Monday Moanin'

Am I, other than MSU fans, the only one in the state who found it hard to root for U of M and against Air Force?  I guess I like the new U of M coach; he seems to stand for all the right things.  But U of M seems to have lost that lofty status of not being like all of the other programs.  OK, maybe it was very naive of me to think that U of M was above the others, but that was the perception.  No longer.  It gets down and dirty with the rest of them.  But more, Air Force had all the same families playing, brothers or cousins, with the names "Service" and "Freedom" sewn to their backs.  I found myself wanting Air Force to pull it out--and it almost did.  Admittedly, I only watched the last few minutes of the game.

I see there was no economic "recovery" for the Detroit area in August.  There's no surprise.  And the story was buried back in the newspaper.  That's no surprise, either.  Throughout all this, all one has or had to do is look around to see that.  I've always been skeptical of the "official figures," anyway.  The politicians, of both parties, cook the numbers.  Anyone who knows history ("Bread and Circuses") or reads literature (Animal Farm among others) wouldn't be shocked at that.

And, speaking of "buried back in the newspaper," the past few days "buried back" were stories of more murders in Detroit.  I thought these murders were "unacceptable."  Why are they not on the front pages, blaring at us every day until, finally, they really do become "unacceptable?"  How can we allow our streets to be like this?  Can't we just come in with, say, the National Guard (or even the military instead of endangering them in winless situations in Iraq and Afghanistan?) and clear the streets of the murderers?  How many more lives, esp of young ones, will we tolerate?

This is not a Republican tirade, since I am not a Republican.  I don't think Romney is a good candidate for President.  I know I'm not voting for Obama, but I'm not at all sure I'm voting for Romney, either.  I haven't made up my mind.  But I'm getting very tired of "holding my nose" to vote for a Presidential candidate.  Anyway, I see the Democrats had Governor Granholm speak.  That raises oodles of questions about the wisdom of the Democratic leaders.  How can they look to her for leadership, guidance, inspiration?  Yes, her speech was emotional, but off-the-wall and its factual basis is questionable.  When Granholm ran for re-election, the state was a mess.  She needed "four more years" to straighten out what the former, Republican, governor had left.  The problem was she guided the state into a what was, for the most part, a single-state recession.  I know, I know, it wasn't one person's fault.  Of course it wasn't.  But, one, she claimed she was the one to lead us out of it--and she didn't.  Two, she certainly would have claimed credit had she done so; so she must also "claim" the blame. Three, her policies worsened matters.  There were two state gov't shutdowns under her administration.  There were higher taxes and anti-business regulations.  The state had the highest unemployment rate in the country--by far.  Yet, all we heard were empty platitudes like "Cool Cities!" and "Everybody Goes to College!"  I remember an anonymous Democratic insider saying off the record, that she "likes to play governor, but doesn't want to be governor," that is, make the hard decisions.  Choosing her as a speaker, as someone to whom the Democratic leadership looks to for guidance and inspiration is an insult to those in Michigan who suffered through those years.  That means most of us.

Nolan Finley had a good editorial in yesterday's newspaper.  But I disagree with his conclusion.  "Voters deserve better than this," he writes.  I don't think they do.  He claims, rightly, that the candidates of both parties are lacking; I assume he means for all offices.  I immediately looked at who's running for President and for US Senator.  Yes, we'll likely get nowhere out of this mess--and not just the economic one--with candidates like these.  But it is out fault; we don't deserve better.  Year after year, election after election we accept what the two parties throw at us.  We vote for one or the other, many of us "holding our noses" to do so.  In essence, we are condoning what the parties do, give us lousy candidates.  We never protest.  We never vote for minor party candidates.  We never bolt our own parties to send a message.  Nope, we do none of these things.  We just accept/condone what we are given.  There are good people out there.  We must insist that the parties find them.