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.
At least a few of the many legal allegations against Blackwater (now Xe), founded by Michigan native Erik Prince, have now been settled. The company has agreed to pay $42 million in fines to the federal government to settle hundreds of instances of violating the law on export of various kinds of weapons from the United States. The New York Times reports:
The private security company formerly called Blackwater Worldwide, long plagued by accusations of impropriety, has reached an agreement with the State Department for the company to pay $42 million in fines for hundreds of violations of United States export control regulations.
The violations included illegal weapons exports to Afghanistan, making unauthorized proposals to train troops in south Sudan and providing sniper training for Taiwanese police officers, according to company and government officials familiar with the deal.
The settlement, which has not yet been publicly announced, follows lengthy talks between Blackwater, now called Xe Services, and the State Department that dealt with the violations as an administrative matter, allowing the firm to avoid criminal charges.
This does not, however, resolve several other ongoing criminal and civil cases against the company and/or its current and former employers, including cases involving bribing Iraqi officials, killing innocent civilians in both Iraq and Afghanistan, and more weapons and obstruction charges against former Blackwater executives.
Blackwater founder Erik Prince is the heir to the Prince family fortune in Holland, Michigan. His sister, Betsy, is married to Dick DeVos, heir to the Amway fortune. Both families have been long-time supporters and financiers of conservative causes both in Michigan and around the world.
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