Free Republic

(WXYZ) State police are stretched awfully thin these days, with trooper layoffs looming and squad cars being parked to save money. So why is the state moving forward with a plan to build a costly new headquarters that troopers never even asked for? Michael Moorman: I guess I ask the powers-that-be this question: what’s more important, a building, or 100 troopers out there on the road? Because that building isn’t going to respond to Negaunee, it’s not going to respond to Ypsilanti, that building’s not going to be able to respond to Flint when the need and the cry for...

The master of child-killing has two individuals on his short list for the Supreme Court vacancy. One of them is Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm. We in Michigan know this nominee all too well. It's no surprise to anyone that the liar-in-chief talks of dialogue and common ground whlie indeed peddling his brand of pure darkness. Granholm is as pro child-killing as one can get. She was at the top of Emily's list during her campaign. She supports homosexual special rights and hate crimes legislation (the exact same thing). She vetoed the ban on partial birth infanticide. She took a suffering...

Not quite a year after defeating a Republican and becoming Michigan’s first new attorney general in nearly four decades, Jennifer M. Granholm, the highest-ranking and most-talked-about Democrat in the state, faced what turned out to be a defining hurdle. It is not clear what kind of legal style Gov. Jennifer M. Granholm of Michigan would take with her to the Supreme Court. It was 1999, and the state was controlled by Republicans. The Legislature sought to fast-track a measure that would have stripped her office of core powers, including the right to sue the state, represent individuals and have official...

WASHINGTON — A source tells The Associated Press that President Barack Obama is considering California Supreme Court Justice Carlos Moreno and more than five other people as nominees for the Supreme Court. An official familiar with Obama's decision-making said others include Solicitor General Elena Kagan, Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and U.S. Appeals Court judges Sonia Sotomayor and Diane Pamela Wood — people who have been mentioned frequently as potential candidates.

WASHINGTON — Will Jennifer Granholm's Canadian birth certificate keep the two-term Michigan governor off the United States Supreme Court? As U.S. President Barack Obama whittles down his list of potential Supreme Court nominees, Granholm has reportedly landed on a White House short list of six candidates under serious consideration for the vacancy being created by the impending retirement of Justice David Souter. But even as buzz around Granholm grows in legal circles, her place of birth — Vancouver, in 1959 — is being cited as a factor that might disqualify her from the job. Several U.S. media outlets have speculated...

WASHINGTON (AP) - Mich. Gov. Jennifer Granholm is among those possibly considered to replace Justice David Souter who is planning to retire after nearly two decades on the Supreme Court. President Barack Obama's first pick for the high court is likely to be a liberal-leaning nominee, much like Souter. The White House has been told that Souter will retire in June, when the court finishes its work for the summer, a source familiar with his plans said Thursday night. The retirement is likely to take effect only once a successor is confirmed.

Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm lashed out at three of the nation’s leading hedge fund companies saying their holding out for more in negotiations with Chrysler were leading the car company down the road towards bankruptcy. “I m strongly urging those who are hedge fund managers to ensure that Chrysler is not forced into bankruptcy because they are holding out,” she said. “The hedge funds, those are the ones that have been previously charged with having made a lot of money by flipping paper, they are holding out as we speak–right now. The future of Chrysler is in the hands of...

Ionia County's unemployment rate for March skyrocketed to its highest level since modern statistics began in 1990. Figures released Thursday by the Michigan Department of Energy, Labor and Economic Growth (DELEG) show the county's jobless rate hit 14.4 percent, which is the highest since the state and federal governments began using their current survey method in 1990 and nearly double the March 2008 rate of 7.6 percent. Ionia County registered an unemployment rate of 18.6 percent in March 1985 but that figure cannot be compared equally to current statistics since it calculated with an outdated formula, according to Tom Krolik,...

Gov. Jennifer Granholm is planning to host a public forum next week to discuss the how to stem the tide that leads nearly half of the Michigan’s college students to seek professional opportunities outside the state within a year of graduating. Granholm wants to reverse that trend and minimize the effects of Michigan’s brain drain, something The Detroit News recently documented in a two-day series. The number of Michigan State University graduates leaving the state increased from 24 percent in 2001 to 49 percent, according to a school study. Fifty-three percent of graduates of the University of Michigan who are...

LANSING, Mich. (AP) -- Michigan is expanding its tax incentive program for companies developing and making advanced batteries used in hybrid and electric vehicles. Gov. Jennifer Granholm signed a bill into law Monday adding $220 million to the program. Granholm earlier this year signed legislation starting the initiative with refundable tax credits worth up to $335 million. Lawmakers are hoping the incentives will help put Michigan in the forefront of battery production for the next generation of electric vehicles. Granholm says Michigan's initiative is more aggressive than any other state's plan.

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Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm said she won't apologize to Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin for her crack at last weekend's Gridiron Dinner that the former Republican vice presidential candidate "really set back the cause of hot governors."

WASHINGTON (CNN) – Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm said she won't apologize to Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin for her crack at last weekend's Gridiron Dinner that the former Republican vice presidential candidate "really set back the cause of hot governors." At the exclusive Washington dinner on Saturday, which was packed with top elected officials, Granholm also used the quip to needle Pennsylvania's governor. "You know where I'm coming from, Ed Rendell," she said.

Gov. Jennifer Granholm had a familiar message today for lawmakers pushing tax cuts: Find a way to pay for them. Advertisement Granholm said she won’t support tax cut proposals, such as a Senate plan to give home buyers a new property tax credit, if they result in less revenue that would force more state cuts. Some lawmakers are pushing for additional property tax cuts, as property values continue to drop around the state. “If there’s a way to pay for it, I’m always willing to look at it,” Granholm told reporters as she toured a statewide high school robotic competition...

Gov. Jennifer Granholm wants lawmakers and other top elected officials to join her in giving back 10 percent of their pay. But it's unlikely more than a handful will oblige. The Democratic governor has returned 5 percent or 10 percent of her $177,000 salary to the state treasury every year since taking office in 2003 as Michigan has struggled with a weak economy and ongoing budget deficits. "This is all about leading by example," Granholm spokeswoman Liz Boyd said Tuesday.

The gas tax proposal advanced by Gov. Jennifer Granholm last week would be the right fuel for Michigan's crumbling roads. The Legislature's job will be to refine her plan -- and make it part of a larger overhaul of transportation spending so that current road funding, which is badly battered, gets the repair it desperately needs. Ms. Granholm's proposal would shift gas taxes from a per-gallon levy to a percentage tax tied to the wholesale price of gasoline. It would work much like the 6 percent state sales tax now collected on gasoline and other items.

Cobo convention center, one of the many aging buildings downtown, is threatening to become the latest tinderbox in resurgent racial hostilities between the mostly black city and its predominantly white suburbs. With calls for self-determination in how the venue operates, members of Detroit's embattled City Council have reopened wounds more than four decades old. (snip) Last week, Council President Monica Conyers, who is black, told a white Teamsters' union official during a contentious meeting on whether to accept the deal that most of the people who work at Cobo during the annual North American International Auto Show "don't look like...

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Governors’ Fight Over Stimulus May Define G.O.P. By ROBERT PEAR and J. DAVID GOODMAN Published: February 22, 2009 WASHINGTON — Republican governors split sharply over the weekend over how to respond to the economic crisis, a debate whose outcome will go a long way toward shaping how the national party redefines itself in the wake of its election defeats of recent years.While the $787 billion stimulus bill might help avert draconian budget cuts by deeply stressed states, Republican governors clashed over just how much of the stimulus money to accept. And governors of both parties said that they did not...

WASHINGTON (AP) — To take federal stimulus money for your state or not to take it. That is the big question for Democratic and Republican governors in town for the National Governor's Association meeting this weekend. Democrats claim those Republican governors who turn down money from the federal stimulus package are "fringe" Republicans eager to score political points. Michigan's Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm said there are other states that want and need the new money. "We'll take it. We'll take your money." Elaborating in an appearance on "Fox News Sunday" with three other governors, Granholm said the issue "is not...