Friday, October 10, 2003

Why Mike Cox is one Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox this week got in two nasty swipes against Governor Jennifer Granholm.  The first swipe was at the state Republican Leadership Council meeting when he said that she is "lacking in vision and principles." The second swipe was when the governor signed an executive order that prohibited the giving of bonuses to state employees.  This didn't apply to the two ranking Republicans, Cox and Secretary of State Terri Lynn Land.  Land also chose to follow Granholm's lead and not give bonuses this year.  Cox, however, argued against it, saying that as long as he has money left in his budget, he should be allowed to reward his employees. Now, given that we're in a budget shortfall, and the state employees had already accepted a paycut (they're working 40 hours but only getting paid for 38, the rest of the time either going into a vacation time or a retirement account), the Governor's order makes perfect sense.  But Cox, with his obstinate behavior, has put the nix on the employee contract, and will probably cause more layoffs. As for his comment about her "lacking vision and principles," that's such a crock.  When Granholm was attorney general under Engler, she worked with him, and didn't take partisan potshots at him.  She was a great AG, doing her best to protect Michigan citizens from fraud and swindle.  As governor, she has demonstrated leadership by involving us in the tax cutting decisions, by taking a three percent pay cut and encouraging other high ranking governmental officials to do the same, and by protecting K-12 school funding from cuts.  Besides chasing down a few deadbeat dads, what exactly has Mike Cox done to prove his superior leadership qualities? I've got three words for you, Mr. Cox:  One term, goodbye. [If you check out the WKAR program "Off the Record," you'll get the whole scoop.] 8:19:40 PM    comment []

There will still be lines at the unemployment office this year There are 50,000 new people on unemployment in Michigan who will have to wait until March or April to get their benefit checks.  That's a lot of people who won't have a good holiday season (to put it mildly).  The problem that the state is having is because of two factors:  a fairly high unemploment rate (above 7 percent statewide) and the early retirement of a whopping forty percent of the state's unemployment agency workers.  (Many were offered early retirement benefits, especially since the state converted over to electronic filing and closed a lot of the offices.) The truly scary part is that there still is a budget deficit, and there might have to be more state workers laid off.  7:45:51 PM    comment []

Referer search follies Interesting searches that my blog popped up on: "trent reznor sat scores" "spence abraham is an idiot"  (I couldn't agree more...!)   7:31:52 PM    comment []

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