Political Feast
by John Lindstrom
Gongwer News Service
September 3, 2010
It has always been a wonder why it is the American people feel the need to moan about the length of election campaigns. The exhaustion they emote when a campaign ad airs on television. The way they rend their garments when politicians speak on the news. The way [...]

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The China Wave
September 1, 2010
Even before Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero secured the Democratic nomination for governor, he and his party started replaying the “shipped jobs to China” mantra against Republican nominee and business executive Rick Snyder. That rhetoric worked to help to defeat the Republican candidate for governor in 2006, so repeating the tactic was [...]

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Hiding the Real Problems in Education
by Stephen A. Jones
September 1, 2010
Of all the experiments being tried in the name of education reform, the one for which I’m most interested in seeing the results is beginning this fall at Barbara Jordan Elementary School in Detroit.
At Barbara Jordan Elementary, there will be no principal — the school [...]

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Reckless Love Affair
by Susan J. Demas
September 1, 2010
Attention, teenage girls. Are you bored? Not sure what to do with your life? Do you want your boyfriend to marry you so you can live happily ever after?
Better yet, do you want to be popular? Have magazine covers devoted to you? Even end up on a kickass [...]

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The Kwame Bleed
September 3, 2010
DETROIT — A year ago, there were lots of reasons to think Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox would be the next governor.
The son of working-class Irish immigrants joined the Marines, put himself through the University of Michigan’s college and law school, and then was elected attorney general, the only Republican to [...]

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The Politics and Personality of Justice
by John Lindstrom
Gongwer News Service
August 27, 2010
Before considering the intrigue that who sits on the Supreme Court can cause, and by that we mean any person sitting on any Supreme Court whether it is John Marshall or Elena Kagan on the U.S. Supreme Court or Thomas Cooley or Alton Davis [...]

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Shades of Fieger
August 27, 2010
Check this out: “[His] anger appeals to people who feel left out of the system,” “he did best among Black voters in Detroit,” he’s “running against his own mouth.”
You’re thinking those are references to the Democratic nominee for governor, Virg Bernero, right?
Nope. It’s former Democratic candidate for governor Geoffrey Fieger, circa [...]

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Stairway to Nowhere
August 27, 2010
Republican Brian Calley, the odds-on favorite to be the next lieutenant governor of Michigan, didn’t support native son Gerald Ford when he lost a close election to Jimmy Carter.
That’s because he hadn’t even been born.
Nor did he ever cast a vote for Ronald Reagan or the first George Bush. He [...]

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Governor’s Race:
August is not November
by John Lindstrom
Gongwer News Service
August 20, 2010
Does it matter really that it is August, that the warm days are still long, that the gardens are fat with melons and tomatoes?
No, because to hear the talk of the town it is past early November, it is past when the leaves [...]

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Throwing Stones at the Bus
August 20, 2010
Pete Hoekstra would have been fun to kick around as governor. You got a glimpse at his no-holds-barred persona on the tube the other day.
Trying to figure out what went wrong is a touchy subject for most candidates. They often go on a scavenger hunt for someone else to [...]

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