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A man walked into Spike N' Mike's Party Store around 10:00 a.m. Thursday morning, intending to rob the place, according to the store's owner. The suspect, identified by a relative as Robert Slanger, didn't count on a vigilant, mixed-martial arts trained customer stepping in, however. "I look at the cashier, I kind of know him, I come in there every day. I whispered to him, I mouthed to him, 'Are you getting robbed right now?' He said, 'Yeah,' like really scared," said Zack Thome, the GVSU college student who tackled the suspect. The store, located at the busy corner of...

In what is being seen as a preview of a fully implemented Obamacare, government officials in Michigan are demanding that a 9-year-old child follow standard procedure and take a dangerous course of cancer medications that can cause additional cancer – even though the boy has had three scans indicating an absence of the disease. The case is being fought on behalf of Ken and Erin Stieler and their son Jacob by attorneys with the Home School Legal Defense Association. The organization concerns itself with home school rights, responsibilities and restrictions but also intercedes in cases that could have a significant...

Remember Herman Cain? Well, Jack Hoogendyk certainly does. The Kalamazoo Republican, who is running for Fred Upton’s 6th District Congressional post, has been endorsed by the former presidential candidate. Cain sent out a press release Thursday, welcoming Hoogendyk into the “Army of Davids.” In the release, Cain said Hoogendyk has committed to his so-called “9-9-9 plan,” calling for a 9 percent tax rate on personal income, 9 percent on corporate income and 9 percent on national sales tax. “The current tax code is confusing and counter-productive. It stifles prosperity,” Hoogendyk said in the release. Cain praised Hoogendyk’s limited government conservatism....

ALLEN PARK — It was an odd fact to come out at a city council meeting, but again, these are not normal times for the city of Allen Park. On Tuesday night, it was revealed that the city is now paying finance charges on a credit card bill from the Home Depot because it can’t pay off the balance of a couple of hundred dollars. Residents have had enough and now they’ve convinced city leaders of the need for help. This week, the Allen Park City Council stated publicly that it needs an emergency manager to be appointed under Michigan...

Hmm. Maybe 4 delegates from Missouri aren't as important to him as one stinking stolen delegate from Michigan. NYT: BRUNSWICK, Mo. — Mitt Romney and his advisers pride themselves on vigorously pursuing every delegate in every corner of the country in their quest to secure the Republican presidential nomination. If "vigorously pursuing" means changing the rules and cheating, then look no further than Michigan, where Team Romney changed the rules and the RNC's very own Saul Anuzis along with the Chair of the MRP, Bobby Schostak voted against the former AG Cox and the MRP Counsel, to win one for...

This is based on a genealogy table I made. Had a bit more trouble than I should have tracking down the first round results, wth.

WXYZ) - An intense line of storms is bringing tornadoes rain, winds and hail to southeast Michigan.

One of the big pushes from Romney surrogates in Michigan is that due to sites like Daily Kos and a Santorum robocall, that 100-120,000 democrats voted in the Michigan primary to create mischief like the case with McCain in 2000. The source that is used is exit polling from CNN. I do not begrudge the surrogates for using exit polling as a source. On a lot of things, it is good. I think the polling was close with a lot of factors. That aspect I am doubting. I also highly suspect that it is being used as quasi-justification for awarding...

The Michigan Education Association was the fourth wealthiest union among its peers under the National Education Association umbrella and the MEA’s employee payroll was third-highest in the country as of 2009-10, according to a union watchdog organization. Despite a 0.9 percent drop in total income in 2009-10 from the previous year, the MEA still brought in $77.4 million in 2009-10, the fourth-highest in the country among the 53 NEA affiliates. Only California at $186.2 million, New York at $128.8 million, and New Jersey with $120.5 million brought in more money. The MEA brought in $623.90 per member it represents, making...

The Fisker Karma is a plug-in hybrid car that seems to have everything the rich and famous — and environmentally correct — look for in a set of wheels. Sleek silhouette? Check. Green cred? Check. Six-figure price tag? Check. Reliable battery? Not so fast. In a test conducted Wednesday by Consumer Reports magazine, the niche-market $107,850 sports car conked out completely, after a short ride at 65 miles per hour on a Connecticut test track. “Our Fisker Karma … is super sleek, high-tech — and now it’s broken,” Consumer Reports wrote on its website late Thursday. “We have owned our...

Industrial Policy: A leading consumer product testing firm takes one of the administration's dream green cars for a spin and had to call a gasoline-powered flatbed truck to tow the lemon away. At least it can go from zero to $529 million in stimulus dollars in nothing flat. When the testers at Consumer Reports took it for a test drive, not only was the $107,850 dream car unable to complete the evaluation, but also it had to be towed away, a visible metaphor for the Obama administration's green energy failures. In a test conducted last Wednesday by Consumer Reports magazine,...

A $100,000-plus Fisker Automotive luxury sports car died during Consumer Reports speed testing this week for reasons that are still unknown, leaving the struggling electric car startup with another blow to its image. "It is a little disconcerting that you pay that amount of money for a car and it lasts basically 180 miles before going wrong," David Champion, senior director for the magazine's automotive test center, told Reuters, on Thursday. In a statement, Fisker said it was assessing the source of the problem that caused its Karma plug-in hybrid to fail. Fisker dispatched two engineers Wednesday night to...

The taxpayer-funded ($279 million) battery supplier that gave big raises and parachutes to its executives shortly after it cut “Green jobs” at its Michigan factories, reported last week it would suffer big losses again for 2011. A123 Systems , whose fortunes were entwined with those of electric vehicle startup manufacturer Fisker Automotive, also announced it would look to China and India in order to survive. A123 also received grants and tax credits from Michigan that could total more than $135 million. The company said it would realize a loss of $257.7 million for last year, compared to the $152.6...

A taxpayer-funded electric vehicle battery company, that is considered in great danger due to its dependency on troubled EV company Fisker Automotive, has awarded its top executives big salary increases despite a steep downward trajectory in its stock price. Massachusetts-based A123 Systems -- whichreceived $279.1 million instimulus money from the Department of Energy, and up to $135 million in incentives from the State of Michigan -- boosted the base salaries of two vice presidents and its chief financial officer on February 8. Chief Financial Officer David Prystash was bumped 27 percent to $380,000; VP of Energy Solutions Robert Johnson’s...

This post has been updated below. Among the objections about taxpayer subsidies for the high-profileChevy Volt, manufactured by Government Motors, is that the many grants, loans and tax breaks that lowered the sticker price on the electric hybrid car facilitated its (paltry) sales for the benefit of wealthier individuals who were purchasing it – those with average annual salaries of $170,000 . So can you imagine how happy the affluent customers (like Leonardo DiCaprio) of the heavily subsidized, $102,000 electric Fisker Karma are, to be able to purchase their gimmicky sports sedan at a discount, with a $7,500 tax...

Our Fisker Karma cost us $107,850. It is super sleek, high-tech—and now it’s broken. We have owned our car for just a few days; it has less than 200 miles on its odometer. While doing speedometer calibration runs on our test track (a procedure we do for every test car before putting it in service by driving the car at a constant 65 mph between two measured points), the dashboard flashed a message and sounded a “bing“ showing a major fault. Our technician got the car off the track and put it into Park to go through the owner’s manual...

Some Michigan politicians are touting a proposal they call “Michigan2020,” which would make available to all Michigan high school graduates four years of fully subsidized college education. The estimated $1.8 billion needed to pay for the subsidies would apparently come from ending corporate welfare, a reform the Mackinac Center fully endorses. Unfortunately, just pouring additional taxpayer dollars into state universities is more likely to benefit their administrators and other employees than students, and here’s why: According to federal statistics presented by the Chronicle of Higher Education, only 33 percent of students enrolled in Michigan’s public universities graduate in four years....

LANSING — Michigan has made several changes to its Foster Youth in Transition Program in light of an audit that found it spent thousands of dollars on iPods, prom dresses, senior trips and a traffic ticket. The audit, released last month, found that the Michigan Department of Human Services did not effectively evaluate and monitor the payments and services it provided to youth transitioning out of foster care. The program is 80 percent funded by federal funds and 20 percent with state general fund dollars. State representatives questioned DHS officials about the audit and changes made during a House committee...

The details posted nearby of recent union collective bargaining agreements signed by Muskegon Heights and Highland Park, two school districts that now are effectively bankrupt and under state receivership, are shocking and reveal why it was necessary last year for the Legislature to give expanded powers to emergency managers appointed to heal effectively bankrupt cities and school districts. Given the number of these "hit the wall" situations statewide, we can now see that the only alternative would be massive taxpayer bailouts rewarding poor performance, profligacy, short-sightedness and an entitlement mindset. Yet this reform and others is under relentless attack by...

More than 50 years ago, President John F. Kennedy warned that “secret proceedings” present a danger to a free society. "The very word 'secrecy' is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings," he said on April 27, 1961. But in 2005, secrecy is exactly what happened in Michigan in a stealth unionization election that added 43,729 so-called home health care workers to the ranks of the Service Employees International Union. That number has swelled to 56,442, with most of them...