The Michigan Messenger

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The Michigan Messenger going forward

By Staff Report | 11.16.11

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 [...]

Colorado-based abstinence program provided false and misleading information to Michigan students

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By Todd A. Heywood | 11.16.11

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.

Class action lawsuit filed against MERS over unpaid taxes

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By Todd A. Heywood | 11.15.11

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.

Schuette fights important mercury regulations

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By Eartha Jane Melzer | 11.14.11

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.

Author Archive

CIA throwing money at Blackwater

By Spencer Ackerman | 06.23.10 | 10:50 am

It’s like they’re in a strip club, according to Jeff Stein:

Systemic failures may give Blackwater another Afghanistan contract

By Spencer Ackerman | 03.08.10 | 3:03 pm

By March 24, the private security corporation formerly known as Blackwater — last seen in Afghanistan shooting civilians and stealing weapons intended for the Afghan police — may win a new Defense Department contract to train the Afghan police. And nearly no one in the government wants to own up to how it could happen. [...]

Blackwater took hundreds of guns from U.S. military, Afghan police

By Spencer Ackerman | 02.24.10 | 7:44 am

Employees of the CIA-connected and Michigan-owned private security corporation Blackwater diverted hundreds of weapons, including more than 500 AK-47 assault rifles, from a U.S. weapons bunker in Afghanistan intended to equip Afghan policemen, according to an investigation by the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Intel chief presents Obama with another headache

By Spencer Ackerman | 01.21.10 | 10:16 am

If President Obama didn’t have enough headaches after the loss of the Democrats’ filibuster-proof Senate majority on Tuesday night, another one emerged for him at a Senate hearing on Wednesday morning: Dennis Blair, the director of national intelligence.

Levin: Obama’s transition date led to spike in Afghan security recruiting

By Spencer Ackerman | 01.13.10 | 2:30 pm

Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, is flying back to Washington from a three-day trip to Afghanistan and Pakistan. He briefed reporters by conference call from a Dubai airport about his visit, and he had a surprising assessment to report. According to Gen. William Caldwell, the new head of training [...]

Carl Levin’s warning

By Spencer Ackerman | 12.02.09 | 10:04 am

WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, urged the Obama administration not to surge U.S. troops before accelerating their Afghan counterparts. That used to be the perspective of Defense Secretary Robert Gates as well. But, of course, President Obama did the opposite, with Gates’ support. In his [...]

By Pete Hoekstra’s 2006 logic, he might be trying to help al-Qaeda

By Spencer Ackerman | 11.11.09 | 10:28 am

Check out Rachel Maddow going hard on Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-Mich.) for publicly revealing that the U.S. intelligence community is intercepting the communications of al-Qaeda-sympathetic cleric Anwar Aulaqi, a former U.S. preacher now in Yemen whom Fort Hood murder suspect Nidal Malik Hasan apparently contacted before the shooting.

Mullen vs. Levin on Afghanistan

By Spencer Ackerman | 09.15.09 | 1:18 pm

WASHINGTON — As I pointed out a couple weeks ago when reporting on a joint press conference, Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, seems more comfortable with increasing U.S. troops in Afghanistan than Defense Secretary Bob Gates does. And today, when Mullen, testified for his Senate hearing to be renominated as [...]

Hoekstra fear-mongers GTMO in Michigan

By Spencer Ackerman | 08.21.09 | 2:39 pm

As Daphne Eviatar has written this week, the residents of Standish, Mich., are starting to turn against a proposal to send terrorism detainees from Guantanamo Bay to their town’s prison, a proposal floated by the legislature and seconded by Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) to alleviate Standish’s economic woes. David Munson, the owner of a tavern [...]