Summer of Democratic Discontent

July 23, 2010

SAULT STE. MARIE — Mark Dobias, a droll, 54-year-old lawyer, has never seen a year when there was less enthusiasm about the race for governor — especially among Democrats.

“It’s like being lost deep in a cold and wet cedar swamp in November with a wet matchbook and it’s getting dark and cold. Survival until the next morning is seriously in question,” said Dobias, a converted “Yooper” known for his droll and sometimes zany sense of humor.

Two years ago, that wasn’t the case. His normally Republican Chippewa County nearly went for President Obama, who easily won both of Michigan’s peninsulas. Some cars still sport fading Obama stickers today.

But on a 200-mile drive through the Upper Peninsula from the Mackinac Bridge to Marquette, the number of yard signs this columnist saw for either Democratic candidate for governor, Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero or Speaker of the House Andy Dillon, was zero.

Dobias puts much of the blame on the economy, and some on Gov. Jennifer Granholm, whose administration virtually every Democrat regards, privately or publicly, as a disappointment.

The lawyer doesn’t even think her much-vaunted skills as a communicator are all they are cracked up to be. “She came up here once and said she looked forward to visiting her fellow Swedes in the UP,” he said.

“Well, they aren’t Swedes; they’re Finns. That didn’t go over so well,” he said.

Dobias gets around; he grew up in Cheboygan, went to Lake Superior State and then to the former Detroit College of Law before returning to “the Soo” to start a practice that has him frequently on the road, traveling hundreds of miles a week to see a far-flung clientele.

The vast Upper Peninsula has barely 3 percent of Michigan’s population, and is a world in itself. But when it comes to the governor’s race, indications are that sentiments are little different on either side of the bridge.

“I got my ballot and tore it up,” an elderly Jewish woman said during a birthday party for her Bloomfield Hills doctor two weeks ago. Actually, she admitted she hadn’t torn it up; she had to vote for her neighbor for county commissioner. But she hadn’t voted for governor. “I can’t vote for either of those. One’s a nut and the other’s really a Republican.” She thought about voting for Rick Snyder, the Ann Arbor venture capitalist who won a surprising endorsement from the Michigan League of Conservation Voters.

Like many seniors, she is voting absentee. But she found out her entire primary ballot would be void if she checked off candidates of more than one party. She asked, “Would I break the law if I wrote in Jim Blanchard’s name?”

Well, no. But she would be about eight years too late.

Back in 2002, Michigan Democrats felt poised to recapture the governorship, and a ferocious battle took place between Blanchard, who served two terms as governor from 1983-1990, then-House Minority Whip David Bonior, and Granholm. Michigan had never had a female governor, and she ended up winning the nomination with nearly as many votes as her two heavyweight rivals combined.

But she took office during a recession that only deepened, and she seemed to have difficulty grasping the legislative process and making and sticking to decisions. Today, it is hard to find any Democrat who thinks the party has much chance of keeping the governor’s office next year.

One indication of that may be that none of the state’s congressmen or other better-known figures chose to seek the Democratic nomination. That leaves party faithful with a choice between Dillon and Bernero, 46, who is widely unknown and regarded by many who do know him as a lightweight and somewhat of a loose cannon. During his re-election campaign for mayor last fall he vowed not to run for governor. Once he had won he jumped into the race within days.

He is getting heavy labor union backing, however. Not because the unions like him as much as they loathe House Speaker Dillon, a 48-year-old attorney and businessman who has expressed support for downsizing state worker pensions and health care benefits.

Other Democrats are turned off by Dillon because he is anti-abortion and anti-stem-cell research, and because they feel he has been ineffective as a legislative leader and too often yielded to his Republican counterpart, Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop (R-Rochester Hills).

Yet many Democrats don’t like that Virg Bernero takes money from controversial Ambassador Bridge owner Matty Moroun, and opposes a proposed new internationally owned bridge.

This is, indeed, the summer of Democratic discontent, without even a romantically inspiring candidate, a la Lynn Jondahl or the late Zolton Ferency, to cast a symbolic vote for. Dobias said it was like being out in that wet November night, with only a few matches and a little kindling.

“A prayer is said as each match is struck, because there are more nights ahead. And no rescue in sight.”

Not, at least, until 2014.

Veteran journalist and national Emmy Award winner Jack Lessenberry teaches at Wayne State University, serves as Michigan Radio’s senior political analyst and writes regularly for several publications. He also serves as The Toledo Blade’s writing coach and ombudsman and is host of the weekly television show Deadline Now on WGTE-TV in Toledo.