Jack Lessenberry Essays and Interviews

Essay: The Shame of Our State - 9.30.09

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Here’s the worst thing about today’s down-to-the-wire battle over balancing the budget. It is that we are here at all.

The lawmakers have known this deadline was coming for a long time. They have known how big the deficit was. The legislative leaders met for weeks in secret sessions to try to avoid the threat of another state government shutdown. Yet they still could not get a deal done.

And so we are still here, waiting to see what happens. They may pass a budget by midnight. They could cobble together a continuing resolution to keep services running while they keep fighting for a few more days. Or, if they fail to do either, much of state government is going to shut down till they can make up their minds.

What is even worse is that this is what Yogi Berra would call “déjà vu all over again.” We were at this point two years ago today, when government did actually shut down for a few hours.

That ended with an absolutely dreadful decision to slap a surcharge on the Michigan Business Tax. The lawmakers vowed that they had learned their lesson and would never do this to us again.

But they did. And the leadership team is exactly the same as it was then - Gov. Jennifer Granholm, House Speaker Andy Dillon, and Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop. In fairness to them, this budget crisis is even harder to deal with than the one two years ago, because the state’s financial situation is so much worse.

However, everyone saw this coming. And nobody forced these people to run for office, or assume leadership positions.

Two years ago, I thought the lion’s share of the blame for the logjam lay with Mike Bishop, who seemed to be cynically obstructionist. This time, I think more of it lies with the Democrats.

Budgets are created and passed by the legislature, true. But governors traditionally lead the process, and articulate a vision for the state. Soapy Williams did that. George Romney did that, Bill Milliken did that, John Engler, whether you loved or hated him, certainly did that. Governor Granholm has not. Indeed, she has been virtually invisible the last few weeks. You might have expected her to come on television, draw a line in the sand, say that she would veto any bill that left the weakest unprotected.

Or something like that. But she hasn’t, and this has left the Democrats rudderless, split between those like Dillon, who are focused on a pragmatic deal, and those like Senate Minority Leader Mike Prusi, who are upset that traditional Democratic values are seemingly being trampled.

And if that wasn’t enough bad news, here’s two more things to think about. Even if they pass a balanced budget that won’t be the end of this. Revenues are still shrinking.

They are almost certainly going to have to come back and cut spending more, unless they raise revenues. And finally, if you think this is bad, next year will be worse. Maybe, much worse. The deficit is unlikely to be smaller and the stimulus money will be mostly gone.

And the politicians will be trying to balance that budget during an election year. I’ll see you in the bunker.

Essay: Credibility Gap - 9.29.09

With less than 36 hours to go before a possible state shutdown, Democrats and Republicans lawmakers still haven’t reached a budget deal. Michigan Radio’s Political Analyst Jack Lessenberry wonders if a shutdown would be such a bad thing…

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Yesterday, Speaker of the House Andy Dillon told reporters that legislative leaders were close to an agreement on next year’s budget.

Unfortunately, he has very little credibility left on this issue, because he has been saying that every day for weeks. There are now less than 36 hours left before the deadline arrives and the state is supposed to shut down. And for the first time, I am thinking …

Maybe a government shutdown wouldn’t be a bad thing.

I am quite serious. Look. The entire lot of them - the Democrats, the Republicans, and our mysteriously silent governor - have proven that they are wretchedly incompetent at this business of governing. They have been grappling for months with one issue:

The most basic task of government, which is creating a budget and balancing it. And they have failed miserably. We were being told yesterday that they were still about $600 million dollars apart. What have they been doing for the last year?

What have they been doing for the last six weeks? Well, they were supposed to meet in a special session Sunday to try and get this done, but at the last minute they didn’t show up.

You can’t blame them. It was a nice day. They couldn’t work yesterday, which was Yom Kippur, the most holy day in the Jewish calendar. So now they are finally drifting back to work.

They do not, however, appear to be focused on what they are doing. After weeks in which it appeared Dillon was more than happy to sign on to the Republican plan, which was to balance the budget entirely by cutting spending, guess what?

Mr. “we almost have a deal,” was suddenly talking about proposing tax increases to protect schools, seniors and the poor. Did he finally remember he was a Democrat?

Meanwhile, the same officials who keep insisting we aren’t going to have a shutdown began preparing for a possible shutdown. And here’s an indication of how really dysfunctional things are:

Two days before the shutdown deadline, the chair of the budget for the Departments of Natural Resources and Environmental Quality said he was still trying to get the Republicans to agree to use money from uncollectible bottle returns to take care of Michigan’s wetlands. Don’t be surprised if some of these guys show up this afternoon to check your sofa cushions for loose change. Two years ago, this same crew also “balanced” the budget at the last minute.

They did it by slapping a monumentally stupid surcharge on Michigan’s Business Tax. That did more damage than a shutdown for a few days would have. I don’t know how our leaders plan to make up the missing $600 million in the next few hours, but I have very little confidence in their ability to do it right.

However, if they don’t, Senate Minority Leader Mike Prusi does have the power to stop the runaway train. All it would take is most of the Democrats voting not to give a last-minute budget deal immediate effect. Yes, the state parks might be closed for a few days.

We’d suffer a few other inconveniences, too. But if a short-term shutdown helps give us a sensible solution, it just might be worth it.

Essay: Why the People Don't Know - 9.28.09

We’ve been hearing a lot recently about state lawmakers voting to make cuts to the state budget. Michigan Radio’s Political Analyst Jack Lessenberry wonders why we aren’t hearing as much about possible tax increases…

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The budget battle is still raging in Lansing, and it is hard to know how things are going to come out. What is clear is that the lawmakers are poised to make massive cuts to the very thing Michigan needs for any hope of a prosperous future.

Namely, education at all levels. We have nearly a hundred thousand students who, together with their parents, feel betrayed by the decision to eliminate the Michigan

Promise scholarship grant they were told they were going to get. What may be even worse is the cuts that are coming at lower levels.

The legislature is talking about slashing the money the state pays for each public school student by $218 dollars a child. Early childhood development programs are going to be cut by one-fourth.

Additionally, other cuts are coming to higher education, not to mention assistance for the poor, sick and elderly. Local governments tottering on the brink are going to take massive revenue sharing cuts that may push some over the edge into receivership.

Michigan State University Economic Professor Charles Ballard knows more about our state’s economy than anyone I know.

Two years ago, at the time of the last major budget crisis, he told me that instead of slapping a commerce-killing surcharge on the Michigan Business Tax, a better solution would have been to raise the state income tax, now 4.35 percent, a few tenths of a percent.

Yesterday I asked him how much you’d have to raise it in order to get rid of the current deficit without damaging education.

Not as much as you might think. First of all, while the deficit is $2.8 billion, thanks to the remaining federal stimulus funds, the lawmakers are trying to cut the budget by only about $1.2 billion.

That could be entirely eliminated by raising the income tax to 5.1 percent. In fact, you could wipe out the whole deficit by raising the tax to 6.1 percent. And it wouldn’t even cost that much. That’s because these taxes are deductible from your federal taxes.

That means, Ballard says, the taxpayers would get about 20 percent back. So if we were to raise state income taxes $1.2 billion, it would actually cost we, the people, less than a billion.

Even raising the tax by the higher amount would be cheaper for most parents who are losing the Michigan Promise Grant. And far less devastating to the long-term future of younger students.

The trouble is, Professor Ballard told me, “the public really doesn’t have a good understanding of what is going on,” namely because our so-called leaders haven’t explained it very well.

Even though people think their taxes were raised two years ago, in fact, taxes are declining every day. More and more, we are becoming a service-based economy, and we don’t tax services.

Also, we have only about half as many state employees as a quarter-century ago -- apart from prisons. No serious maintenance has been done at our state parks in a decade.

You get what you pay for, and right now, our leaders seem to think what we want is worn-down, shabby and cheap.

My guess is that there is a better way.

And if we hope to have a prosperous future, we better find it.

Essay: Chained to the Past - 9.25.09

Michigan’s legislators continue to struggle to balance the state’s budget. Michigan Radio’s Political Analyst Jack Lessenberry isn’t convinced these lawmakers’ decisions are always rational.

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Here’s something to keep in mind as the politicians in Lansing decide which essential services to cut as they battle to balance the budget. For too many of them, their constituents aren’t you, but the lobbyists and special interests that donate to their campaigns.

For example, as I speak, they are fighting over whom to hurt the most: Kids in elementary school; young adults in college, the elderly and sick, or local governments which desperately need revenue sharing dollars. I’ve heard House Speaker Andy Dillon say everyone has to share in the suffering, but that’s not true.

Take the beer industry. The last time the legislature fooled around with the tax on beer was in 1966, when they lowered it. The tax has stayed the same ever since -- if you don’t take inflation into account. If you do, you learn that a dollar in 1966 is worth six dollars and fifty cents today. We are heavily subsidizing the beer industry. So, are the lawmakers considering a tax on beer?

Not on your life. The beer industry has good lobbyists and knows how to influence legislators. So, little Johnny may not get what he needs to learn in school, but the beer interests will be just fine.

Hope that makes you feel better. But for real irrationality, turn to the biggest item in the budget: Corrections. Michigan spends nearly two billion a year to lock people up.

The prison population has gone down. Two years ago it was about 51,000, as of Tuesday, it was 46,645. But that’s still too many when you consider it was less than a third of that thirty years ago.

It costs more to keep someone in the slam for a year than it would cost to send them to Harvard. But there are some signs of hope. There is a so-called prison boot camp near Chelsea in Washtenaw County that is saving vast amounts of money.

Currently, there are about 400 inmates in the facility, which is called SAI, for Special Alternative Incarceration Program. A recent independent study puts the savings to the taxpayer at $36,514 for each inmate, money Michigan badly needs.

But as it stands, the state is going to close SAI at the end of this month. If that happens, it will cost us a tremendous amount, $40 million dollars or more. Why so much?

Well, for one thing, the prisoners will have to be transferred to regular prisons, where it costs more to house them. For another, according to the Department of Corrections, adding those inmates would mean the state “almost certainly” would not be able to save money by closing, as planned, the Muskegon Correctional Facility So why doesn’t the state just keep running the boot camp? The House voted to do so. But the Senate Majority Leader, Alan Cropsey, hates boot camps, wants this one closed, and has shown no signs of budging. It would be nice if someone could change his mind.

Otherwise, they may have to cut money for elementary schools by another $50 million, to support a totally irrational decision.

You know, it would be hard to write a novel about these people. You just can’t make this stuff up.

Essay: Promises Made, Promises Broken - 9.24.09

In Lansing yesterday, a series of state legislative conference committees voted to slash spending for both higher and K-12 education. Michigan Radio's Jack Lessenberry has been thinking about what that means.

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The state legislature in Lansing took a giant step yesterday towards destroying our chance of a better future. They eliminated the Michigan Promise grant for college students. That means that 96,000 college students who have been promised aid by their government are now being told: Guess what.

You aren't going to get it.

The lawmakers also cut support for students in elementary and high schools by $218 for every child in Michigan public schools. They also further cut aid to higher education in Michigan, after five years when Michigan, a state which desperately needs a better-educated workforce, had cut higher education funding more than any other state in the nation.

Let's be very clear about what happened here. The state lawmakers decided, in a series of conference committees, that the present is more important than the future. Among other choices, they had this one: They could have saved the schools and given our kids a better chance at the future by increasing the personal income tax by a few bucks on people like me, grownups with jobs.

We would scarcely have noticed it. But no. I am a middle-class white male with no children and a good life. But our leaders in Lansing thought it was more important not to raise my taxes than it was to save our kids. They never even talked about the option of raising taxes. Democrats control the state house of representatives and the governorship. They actually even got more votes for state senate in the last election, though Republicans won more seats.

But the Democrats, led by Speaker of the House Andy Dillon, are rolling over and adopting the Republican budget. There were a few dissenters. State Rep. Joan Bauer, a Democrat from Lansing, chair of the higher education conference committee, voted no. "We made a promise to students," she said. State Senator Jim Barcia of Bay City, who used to be a congressman, agreed. But other Democrats fell in line. George Cushingberry of Detroit rammed the bill through, saying that maybe he could later get Republicans to tax bottled water and put a new tax on physicians to replace the lost revenue. He'd be better off trying to get Tinkerbell to bring the money from the Magic Kingdom.

Michigan has a less educated workforce than the national average. That's a legacy of the old muscle-based assembly line economy. Those days aren't coming back. We can either produce a better educated work force, or become something like West Virginia, poor, declining and washed-up.

There are a few final chances to avoid this. The full legislature could vote no. The Senate Democrats could announce they will refuse to give the budget immediate effect.

Or the governor, who has been nearly as silent as Greta Garbo lately, could veto it. Her spokesperson denounced the cuts yesterday. But she refused to say if Jennifer Granholm would veto them. That would require taking a stand and making an unpopular decision.

That would require being a leader.

If you care about this stuff, you've got a day or so at most to call your legislators and make your feelings known. Otherwise, well, maybe your kids can hope that someone will reopen a coal mine.

Essay: Order from the Courts - 9.23.09

Detroiters will finally get to decide whether to change the way their City Council is elected. Michigan Radio's Jack Lessenberry thinks this sheds some important light on how the city works.

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Detroit today is plagued by economic troubles that rival those of the Great Depression. Many of its buildings are abandoned or falling apart. Unemployment is 29 percent.

The city would have big problems if it were governed by the modern-day equivalents of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Barack Obama and Franklin D. Roosevelt.

But in fact, it has had an increasingly dysfunctional, incompetent and corrupt City Council. Recent members have included a former Motown star who didn't bother to hide the fact that she had little interest in her job; a man now in prison for putting his girl friend's daughter on the payroll, and a woman who died as she was about to be indicted for trading a vote for 17 pounds of sausage.

More recently there was Monica Conyers, who was in a category all her own. There are a lot of people elsewhere in Michigan who blame this all on race. Yet I am convinced that race has nothing to do with it, other than that racism has helped keep the city poor. The biggest problem has been the way city council is elected.

Detroit is the only large city in the nation where the entire council is elected at large, by a vote of the entire city. Voters start with a primary ballot that includes well over a hundred names.

Voters in August then whittle those down to 18 names, and in November, the top nine go on to four year terms on city council.

Now -- how does an average voter look at 100 names or even 18 and decide who the best are? They can't and they don't. Nobody has the time to research all these people.

So they vote for names they know. I think people would do much the same in Grand Rapids or Chicago. As a result, incumbents usually win. So do people with famous names, such as Ms. Conyers, the wife of the congressman who is now likely headed to jail herself.

For those who get elected, it's a pretty cushy life, with a hefty salary, car, office and staff. Members can live anywhere they want to in Detroit, meaning vast areas are really not represented at all.

This summer, however, an idealistic group of mainly young people fought to allow people to vote on changing this to a system that would include seven members from different districts of the city. They worked hard and they got enough signatures to qualify for the ballot. And then City Council itself took it off.

Why? The real reason is they like the way things are just fine now. You might think thwarting the people's will took some nerve, but that's Detroit's City Council. The idealists then took it to court, where they drew a Wayne County Circuit Judge named Virgil Smith, a Coleman Young-era machine politician who was appointed to a judicial vacancy. He ruled against them again.

But Citizens for Council by Districts refused to give up, and yesterday, a three-judge panel of the Michigan Court of Appeals unanimously restored the measure to the ballot. How the voters will decide is anyone's guess. But they will get to decide, which proves that sometimes, the system really does work. You just have to be willing, if at first you don't succeed, to try and, try again.

Essay: Actions and Consequences - 9.22.09

With barely a week before a state government shutdown could happen, the legislature still hasn't resolved the budget mess. Michigan Radio's Jack Lessenberry thinks he knows why, and it involves a dirty little secret.

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For weeks, Speaker of the House Andy Dillon has assured us that the politicians in Lansing are going to resolve the budget mess, and that we aren't going to have a state government shutdown.

Occasionally, Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop says the same thing. And yet, I am starting not to believe them. We are now less than eight days away from the edge of the cliff.

The Michigan Constitution requires the legislature to pass a balanced budget before the start of each fiscal year.

That means, in case you were confused about this, that Lansing can plan to spend no more money than it takes in.

Right now, there is a major crisis because the spending plans in place require almost three billion more dollars than the state is going to have. That means massive spending cuts, or sizable tax increases. Republicans insist that they will never agree to tax increases, and they control the state senate.

So the way it looks now, the state will have to enact massive cuts. Last week, the Speaker of the House, who is a Democrat, and the Senate Majority Leader, who is a Republican, signed an agreement calling for $1.2 billion in spending cuts.

That was hailed as a great breakthrough that went a long way towards solving the budget crisis. Unfortunately, those hailing the deal forgot something. You can't be a leader without followers. Dillon, who is more conservative than most of his caucus, apparently didn't check with his troops before signing this treaty.

And they aren't happy with it. This doesn't surprise me. What Dillon did was, essentially, agree to the Republican budget, and it isn't clear if he got anything in return.

That was never going to fly with most Democrats, who hold a huge majority in the House. There are big differences between the parties these days, and most Democrats are totally opposed to the way the other party does things and sees the world.

So now they are in virtually open revolt. They don't trust this strategy. Nor do many of them like what the budget would do. It would cut state revenue sharing with Michigan's cash-strapped cities, by 20 percent. It makes deep cuts in Medicaid health services to the poor. And it entirely eliminates the Michigan Promise Scholarships, which tens of thousands of students were told they could count on.

If these are wiped out, it will be a clear case of promises made, promises broken. And so the battle lines are being drawn.

Here's a dirty little secret that nobody wants to admit. We really like government. Yes, we do. You can't say that, of course. It is fashionable to rant on about how awful government is. But we love it.

We secretly wish we had more of it. We want government to fix the potholes, pave the streets, lock up child molesters, keep Billy's tuition affordable and pay for grandma's blood thinner.

We want all this government, and more. We just don't want to pay for it, and that's the problem. We have a week to learn how to be grownups, or we may find out what a world without state government is like. If that happens, I can guarantee it will be educational.

It may not, however, be very entertaining.

Essay: Turning to the East - 9.21.09

Even elementary school children these days know that China is the world's newest economic superpower. Michigan Radio's Jack Lessenberry asks why Michigan has been so slow to build economic ties with this fast-rising region.

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If you want to discover what's really happening in Michigan today, one of the best ways to do so is turn to an innovative new magazine that's a little different than the ones we grew up with.

Dome Magazine is colorful, snappy, well-written -- and absolutely free of charge to anyone who wants to read it. Its name comes from the dome over the Capitol in Lansing, and its masthead says it covers "the people, issues and events shaping Michigan politics and policy." It does that supremely well. The only drawback is that you can't easily curl up on the back porch with it.

That's because it exists only in cyberspace. That is, unless you want to print something out. Well, I have just looked at the latest issue, and printed out a piece we would all do well to read.

The cover story this month is called "Bridge to China: Stop Whining, Michigan, and Start Building!" It is by Tom Watkins, a man who was once Michigan's top educator, but who has reinvented himself as our state's ranking China expert.

Watkins, who was state superintendent of public instruction, was forced out by Jennifer Granholm four years ago, in large part for daring to have independent ideas on topics like reforming school benefits. Since then, he has devoted himself to his other great passion, China. He's been trying to get us to take our heads out of the sand and recognize that this is the economy of the future.

We haven't been very good at visualizing the future in this state, much less capitalizing on it. For years, our culture has been dominated by top executives, union officials, and elected politicians who have acted as if 1957 was going to come back any day.

However the economy of the past has largely vanished in the last few years. Our state has the highest unemployment rate in the nation, and China is the new booming economic superpower.

You might then logically assume that Michigan would be ready for a new attitude towards China. However, you would be sadly wrong, as Watkins points out in this very timely article.

He urges the governor to "brainstorm with all the various experts and pull together an action plan that can position Michigan to take full advantage of the continuing rise of China." Watkins, who seems to be in China every other week lately, thinks there is great potential for Michigan in increased cultural, agricultural, tourism and educational ties to China.

But sadly, he notes, there is no plan to do so. Our "go anywhere, do anything" governor hasn't made a single trade mission to China. And she, and other top political figures, continue to spew inflammatory rhetoric demonizing those who would "ship our jobs off to China" in order to win elections.

That may be politically effective, but is economically disastrous.

Globalization is no longer a theory, it is a reality, and our state needs to get into the game, as fast as possible. Watkins, who has been acting as our unofficial and unpaid trade representative to China, quotes the old proverb that a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. It is high time, he notes, that Michigan broke into a run.

Essay: Happy New Year - 9.18.09

Tonight marks the beginning of Rosh Hashanah which is the New Year in the Jewish calendar. This has Michigan Radio’s Political Analyst Jack Lessenberry thinking about a man and an institution that have truly unique stories...

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Tonight marks the beginning of Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year, and while I am not Jewish, I try never to miss an opportunity to celebrate whenever I can. This will be the year 5770, and I certainly hope things get better for all of us in Michigan, regardless of tradition. I am actually happy the 70s are here again.

If you remember, the late ‘60s were tough years in the conventional calendar, as well. I just hope disco doesn’t make a comeback. But one thing I do know is that those who don’t remember the mistakes of the past are, indeed, at great risk of repeating them.

We see that every day in Lansing, but there is a place you should go and take your children and grandchildren to really learn what that means. It is the Holocaust Memorial Center in Farmington Hills. It’s easy enough to find; it is right off the Orchard Lake Road exit on I-696. You won’t have any difficulty recognizing it. Not many buildings are wrapped in barbed wire. And as sobering as the subject is, they have made it suitable for all but the smallest children. I have visited there a number of times since it opened six years ago.

I was there again recently, partly because a colleague of mine at Wayne State, Guy Stern, became the interim director this year when the founder, Rabbi Charles Rosenzveig, suddenly died. Stern was one of Wayne State’s most distinguished and most beloved professors. A warmly elfin man with a toothy smile, he was widely known for having been Marlene Dietrich’s driver near the end of World War II.

He was actually much closer to the great actress Lotte Lenya. But when I had known him for some time, he told me about a boy named Gunther, who came here from Germany in 1937, when he was fifteen years old, to live with his uncle, a semi-employed baker.

Guenther loved everything American, and he had a goal. He wanted to find a way to get his parents and sister out of Nazi Germany and bring them here to join him. But times weren’t good, getting visas wasn’t easy, and he had to deal with a stupid lawyer and a maddening, sometimes anti-Semitic bureaucracy.

When the war ended he found that his entire family had been sent to the Warsaw Ghetto and killed. He was at Columbia then, and his professors said he had the makings of a brilliant German scholar. But how could he do that, he was asked? This was the language of his family’s murderers. He decided finally that if he didn’t claim German for the righteous, “I would be doing the task of the Nazis on my own.”

By that time, he had dropped Guenther, and was instead called Guy. Guy Stern. When they asked him to run the Holocaust Center in January, he hesitated for a moment, and then said yes. After all, he was barely 87 years old. What he is doing now is trying to make it more relevant to all of Michigan, regardless of faith.

He knows a time is coming when the last survivor is gone, and he knows how important it is that we never forget.

L’shana tovah, my friend. Happy New Year.

Essay: The Mushroom Budget - 9.17.09

The leaders of Michigan’s legislature said last night they had a tentative agreement on a plan that would balance the state budget. Michigan Radio’s Political Jack Lessenberry wonders, however, whether the agreement will stand…

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There was a certain minor sense of relief in the air when it was announced that an agreement of sorts had been reached to balance the Michigan budget. An agreement, that is, between Speaker of the House Andy Dillon, a Democrat, and his counterpart, Mike Bishop, the thoroughly Republican Majority Leader of the state senate.

The sense of relief stems from the fact that those Michiganders who happen to be sane do not want a state government shutdown two weeks from today. Besides being disruptive, a shutdown of any length would send this message to the rest of America: These people in Michigan are dysfunctional incompetent wackos. You don’t want to even think about moving to this state or relocating a business there.

However, there is reason to think that this budget deal may not be a done deal at all. The governor was completely cut out of the action, and if she refuses to sign it, it isn’t happening. Most of the legislature was also kept in the dark, and many Democrats plainly aren’t happy.

However this all turns out, what’s happened up to now indicates that whatever you think of the main actors, Michigan’s government and the entire budget process is, indeed, highly dysfunctional.

Essentially, so far as I can tell, this budget agreement is an agreement between two of the 148 legislators – Dillon and Bishop, and each has his own agenda. Bishop wants the GOP nomination for attorney general next year. Right now, he is an underdog. Most of the party establishment prefers former Congressman Bill Schuette. Bishop wants to be able to say that he balanced the budget without raising taxes. Not raising taxes has become the holiest sacrament, by the way, in the Republican religion.

Andy Dillon has an agenda too. Regardless of what he may say, he is thinking about running for governor, which would mean taking on Jennifer Granholm’s favorite, lieutenant governor John Cherry.

Dillon is more conservative than the average Democrat both on economic and social issues. He also wants to say he got a deal done, and hopes he can finesse the details to make it look like Democrats did prevail in a few areas, such as the Michigan Promise college scholarship grant, which Republicans want to completely destroy.

Both men also share a sense of exasperation, if not contempt, for the vacillating weakness of the governor. Normally governors are the leading force in negotiations like this. This time, Jennifer Granholm seems to have been cut out of the process. She isn’t happy, and if she doesn’t sign it, it isn’t happening. There may also be a revolt by legislative Democrats, who are appalled that the deal makes massive cuts in education, health care and public safety and produces no new revenue whatsoever.

Nor is it clear that this budget is really balanced, since the deficit is still greater than the spending cuts and the stimulus money combined.

How this will all play out is anyone’s guess. But keep in mind that things are still unsettled, and our state is still in trouble. And don’t forget, they are going to have to do this all over again next year, and it may be much worse. The stimulus money, you see, will all be gone.