1. Remove any policy impediments that would halt massive layoffs.

2. Hire a hatchet man to replace your old-guard management. Give him a hatchet.

3. Start by eliminating your most experienced (and therefore best-paid) workers.

4. Make hollow promises that those who take on more work will survive another round of layoffs. See who can stand up to the stress.

5. If possible, re-form your company so you can pretend that changes are being made because of a major business shift, not to fatten your bottom line.

6. Put the hatchet into overtime. Get rid of everyone above a certain pay grade. Cut middle management to the bone. Keep your youngest and cheapest employees.

7. Under the banner of the “new” company, hire in young workers at a pittance of what you used to pay and give them two or three times the workload that people in their position formerly had. Also, sell off expensive assets.

8. Preserve the salaries and bonuses of your top executives. But put any executives you want to get rid of into jobs in which they will clearly self-destruct.

Welcome to the remade Grand Rapids Press, run by its “new” owner, MLive Media Group. Have we just seen the capitalist step-by-step “reorganization” plan above used as its road map? Judge for yourself:

According to Rob Kirkbride, a former reporter who blogs about newspaper topics, the Press used to have two “cornerstone pledges” to their employees: no jobs would be eliminated because of the economy or because of changes to technology. Kirkbride writes, “Booth Newspapers, which owned the Press, changed its policy a couple of years after I left and they have not stopped cutting jobs since.” This was about the same time that Mike Lloyd retired and Paul Keep was brought on as Press editor.

The first staffers to go were some of the most popular reporters and columnists, like Tom Rademacher and Ruth Butler. Other familiar bylines started to disappear, returning occasionally to freelance. The hatchet fell like a guillotine, however, when the “new” MLive Media Group made cuts in all eight of its newspaper staffs: 550 jobs were lost across the state, including 146 here in Grand Rapids. As Dan Gaydou, formerly publisher of the Press and now president of MLive Media Group, said adroitly in a statement, “We’ve been clear since the moment we announced the launch of MLive Media Group that we’d be a smaller company as a result of the transition.” No kidding.

And to twist the knife in even deeper, Gaydou added “…all these employees are eligible to apply for new jobs within MLive Media Group and Advance Central Services Michigan, and we have and will continue to encourage them to do so.” I’d interpret that as: it may be possible to get a job again, as long as you’re willing to put up with a massive pay cut and probably be forced to take on additional responsibilities as well.

Those saying “no thanks” to the offer included Ed Golder, an award-winning op/ed writer for the Press, who packed his bags and accepted a job directing communications at the Department of Natural Resources in December.

So, as the blood is mopped up, what will the new Grand Rapids Press look like?

The Press has put Julie Hoogland, a former education editor, into an equivalent of Paul Keep’s job. Instead of a managing editor, there are going to be three “managing producers of content” who will be taking stories from reporters and transferring them into online media and print.

Paul Keep has been named executive editor of the print versions of all eight newspapers now controlled by the new organization. Given the MLive Media Group’s emphasis on their web presence, this job appears to be the equivalent of the Inuit putting one of their elderly onto an ice floe to drift off and die. After all, it’s clear to everyone in the business that print newspapers are on life support.

Who’s left to do the reporting? The Press has retained a few of its most skilled writers, including Shandra Martinez, Jim Hargar, John Serba, and Jeffrey Kaczmarczyk (probably one of the best writers the Press has ever employed). John Gonzalez, who used to be the overlord of a whole entertainment department, has been bumped to an entertainment reporter position. But many of the survivors are the greenest (and therefore probably less-well-paid) of the former staff reporters.

These include Troy Reimink, who often seems incapable of separating objective reporting from personal commentary and injects frat-boy humor into news stories. The surviving staff also includes Garret Ellison, who last year posted a story about an Occupy Grand Rapids protest that some attendees claimed was false or exaggerated. Even after posted film footage showed that certain details of Ellison’s story did not seem to match what happened at the event, the Press allowed the story to stand—probably because Ellison’s spin appealed greatly to its conservative readership base.

Ellison has also thrown notable online tantrums when readers try to tell him that he has misspelled something. But he won’t have to worry about his lack of grammar and spelling skills any longer. That’s because the Press staff no longer includes any copy editors.

Anyone who has ever worked in any kind of publishing knows that writing without editing is madness. And with a young, inexperienced staff, it’s a kind of madness that truly points to how low costs are much more important now at the Press than any kind of journalistic integrity. Although the suits like Gaydou and Keep are lining up to crow about their new, improved product, details are already leaking out about the craziness of the business model these capitalists have created.

A retired reporter from Lapeer, who runs an excellent blog site called Free From Editors, wrote on January 9, 2012 about an applicant for one of those MLive reporting jobs. At the interview, the prospective employee was told that driving the Press’s web traffic was the job’s focal responsibility. He was also told, “Reporters will self-edit.”

I admit, when I read that line, I shuddered. There are very few people left at the current Press who are even capable of self-editing, and they are seasoned enough to know that it’s a bad idea. There are also plenty of prima donnas who seem to believe that even their typos are marks of their genius, and now they’ll never get a chance to hone their craft.

According to the blog story, MLive reporters will be given backpacks, laptops, and smartphones. They are expected to shoot videos of every source on the smartphone, and then shoot the whole bundle with an article to HQ to keep feeding the website. And—this really shows how the stated MLive “commitment to print” is a string of empty words—the interviewee was told that the print version of the paper was not a priority and would “just end up filling itself.”

It was also made clear in the interview that reporters were expected to work themselves into a frenzy, not writing and filing carefully investigated stories but “producing content.” There is also a hint that the compensation was dismal when balanced against the amount of work expected. Or, as the interviewee noted, the whole thing is “a nightmare, honestly…the stress level is through the effing roof up there.”

Brand-new staffers will not even work in a newsroom. The Press sold its newsroom/office building downtown to Michigan State University for a cool $12 million. What they have provided for employees is an office they are calling a “hub,” although from the video of the place, it’s clear it’s nothing more than a drop-in way station. Its sterile blue and white rows of countertops are reminiscent of a robot-run factory from a 1960s cartoon like The Jetsons. I suspect that the true Press hub will probably be some hipster bar like Hopcat, where exhausted reporters will be downloading their stories and videos over beers and crack fries.

More freedom in a job is always desirable, but there’s also value in connecting with and learning from more experienced staff members. In the chilly atmosphere of the “hub,” it’s hard to imagine anyone will want to hang around for long. So consistent, casual interaction there seems unlikely.

Many readers sense that worse days are coming. In comments made on a Sunday column by Paul Keep in which Keep sings the praises of the print editions he’ll oversee, one reader from Kalamazoo sarcastically noted that he dropped his Gazette subscription when his paper “had been blown down the street by the slightest of breezes.” Another savvy reader pointed out that there would no longer be any investigative reporting, just AP wire stories and stuff rehashed from other web sites. “You have hurt the local communities,” the reader told Keep. “They are angry. You expect them to be grateful?”

For years, the Grand Rapids Press has been, in my opinion, a mediocre paper at best, with an occasional news series or reporter standing out from the rest. I’ve often wondered what it would look like at rock bottom. With no copy editors, few experienced reporters, the cheapest available staff overworked to the point of collapse, and an emphasis on quantity over quality, it appears I’m about to find out.

MLive Media Group hub photo used by permission from Ari B. Adler from his site Here Comes Later: http://aribadler.wordpress.com/

House Bill 5023 would “prohibit strikes by certain public employees; to provide review from disciplinary action with respect thereto; to provide for the mediation of grievances and the holding of elections; to declare and protect the rights and privileges of public employees; to require certain provisions in collective bargaining agreements; and to prescribe means of enforcement and penalties for the violation of the provisions of this act.”

The House Committee on Oversight, Reform & Ethics is a 6-member committee, with the 4 Republicans voting in favor of the proposed legislation and the 2 Democrats voting against. The MLive story claims that the proposed legislation is in part a response to the teacher strike at Central Michigan University last year and is designed to prevent such actions in the future. The right to strike in the US has been under attack since WWII and was dealt a large blow with the passing of the Taft-Hartley Act in 1947. The ability to strike is the only real power that unions have, which is no doubt why House Bill 5023 is on the table.

There are three other House Bills that are part of this package of bills that cleared the House Committee and is headed to the State House for a vote. All three of the additional bills build on the anti-union focus of House Bill 5023.

First, there is House Bill 5024, which states, “An act to create a commission relative to labor disputes, and to prescribe its powers and duties; to provide for the mediation and arbitration of labor disputes, and the holding of elections thereon; to regulate the conduct of parties to labor disputes and to require the parties to follow certain procedures; to regulate and limit the right to strike and picket; to protect the rights and privileges of employees, including the right to organize and engage in lawful concerted activities; to protect the rights and privileges of employers; to make certain acts unlawful; and to prescribe means of enforcement and penalties for violations of this  act.”

House Bill 5025, which deals with the collection of union dues, states, “An act to regulate the time and manner of payment of wages and fringe benefits to employees; to prescribe rights and responsibilities of employers and employees, and the powers and duties of the department of labor; to require keeping of records; to provide for settlement of disputes regarding wages and fringe benefits; to prohibit certain practices by employers; to prescribe penalties and remedies; and to repeal certain acts and parts of acts.”

Lastly, House Bill 5026, which essentially will make it easier for employers to hire people to replace striking workers (what should be referred to as scabs), states, “An act relating to solicitations for employment; to prohibit recruitment of or advertising for employees to take the place of employees engaged in a labor dispute without stating that the employment offered is in place of employees involved in a labor dispute; to prohibit the importation of strikebreakers; and to provide penalties for violations of this act.”

The Michigan Education Association is referring to these bills as anti-union and draconian, but no other major union has as of yet released a statement about these proposed pieces of legislation.

All four of these bills were sponsored by Republicans, with some of those GOP State Legislators adding their names to more than one of these bills. For instance, Rep. Lisa Lyons, who represents Alto, sponsored House Bill 5023, but she also is a co-sponsor to House Bills 5024, 5025 and 5026. Other recent anti-union/anti-worker legislation she has voted for were amending workers’ compensation law and ending domestic partner benefits for public employees.

House Bill 5024 was introduced by Rep. Tom McMillen from Rochester Hills, Michigan. In addition to introducing House Bill 5024 he is a co-sponsor to House Bills 5023 and 50 25. McMillin has also recently voted for ending domestic partner benefits for public employees and amending the worker’s compensation law.

Rep. Earl Poleski introduced House Bill 5025, but is also a co-sponsor of House Bills 5023. House Bill 5026 was introduced by Rep. Amanda Price, who has also co-sponsored House Bills 5023, 5024 and 5025. Price, who represents Park Township in West Michigan, also recently voted for amending the worker’s compensation law and ending domestic partner benefits for public employees.

Other legislators who co-sponsored at lest one of these four bills are Al Pscholka, who is considered one of the masterminds behind the public-park-into-private-golf-resort plan down in Benton Harbor and Dave Agema, who has introduced anti-immigration legislation and was the primary sponsor of the legislation to end domestic partner benefits for state employees.

If we hear of any efforts to fight these anti-union legislative proposals we will update our readers with that information.

Mayor Heartwell acknowledged that despite all the solid area programs that addressed child well-being, that all the measurements indicate that child well-being is declining. Here are the statistics the Mayor provided.

“Did you now that 36.7% of all children in Grand Rapids live below the poverty line?  Nearly four out of ten children live in poverty!  What does that mean? Four of ten children experience persistent hunger. Four of ten children live in housing that is unhealthy or unsafe. Four of ten children don’t have the resources they need to succeed in school: books in the home; routine access to the internet; paper, pencils, calculators. Four of ten children can’t afford the enrichment experiences that their more affluent friends have. Four of ten children probably have substandard medical and dental care, if they have any at all.”

The Grand Rapids Mayor stated that he met with 43 people in recent months, people he referred to as “sages,” to find out what they thought about what needed to be done to address the awful condition of so many children in this city. Heartwell said he met with, “College and University Presidents, to titans of business and industry, to local elected officials, philanthropists and foundation directors, non-profit professionals, parents and…of course, children.”

A summary of what the Mayor learned and is recommending is as follows: First, the Mayor wants the community as a whole to have conversations about children, record the ideas on how to address the problems they face and send them to the Community Research Institute at Grand Valley State University.

Second, the Mayor highlights the work of the Upward Bound program, which offers poor children an opportunity to get to college. Heartwell said that the program could serve more kids if there was more federal funding. The Mayor then tells the crowd gathered that he went to a local Business man and asked if he would find more funding for the program.

A third program is a college scholarship program through the Grand Rapids Foundation. A fourth idea is top promote more literacy and to get more parents to read to their kids. A fifth idea discussed was a new educational model at the Kent Intermediate School District, where best practices are being shared amongst area high schools.

Lasting, the Mayor offers up a suggestion from Michigan Governor Snyder’s Education Achievement Authority. This is a proposal to have state entity manage local schools that are struggling.

In many ways one has to respect the Mayor for his passion and what motivates his intentions. It seems clear that he truly wants children in Grand Rapids to not live in poverty, to have the opportunity to get a good education, have good homes and a healthy lifestyle.

Where all of this falls apart seems to be the unwillingness to acknowledge the reasons for the 36.7% of Grand Rapids children living in poverty. All the good intentions in the world won’t make a difference with this reality. All the money we spend to improve educational opportunities and all the efforts we put into literacy will not fundamentally reduce poverty.

Poverty is a result of the economic system of capitalism. The parents of these children living in poverty are unemployed or underemployed and do not make wages that are adequate for a family to live on. Children live in poverty because their parents live in poverty, something which the Mayor did not address.

The Mayor did not address the fact that housing foreclosures are still occurring at high rates or that unemployment benefits are dwindling. The Mayor did not address that disproportionately high numbers of Black and Latino youth are dropping out of school and ending up in the Prison Industrial Complex. The Mayor also did not address the incredible wealth gap that exists in this city, with a small percentage of people with tremendous wealth, while a growing number of people are the working class poor.

This same failure to look at the root causes of child poverty was how the Kids Count Michigan data on child poverty in Kent County was addressed last week. Everyone was acknowledging that there is a growing number of children living in poverty, but no one was asking why.

The Mayor ended his speech by quoting Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The comment by Dr. King spoke to the interdependence of all humanity.

“As long as there is poverty in the world I can never be rich, even if I have a billion dollars.  As long as diseases are rampant and millions of people in this world cannot expect to live more than twenty-eight or thirty years, I can never be totally healthy even if I just got a good checkup at Mayo Clinic.  I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be.  This is the way our world is made.  No individual or nation can stand out boasting of being independent.  We are interdependent.”

This is a nice quote from Dr. King, but it doesn’t address the totality of what King thought about poverty and the economic system that causes poverty. Here is what King had to say about poverty and capitalism:

“We are now making demands that will cost the nation something. You can’t talk about solving the economic problem of the Negro without talking about billions of dollars. You can’t talk about ending slums without first saying profit must be taken out of slums. You’re really tampering and getting on dangerous ground because you are messing with folk then. You are messing with the captains of industry….Now this means that we are treading in difficult waters, because it really means that we are saying that something is wrong…with capitalism…here must be a better distribution of wealth and maybe America must move toward a Democratic Socialism.”

It seems to this writer that poverty cannot truly be addressed until we start messing with people, people King identifies as members of the capitalist class – the Captains of Industry.

For years we have all seen the “Got Milk” ads, where some one has a milk mustache in the ad. This ad campaign has featured numerous celebrities from the sports world, cultural entertainment world and even the political world.

Now the Got Milk campaign is using commercial icons that will be targeting children. The breakfast cereal giant Kellogg’s is partnering with the National Fluid Milk Processor Promotion Board to promote milk with breakfast cereal, particularly over-sweetened breakfast cereals such as Frosted Flakes and Rice Krispies.

The ad campaign partnership was announced this week through MIBiz in their weekly e-newsletter. Actually, MiBiz did not announce the campaign, they just provided a hyper-link to a Media Release by Kellogg’s. The Media Release states in part:

“At Kellogg’s, we know that a bowl of cereal and milk is a great, nutritious way to start your day,” said Doug VanDeVelde, Kellogg SVP of marketing and innovation-ready-to-eat cereal. “So, it just made sense to bring our two brands together in a fun way while continuing to engage moms about the many nutritional benefits of cereal with milk. In fact, this dynamic duo delivers 10 important nutrients to kid’s diets.”

Despite the rather benign notion of breakfast cereals and milk, this ad campaign should certainly be scrutinized by parents and citizens alike.

Using cartoon characters like Tony the Tiger and Snap, Crackle & Pop, is a decades-long strategy to market food-stuff to children. This tactic of marketing highly sweetened cereals to children was supported by recent reports from the Yale Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity.  Much of this research and that noted by the Campaign for Commercial Free Childhood notes that this kind of marketing to children has contributed to the current epidemic of childhood obesity.

In addition, the campaign continues to cover up what the function of the National Fluid Milk Processor Promotion Board. This board oversees the National Fluid Milk Processor Promotion Program, which came about as a result of the Fluid Milk Promotion Act of 1990. This federal act essentially was a mechanism to provide funding for generic advertising for milk in order to expand the market…….ie, it was a way for milk producers/processors to make more money.

The expanding of markets for the milk industry has had a major impact in how milk is produced. With the push for increased milk production the industry created rBGH, a bovine growth hormone that has created serious consequences for the cows that are injected with the hormone and for humans who consume rBGH milk. The US FDA allows rBGH milk to be sold in the US, but Europe has banned rBGH milk from the US because of the human health risks of its consumption. Monsanto developed rBGH and went to great lengths to keep the human health risks hidden from the public.

On January 24, MLive posted two stories about a “2012 Turnaround Plan” for Michigan that was being presented by the Business Leaders for Michigan. GRIID did a story previously on this gang of robber barons, and showed how they were using the DeVos-funded Mackinac Center as a resource for the group’s recommendations. The connected groups are powered by the wealthiest Michigan capitalists. The BLM, which we called “The Kings of Michigan,” appears to be running the state—and also Snyder, who they hand-picked and who is now following their orders. Don’t believe that? Just compare his campaign platform to an identical plan created by the Mackinac Policy Center and transferred to the BLM in 2009. Snyder had been prepped with their own “ten-point plan” to derail democracy in the state and place it in their hungry hands. Everything he’s done since has been on the wish list of the BLM.

And now the kings have issued their demands for Snyder’s 2012 legislative focus. Jim Harger’s article is little more than a rephrasing of the BLM’s press release. Melissa Anders’ story, while still short and completely uncritical, offers a few more details.

I was going to fault the reporters for paper-thin content until I went to the BLM site to see the kings’ commandments for myself. The plan was nearly impossible to find—buried beneath layers of lists of hollow buzz words and catchphrases and colorful charts that explained nothing. This was the same hide-the-real-message tactic that they had Snyder use during his campaign so he could pose as a moderate and get elected.

When I finally found the details, it was clear that the group had finessed their original 2009 plan, created before they selected Snyder as our next governor. But the 2012 version offers some new information that will undoubtedly set the agenda in Lansing for the coming year. Since a lot of it is in capitalist-speak, I’ll offer translations of some of the group’s major agenda points:

Become the Gateway to the Midwest.

Translation: Pour money into the Detroit airports and turn them into an “Aerotropolis”; build another bridge to Canada.

Develop a Life Sciences Hub.

Translation: Focus on health care as a major “industry” here. Attract more big pharma companies to the state. This makes sense when you look at the list of BLM members, which include executives from Dow Chemical, Blue Cross Blue Shield, and Perrigo.

Take Advantage of Michigan’s Natural Resources.

Translation: Rape the state by selling off water rights, permit timberland destruction, promote shale oil drilling, etc. This step also mentions our “agricultural know-how” and how it can be married to destructive, monster-sized agri-businesses (called “high-yield agriculture” in the plan).

Make Michigan a Global Engineering Village.

Translation: Close down factories with living-wage jobs for the working class and get rid of those nagging unions. Skim off our “engineering expertise,” people with specialized degrees, and sell their skills on the world market.

Make Michigan More Attractive to Out-of-State Businesses.

Translation: Continue to weaken union power by taking away collective bargaining, workers’ compensation rights, and lowering or eliminating business taxes all together (something already being discussed in Lansing; Snyder eliminated the Michigan Business Tax in 2011). Improve the “regulatory climate” by reducing or eliminating regulations on business and industry. Eliminate the personal property tax. (This step is called out plainly instead of being hedged with buzz words, so it’s clearly Priority One. The  Michigan Chamber of Commerce has also called for this step).

Ask yourself: Can Michigan as a right-to-work state be far behind?

Make Urban Centers More Attractive to Knowledge Workers.

Translation: Can anyone say “gentrification”? Can anyone say “Art Prize”? Can anyone say, “We want more hipsters here?”

Efficiently and Effectively Provide Public Services.

Translation: This step has privatization and power-grabbing measures such as One Kent written all over it. It will shift the higher costs of these types of services to the citizens of Michigan, and at the same time will open up fat-cat contracts for various businesses.

Efficiently and Effectively Provide State Services.

Translation: Lower wages and take away benefits from state workers. Privatize prison management. Privatize road and infrastructure care. Snyder achieved some of these steps in 2011.

Efficiently and Effectively Provide School Services.

Translation: This step mentions the high pay of teachers and the unnecessary number of schools, along with too little accountability for performance. In other words, charter schools, charter schools, charter schools…Dick and Betsy DeVos’s dream come true. Snyder drove in the thin edge of the wedge on this issue in 2011 with Senate Bill 618.

Apparently what Snyder will be doing in 2012 is more of what he’s done in 2011: take away the power of citizens’ votes…impoverish working class and elderly citizens to hand over millions of dollars to corporations…bust unions…privatize public services…and create a climate that allows the Kings of Michigan and their peers to double, triple, quadruple their personal wealth at the cost of working citizens.

All this wrapped up in a nice little package that claims it will “turn around” Michigan for all of us, with touching photos on the front and back covers of the brochure. Is anyone still buying this?

The Business Leaders for Michigan. Get to know their names. Look at their companies. These are the people who must be dethroned if we are going to save our state from plutocracy.

Just a few days ago the annual Michigan Kids Count report was released to the news media. The annual report is produced by the Michigan League for Human Services and highlights several social indicators for children.

As could be expected all the major daily news sources in West Michigan reported on the Kids Count report. MLive was the first, reporting the data in a story early this morning, with an emphasis on the increase in numbers of children living in poverty. They report that 32,000 children in Kent County live in poverty.

The local TV stations also reported on the new data with WOOD TV 8 emphasizing the increase in child abuse and neglect in their headlines over poverty. WZZM 13 led with an emphasis on the increase of child poverty, as did WXMI 17. WOOD radio, with the shortest story of all local news media cited, focused on child abuse and neglect.

Most of the local news agencies sourced a representative from the Michigan League for Human Services, but only MLive used additional sources such as a spokesperson from the groups Family Futures, Michigan’s Children and the Great State Collaborative in Ottawa and Allegan County.

In a few of the stories there is mention from the Michigan League for Human Services spokesperson that the increase in poverty has resulted from cuts in public spending. The MLive story states:

“The banks were bailed out, but now when we have budget talks it’s all about how we can’t afford to have these (social support) programs go on forever,” said Jane Zehnder-Merrell, Kids Count in Michigan director. “Instead of helping families we are actually hindering families from meeting the needs of their children in times of economic crisis.

“If we don’t provide a solid socioeconomic foundation for children, they’re going to have 50 years of not being productive adults.”

None of the other news agencies provided any commentary or bothered to ask WHY so many children are living in poverty. Certainly, the huge cuts to welfare, unemployment benefits and the austerity measures put in place in recent years, beginning under Gov. Granholm and continuing under Gov. Snyder are significant. However, the point that the spokesperson for the Michigan League for Human Services made about bailing out the Banks is more relevant to what is at issue.

Children live in poverty because of policy and priorities. The federal government, at the urging of the financial sector, bailed out the banks with billions of dollars. Some sources put the number at $800 billion dollars, while others put it as high as $12.8 Trillion. This all happens, we are told, to save the economy. At the same time the Pentagon budget increases and the federal government siphons off billions to pay for war and militarism.

However, when it comes to paying for unemployment benefits, domestic partner benefits, children’s educational programs, child poverty programs and children’s health, we are told there are not sufficient funds. From some circles on the far right we are told that you just can’t throw money at poverty to solve the problem, but these same sources didn’t have a problem with the federal government throwing money at the banks.

So while it is important that the new Kids Count Michigan data has been reported on, the local news agencies do all of us a disservice by not asking why so many children in Michigan are living in poverty.

“A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.”   Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

The first question was about the Democrats urging the Governor to use surplus money for public education. Snyder did say he would consider investing State funds on education, but not without some “criterion.” However, the Governor only offered up a vague notion of “student growth,” growth that could be measured.

Albin followed up those comments by asking what Snyder would do to make sure schools were increasing the amount of high school graduate who were college ready. Snyder responded with rather vague commentary about how not all schools have come on board with adopting practices suggested by the state to receive funds based on performance.

The Michigan Governor then went on to compare school funding with local revenue sharing. He talked about how revenue sharing was based on “best practices,” which is code for downsizing & privatizing government, and then he said that the state also encouraged local governments to come up with innovative ideas that could also land them more funds. The example Snyder gave was the decision of Grand Rapids, Flint and Lansing to process tax returns collectively. What Snyder failed to mention was that this $550,00 state grant would be used to pay JP Morgan Chase Bank to process the tax returns instead of having City employees do it.

Snyder never really answered Albin’s question about education and instead of challenging the Governor on this issue Albin just goes along with Snyder’s desire to talk about “innovative ideas.” Again, the only thing that Snyder could say about more funding for education was for school districts to adopt an innovative approach in the same ways that municipalities have.

Albin does bring the conversation back to education and asks Snyder to respond to the Democrats proposal for funding higher education. Snyder admitted that he had not really looked at the Democrats proposal, but he did say he thinks that we have to figure out ways to make college tuition affordable. However, the Governor did not provide any specifics except to say that one way that students could save money was to allow more high school students to take college courses and get credit for them before they finish high school.

The discussion then shifted to the idea of Michigan trying to balance its budget and what kinds of things the state should be investing on. Snyder says he wants to think long term, but the only concrete investment he could offer was road repair in Michigan. He said that investing in Michigan roads would do two things. First, it would put more unemployed people back to work and secondly, it would support commerce, particularly with more emphasis on exporting to Canada via the bridge. Again, Albin did not challenge the Governor on such claims.

The next question that the WOOD TV reporter posed to Snyder had to do with reducing crime in the state of Michigan. Snyder said that Michigan has 4 of the top 10 most violent cities in the country; Flint, Saginaw, Pontiac and Detroit, based on FBI data. Snyder believes there are three things that Michigan can do to respond to this problem. First, the Governor thinks we need to put more police on the streets. Second, Michigan needs to reform its criminal justice system to make it more efficient and third, Snyder thinks we can stop crime by creating jobs. Once again, Rick Albin did not question the Governor on his responses. Albin did not talk about the racial reality of crime reporting and crimes statistic in Michigan and why a disproportionately high number of racial minorities were in the criminal justice system, particularly for drug related crimes. Albin also did not challenge the Governor around job creation and crime reduction, especially on the matter of job creation within the prison/jail expansion within the state. Here it seems that jobs are being created because of the criminal justice system.

The last question from the WOOD TV reporter had to do with personal property tax. Snyder said there were three areas of the personal property tax that are distinct, but the emphasis should be on reducing industrial property tax. Snyder believes that if businesses have less industrial property tax they will come to Michigan and create more jobs. As was the pattern, Rick Albin did not question the Governor on this question and the online interview ended there.

Essentially the interview was a version of the State of the State address, which may have been the agreement between Governor Snyder’s office and channel 8. Even if this wasn’t the case it omitted numerous issues that Rick Albin could have pressed the Governor on. For instance, Albin could have asked questions about the tax benefits for wealthy Michiganders, the further privatization of government services, the status of the Emergency Financial Management policy and many more critical areas that may have been equally relevant to Michigan residents.

As is always the case during a major election cycle, local broadcasters will reap the benefits of those seeking to influence elections and legislation.

As we have noted in pervious election cycles, local broadcasters, particularly TV stations will make millions from money paid to buy airtime from political parties, political action committees (PACs) and from individual corporations and associations.

Recently, the American Petroleum Institute has been buying airtime in West Michigan with a commercial advocating that the Obama administration approve the Keystone Pipeline Project.

The ad, like all political ads, over simplifies what is at stake. The American Petroleum Institute uses language that tries to make it sound like the Obama administration must approve this project in order to be true to his claims to getting the US economy back on track. The ad focuses mostly on how the Keystone Project would create jobs and provide a safe energy source for the US.

The American Petroleum Institute ad, however, is full of misinformation. First, the bulk of the oil from the Alberta Tar Sands Project will mostly be for export and not for domestic use as the ad claims. Second, the project is considered one of the worst environmental disasters in recent years. According to Tar Sands Watch the project is using an excessively large amount of water resources from Canada and it is now the number one emitter of greenhouse gases in the country. Third, the project is opposed by Aboriginal groups, since the pipeline will threaten the sovereignty of native lands.

These facts and others are not included in the American Petroleum Institute ad and local TV stations are not challenging or questioning their claims.

In addition, the local TV broadcasters are not reporting on the fact that one of the main players in the Keystone Pipeline Project is Enbridge, as you can see from this map below. So not only are local broadcasters making money from this ad they are not investigating the link between a company with a major oil spill in West Michigan and one of the worst ecologically disastrous projects in recent decades.

West Michigan TV viewers are also not likely to hear local TV stories about the political influence of the American Petroleum Institute. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, the American Petroleum Institute has spent millions annually lobbying Congress.

Lastly, this new ad campaign from the American Petroleum Institute is right on the heels of another ad campaign they rolled out late last year called the Vote 4 Energy campaign, where viewers were led to believe that people off the street were saying positive things about the oil industry. We know that the ad was scripted and not the spontaneous reflections of average Americans because a Greenpeace activist was able to get in on the production of the commercial and tape how lines were being fed to people. The ad campaign was also exposed by the group Polluter Watch, which did its own spoof ad we encourage you to watch here.

Agema, the term limited State Representative from Grandville, wants the State of Michigan to pass legislation that would require what Agema refers to as the core government documents – US Constitution, Federalist Papers, Bill of Rights and the Declaration of Independence.

In addition, Agema wants in mandatory that the Pledge of Allegiance be recited in public schools daily. The Press reporter cites only Agema who comments that he hopes Tea Party members would put pressure on the State government to make such legislation official.

Press reporter Jim Harger doesn’t verify if Michigan public schools already teach such documents nor does he provide any response from a different perspective.

The Press reporter also doesn’t mention that this legislation is just one more example of Agema’s extremist proposals. Agema over the years has proposed numerous pieces of legislation that demonizes and criminalizes immigrants. The Grandville legislator has also supported Governor Snyder’s austerity measures that attack unionized public sector workers and working families in general. Agema is a proponent of making Michigan a Right to Work state and has proposed legislation that promotes Islamophobia. Agema’s most recent attack on working people was to eliminated domestic partner benefits for those who are state employees, an action that is widely understood to be an attack against the LGBT community in Michigan.

Having said that I would support the teaching of US government documents that Agema mentions. We all should be familiar with this history and we should be educated to take a critical look at the significance of documents such as the Bill of Rights. Michigan schools should also expose students to the writings of Thomas Paine and other dissidents who challenged the failure of the founding fathers to take such documents seriously.

For instance, it should be known to children in Michigan public schools that the only people who could vote after the country was founded were White men who owned property. In addition, it should be taught that many of the founding fathers owned slaves and would not support efforts to abolish chattel slavery in the early years of this nation.

Michigan children should be taught about the Sedition Act of 1798. The Sedition Act fundamentally made it illegal to publicly oppose any measure of the federal government, legislation that was targeted at dissidents.

One additional part of Michigan’s education could be the statement inscribed on the Statue of Liberty, which was written by Emma Lazarus is 1883:

“Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame. With conquering limbs astride from land to land; 
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand 
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame 
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name 
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand 
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command 
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” 
cries she 
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your 
poor, 
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, 
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. 
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, 
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

Such a statement flies in the face of the position that Representative Agema takes towards immigrants.

Then there is the matter of reciting the Pledge of Allegiance. The original pledge was written by Francis Bellamy in 1892, “I pledge allegiance to my Flag and the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

In 1924 the American Legion and the Daughters of the American Revolution lobbied to change the Pledge’s words, ‘my Flag,’ to ‘the Flag of the United States of America. It wasn’t until 1954, during the height of the McCarthy hearings that the words “under God” were added to the Pledge, a campaign initiated by the Catholic group the Knights of Columbus.

Representative Agema continues to push his far right agenda on the people of Michigan and the news media continues to give him a pass by not asking reasonable questions to challenge his proposed legislation.

A few years ago Glen Beck organized an event on the anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington and many social conservatives will often misuse Dr. King’s comment about judging people not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.

However, social conservatives are not the only ones who misuse the memory of Dr. King. We often see social liberals use King in very sanitized, self-serving ways.

Such was the case in a January 15 story on MLive. The article focuses on what three local African Americans have to say about how to achieve Dr. King’s dream of equality. The Press reporter never really clarifies what was meant by King in terms of equality and presents each of the three responses as in step with what Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. preached.

What is particularly problematic about the article was the focus on black businesses, being entrepreneurs, development and preparing youth to “survive in the work world.” The comment about black businesses came from the head of the Black Chamber of Commerce, the statement about development came from a City Commissioner and the comment about youth surviving in the work world was from the acting superintendent of Grand Rapids Public Schools.

While one could certainly argue that King supported more Black economic autonomy and independence, he more often spoke about economic justice and against poverty. This is not the focus of the Grand Rapids Black Chamber of Commerce, as we noted in an article in September.

Ironically, although much of the emphasis is on economics, not much of what was said reflects the analysis that Dr. King provided during his life, particularly during the last few years of his life.

First, King recognized that the poverty that befell Americans, particularly Black Americans, is based on a history of exploitation.

“No amount of gold could provide an adequate compensation for the exploitation and humiliation of the Negro in America down through the centuries. Not all the wealth of this affluent society could meet the bill. Yet a price can be placed on unpaid wages. The ancient common law has always provided a remedy for the appropriation of the labor of one human being by another. This law should be made to apply for American Negroes. The payment should be in the form of a massive program by the government of special, compensatory measures, which could be regarded as a settlement in accordance with the accepted practice of common law. Such measures would certainly be less expensive than any computation based on two centuries of unpaid wages and accumulated interest. I am proposing, therefore, that just as we granted a GI Bill of Rights to war veterans, America launch a broad-based and gigantic Bill of Rights for the Disadvantaged, our veterans of the long siege of denial.”  (Why We Can’t Wait)

In addition to King’s version of reparations, the slain civil rights leader was also critical of free market capitalism:

“We are now making demands that will cost the nation something. You can’t talk about solving the economic problem of the Negro without talking about billions of dollars. You can’t talk about ending slums without first saying profit must be taken out of slums. You’re really tampering and getting on dangerous ground because you are messing with folk then. You are messing with the captains of industry….Now this means that we are treading in difficult waters, because it really means that we are saying that something is wrong…with capitalism…here must be a better distribution of wealth and maybe America must move toward a Democratic Socialism.”

King’s critique of capitalism and the growing wealth gap in the US led him to support worker rights campaigns, which is well documented in Michael Honey’s recent book, “All Labor Has Dignity.” This support for workers led him to Memphis in April of 1968 to support sanitation workers who were striking for better work conditions and pay. King was also in the midst of an organizing effort to confront the federal government’s failure to defend American families it what was known as the Poor People’s Campaign.

None of this kind of analysis and advocacy on behalf of the poor is reflected in the comments by those cited in the MLive story. The lack of substantive commentary is disappointing as is the failure of the Press reporter to question how the sources comments were consistent with Dr. King’s notion of equality.

Lastly, it should be noted that the group United for a Fair Economy has just come out with their annual State of the Dream Report. In the 2012 report, which looks at the wealth divide in the US along racial lines, the authors identify four roadblocks to achieving Dr. King’s Dream.

• Disparities in income perpetuate poverty in communities of color and will continue to do so unless change is made.
• Increasing wealth inequality entrenches the racial economic divide.
• Education is one of the most important tools we have for increasing social mobility, yet dramatic disparities in education perpetuate inequality.
• The mass incarceration of people of color is historically unprecedented.

Imagine if the Press reporter had known about this report or familiarized herself with what Dr. King really stood for. How would that have changed the content and what would be the benefit to the West Michigan community?