Okay, this is funny. The Wall Street Journal published an op-ed awhile ago which sliced and diced Michigan’s Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm’s tax proposals. Granholm is between a rock and a hard place with Michigan’s downward spiraling economy, but she just doesn’t seem to understand that the way out of Michigan’s mess is to make the state more business friendly rather than increasing taxes.
A member of our legislature, Rich Baxter, wrote an article saying as much, and Granholm lashed out saying the article was “treasonous for the state of Michigan” and telling the Michigan Republican Party,
When you are so engaged in building up your political party in such a way that you damage the state, that to me, that representative should be removed from office.
Although I don’t agree with her policies, Granholm is very personable and generally does a pretty good job selling her decisions, so this sort of outburst is very uncharacteristic.
Of course, it could be calculated. One of the Republican candidates vying to run against her in November is Richard DeVoss, and Democrats are already all over him because his family’s company, Amway, shipped jobs out of Michigan oversees. So maybe this is part of a “the problem isn’t Michigan’s high taxes and poor business environment, but rather its the Republicans sending jobs to China and telling people about our state” campaign.
Source:
Granholm: Legislator betrayed the state. George Weeks, The Detroit News, July 11, 2005.
Of Taxes and ‘Treason’. Wall Street Journal, July 14, 2005.