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.
Former GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin will kick off the national book tour for her new book “Going Rogue” in Grand Rapids. The former Alaska Gov will appear in Grand Rapids two days after a sit down with Oprah Winfrey in Chicago.
Palin’s appearance is scheduled for Nov. 18 from 7-9 p.m. at the Barnes and Noble store in Woodland Mall, says the Grand Rapids Press.
Palin’s appearance precedes a visit by former GOP contender for the presidential nomination Mike Huckabee. The Huckster is out on book tour for his new book “A Simple Christmas,” and he will appear on Nov. 17 from 5-6 p.m. at Schuler Books in Grand Rapids.
Leading the pack of national GOP figures visiting West Michigan, however, is GOP Chairman Michael Steele who is speaking at a the Ottawa County GOP luncheon in Holland on Nov. 12.
Clearly such high profile GOP names barnstorming the state in the course of a week is more than news, there has to be some strategy happening here.
Both former candidates are constantly named as possible 2012 Republican candidates to challenge President Barack Obama. And both are rising stars in the conservative movement. Both waded into the New York Congressional District 23 by endorsing the Conservative party candidate Douglas Hoffman. Hoffman was bankrolled by Club for Growth. While Hoffman lost his bid to Democrat Bill Owens, I noted earlier this week that the battle in the 23rd was a repeat of the Republican primary battles in Michigan’s 7th back in 2006.
In addition to noting the Club for Growth influence, I noted this was the edge of the internal civil war in the GOP — one that Michigan’s 11th District Republican Congressman Thaddeus McCotter has been warning against.
So the question is, are Huck and Palin visiting Michigan under the cover of book signings to lay the ground work for Presidential bids in 2012? And who will the two, plus Steele, be meeting with privately and who will be seen in public with them? What impact will those connections have on the coming GOP primary for governor, attorney general and secretary of state? Will the civil war have a new front in Michigan?
Time will tell, that’s for sure.
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