back in an hour or less!
Its the voters in Michigan who’ve abrogated their rights to say how things should run. If they spent a little more time watching the knuckleheads running their towns and schools, they wouldn’t need emergency managers.
So if the EM fires someone, that person is not actually fired? Because I reckon that they feel fired!
And then gets rehired once the EM’s contract expires and sues for back wages? Exactly my point Greg, these guys can wreak any kind of havoc they want, then walk out the door after they return a city to “stability”, leaving others to clean up the mess. One of them sold off most of a city’s buildings to boost the bottom line and chopped staffing so much there is basically no way for the average citizen to get simple services like building permits, which will, over the long run, hurt revenues. But then again, short-term gain without regard for long-term consequences seems to another specialty of today’s business philosophy.