John Kerfoot, a resident of St. Clair Shores, has come up with several parodies of the Pure Michigan campaign.  And they are hilarious! Don’t miss ‘em. (Warning:  NSFW).

This was the response I heard to the report that Michigan Republicans, led by Mike Bishop (Senate Majority Leader), want to raid the public school fund and use it to balance other segments of Michigan’s budget.

What is it about Michigan Republicans that causes them to think that further depriving Michigan children of an education is a good idea?  Why do Michigan Republicans think that we can decrease school funding and continue to remain an attractive place for businesses to locate? Since when did education become a non-essential service?

Kids are only kids once.  They only get one chance to receive an education.  Instead of solving Michigan’s revenue problems, Mike Bishop continues to live the fantasy that our great state can somehow cut its way out of its financial problems.  Bishop has no political will to propose, much less vote for any of the changes necessary to fix Michigan’s obsolete and irrational tax code, eliminate the ridiculous tax credits that failed to keep business here, and do what is necessary to bring Michigan into the 21st century.   Since he’s term-limited, no doubt he’s delighted to abandon true leadership and leave these problems to his successor.

Being the “party of no” was tired last year. It’s still tired today.  Here’s to hoping that Bishop’s replacement has a spine.

The kids had their Grand Finale for gymnastics today at the University of Michigan’s Cliff Keen Arena.  That’s Hannah above, doing a vault.  Next is Esme on the balance beam (with her spotter):

Teilo was great, too.  Here he is on the bars and doing a vault:

Finally, here are some more shots of Esme on the bars and doing a vault:

The entire family went to Florida back in April, and we had a great time.  One of the things we did was visit the Everglades and did a tour on an airboat.  Everyone had great fun!

While on the ride, we saw an alligator:

We also stopped to see a raccoon that lives among the mangrove trees:

Everyone had a fantastic time!

Support Pete Murdock and his campaign for Mayor of Ypsilanti at the Keystone Underground (corner of Michigan and Washington) in downtown Ypsilanti.   The event will take place on Thursday, May 20 from 5:30 P.M. to 7:30 P.M.  If you haven’t yet been to the Keystone, this is a great chance to see one of the finest hangouts in all of Ypsi.  It’s located right under the J. Neils Mongolian Grill.

If you can’t make it, consider sending Pete a check to show your support:

Pete Murdock Campaign Committee
504 North River Street
Ypsilanti, Michigan 48198

The quote is attributed to Ben Franklin.  For more, read this article by Derek Melot in the Lansing State Journal.  I frequently don’t agree with him, but he hits the nail right on the head this time.

Leonard Pitts, Jr., an award-winning nationally syndicated columnist, wrote an article recently along the same lines (from the Detroit Free Press).  Both are very much worth reading.

I just couldn’t help myself. I pre-ordered one and couldn’t wait for it to arrive. Now I can’t put it down. In fact, I’m writing this post from it. Yep, you guessed it, I got an:

What is it about Republicans that make them such fierce enemies of the truth? They don’t believe in global climate change. They put politics over science.

Last week, they punished one of their own just for speaking the truth. David Frum, a prominent conservative and former Bush speech writer recently wrote a blog post calling the passage of the health care bill the Republicans’ Waterloo. Within 4 days, he resigned from prominent conservative think-tank, the American Enterprise Institute. This is so fresh, his name is still up on their web page! (At least it wasn early last week, now it’s gone)!

This is reminiscent of Andrew Buckley’s endorsement of Obama. He did not leave the party, the party left him, and all that. Next they’ll start jerking around with the textbooks.

Advance Ypsilanti PAC floated a post (This is not about Burger King) on their blog last weekend. I use the term “blog” loosely, as they don’t welcome comments, which shows either an ironic sense of humor or a hilarious lack of self-awareness.

But I digress.  The Burger King post is like most of the other posts on Advance Ypsilanti PAC.  There’s a lot of poor quality fruit (sour grapes, specifically), a fair amount of fat (opinions devoid of substance), all wrapped up in a pretty package, but there’s not a lot of beef.  There’s a lot of talk about passing zoning for the hollow shell of a titanic mess we now refer to as Water Street, but there’s no actual explanation of why.  Advance Ypsilanti PAC complains there’s no leadership, but somehow manages to omit the fact that one of the authors of the post sat on City Council and helped lead us into this mess.  There’s no mention that this property has been a non-starter for well over a decade now, or that multiple developers have either pulled out or passed on starting a project here. There’s no explanation of how passing zoning, which would narrow options for the land rather than expand them, could conceivably increase the City’s options.

There are several posts, but the site is only updated sporadically.  My favorite one is the Open Meetings vs. Open Process post.  The post begins by stating, “AY PAC applauds all efforts by our city to promote open processes, meetings and decision making” and then lambastes City Council for making things more transparent too quickly.  Later on in the post the author states, “AY PAC applauds all efforts by our city to promote open processes, meetings and decision making,” while characterizing the process by which our city government became more transparent “suspect.”

I don’t know about you, but any process by which our government becomes more transparent can’t happen quickly enough, so far as I’m concerned.

Advance Ypsilanti PAC’s mission statement is a list of platitudes that only the Grinch could possibly disagree with.  Where are the facts upon which you base your opinions, Advance Ypsilanti PAC?  Where’s the beef?

Don’t miss the most recent Ypsilanti Youth Theatre play, “A Comedy of Errors” directed by Robert Papineau.  It is highly entertaining, the kids and sets are fantastic, and you won’t want to miss this one.  Tix are $8 at the door.  Performances are Saturday at 2 and 7 and Sunday at 2.

AnnArbor.com has a fantastic slideshow that you should definitely check out.  Many thanks to AnnArbor.com for the fantastic coverage!