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You are here: Home / Open Threads / Late-Night Worst Person Open Thread: Senator Mike Lee “Holding Flint Aid Hostage”

Late-Night Worst Person Open Thread: Senator Mike Lee “Holding Flint Aid Hostage”

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Tough competition, but Cruz coat-holder & Backpfeifengesicht club member Mike Lee is a contender. Tim Mak, at the Daily Beast:

The intellectual leader of the tea party movement in the Senate is secretly holding up a bill to help the residents of Flint, Michigan, who have been poisoned by their own water supply…

Lee is using a Senate tactic used to gum up the works known as a “hold,” which is generally kept secret so the lawmaker can remain anonymous. But two senior Senate sources confirmed to The Daily Beast that Lee is behind the maneuver to stall an utterly uncontroversial provision…

His action—or inaction—comes as lawmakers in the Senate are scrambling to advance urgent legislation that would make hundreds of millions in grants and loans available to Flint, which in January declared a state of emergency after thousands of its residents were exposed to toxic levels of lead.

The initiative, which senators want to add to a larger energy policy bill, ultimately doesn’t cost any new government funds, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, since the proposal is paid for with money redirected from a subsidy for the automotive industry…

It’s not a secret any longer, since his hometown Salt Lake Tribune has published an article subheaded “Grandstanding?”:

Sen. Mike Lee is defending his decision to block a vote on a $220 million package to help Flint, Mich., respond to its lead-poisoned drinking water.

Initially, Lee, R-Utah, was part of a group of senators to place a procedural “hold” on the vote, but that group has shrunk and Lee is the only objecting senator to be identified. At first, he declined to comment, but he decided to break his silence Friday.

“Federal aid is not needed at this time,” Lee said in a statement, noting that Michigan has a budget surplus and a “rainy day fund” that it could tap before turning to Congress. “The people and policymakers of Michigan right now have all the government resources they need to fix the problem. And those public resources are being augmented every day by the generosity of individuals, businesses, labor unions and civic organizations of every stripe from across the country. The only thing Congress is contributing to the Flint recovery is political grandstanding.”

If that’s the case, then it is bipartisan grandstanding.

Michigan’s two senators, Democrats Debbie Stabenow and Gary Peters, are sponsoring this proposal with Republican Sens. Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma and Rob Portman of Ohio…

Mike Lee is up for re-election this year, but the only declared Democratic challenger my weak search skills turn up is “untested” marriage therapist Jonathan Swinton — although Blue Dog Jim Matheson seems to be a possibility. Anybody here know enough about Utah politics to judge whether it would be worth funding an Act Blue page to get Mike Lee away from the national levers of power?

Reader Interactions

54Comments

  3. 3.

    Betty Cracker

    I don’t know how vulnerable Lee is either, but I’m all for nationalzing elections to punish dickish behavior like that.

  4. 4.

    Felanius Kootea

    Not sure about a viable Democratic challenger in Utah but maybe a sustained national shaming effort will have an effect on Lee. Have activists follow him everywhere with signs pointing out that he’s an asshole who doesn’t want to help children poisoned by lead in their water.

  5. 5.

    mclaren

    Depressingly accurate article about the Clintons and why Sanders remains an infinitely superior choice to corporatist warmonger Hillary:

    Sanders’ emergence as a credible challenger has helped to remind people that Clinton’s claim to be progressive is only selectively defensible, at best, and requires us to completely ignore the entire thrust of the politics which first brought her and her husband into power, and brought the Democratic Party into prolonged disarray, which it has yet to recover from.

    I don’t believe Bernie Sanders is a perfect candidate. I don’t believe anyone is. But he has done an incredible job of bringing long-neglected issues, people and over-arching perspectives into the political process—which in turn invites and encourages others to do the same. That’s what a political revolution looks like. Its claim to be progressive is much more straightforward than Clinton’s claim can ever be. And the social democratic vision it derives from provides a much better, broader framework for understanding the world than the neoliberal framework that Clinton champions, regardless of real-world results.

    Source: “The establishment looks like this: The real reason why Clintons always push our politics to the right,” Salon online, 16 February 2016.

    Solid discussion of Sanders’ achievement so far in this primary:

    The 2016 New Hampshire presidential primary was the most significant in the 64-year history of that venerable institution, surpassing even the mythic 1968 battle by which Gene McCarthy drove Lyndon Johnson from office. McCarthy didn’t win the nomination but he did forge a consensus to end what was, until Iraq, our most tragic foreign war. Whether or not Bernie Sanders is nominated, he too is forging a new consensus. The old order is dying; a new one’s being born.

    If you get your news from cable TV you don’t know any of this. Whatever their age or gender, cable reporters still cover politics like cigar-chomping old men poring over racing forms. History was made under their noses and they still spent the night talking win, place or show, obsessed by the order of finish in the crowded middle of a lame Republican pack. It was a coming out party for a political revolution, but Gil Scott Heron had it right: The revolution will not be televised.

    Sanders made history even by the metrics of horse-race journalism. He had the most votes (155,578), biggest vote share (60.4 percent) and biggest margin in a contested race (22.4 percent) of any candidate of either party in New Hampshire primary history. As in Iowa, he outperformed late polls by more than their alleged margins of error. Sanders won 55 percent of women, a stunning 84 percent of voters under 30, and 92 percent of those who say the trait they prize most in a politician is honesty.

    “The Clintons really don’t get it: False attacks and failed strategies as Hillary repeats 2008”, Salon.com, 16 February 2016.

    And Mahablog has an excellent summary of how the relentless over-the-top envenomed verbal attacks on HRC by the right have immunized her from criticism by the Left:

    In other words, the steady drumbeat of hysterical, over-the-top animus and accusations that the Right has flung at Hillary Rodham Clinton all these years has inoculated her from criticism from the Left. Because of Darrell Issa’s idiot and dishonest Benghazi!!!! hearings, for example, the Left is closing its eyes to a real issue, which is that Secretary of State Clinton sold President Obama on policies in Libya that turned out to be disastrous.

    After all we have gone through from Vietnam to Iraq, you’d think lefties would be extremely reluctant to support an obvious hawk like Clinton. But leftie groupthink has taken hold that doesn’t allow us to talk about this.

    Source: “How the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy Made Hillary Clinton Invincible,” mahablog, 2 March 2016.

  8. 8.

    mclaren

    @redshirt:

    I’m less pro-Clinton that pro-Sanders. But let’s face it, with Trump looming like Jabba the Hut, I’ll vote for either of them before I let that demagogue into the White House.

    If you want a foretaste of why, check out “US Airstrikes have made Hundreds of Thousands of Widows, Orphans in past 15 Yrs; GOP Pledges New level of War Crimes” at Juan Cole’s Informed Consent website.

    Meanwhile, while microcephalic boasting strutting AmeriKKKa screams for more war and more bombing of the world’s poorest countries, researchers say that climate change will kill more Italians and Greeks than Syrians by 2050.

    The Lancet (British med journal) running numbers about probable fatalities from crop failures & heatstroke, “Global and regional health effects of future food production under climate change: a modelling study”:
    http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(15)01156-3/fulltext

    And, as a tonic to the slope-browed criticisms of Sanders by various mouth-breathers on this forum, check out this article:

    Bernie Sanders is taking a lot of heat for making promises everyone agrees can’t be achieved in today’s Washington. However, Sanders is not just smoking free-love-sixties-dope when he talks about universal health care, free college tuition, stopping deportations, and drastically cutting the prison population.

    I used to teach negotiation to MBA students and lawyers seeking CLE credit, and have included negotiation content in executive coaching and other consulting work I do. One of the things I’ve sometimes taught was how to use audience effects to gain leverage in negotiations. The best story I know to illustrate this comes from Gandhi, from his autobiography.

    Gandhi Rides First Class

    Gandhi’s early years as an activist led him to South Africa, where he advocated as a lawyer for the rights of Indians there. One discriminatory law required “coolie” Indians to ride third class on trains. Soon after arriving in South Africa, Gandhi himself had been thrown off a train for seating himself in first class.

    Looking for a way to challenge the law, he dressed flawlessly and purchased a first class ticket face to face from an agent who turned out to be a sympathetic Hollander, not a Transvaaler. Boarding the train, Gandhi knew the conductor would try to throw him off, so he very consciously looked for and found a compartment where an English, upper class gentleman was seated, with no white South Africans around. He politely greeted his compartment mate and settled into his seat for the trip.

    Sure enough, when the conductor came, he immediately told Gandhi to leave. Gandhi presented his ticket, and the conductor told him it didn’t matter, no coolies in first class. The law was on his side. But the English passenger intervened, “What do you mean troubling this gentleman? Don’t you see he has a first class ticket? I don’t mind in the least his traveling with me.” He turned to Gandhi and said, “You should make yourself comfortable where you are.”

    The conductor backed down. “If you want to ride with a coolie, what do I care?”

    And that, my friends, illustrates the strategic use of creating an audience effect to gain leverage in a negotiated conflict. The tactic can be applied in any negotiated conflict where an outside stakeholder party can be made aware of the conflict and subsequently influence its outcome.

    Source: “Does Bernie Sanders Know What He’s Doing?”

  11. 11.

    ruemara

    These are reprehensible people. I wish I knew why there weren’t more people trying to replace them in office.

    I got about 3.5 hours to nap before I have to be ready for my airport ride, but the concert I went to has me a bit amped.

  12. 12.

    mclaren

    @Amir Khalid:

    Good logic, Amir. We all know that the person who gets more votes must have a superior set of policies. That explains why Donald Trump is winning the Republican nomination, despite getting comprehensively debunked in the debate:

    “Donald Trump’s rivals and Fox News’ debate moderators laid out a clear and factual case on Thursday that Trump’s policies were unworkable; that he regularly shifted his positions; and that he had engaged in business practices he routinely denounces on the campaign trail. Trump, in turn, bragged about the size of his pen!s and promised to force Americans to commit war crimes. He remains the odds on favorite to win the Republican nomination.

    Source: “Only the voters can judge Donald Trump’s horror show of a debate,” MSNBC website, 4 March 2016.

  15. 15.

    Mustang Bobby

    @mclaren: It’s fine to be in favor of one candidate over another, but using terms like “corporatist warmonger” isn’t going to persuade people to listen to you. It kinda puts them off, if you know what I mean.

    Have a nice day.

  16. 16.

    J R in WV

    Some days you discover who your friends are, and who are not your friends.

    Senator Lee is no one’s friend, if he believes that showing down funding to resolve a catastrophe doesn’t matter in both the short term and the long term. Only monsters have the lack of feeling this man has towards people who continue to suffer damage from a wholly Republican-caused tragedy.

    Debbie Wasserman Schultz is following in Senator Lee’s path, and maybe gaining on him in the care-less category. I have never thought highly of the woman’s intelligence, both intellectual and emotional. This Payday Lender situation is so clearly a lose-lose proposition for her, yet she seems oblivious to the damage she personally will suffer from this collision with the CFPB and Senator Warren. All the levers of power work the wrong way for this Floridian situation, yet she seems not to know or care.

    I’m just glad we have a crowd of friends who get together to make music and be together in an atmosphere of love and kindness. It acts as an antidote to all the commercial messages of distrust we get individually. Spent Saturday afternoon and evening with friends at a dairy goat farm, eating great pot luck food and hearing great old time music. What a relief!

  17. 17.

    Amir Khalid

    @mclaren:
    I’m not making any argument about the superiority of one candidate’s policy over another’s. I’m pointing out that Bernie has been far less persuasive than he needs to be to win the nomination.

  18. 18.

    bystander

    A lot of Bernie’s problem is that he’s not a Dem. His purity is offputting.
    I’ll stick with the woman who signed up many years ago and wasn’t afraid of getting her hair mussed.

    As for Lee, my first instinct is to suggest holding up funds for Utah after reading the next natural disaster. Mother I realized I was talking about a place that’s basically a disaster area in the first place.

  19. 19.

    John S.

    @bystander:

    Your entire stated rationale for supporting Clinton has nothing to do with her agenda. I find that kind of frightening.

    By your logic, the person in a company who has been around the longest and was part of the team should be promoted over someone who is newer but more qualified and would do a better job actually running the place.

  20. 20.

    Zinsky

    Someone should punch his front teeth out and flatten his nose and then say, “no medical care is needed at this time”. If there is a God, I hope there is a special eternity of punishment waiting for people like Mike Lee!

  21. 21.

    Patricia Kayden

    I doubt the Republican (very White) state of Utah wouldn’t vote for Lee because of his hold on Flint aid. There are zero consequences for his behavior which is per usual when it comes to Republicans.

    But good luck to whichever Democrat runs against him.

  22. 22.

    Zinsky

    @J R in WV: Your outdoor music festival/potluck sounds fun! We do something similar in my backyard in the summer. I look forward to it all year long!

  23. 23.

    Gimlet

    “Federal aid is not needed at this time,” Lee said in a statement, noting that Michigan has a budget surplus and a “rainy day fund” that it could tap before turning to Congress. “The people and policymakers of Michigan right now have all the government resources they need to fix the problem. And those public resources are being augmented every day by the generosity of individuals, businesses, labor unions and civic organizations of every stripe from across the country. The only thing Congress is contributing to the Flint recovery is political grandstanding.”

    Remembering how Bobby Jindal used hurricane aid to fund his slash and burn budget policies, I’d like to know more about whether Michigan really needs federal help on this wholly owned disaster.

  24. 24.

    Gvg

    @John S.: you are assuming it is obvious that Sanders would do a better job. I have evaluated the evidence for myself and come to the opposite conclusion. I think some others have also. My experience in life though has shown that no one can actually know ahead of trying, but we still have to make the best guesses we can.
    Long time hard workers who are competent often do quite well when promoted. Outsiders it’s more random and checking with prior employers is helpful but never quite enough. Sanders is not an outsider though. He is an insider who hasn’t joined in as much in the past. I evaluate that as unlikely to be a good enough persuader to work in an elective representative government like ours.

  25. 25.

    Just One More Canuck

    From the Salt Lake Tribune article:

    “Their proposal, funded by redirecting money from a 2007 stimulus program for automakers, would create $100 million in subsidized loans for any state with a federal emergency due to lead contaminants in its water. Flint is the only community that would fit that description. The city of 100,000 could use the money to redevelop its water system.”

    “Another $70 million would help secure loans up to $700 million for water projects nationwide. And $50 million would help create a lead-exposure registry and three children’s health programs.”

    God knows you wouldn’t want to upgrade your infrastructure and find out how widespread the lead issue is with funding that’s already been paid for. What an asshole

  26. 26.

    MattF

    Just to be specific, Lee’s action puts the responsibility for fixing Flint’s water system squarely on the politicians who have already repeatedly and with malice aforethought betrayed the people there. See the problem, Mike?

  29. 29.

    Gene108

    @Just One More Canuck:

    Lead contamination also occurs in older homes, that were built and painted prior to the mid-1970’s.

    Very little money is available for remediation.

    Basically there are enough issues nation wide, with regards to lead contamination extra money is needed, beyond Flint.

    ***************************
    The next time there’s a disaster in a red state Dems need to block relief. I am sick of Republicans holding up disaster relief. They did this for Federal aid for Sandy recovery, but when Texas gets too much rain they beg for Federal funds.

    Fuck ’em.

    Too much of Republican bullshit is made possible because Democrats act like grown ups, when Republicans have their toddler like tantrums over things like disaster relief

  30. 30.

    Kay

    This would make me crazy if I were a strong supporter of one of the Ohio GOP candidates:

    Every Republican primary voter in Ohio will have two opportunities to vote for president, in a ballot twist that only escalates the potential confusion caused by the party’s large and fractious field of candidates.
    GOP ballots for the March 15 primary feature two boxes for president: one for designating an at-large presidential delegate and one for designating a district delegate. It’s a carry-over from a time when Ohio’s Republican vote was divided proportionally, rather than in the winner-take-all fashion being used in 2016.
    The two boxes raise obvious questions: Do voters get two votes? Can conflicted voters split their vote, or do votes for two candidates cancel each other out? If only one of the two boxes is filled in, does the person’s vote still count?
    Ohio never changed a requirement that both boxes be listed, and the secretary of state’s office says both will also tallied. But the Ohio Republican Party says only one will count.

    People are never, ever going to understand this. They better hope the one they’re counting is the one with the highest total for any candidate.

  31. 31.

    debbie

    @Kay:

    But the Ohio Republican Party says only one will count.

    The one they like better, no doubt.

  32. 32.

    Shane in SLC

    Anybody here know enough about Utah politics to judge whether it would be worth funding an Act Blue page to get Mike Lee away from the national levers of power?

    Alas, no. Lee isn’t loved here in Utah, but he has an R after his name, so he is sure to get re-elected in the general, as most Mormons vote like sheep. The best chance for ousting him is in a primary, but the caucus system is so arcane and undemocratic that that’s not very likely either. Sigh. Good luck with the shaming campaign, too, as I haven’t found any signs that he has any shame…

  33. 33.

    hamletta

    The only reason Michigan has a surplus is because the Snyder administration is a bunch of incompetent boobs. The Detroit school system only has enough money to stay open through April.

    School’s out for…spring? What would Alice Cooper say? Isn’t he from Detroit?

    ETA: I know! Send Iggy Pop to scare the shit out of him!

  34. 34.

    Kay

    @debbie:

    But that’s the thing! Kasich is the sitting governor. There will be all kinds of conspiracy theories.

    It doesn’t matter that they’ve always had the two boxes. Ohio “has always” rotated the candidate on the top line of the general election ballot – it’s more fair, because the candidate listed first has an advantage among voters who have no idea what they’re doing. They print the ballots in batches and they rotate the name on top- say, 30,000 Romney then 30,000 Obama then 30,000 Green candidate, etc. It’s random. It’s fair. In 2012, I got 4 calls from county Democrats complaining that Romney was listed first on their ballot. They were sure Kasich had set it up.

  35. 35.

    Mike R

    Sort of off topic, but attended the Ne caucus last night and some of the Bernie supporters are certainly enthusiastic, hopefully they will stay active, and as many were new to politics hope they stay and learn and contribute going into the future.

  36. 36.

    cmorenc

    @Betty Cracker:

    I don’t know how vulnerable Lee is either, but I’m all for nationalzing elections to punish dickish behavior like that.

    In a nutshell, if the Utah electorate was limited to the immediate Salt Lake City, Lee would be extremely vulnerable to a challenge from decent moderate Democratic challenger. Alas, once you go but a short distance north toward Ogden or south toward Provo, the rest of the state is still so strongly dominated by right-wing Mormons that they flood out the influence of SLC’s more moderate electorate in statewide elections.

  37. 37.

    Kay

    @Mike R:

    I do too. My middle son is a Bernie supporter and I’m glad he can vote for Sanders in the Ohio primary. He doesn’t care if he wins. That’s who he wants to vote for. They’re maddening, though, younger voters. I told him he had to update his registration because he moved since the last election and he’s in a different county and he got it in right under the wire. He works full time and takes a class one night a week, but still. They seem to have so much trouble with the rules.

  41. 41.

    Kay

    @rikyrah:

    Ohio voters must be registered 30 days before the election in which they want to vote.
    That means Tuesday, Feb. 16, is the deadline to register to vote in Ohio’s March 15 primary election. If you’ve moved, you need to update your address on file by Feb. 16.

    No. If they’re newly registered they get a choice of which ballot, R or D. If they voted in a prior primary they’re registered under that Party, but they can change. If they change it’s actually an affidavit, a sworn statement. that they will vote for that Party in the general but that requirement is ignored. We had lots of R’s voting for Clinton in the 08 primary. I was a poll worker and I saw it happen. It’s my precinct so I know they’re R’s and I know they weren’t voting for the D in the general. It pissed me off to no end because I wouldn’t do that- I wouldn’t vote in an R primary if I were swearing to vote R in the general, and that’s what they were doing- although they probably had no idea what the rules are.

    This son voted for Obama in ’12 but only in the general, so he’s technically an “undeclared”. When he votes in the D primary he will be a D. He lives in a “swing” county now- it’s one of the counties campaigns look at to see who will win Ohio in the general- “as goes his county so goes the state” , so I told him he’s MUCH more important now :)

    He could have come back to this county and voted in the primary, using my address, because unless I miss my guess I would bet that’s the address on his driver’s license- I still get what seems to be most of his mail. That would be legal as long as he didn’t vote both places.

  42. 42.

    Mike R

    @rikyrah: Well there was one shock, a woman who claimed to be something at the local University told us her son was working as a PhD Rocket Scientist, and then asked did we now what a PhD rocket scientist was, and he made less than a Starbucks Barista. Still all in all, while some where a bit over the top this is Ne and in general people aren’t too obnoxious.

  43. 43.

    Micheline

    DWS is awful. It’s a shame that she’s going to win the primary. Her primary challenger, Tim Canova, is really good. He’s law professor who was a former aide to Paul Tsongas. He’s a big Bernie supporter who’s very passionate about progressive politics. So far I haven’t seen anything indicating DWS would lose. I wish could vote for him but I don’t in DWS’s district.

  44. 44.

    debbie

    @Kay:

    We had lots of R’s voting for Clinton in the 08 primary.

    Ah, but they paid the price! All the Dem emails filling their inboxes must have been aggravating for them. After voting for Obama in 2008, I moved back to Independent just so they’d end. I’m going to ask for a Dem ballot so I can vote for Sittenfeld (and Sanders also), but I’m not looking forward to the deluge.

  45. 45.

    Kay

    @Micheline:

    I just don’t know why they would want her in charge in ’16. I don’t know- if you lose a lot of elections shouldn’t you get replaced? This job seems to have nothing to do with “merit”. Is it the Florida thing again? Remember how we had to have Joe Leiberman with Gore because he was a lock in Florida?

  46. 46.

    The Republic, Blah Blah Blah...

    The intellectual leader of the tea party movement in the Senate…

    Talk about setting the bar low…

  47. 47.

    Kay

    @debbie:

    It was gross because they were doing things like holding their nose and taking the ballot. One of them is the mother of a (close) friend of my daughter’s and I never felt the same about her after seeing that. I told a juvenile judge in the next county over what happened in my precinct – he’s an R but he agreed with me- he thinks it’s fraud. I would be ashamed to take orders from Rush Limbaugh publicly, and Limbaugh was the one who promoted it.

  48. 48.

    Kay

    @debbie:

    I don’t have any problem with it if you’re switching because you actually plan to vote that Party in the general. Lots of Dems do it here because the local races often have only R’s to choose from and they want the least-worse R. They end up on the R list.

    It is hard for campaigns, though, because the County voter list has the Party preference and often it’s wrong.

  49. 49.

    Kay

    This is good news for Democrats as far as the general election:

    Very bad news for GOP – New WSJ/NBC MI poll:
    Hillary 48% Cruz 41% Sanders 54% Cruz 36%
    Hillary 52% Trump 36% Sanders 56% Trump 34%

    Trump’s big line to media is he will flip rust belt states in the general. Clinton OR Sanders kill him in MI. He actually does worse than Cruz.

    Donald Trump, welcome to the rust belt- meet your non-white voter problem :)

  50. 50.

    Micheline

    @Kay: It’s a Florida thing. The Florida Democratic party is so disorganized. OFA is the only reason Obama won this state twice. The state party had nothing to do with that. This is one of reasons we have Rick Scott as governor. It also doesn’t help that a lot of Democrats don’t vote in midterm elections.

  51. 51.

    chopper

    @Amir Khalid:

    that would mean mclaren would have to actually read the post to which he’s replying, rather than launch a preloaded spittle-flecked invective had had already written.

  52. 52.

    pseudonymous in nc

    @Kay:

    Donald Trump, welcome to the rust belt- meet your non-white voter problem :)

    Wasn’t that the point of controlling governors’ mansions and state legislatures in the midwest — voter ID laws that mean “no voter, no problem”? Of course, the enthusiasm of the professional vote-supressionists may be challenged if El Trumpador gets the nomination.

  53. 53.

    Miss Bianca

    @cmorenc:

    I’ve been wrestling with the question Anne Laurie poses, being a Dem in a deep-red CO county. I’ve watched as the Democrats hurl highly-qualified candidates again and again at that only-slightly-less-vile-than-Mike-Lee waste of human flesh, Doug Lamborn (my district includes Colorado Springs), including a highly-decorated Air Force colonel a cycle or two back. He’s so bad, that he’s even been primaried from the left on the Republican side last time round (It was the only time I’ve ever been tempted to switch my party registration, just so I could participate in that endeavor. It didn’t work, fwiw, regardless. I can’t even remember whether the Democrats bothered to oppose him).

    I’ve been tempted to despair many and many a time. But I finally have decided that, whether we have a chance to win or not, the principle of putting up an opposition candidate is important to me. Because if we don’t, then we are tacitly complicit in facilitating one-party rule. I guess I am a proponent of the 50 State Strategy, after all.

    To that end, yesterday at our local Democratic assembly I agreed to fall on the grenade on a local level in two years’ time. It’s too late to declare for this year’s election, but as a brand-new member of the central committee I’ll be one of the ones in charge of recruiting local candidates for everything from school board to state senator. We have vowed and declared that we will have a full roster of candidates, if only to force debates at the local level. We’re almost guaranteed not to win, so presuming I’m one of the Doomed Dems, I plan to have all *kinds* of fun, speaking truth to white rancher good old boy power.

    We fight till we win, as Woody Guthrie said. Then, I guess, we fight harder.

    Poor Flint. Held hostage to the machinations of heartless white Republican men from the suburbs as long as I can remember, and now held hostage at the national level by another. I grew up in Michigan and my heart has been bleeding for that state for years.

  54. 54.

    Denali

    @Miss Bianca,

    Thank yoou for your efforts. It always irritates me when Democrats do not bother even to find a candidate in a heavily Republican district. I do not like to even be presented with a choice.

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