I am writing today to announce the closure of the Michigan Messenger. After four years of operation in Michigan, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news into a single site, The American Independent at Americanindependent.com. This is part of a shift in strategy, towards new forms [...]
An abstinence-only presentation provided to numerous school districts in Calhoun and Eaton Counties in October of this year provided false and misleading information to students about HIV, experts allege.
Two county registers of deeds filed a class action lawsuit Monday on behalf of Michigan’s 83 counties alleging that the Mortgage Electronic Registration Services owes millions of dollars in property title transfer taxes.
Despite evidence of the impact of mercury on children and public health, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette last month joined with 24 other state attorneys general in filing a lawsuit to scuttle new EPA regulations that would reduce mercury emissions from power plants.
Democratic legislators who have found themselves besieged by angry protesters screaming at them during townhall meetings and calling them Nazis are not the only ones upset about such tactics. The conservative Detroit News had an editorial on Monday condemning those who disrupt such gatherings and quoting Republican Rep. Thad McCotter doing the same:
Most Michigan members of Congress of both parties are opting out of public town halls on health care reform because a Romulus meeting sponsored by Rep. John Dingell earlier this month turned angry and ugly. Dingell barely got a chance to speak — and neither did those in the audience who were interested in a legitimate discourse on the proposals — because noisy, aggressive protesters chose to scream instead of talk.
Similar disruptions have occurred at town hall meetings across the country. So instead of open public forums, most members of the Michigan delegation are choosing to do telephone town halls instead.
“At town halls, those who vehemently oppose the bills and those who vehemently support them get all the attention,” says Rep. Thaddeus McCotter, R-Livonia. “The average person sees what’s going on and says, ‘that’s not somewhere I want to go after work.’ ”
It’s important that citizens are fully informed on all aspects of the proposals under consideration in Congress and understand how they will be affected by the legislation. Town halls would be useful forums for disseminating that information. But not if they are overrun by angry mobs.
Hear, hear. Nice to hear other voices saying it.
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