@dvd_garvin/flickr
Regarding the idea that autocracy can't help Michigan's troubled towns, commenter @tra1215 writes from one town the state has taken over:
I live in Flint, and I haven't seen anything - NOTHING - that makes this city better. Police are still slow to respond (they don't even come for robberies anymore, unless they're in progress), potholes still dominate the roads, I wouldn't know about the schools because I pulled my kids out of them last year. For the sake of those children, I hope something is done soon.
So that's one view from the ground.
This week a former emergency manager of Pontiac has been arguing that the emergency manager law can't work because it takes away the civic structure and does nothing to build a new one. Governor Snyder replaced Stampfler last fall because, his administration told me, the governor believed it was time for a change and wanted "to move into the next phase." If you look back at Stampfler's exit, you'll see that he argued then, too, against the emergency manager law:
The restrictions placed on an Emergency Manager to control the City by the State Treasurer with little if any input from the Pontiac citizenry and the public perception of this control as an occupation of the City are severe impediments to achieving long term solutions for the chronic financial situation in this community. Long term neglect – many years of neglect – in both financial terms and community planning terms has virtually sealed the fate of the distressed community represented in poster child fashion by Pontiac. This is a sad and almost hopeless endeavor considering the absence of democratic process and lack of support or involvement by competent local elected leaders.
Stampfler is speaking next week about this issue at a Rotary Club lunch in Wyandotte. It's looking like this might be kind of a big deal, at least a big enough deal that he gets heard.
(Image: Elementary school in Pontiac by @dvd_garvin/Flickr)
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I think the Federal Government should take over Mississippi.
Perhaps we've become complacent about the wonders of living in a "democracy." It might be worth recalling why democracies are the worst form of government except for all of the others tried so far.
Stake. Skin in the game. Ownership.
At root, stability. It's hard to work up a revolution in a democracy because by the time you have enough people behind you to overthrow the government you could have been voted in [1].
Treating your citizenry like occupied territory denies that. Disenfranchise them, and they'll find some other way. Santayana was right: those who forget the lessons of 1965 are at risk of repeating them.
[1] At least it was in the 18th century, when mass infantry ruled the battlefield. Today, armies are longer on capital and shorter on labor, so maybe plutocracy has that advantage.
ah but the right would remind you that this is a republic not a democracy. Of course the right is full of...as they leave out the term representative.
The situation in Michigan is going to blow up in their faces sooner or later. History has shown us that people denied the right to vote and have a voice will eventually awaken to how they are being treated. Women, African Americans both fought for voting rights, have we become a Nation of lazy cows unwilling to take action?
Paul, that was what "the lessons of 1965" was about.
And just to make sure.... you all know this is exactly what they've been doing to public schools in the past decade, right? Strip the school board and superintendent away, make the new superintendent a guy with an MBA or a (woman who taught for a couple years and thinks she's suddenly an expert on fixing schools), test the kids like mad and tie teacher pay and tenure to the kids' scores (but only in reading and math), fire a bunch of perfectly good teachers, take away music and arts, strip science and social studies, test the kids some more, and the kids are either no better off or worse for it (but somehow a bunch of extra money got spent... with some education "reform" firm... )
Oh, I get it
freedom of speech for some
I catch your drift
Won't be buying the book though
Why is the emergency manager law not a violation of Article IV, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution which states: "The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence." ?
Thanks to Rachel for reporting on the end of Democracy in Michigan. Local stations are doing virtually no reporting on this. I used to watch PBS for at least some fair reporting on local matters in Michigan; but this has stopped also. The other day I was looking at a list of PBS contributors and there was David Koch listed as one of the donators to PBS.