I don't know whether it was a paid ad or just a plug by Paul W. Smith, but just seconds ago he announced, with the caveat that he "doesn't know if [he] could ever remember U-M football tickets being offered this way". He proceeded to describe an offer of season ticket packages for all 8 home games that were a one-time opportunity (no renewal privileges).
You know, I don't ever remember tickets being available like that either, let alone at this late date in the year.
I dare say Michigan's football program might be suffering a small dip in demand. Some of that is demand driven no doubt - the economy has depressed everyone's boat. But another part is supply - the quality of the Michigan product is in jeopardy for the first time, with Michigan's abysmal performance last year.
I actually called the reporter, Jim Totten, of the Livingston Argus, last night, to verify that Police Chief Wightman of the City of Brighton actually said it. According to Totten's story yesterday, which I hadn't had time to dig up in my post then, the Chief took a whole new tack - the ordinance has worked. So amazingly well that it has never needed to be enforced because "so many people know about it" that they've been "deterred" (paraphrasing here).
That is, Brighton is obviously now among the least annoying cities in the land, apparently. Their citizens are apparently more gentile than the citizens of other less enlightened towns without the regulation, or at least more cowered in their submission to and fear of Brighton policing powers.
Why do I find that remarkable?
First, it flips the City's initial whining about publicity being unfair on its head. Without the publicity, you can't have the deterrence. Second, it admits the goal all along was to have a "chilling effect" on speech. If people are aware of the law and have modified their speech - given the law's facial overbreadth and difficulty in defining - then those people have already experienced a negative First Amendment impact.
That is, the Founders didn't envision a perfectly tame, bland, oatmeal-like civic discourse where the people or civic society is annoyance free. Being annoying - at times and within reason and the bounds of not physically or measurable way - is both a consequence of and necessity of truly free speech. The speech we all agree with needs to defender or First Amendment - the speech at annoys is most vulnerable.
I also found curious this clip:
"This ordinance is not there to violate one's constitutional freedom-of-speech rights," he said.
Wightman said he didn't know if officers had actually warned people they could be ticketed under the amended rules because that information "doesn't make it to me." He said officers don't report to him every warning they've issued.
Hmm. Does that mean you don't communicate well with your officers, or you just don't want to know on this issue. Or maybe you just don't want to be transparent about it.
I've heard of spin and putting a positive light on things. The spin however digs you deeper usually, if you look at it closely.
The media has revisited the Brighton annoyance ordinance, and mentions our FOIA work and "citizen journalism" in a note of respect. Here at the blog of WDIV Detroit and WILX & WLNS Lansing, which appears to be a rehash of an AP story by the Press and Argus of Livingston that I can't handily find. Here's a clip:
Six months after it adopted more stringent ordinances that outlawed annoying behavior and harassment, the city has not ticketed anyone under the revised rules.
Police Chief Tom Wightman tells the Livingston County Daily Press & Argus of Howell the ordinances serve as a deterrent because people know about them.
But a political consultant who runs two citizen journalist Web sites focused on politics and local government says the changes were a bad idea and illegal.
Chetly Zarko said the ordinances are too subjective and not easily understood.
Why is the portion I have underlined funny to me. First, it proves that the Police Chief believes at least that the law has a "chilling effect" on conduct. That's unconstitutional First Amendment restraint (I've noted the law is unconstitutional under the Fourteenth Amendment Coates v. City of Cincinnatti analysis due to vagueness). Second, its a reversal from the whining and complaining the City officials went through in January about how the media blew this out of proportion. To get the "everyone knows" about it argument, the City would have needed and wanted to encourage media attention.
Maybe that was the plan all along.
I've lost respect for Wightman. Which is it? Unfair for the media to broadcast your stupid policy, or good deterrent if they do? I suppose this blog has contributed to deterring crime?
The timing of this one is interesting in that it overturns a ruling by a nomiinee for the high court itself. Here's a short clip about the ruling from Fox News politics online, and how Sonia Sotomayor's Court of Appeals decision was overturned.
For us here in Michigan - particularly supporters of and participants in the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative (MCRI) - the ruling is also a bittersweet vindication.
In assessing claims of race discrimination, “[c]ontext matters.” Grutter v. Bollinger, 539 U. S. 306, 327 (2003).
Ah. Right out in the open now. So the Constitution is a flimsy guide where "context matters," (context in this light is if you're white, you are assumed to not have the "history of being discriminated against") at least regarding the 14th Amendment. This is a core dispute though between modern conservative Constitutional doctrine and modern liberal doctrine. The "living, breathing Constitution" versus one where the original words have relatively defined meanings and should be given ordinary construction. Ginsburg goes on to predict the majority ruling will not "have staying power." Certainly, in her view of history, almost nothing should have staying, let alone can, if indeed, "context matters." If Ginsburg is right, the 14th Amendment to, and the entire Constitution itself, are the things that won't have "staying power."
The majority decision is written by Justice Kennedy, and while that might leave room for concern, it indicates where he is now in the mix of the court. It should be noted that Kennedy's dispassionate ruling against disparate-treatment of any kind focuses on detailed analysis of arcane nuances of the Civil Rights Act, and hence is not a master key into proper construction of the 14th amendment or Equal Protection Clause theory. But it is a key for preference opponents into a backdoor (some observers thought the Center for Individual Rights (CIR) should or could have litigated the U-M cases using either state law or Civil Rights Act law, but had they done that they would not have had a shot at the key for the obvious ... front door equal protection analysis) to ensure equality, and it closes a circle of argument by preference supporters that the Civil Rights Act forced preferences somehow. Ricci is therefore a major step forward for the anti-preference movement, but it is not nearly as a big a step backward as represented by Grutter. The only saving grace of Grutter is that it contained enough other language and a type of analysis that sows its own seeds of destruction in the future.
The preference v. non-preference has become a long, ongoing battle in legal and social history, one which will continue many years, in many chapters, and on many fields of political and legal contest. Ward Connerly, pictured above, is right to see it as a battle that can't be won without political and social force. The success in 2006 in Michigan may have contributed to the outcome in Ricci in subtle ways, although we must all be careful and vigilant to guard and expand upon the equality movement in the future.
Below are the press releases from Arizona announcing what was difficult to accomplish last year via signature drive has been accomplished by legislative vote. The signature-drive last appeared to have enough signatures but was disqualified by Arizona municipal clerks on technicalities because their signature margin was too close and AzCRI didn't have enough time to complete challenges to the challenges against the signatures.
Arizona voters will have the opportunity they missed last year in 2010, and its an issue we'll continue to follow for Michiganders interested and those that helped in 2006 pass the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative (MCRI).
Many of you may have noticed the new blog and facebook group "Race for Michigan" that purports to be a new source of information for Michigan political races, particularly at the top of the ticket.
OutsideLansing.com research however indicates its an anonymous "attack blog", and recent posts have racial overtones, as the post here attacking Secretary of State Terri Lynn Land suggests. The post accuses of Land of failing to act on a campaign finance complaint against Kwame Kilpatrick for using campaign funds for personal purposes, and then both in words and visually juxtaposes Land with Kilpatrick. It suggests her lack of action was intentional - an effort to "get Detroit votes" - and attacks her for that. Outsidelansing condemns the attack - both in its style and substance. Land was not wrong to not prosecute Kilpatrick because Michigan campaign finance law is weak, unclear, and probably doesn't actually apply to this situation, and Kilpatrick has already received the brunt of his punishment and campaign finance law would only allow a further slap on the wrist anyway.
Furthermore, Race for Michigan is registered by GoDaddy's "Domains by Proxy" service, meaning that short of litigation and court order, the identity of the owner will remain unknown. Since there is no way to contact Race for Michigan - OL left a message on its Facebook feed/wall and we were told to contact them by Facebook e-mail (which didn't appear to work at first but did after our request). Our e-mail with questions has remained unanswered for several weeks now.
Anonymous speech is a time-honored tradition in America, dating back to greats like Ben Franklin and Thomas Paine - but they made lasting and truthful points about liberty. Race for Michigan is a nothing more than an attack tool for someone - and lest speculation be that it is run by a Republican, it is entirely possible a Democrat or anyone is operating for whatever long-term reason. It has attacked several other Republican candidates, and its difficult and unclear whose horse the operator may have a stake in. It would seem that Race for Michigan has a right to exist - even anonymously - but it is also right for everyone to recognize it is NOT a legitimate or unbiased "news" source, that it has an agenda, and for us to condemn it when it launches into questionable attacks.
Some stories are astounding. This one you have to believe is just an overly straight-faced attempt at sarcasm.
But PETA mildly chastised (they still like his voting record) President O'Bama for swatting a fly.
I respect a President willing swat flies, and then say "I got the sucker." If O'Bama carries the same stick in foreign policy (the key to foreign policy is a good balance of both sticks and carrots, and it might be a valid criticism that Bush that he wasn't very good at the carrot side, but so far we see little stick from O'Bama) or swats a sucker named Osama, his presidency may be considered a success.
PETA is sending President Barack Obama a Katcha Bug Humane Bug Catcher, a device that allows users to trap a house fly and then release it outside.
"We support compassion even for the most curious, smallest and least sympathetic animals," PETA spokesman Bruce Friedrich said Wednesday. "We believe that people, where they can be compassionate, should be, for all animals."
During an interview for CNBC at the White House on Tuesday, a fly intruded on Obama's conversation with correspondent John Harwood.
"Get out of here," the president told the pesky insect. When it didn't, he waited for the fly to settle, put his hand up and then smacked it dead.
"Now, where were we?" Obama asked Harwood. Then he added: "That was pretty impressive, wasn't it? I got the sucker."
Catching and releasing a fly is like catching bin Laden and releasing him. Flies carry disease - often lethal. But its also simply a waste of time.
I also admire presidents who prefer to protect themselves and others against malaria and other disease. If only he and the United Nations would fight to allow DDT in Africa, millions of human lives could be saved (ah, but billions of flies would die).
Much has been said about the size of the April 15 Lansing Tea Party. Here's the only high-angle overhead shot I know of showing the crowd - unfortunately, it was taken at 1130am for an event advertised at noon that didn't really get rolling until about 1215, when I was in the House Office Building.
I didn't post it earlier because to get the wide angle I had to use a smaller camera. The crowd had swelled by the time I walked down to the Capitol lawn right after this photo was shot, and packed the area shown plus areas out to the second imaginary half circle of trees.
I don't know if the photo offers a way to measure the crowd size - but it is the largest group I've seen on the lawn by far and certainly compares to some historic protests.
At right is Nick Deleeuw, taken the same day. Included just becauses its a cool shot angle.
Even most Democrats should agree - spending government money to advertise the "Senate Democratic Caucus" official website on google ads that appear here (or anywhere in my mind), is wasteful government spending.
The Democrats have decried the differential amount that the Senate majority caucus budget gets, but the credibility of such a claim seems shot when the Democrats are using public taxpayer dollars to advertise their websites.
In this time of fiscal crisis, the Senate Democrat ads smack of hypocrisy and lack of wisdom. There may be a role for this type of thing, but not when you stake out a moral high ground and accuse the Republicans of misusing their caucus budgets (of course, the shoes are on the other foot in the House).
Still, OutsideLansing.com encourages users to click through any Senate Democrat ad. They're going to waste the money anyway, someway, so you might as well help steer some of my tax money back my way. The Senate Caucus is also more than welcome to buy a permanent banner ad sponsorship as well.
Tonight at 7:17pm I received another automated telephone poll (from 989-773-1144, an unpublished Mount Pleasant landline) attempting to guage the gubernatorial or Secretary of State primary races - its hard to tell which the focus was on. These polls are incredibly cheap - albeit not reliable for anything other than a determination perhaps of vaguely which direction the wind is blowing or whether a mountain is some direction to your fore. Like a golfer throwing a fingerful of grass into the air - some information is gleaned but knowing the rest of the landscape takes time and better tools.
It's also interesting trying to guess who is trying to measure this stuff - my guess is the introduction of Sheriff Michael Bouchard into the race caused one of his opens to check the impact, although it could be Bouchard's people themselves. Then again, two of the questions deal with the Secretary of State (which I would have used to "cold water" the result, distract the issue from any prying eyes, and improve the validity of results for the Governor questions).
Details:
Three questions
A) What is the most important role of the Secretary of State.
1) customer service
2) enforcing campaign finance laws
3) preventing ACORN and others from election fraud.
My opinion is the last part of the question is poorly designed and a bad road to travel down as a focus. While ACORN certainly should be watched and has a history of problems, it shouldn't be the focus of a campaign and even if fraud is the key issue, using the ACORN name here is likely to draw more attention to the third response than the other questions.
B) Which Sec. State candidate would you vote for?
All four choices were given, I didn't catch the order in my notes, but did catch the 5th choice of undecided. Emmons, McManus, Brown, and Norlander are the current candidates.
The timing of this one is interesting in that it overturns a ruling by a nomiinee for the high court itself. 
Even most Democrats should agree - spending government money to advertise the "Senate Democratic Caucus" official website on google ads that appear here (or anywhere in my mind), is wasteful government spending.
