Jack Lessenberry Essays and Interviews

Essay: The Magic Truck - 12.24.09

Christmas arrives tomorrow after what has been a rough year for the auto companies, especially Chrysler. But senior political analyst Jack Lessenberry once knew a man for whom the words Dodge and Detroit were pure magic.

Hear Audio Story   

Christmas is almost here, after a bruising year which may have been the worst ever for General Motors and Chrysler.

Chrysler, the smallest of what used to be the Big Three, had perhaps the toughest time. Not only did it go through bankruptcy, it was pretty much ordered by the government to sell itself to Fiat.

How much of a Chrysler identity will remain in a few years is a real question. Whether any of our car companies will be around in a generation is also a question. But we sometimes forget how much they made the world a better place. Not just America, the world. And at Christmas, I often think of one of the most unlikely of these stories.

Twenty-two years ago, I was reporting in Bulgaria, back when it was still a Communist dictatorship. Late one afternoon, with the help of an interpreter, I found a cab. The driver was burly, prematurely aged, with a flushed face and a fisherman's cap slouched on his head. But he was boomed out a big hello.

"You are from America," he asked.

Yes, I said. Detroit. He swiveled sharply and stared at me. His eyes filled with tears. "All my life, I have wanted to meet someone from Detroit. Because of Detroit, I am alive today." His name was Dimitar Assenov Dimolianov, and he took me back to 1939, when his father, Asen Mitsev, a sturdy farmer, realized his life's dream. A truck.

The best truck he could possibly find. So he took all the money he had saved in his life, went to Sofia, found a representative of the Dodge Motor Car company, and ordered a truck.

When it arrived months later, it was the best truck anyone had ever seen. Soon after, war arrived too. The Dimolianovs survived because of the truck, hauling food and firewood long distances. It got so battered the Germans didn't take it.

When Communism came after the war, it was so worn out they were allowed to keep it. Asen Mitsev told his boy: Everything depends on the truck. It has to be kept running, no matter what.

They used chicken wire, twine, anything. They kept it running. When the old man died, Dimi took the job over. He kept it going for twenty-four years and half a million miles. "No one else had such a truck. Without that truck, we might not be alive today."

We got to my hotel. He wouldn't let me pay. I insisted. "I could not possibly accept money. It is an honor to give a ride to someone from the city of the Dodge Motor Car Co."

But he did have a request. If I ever met anybody from Dodge, he wanted me to thank them. I wrote about this that Christmas.

Chrysler saw the story, and wanted to give Dimi another truck. They contacted me, and then the Bulgarian embassy. But nothing ever came of it. The new spirit of openness hadn't spread to Bulgaria yet. I have no idea whether the cabbie is still alive; he was a battered man with a bottle of spirits shoved under his parking brake.

But I do know this. He would be happy that the Dodge Motor Car Company didn't die this year. He felt he owed his and his family's life to Dodge, and that magical land called Detroit.

Let's hope that a little of that magic is left.

Essay: Eyes on the Prize - 12.23.09

As the holidays approach, it’s nice to sit back and relax. Michigan Radio’s Political Analyst Jack Lessenberry however, has a different idea…

Hear Audio Story   

It’s two days before Christmas, and nobody wants to think about the hard stuff we’ve got to do when the holidays are over.

You know, get the snow blower fixed, do something about that leaky faucet, figure out how to pay the bills, and, by the way, fix the state. Yes, you heard that last part right. Fix the state. I know we hire other people to do that, by electing them to office.

But they seem to need more supervision, don‘t you think?

There is some good news. During the last few weeks, our lawmakers actually behaved a little more like statesmen and a little less like a bunch of fourth graders fighting on the playground.

After an entire year in which the two parties seemingly couldn’t agree on a bipartisan approach to pick up a dead pigeon, they managed to reach a compromise on a smoking ban.

Then, after much wailing, screaming and gnashing of teeth, they passed a package of education reforms which, we were told, could qualify Michigan for $400 million dollars in federal “Race to the Top” education money. Actually, the way it was usually presented was that if we got the legislation done, we got the dough. Afterward, our lawmakers seemed pleased with themselves. But it turns out that we really don’t know how much money we will get, if any.

Four hundred million is almost ten percent of all the money available, and Michigan only has three percent of the nation’s population. Plus, as the Gongwer News Service reported yesterday, the respected journal Education Week casts some doubt on Michigan’s chances. There seems to be some concern that the reforms didn’t make it sufficiently harder for teachers to get tenure.

But let’s assume we do get the money. What we have to make sure is that the lawmakers don’t do with it what their predecessors did when Michigan started its first state lottery, almost forty years ago. They sold it to the voters by promising the proceeds would be used for education. And they were…

Except that the lawmakers then took away money they had been spending on education and used it for something else, in a classic version of the old shell game.

We can’t afford to let them do that this time. If you’ve been listening to me for a while, you know that I’ve been moaning that we are facing the mother of all deficits and budget battles in Lansing next year, and that Michigan’s future is at stake.

Increasingly, other people are saying this too, that our future will be determined for decades by the decisions that are made in 2010, both in Lansing and at the ballot box.

We’ll be making some of those decisions ourselves, and pressuring our elected representatives to make right ones for us.

But here’s a suggestion. When you are trying to figure out for yourselves what the right policies are, forget next year.

Think about 2025 or 2030, when the babies and children of today will be young adults entering college or the work force.

What kind of opportunities do we want them to have? What kind of a Michigan do we want to create for them?

If we make our decisions with that in mind, the chances are much better that everything will be all right. And for our battered old state itself, I can’t imagine a better Christmas present.

Essay: Upper Peninsula, Under Covers - 12.22.09

It is present-buying time, and Michigan Radio's senior political analyst thinks he's found the perfect gift for that secret yooper who is nestled in all of our hearts.

Hear Audio Story   

If you are looking for that last minute Christmas present for that special someone, look no more. This one weighs a couple of pounds, is family-friendly, and costs a mere $27.95.

I am talking about the first-ever, just published, Michigan's Upper Peninsula Almanac. The University of Michigan Press put out this soft-cover book, and I have to confess that when the publicist told me about it, I thought she was joking.

Then, I expected a parody. You know, sort of an Escanaba in Da Moonlight pretending to be a reference book.

But when the Upper Peninsula Almanac arrived, I just couldn't put it down. It is five-hundred and eighty pages full of, yes, crazy and fun stuff, but also fascinating history, important reference material and more information about the UP than you can imagine.

Yes, you can see a picture here of the world's biggest-ever pasty, which contained four hundred pounds of potatoes, two hundred fifty pounds of meat, and more dough than I can safely mention on the airwaves. There are also the one and a half pound Hilltop Sweet Rolls meant for daily individual consumption.

With the help of this book, you can learn about the world's largest concrete Frosty the Snowman, which is in Alger County, and find out about the world's biggest annual outhouse race, which also happens in Alger County. The fine print notes that it is apparently also the world's only annual outhouse race.

However, you can also learn a vast amount of serious stuff about the history, the economy, the wildlife and the geography of the Upper Peninsula. No other state has anything like this.

Michigan's upper half is this vast land mass, twice the size of New Jersey. But only three percent of all us Michiganders live there -- 308,000 people, by the latest census estimates, two thirds of whom live in the wilderness, or in towns of less than two thousand people.

Yet the Yoopers have created an image and have had an impact on our culture far out of proportion to their numbers. I talked yesterday to one of the two authors of this book, Ron Jolly, a well-known, award-winning radio newsman from the Traverse City area.

Four years ago, he wrote the Northern Michigan Almanac, which covers the upper lower peninsula. It sold better than expected. So when he was approached about an almanac for the UP, he was willing, especially when he hooked up with a co-author. Karl Bohnak is the UP's best-known weatherman, and the author of a book about its climate called, not surprisingly, So Cold a Sky.

Thanks to Karl, almanac readers can learn that in some parts of Marquette County, the time between the last spring frost and the first freeze of the fall can be little as ... four days.

That makes for a short growing season.

Jolly told me he found the incredible ethnic diversity of the UP especially fascinating: Finns and Germans and Swedes, Native Americans and the descendants of the 19th century Cornish and Welsh miners who came to hew iron out of the earth.

Both men fell in love with all things UP, and it shows. So pull your Stormy Kromer down over your ears, trudge off to the bookstore, and bring back an almanac.

If you're lucky, Mom will have a hot pasty waiting when you get back. Hopefully, one of the slightly smaller ones.

Essay: Reflections on a Bruising Year - 12.21.09

It's no secret that this has been a difficult year. But Jack Lessenberry, Michigan Radio's senior political analyst, thinks we may be better off in some ways than we know.

Hear Audio Story   

This has been a tough and bruising year for Michigan. We lost nearly three hundred thousand jobs, most of them permanently. Schools have lost funding, cities have lost revenue sharing money.

Pontiac has been taken over by a state-appointed Emergency Financial Manager, something likely to happen to other Michigan cities eventually. And the legislature broke its promise by denying Michigan Promise tuition money to 96,000 students who had been promised that it would be there. Worse things may be coming, Reminding ourselves of all that is not, I realize, not news calculated to spread Christmas cheer. Yet there are things to celebrate. We are actually better off in some ways than last year, even though it may not feel like it.

For proof, let's look at the record. A year ago, our financial condition might have been described as controlled panic.

There was a real fear that General Motors and Chrysler might go out of business. Not just declare bankruptcy, actually go out of business. That indeed could have happened, if they had been forced to declare bankruptcy without any federal aid.

That seemed like a real possibility last December. The leaders of the no-longer-so big three had gone to Congress to ask for aid, and had bombed worse than a used Edsel. Several Republican senators from the south vowed not to give them a cent.

What few realized was that if GM and Chrysler had gone belly up then, their inability to pay might have shut down suppliers that also do business with Ford. The ripple effect could have had devastating consequences across the entire industry.

But then first President Bush and then President Obama ignored that advice and helped Chrysler and GM with billions in loans. Among other things, they knew that if the car companies had suddenly declared bankruptcy, the shock waves could have had a devastating impact on a thoroughly jittery Wall Street.

The markets already had lost thousands of points when the big investment houses failed. For the auto industry to follow might have created a near-replica of the Great Crash of 1929. Fortunately, that didn't happen. By the time GM and Chrysler did declare bankruptcy in the spring, people were psychologically prepared.

What's more, machinery had been set up to get them through bankruptcy as swiftly as possible. They are leaner companies now, and no one knows what their future holds. But both Chrysler and GM are alive and kicking, paying wages and selling cars.

A year ago, Detroit was both the shame and laughingstock of the nation. Former Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick was in jail, and the city faced four elections this year. Nobody knew what would happen.

Fortunately, the city ended up with a mayor who has a solid business background, considerable charisma left from his days as an all-star basketball player, and whose first agenda is to get a handle on the city's finances. Then, he intends to do everything he can to put Detroit's political, social and, especially, financial, house in order.

That won't be easy. The good news is that he knows it.

We'll be facing a lot more challenges. But the good news is that we, and even our leaders, increasingly seem to get it.

We have a lot to do to restore that Wolverine roar. But we've been giving up our illusions; making a start. And if that isn't worth celebrating, I don't know what is.

Essay: The Grinch and Lansing - 12.18.09

As the Michigan Legislature continues to fight over federal education funding, Michigan Radio’s Political Analyst Jack Lessenberry is wondering why Lansing always seems to be the Grinch…

Hear Audio Story   

Christmas is a week from today, and the state is full of haggard people marching off to shopping malls to look for last-minute presents, some of which they can‘t afford, for people they care about.

Whatever your faith tradition, there is something nice about that. Yes, I know all the arguments against greed and the consumer culture. Yet there is still something nice about doing something to make someone else happy.

That may be why the armies of shoppers today will include even some Jewish people I know and a whole lot of completely secular folks who buy their loved ones presents.

Doing something for others you care about, especially, something that makes sense in the long run, really shouldn’t be seen as a sacrifice at all, especially if it benefits you too.

You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure that out. However, it does seem beyond the ability of the Michigan legislature to grasp much of the time. Today, they are still squabbling over a series of simple education reforms they need to make in order to not lose $400 million dollars in so-called “Race to the Top” federal education aid. Given how much the schools have lost recently, you’d think that Lansing would have snapped up that money in a heartbeat.

In fact, they were supposed to have recessed for the holidays already. But no, the lawmakers are, as usual, finding things to fight about. Charter schools, for one thing. Republicans want a whole lot more of them, and demanded this be part of the legislation.

They want, essentially an unlimited number of charters. Democrats, who are closely allied with the main teachers’ union, the Michigan Education Association, don’t want that.

They may be near a compromise on that issue, but the leadership also has been fighting over whether high school kids should be forced to pass a curriculum designed to prepare them for college, and over what to do with clearly failing school districts.

Should the state be able to take over the academics of an entire failing school district, or should it be allowed to do so only one building at a time? One would have thought the sad spectacle of Detroit’s Public Schools would be an adequate answer.

All this comes after a session in which our cash-strapped state missed out on other opportunities for billions in federal dollars, because lawmakers refused to come up with matching funds.

For example, we lost $600 million in federal highway funds because we wouldn’t come up with the $120 million we needed to get that money. The legislature wouldn’t do anything because, of course, all new taxes are bad, even if we get four times the money back. As a result, the state may cancel $200 million in road repair projects.

Maybe our lawmakers think potholes will heal themselves. Now, there is a chance that Congress may give us these funds anyway. The House has voted to do so; the Senate is yet to act.

But even if they do, the legislature too often, in too many ways, has become the grinch that is stealing our future, mainly through partisan and pressure group nastiness. A few years ago, there was a movement to change the constitution to convert us to a non-partisan, one-house unicameral legislature, something Nebraska has now.

At the time I thought that was a silly idea.

Today, I think I just might have been wrong.

Essay: Can You Spare A Job? - 12.17.09

As the state unemployment rate continues to be in the double digits… Michigan Radio’s political analyst Jack Lessenberry thinks dealing with job loss may require us to turn to an almost forbidden word…

Hear Audio Story   

Today I want to say something shocking, so if there are any small children standing nearby, you may want to cover their ears. Okay, here goes. More and more, it seems that what this state’s economy needs is a strong, swift dose of socialism.

Now I know there’s nothing I could say that would be more likely to get anonymous bloggers foaming at the keyboard.

But I am convinced this is true. No, I am not talking about collective farms, slave labor camps, and forcing everyone to share an apartment and a single toothbrush.

What I am talking about is the fact that we learned yesterday that the real unemployment number in Detroit may be nearly half of the working age population - forty-five percent, to be precise.

There are no jobs in the private sector available for these folks today. What would be wrong with a federal program to put a large number of them to work for the public good?

What if we were to create something like an American Infrastructure Corps, to fix roads and the bridges and tear down dangerous and unsightly abandoned buildings?

What would be wrong with paying some of them to prepare tracts of abandoned land for urban agriculture?

Almost certainly, we could vastly improve our state’s physical condition and give these folks a better life with new meaning for a tiny fraction of what we spent to destroy the infrastructure of Iraq.

We’re spending hundreds of billions to prop up mismanaged corporations and to bail out Wall Street. Why not a little money for the battered and shattered Main Streets of our state and nation?

Naturally, we couldn’t call it socialism. Incidentally, we sometimes pretend we no longer have taboos in our society, mainly because we can discuss sex on television in great detail.

And it’s certainly true that you couldn’t do that fifty years ago. However, back then you could freely discuss different economic systems and ideas, including capitalism, socialism, even communism. If you took it as a given that we needed what used to be called a “mixed economy,“ you could debate the proportions.

How large and vibrant should the public sector be? Today, you’ll find it far less taboo to bring up sex in conversation than to talk about what somebody might call - gasp - socialism.

Today, thanks to thirty years of what I’d call silliness founded on the charm of Ronald Reagan, far too many of us have come to believe that all government spending is evil.

That, is, of course, with the exception of the trillions spent to maintain a vast military apparatus. Nobody wants to admit this either, but -- collectively speaking -- the United States Armed Forces are the world’s largest and most successful socialist enterprise.

During the New Deal, the Works Progress Administration built post offices and schools and created classic guides to our nation’s states and rivers, along with some fine works of art.

Nobody today thinks a completely collective economy is the answer. Yet the so-called free and unregulated market doesn’t seem to get the job done either. Michigan has a lot of problems these days.

And the bottom line is that we are all in this together. Clearly, we would all be better off if everyone was better off.

So let’s park our ideological taboos in the garage, and come up with some rational policies to make that happen.

Essay: Criminal Defense - 12.16.09

Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox ruled yesterday that it is, sometimes, illegal for politicians to spend campaign finance money to defend themselves against criminal charges. Michigan Radio’s political analyst Jack Lessenberry takes a look at what exactly this ruling means...

Hear Audio Story   

More than four months ago, I told you about a retired law professor named Maurice Kelman who was waging a lonely fight for an important principle. He doesn’t think politicians charged with felonies should be able to use campaign funds to pay their criminal defense lawyers. Morally, he thinks that isn’t right; that’s not, after all, what people gave them the money for.

More importantly, he believes it is illegal under Michigan Campaign Finance Law. That got my attention because you would think a respected law professor would know what he is talking about.

And this is all especially relevant because it is exactly what former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick did. Records show he used nearly a million bucks this way before he pled guilty to multiple felonies, and resigned last year.

So Professor Kelman asked Secretary of State Terri Lynn Land for an opinion. She, or rather a bunch of her bureaucrats, just blew him off, saying he had no standing to ask for one.

That made no sense, since he is a citizen, a legal expert and other secretaries of state have been happy to give him opinions on public matters in the past. No sense … unless Secretary Land was trying to duck making a controversial decision.

So after I talked to Professor Kelman, I asked Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox for an opinion. He told me that legally, his opinion would have to be requested by an elected official. So I asked State Senator Gilda Jacobs to do so, and she was happy to oblige.

She formally asked Cox for a ruling. Yesterday, the attorney general finally gave Senator Jacobs his opinion. I don’t know why it took four months, but better late than never.

The ruling is twenty-five pages long, and says politicians can use campaign finance money to defend themselves against criminal charges, but, quote, “only if the expense is an ordinary and necessary business expense of the elected official … and is incurred in carrying out the business of elective office.”

I can understand that, in a case, say, when an officeholder seeks to defend him or herself against a clearly politically motivated lawsuit. But the attorney general said it is not legal to use campaign funds for criminal lawsuits that have nothing to do with an official’s duties. For example, when former Mayor Kilpatrick assaulted a detective and an investigator from the Wayne County Sheriff’s office.

Using campaign funds to defend against those charges was clearly improper, Cox says in a footnote that acknowledges that Professor Kelman brought it to light.

However, the attorney general says it is up to the secretary of state to do something about it. Terri Lynn Land immediately tried to pass the buck again, saying, through a spokesman that she wouldn’t act without a complaint from the public.

Yesterday, Professor Kelman told me he wasn’t overly thrilled with the opinion. Though it is better than nothing, “it still leaves considerable room for campaign spending on criminal defense.“

And yes, he intends to file a complaint with the secretary of state’s office, though, he added, “given Land’s dismal performance to date, there’s no reason to think she’d do the right thing.”

So as of now, my citizenship scorecard reads five stars for Professor Kelman, two for Attorney General Cox, and zero for Secretary Land. And the bottom line is that Michigan Campaign Finance Law clearly needs further reform.

Essay: Cherry Picking - 12.15.09

Lieutenant Governor John Cherry has a proposal to restore the Michigan Promise Scholarship by taxing water that’s bottled in the state. Michigan Radio’s Political Analyst Jack Lessenberry thinks this idea is interesting for reasons that have nothing to do with water...

Hear Audio Story   

Lieutenant Governor John Cherry has an interesting proposal to come up with enough money to restore the Michigan Promise college scholarship. He wants to assess a tax of ten cents a bottle on all the water harvested in Michigan. To me, this is fascinating for reasons that have nothing to do with bottled water.

Frankly, taxing plastic water bottles is probably not the most interesting idea in the history of government finance theory, though you can certainly make the case that it bears thinking about.

Nor is it interesting because it might become law. In fact, it has no chance whatsoever to be passed, especially not this year and especially not because it might make John Cherry look good.

The main reason the bottled water idea is interesting is because it illustrates the terrible dilemma the lieutenant governor is facing, and will continue to face. He has to try to define himself as his own man, to carve out an identity separate from that of the governor.

If he doesn’t do that, he doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in a foundry of surviving an election. For Jennifer Granholm is terribly unpopular. She may be the most unpopular chief executive Michigan has had in my lifetime. To be fair, a lot of that is due to circumstances that aren’t her fault and which are beyond her control. The national economy, in other words, and the collapse of the auto industry. To be sure, there is also a perception that she has failed to be an effective or consistent leader.

Whether you agree with that or not, every poll shows the voters will be more than happy to be rid of her. And just about the only thing most people know about John Cherry is that he is her deputy.

Lieutenant governors, like vice presidents, have a hard time getting elected even when they follow popular governors. For some reason, they generally get saddled with all things people didn’t like about their administrations while getting none of the credit.

Cherry is not stupid, and knows he needs an identity of his own. So last Friday, he announced this proposal. He will ask the legislature to pass a law assessing a dime-a-bottle tax on the state’s major water bottling firms, principally Nestle.

Those firms were all screaming bloody murder about this yesterday. Now, Cherry served in the legislature and knows there is no way the Republicans would ever pass his proposal.

What he wants, is for the public to get behind it. He wants to campaign for governor next year as … “the man whose brilliant idea would have saved the Michigan Promise Scholarship!”

“Except, however, that those skinflint Republicans denied your little Johnny or Susie the help they need for a college education.”

If it works, that’s not bad politics. Indeed, the Republicans appear tone-deaf to public sentiment on this issue. However, Cherry made one telling little misstep that shows how desperate he is to be seen as his own man. He told reporters that he hadn’t even told the governor about his idea, something that seems hard to believe.

And within hours, there was Granholm, facing the cameras, stealing his thunder, brightly chirping that she supports taxing bottled water too. Politically, the governor and lieutenant governor are as tied together as conjoined twins. Over the next seven months, it will be fascinating to watch John Cherry continue to attempt to break free.

Essay: Sobering Up - 12.14.09

It’s Monday afternoon, and Michigan Radio’s Political Analyst Jack Lessenberry thinks we should all be sobered up. What’s more, he thinks our legislature should be, too…

Hear Audio Story   

Generally speaking, it is better to be sober than drunk, especially on a Monday afternoon. Granted, we may not always feel that way emotionally, but trust me on this.

Your boss will appreciate it. As far as I can tell, the main reason most people get seriously drunk is to escape. Escape their problems, escape dealing with reality. And there are many other ways to do this than through alcohol. For example, instead of worrying about our problems, we can obsess over those of Tiger Woods.

Personally, I’ve had to face the fact that the golfer’s love life is unlikely to have any impact on me, since both my significant other and I are old enough to be his parents.

You, dear listener, as much as it pains me to say it, are also extremely unlikely to be involved in a romantic twist with the world’s most athletic billionaire. Yet in the last week I’ve had people ask me what I thought about Tiger with the sort of earnestness that used to be reserved for questions of war and peace.

I suppose there is no great harm in this. Except that evading reality is usually a bad thing, if you keep it up long enough. The City of Detroit is now emerging from an unreality binge that lasted years, and did a lot of damage. The Motor City was run for years by mayors who refused to deal with the city’s shrinking economic base, other than to blame it on racism. That culminated in the reign of a self-indulgent man-child who thought the city was his playpen.

Today, the city is being run by grownups who are trying to assess and cope with the damage. The same is true of Detroit‘s public schools, which at last are being run by a rational and competent expert, Emergency Financial Manager Robert Bobb.

However, the state of Michigan still hasn’t come in from the cold. The state legislature has a week left before they take yet another long vacation, and they are still dithering over some basic education reforms. If they don’t get them done, they will lose $400 million dollars in federal “Race to the Top” education money.

When they come back in January, they have another serious issue to deal with. Our roads are falling apart, and lack of funds has forced construction projects to be delayed.

Unless we get them going again, we’ll lose millions more in federal funds.

Everyone wants the roads to be fixed. The easiest way to get the cash and secure the federal money that is just sitting there would be to boost the gas tax nine cents a gallon. That makes sense… except for that hated word: Tax. Republicans have sworn to oppose any tax, no matter how much sense it makes.

But there may be hope. Pam Byrnes, the House transportation committee chair, has a solution. She knows her colleagues are allergic to any talk of taxes, so, she intends to “present this as an investment in economic development.” After all, she added, “we are not going to be able to attract people to our state when our roads are crumbling and our bridges are being closed down.”

That may be the most sensible thing said in Lansing all year. How her fellow lawmakers react ought to give us some indication as to whether there is any hope of sobriety in our state capital yet.

Essay: Making a Difference - 12.11.09

The legislature passed a workplace smoking ban yesterday. Governor Granholm is expected to sign it into law. Michigan Radio’s Political Analyst Jack Lessenberry thinks what went on behind the scenes in Lansing holds some important lessons…

Hear Audio Story   

Yesterday, after years of struggle, the Michigan Legislature passed a bill banning smoking in restaurants, workplaces and bars throughout the state. That’s old news by now to most of us.

Yet there are three important lessons in this that have nothing to do with the smoking ban itself. They are, simply put, these. First of all, the common citizen can make a difference.

If enough people care about an issue, confront their legislators and keep up the pressure, it will eventually have an effect. The second lesson is the corny old proverb:

If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again. And finally, at some point, you’ve got to be willing to compromise, as long as we aren’t talking about dealing with Nazis or child molesters. You can’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

If you insist on a solution that is perfect, you’ll never get one that is either perfect or good. But you also have to realize that you can’t compromise too early. Here’s how all those things played out in the smoking ban wars. The hero of the story is a state senator from blue-collar, downriver Detroit named Ray Basham.

He’s someone you might think would be more likely to be a smoker than the champion of the smoking ban. He was born on the hills of Virginia, served in the U.S. Air Force and then came up here to work for Ford for thirty years. He got involved in the union, and was elected to the legislature a dozen years ago.

But he’d seen what tobacco did to the lungs of people he knew, some of whom were the victims of second-hand smoke. He introduced a bill calling for a smoking ban his very first term.

The restaurant industry, as he now cheerfully admits, outmaneuvered him easily, and used his early willingness to compromise against him. He learned from this. From then on, it was take no prisoners. He pushed for a total smoking ban, period.

Year after year. Meanwhile, smoking became more and more unpopular, and more people became aware of the perils of second-hand smoke. Other states, notably neighboring Ohio, passed smoking bans. Lobbyists for restaurants and bars had predicted financial doom if smoking bans were passed. But that didn’t happen. In some cases, business actually increased. This didn’t lessen the opposition of the Michigan Restaurant Association, but it made their claims less credible. Lawmakers began hearing from constituents who insisted on a ban, and who wouldn’t go away.

Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop was still opposed, but for once, wasn’t going to be able to prevent a vote. Ironically, it was Basham’s own Democrats who were the final obstacle, because they feared the loss of casino jobs. That held things up for a year.

But then Ron Jelinek, a Republican state senator, proposed a compromise exempting casino gambling floors, tobacco shops and cigar bars. For Basham, it was a Kenny Rogers moment, meaning, “you've got to know when to hold them and when to fold them.”

And so the deal got done.

Thanks to term limits, Basham leaves the senate forever in a year. He’ll be 65, and his political career is likely over. But he got something big accomplished. By the way, one colleague proposed naming the smoking ban bill after him. He declined. He wanted it to be named for a doctor who died last year.

Sometimes, the system works.