Still Cleaning Up a Mess

by John Lindstrom
Gongwer News Service
February 5, 2010

Governor Jennifer Granholm used to employ a laugh line about cleaning up messes. That comes to mind as one looks at the sprawling, messy State of the State Address she delivered and her upcoming budget announcement.

Then again, as one might free associate over aspects of her final State of the State, Ike’s grin also comes to mind.

A mess was not planned. Ms. Granholm and her staff had set up and coordinated a series of speeches and events to outline her proposals. On January 29 came her blockbuster calling for major changes to the benefits of state and education workers. Then came her valedictory State of the State address. Up next will be her proposed budget for 2010-11 in which all will be revealed about her proposal on taxes. It all seemed so tame, so neat.

Oh, but the State of the State was a mess, at least for reporters — a big, confused, conflicting mess. In the land of freedom of the press, nobody wants reporters roaming freely, asking questions, watching things happening publicly that people would prefer stay private. So for years, reporters have adjusted to the limitations the House and administrations have put in place regarding when they could get information, and where they could stand, and when they could talk to people. But in this address, the limits were stretched past the breaking point.

At the briefing for reporters on the address, held about two and one-half hours before the speech (and note to the next governor: former Gov. William Milliken used to brief reporters the night before the address with almost the entire top staff present to answer questions. No governor since has done that. Think about it, whomever ends up lucky enough to lead us for the next four years.), there were no advance copies of the speech. Tweaks were being twung to the opus, reporters were told. Two hours before the speech, no speech. One hour before, no speech. Thirty minutes before, nope. Fifteen minutes, nada. Five minutes before, “they’re pressing the button now” to send the speech.

One minute before 7 p.m., the address arrived in email boxes with warnings it was embargoed until 7 p.m. Well, that wasn’t too hard an embargo to keep.

Then after the address, reporters were ready to rain blows on the House sergeants who seemed confused but determined to keep reporters from talking to people for reactions. Some reporters were able to leak through the thin graying line and get onto the House floor to hold interviews, but others were held back, seething as they watched their competitors ask questions merrily away.

The mess wasn’t limited to the reporters’ complaint. Outside, the state had prepared for a much hyped “tea party” where thousands of “patriots” would descend to demand changes to the government. And based on the noise they generated, one could be excused for thinking a mammoth crowd was on hand, but in truth it was a few hundred only. Frankly, a piddling number given the promotion generated. There have been bigger crowds at Congregational Church coffee hours.

The cops did get to exercise a little muscle by keeping the most baby-boomer tea partiers away from the small crowd of students demanding restoration of the Michigan Promise scholarship.

Oh, and let’s not forget the messy little thing called the Internet, and specifically Facebook and Twitter. Some 50 years ago Richard Hofstadter (another person no one reads these days, alas) talked about electronic media turning politics into entertainment. Technology today allows us to spew our inner intellectual-Freudian-religio-socio-political-sexual-angst-anguish-anger-and-adoration out for the whole world to read. (Cripes, who needs shrinks anymore? Wait, maybe we all do.) Via the magic of cable and the Internet, politics is entertainment as confessional primal hoohadoody, and, brother, lots of nice people were letting their naughty sides out during the State of the State.

And the speech itself was as much a verbal slide show of what we did during our administration as it was a roadmap to what needs to be done for the future. Predictably, Democrats praised the speech. Just as predictably, Republicans panned it.

The comments of one critic, though, Rep. Rick Jones (R-Grand Ledge), were particularly interesting because he said Ms. Granholm failed to talk about restructuring government. Actually, she did when she talked about changes to worker benefits, and the criticism ignores the fact that state government has been restructured. The circumstances of the last decade forced that restructuring, and one has to presume the restructuring will continue well past even the next governor.

Government may not be restructured in a way Mr. Jones and other Republicans would like, but it has been restructured.

But back to the mess.

When Ms. Granholm was first elected, she would often drop a line that drew laughs and cheers: “I’m a mom, I know how to clean up a mess.” She was referring to the state’s ugly budget situation in 2002-03. Former Governor John Engler and the legislature cleaned it up when they left town, but their buckets leaked and the mess came back.

When she first took office, the reasonable hope was that recession would be like all the recessions the state has known since the 1930s, and so be short-lived. The line resonated because its meaning was clear: I got a mess, I’ll clean it up, and everything will be fine.

But the mess was never fully cleaned. The economy never recovered. Every time Ms. Granholm and the legislature (and recall for half her administration the entire legislature was Republican, so winning agreements was always a struggle) thought they could catch their breath, the plumbing blew somewhere else and they were back to cleaning up a new mess.

At the end of her first term, in a year-end interview with reporters, Ms. Granholm had occasion to bring out the line once more. But now battered by the battles she had fought and the new ones to come, she quickly backtracked and said she did not intend to offend anyone when she talked about a mess.

In one sense, her final State of the State, with its slide show of the efforts the state has made to diversify and expand its economy, of the companies the administration has been able to attract, of the changes she hopes are now in place and proceeding, was her summation of how she tried to clean the mess. It was a Sisyphean task, trying to clean this endless budget and economic mess, so before the next sucker gets to take up the state mop, Ms. Granholm was giving her accounting. Even allowing for the often justified criticisms of her administration, no one can say Ms. Granholm did not give full measure of her abilities in the struggle.

But, what about all this reminds one of Ike?

When Dwight David Eisenhower was made supreme commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force, World War II was not going well for our side. The outcome was gravely in doubt. We had years of horror ahead of us for any hope of victory.

Yet when the general sat for his photo he did not look grimly and resolutely into the camera, as one would rightly expect. Ike smiled broadly, and the confidence radiated in that expression became his lasting image, as the good guys did win.

Ms. Granholm has been criticized over the years for not laying out the full extent of the state’s problems. What of it? It’s not like anyone who was paying attention didn’t know the state was suffering mightily.

In every one of her State of the State addresses she has emphasized hope and confidence. It does not matter the hope was often misplaced and the confidence knocked down. She did not give up hope, she has dared the state not to give up hope, and presuming that one day the good guys in Michigan can again claim victory, she can take pride in that.

John Lindstrom is publisher of Gongwer News Service. For nearly 50 years in Michigan, Gongwer News Service has provided independent, comprehensive, accurate and timely coverage of issues in and around Michigan’s government and political systems. For subscription information, including a free trial, visit Gongwer online.