Jack Lessenberry Essays and Interviews

Essay: Prison Policy - 2.26.10

There’s a big argument underway in Lansing over whether to parole more prison inmates. Michigan Radio’s Jack Lessenberry thinks both sides need a reality check, and some common sense.

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Across Michigan, a fierce debate is raging over how long to keep criminals locked up in prison. Basically, it’s all about money. Governor Jennifer Granholm has to present the legislature with a balanced budget, and the state is running a huge deficit.

So she’s proposing saving $140 million this year with sentencing reforms that would reduce Michigan’s prison population, now about forty-six thousand inmates, by ten thousand by the end of next year. The way to do that is simple: Let people out earlier.

That’s already going on, to some extent; the prison population is down several thousand from its all-time high. To some extent, that’s due to more paroles. But the state also seems to be experiencing some success with its Prisoner Re-entry Initiative, designed to help parolees adjust to society.

However, the governor wants to release a lot more inmates. She’s supporting a bill that would reinstate what’s called “good time.” Prisoners could reduce their sentences by as much as five days a month in return for good behavior in prison. Almost all other states have this already. Michigan used to, but abolished good time a few years ago, under the theory that the best way to solve the crime problem was to keep prisoners locked up as long as possible.

Trouble is, that hasn’t worked very well. Studies show that longer sentences aren’t any more likely than short ones to keep inmates from returning to a life of crime.

True, they are no threat to society while still in prison, which is the best argument for keeping them behind bars. The state, however, is out of money. The so-called “good time” bill now before the house would save taxpayers more than $100 million a year.

But prosecutors don’t like it. Oakland County’s Jessica Cooper calls the current program of accelerating paroles “reckless,” especially where violent felons are concerned. Wayne County alone has forty convicted killers eligible for parole by the end of April. In keeping with their law and order image, the Republicans in the legislature also don’t want to let people out early.

But are they willing to raise taxes to keep people in prison? No, they don’ t want to do that either. Well, comrades, there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch. Keeping someone in a Michigan prison costs around $35,000 a year. Republican State Sen. Alan Cropsey is sponsoring a modest plan that would allow most prisoners to be released after serving 120 percent of their minimum sentence.

That would reduce the prison population slightly, by 2,000 inmates over the next four years, and save maybe $35 million, but not nearly enough to close the deficit.

So -- what’s the answer?

I suggest finding a way to have prison policy governed by common sense. We have to find a way of differentiating between those who rape and murder and the guy who got into drugs, wrote some bad checks, and has a shot at rebuilding his life.

We also have to give newly released prisoners a chance to support themselves -- or they’ll end up right back in prison again. My guess is that we can do all that -- if we first find a way to remove prison policy from partisan politics. Otherwise, we’ll be sentencing our state to some really hard times.

Essay: Toyota Gives Detroit a Chance - 2.25.10

Toyota's accelerator problems have resulted in a public relations nightmare for the automaker. Michigan Radio's Jack Lessenberry wonders how the Big Three will respond.

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Toyota has just given Detroit's big three automakers their best chance ever at winning back the hearts, minds and wallets of the American consumer. We ought to know within the next few months whether Ford, Chrysler and General Motors are up to the job.

Japanese automakers have been systematically beating Detroit since the 1970s, and they've been doing so largely because of one main feature: quality.

Twenty years ago, when I was living in another state, I bought a Honda Accord. The reliability of that car was so far superior to the Buick and Oldsmobile I had previously owned, it was hard for me to even consider a domestic vehicle after that. Multiply that experience a million times, and you'll see why the Big Three landed on the rocks.

But now it is Toyota's turn to have their cars suffer from one of the most frightening safety issues imaginable. Cars which accelerate out of control without warning, threatening to kill the drivers.

Worse, Toyota's handling of this has been a PR disaster of almost unbelievable proportions. Corporate headquarters in Tokyo has alternated between stonewalling, denials, and confusion.

This week, Jim Lentz, the president of Toyota Motor Sales in America testified before Congress in what was the worst such performance I can ever remember. Barely a year ago, the press attacked the heads of the Big Three for their clumsy performance testifying before Congress when they were close to bankruptcy.

Toyota's main man in this country made GM's Rick Wagoner look like a combination of Einstein and Shakespeare.

Over and over again, Lentz displayed appalling ignorance of things he had to have known he'd be asked. When did Toyota first hear about the sudden acceleration problem? John Dingell asked him. "I don't know the answer to that," Lentz said. Well, when was the first recall? He didn't know that either.

How many complaints had Toyota gotten?

You guessed it. He didn't know. But what everyone will remember most is an exchange that belongs in a textbook of how NOT to do public relations. Toyota's man was asked if the recalls the company has finally issued, to fix sticky accelerator pedals and floor mats, would fix the problem. "Not totally," he said.

That ought to inspire consumer confidence. One can just see the comedy routines coming, featuring men lining up to buy new Toyotas -- as gifts for their mothers-in-law.

Toyota executives used to say their fear was that they would expand so fast they would become General Motors, by which they meant an unresponsive company with serious quality control issues.

Now, that seems to have happened.

The real question for Detroit's automakers, however, is how they will use this enormous gift that has been dropped in their lap.

Will they find a way to capitalize on it, to inform consumers across the country of their vastly improved safety and reliability records? Will they be able to persuade millions of Californians who long ago stopped buying American to give Detroit iron another try?

Clearly, there are hundreds of thousands of Americans who may now have second thoughts about buying a Toyota Camry or Corolla. But will they buy Chevy Impalas or Ford Fusions instead?

Or will they switch to Honda Accords? The answer may tell us a lot about our automakers' ability to compete in the 21st century.

Essay: Kildee Jumps In - 2.24.10

Dan Kildee, the former Genesee County treasurer announced he is running for governor yesterday. Michigan Radio's Jack Lessenberry thinks this might be good for the Democrats.

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Yesterday, a man in Monroe asked me what I thought about Dan Kildee's decision to jump into the governor's race.

"You know, I've always thought he was a great guy. But don't you think he is a little old for that job?" he said. Well, not really. Dan Kildee is 51, the same age as Jennifer Granholm.

But the voter had him confused with his better-known uncle, Dale Kildee, a congressman from Flint who is now over 80 years old.

Having a famous name probably will be a plus for Dan Kildee, once voters realize he isn't an octogenarian.

The Kildee name is a famous one in the Flint area, and those who know Dan Kildee give him generally high marks. He doesn't have Lansing experience, but does know something about government. Kildee spent a dozen years as a county commissioner and then thirteen years as county treasurer.

Last year, he became president of the Genesee County Land Bank, a non-profit urban policy center. It's possible that he might be just what the doctor ordered for the Democrats. He's a new face, though one with a familiar name.

He has experience, but not the kind of experience that has made him a lot of enemies. Nobody knows, of course, how he'll come off to the voters. I can't assess his charisma quotient, because he is the only serious candidate I haven't yet met.

But he does appear to be able to make up his mind. For the last few weeks, the Democratic contest for governor has been dominated by a series of "nervous Nellies" who couldn't decide if they wanted to run or not. Former state treasure Bob Bowman was out, then in, then finally out again. Ditto for pizza heiress Denise Ilitch. Speaker of the House Andy Dillon continues to play Hamlet and can't decide whether he is running or not.

But Kildee jumped in with both feet. He filed paperwork that will allow him to raise money and said that while he is doesn't yet have his campaign team in place, he is in the race to stay. Exactly where he sits on the political spectrum isn't clear, but he wants to be seen as a can-do pragmatist.

"Lansing politicians can't get a budget done on time and are putting excessive partisanship ahead of the people," Kildee said. Hard to quarrel with that. His entering the race also helps ensure that Democratic primary voters have a decent selection of qualified candidates for governor to choose from.

That will be true even if nobody else gets into the race. Alma Wheeler Smith is the least well-known and the least well-funded, but has many years of legislative experience and some well-developed ideas on tax policy and balancing the state budget.

Bernero, the mayor of Lansing, has both legislative and executive experience. And Kildee has plenty of both kinds of experience without having been part of the mess in Lansing.

For their part, Republicans also have at least three major candidates with major league experience -- a congressman, the state attorney general, and a big-county sheriff and former legislator.

The field is filling up, and voters in each party have almost six months to figure out who they want to dance with in the fall. Now more than ever, it's important that they make the right choice.

Essay: Kilpatrick Again - 2.23.10

Kwame Kilpatrick is back in the headlines this week. Michigan Radio's Jack Lessenberry thinks we need to consider how this affects everyone in our state.

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Yesterday was not a great day for Detroit Mayor Dave Bing, who is trying to hold his city and its finances together in the face of what's the worst recession since World War II.

I didn't talk to the mayor, but I know his day was dismal because, once again, Kwame Kilpatrick was back in the news. Last fall Mayor Bing told me that any time the former mayor is in the headlines, it makes his job that much harder.

He let a lot of people down, and we are paying for that,? Bing told me, adding that every time there is any new Kwame development "you have to work just that much harder to change the perception of folks about Detroit."

What we need to remember is that's bad for all of us in Michigan, regardless of where we live. For years, Detroit has been the place people elsewhere in Michigan love to hate. To some extent, this goes back before race was an issue.

Detroit was once big, brawling, arrogant and rich. Almost a third of the state's population lived in the city in Detroit's glory days, and folks on the west side of the state, up north and in the thumb resented that the Motor City got all the attention.

Then, however, Detroit became a place of troubles. Years of population loss and economic decline followed, and many across Michigan blamed this on blacks ruining Detroit. That wasn't the case, but sometimes perceptions are their own reality.

Then nine years ago, Detroit voters elected Kwame Kilpatrick, who was charismatic, superficially brilliant, and a spoiled child in a man's body. His corruption cost the city millions that we know about.

But far worse was the message it sent the nation, which was, literally, "don't even think about coming to or investing in Detroit." There were also fools outstate who took delight in the Motor City's embarrassment. The fact is, when Detroit does badly, it hurts all of us in Michigan, economically and otherwise.

Detroit's current leaders are grappling to find the resources to keep operating, and prevent their city from being taken over by the state, as Pontiac and other places have been.

They hoped Kilpatrick would move to Texas, pay his restitution, and not be seen or heard of again. But he seems constitutionally unable to behave like an adult.

What the media and the courts need to do is sort out what's really important. The rest of us need to keep this all in perspective. Detroit had a corrupt white mayor in the 1930s who went to prison. Michigan had a former governor and supreme court justice who was convicted of perjury and jailed in the 1970s.

We survived all that, and will survive our current problems too, if we remember something. We're all in this together, as far as the rest of the nation is concerned. They never heard of Saugatuck in Silicon Valley. They know about Detroit.

We're living through a crisis that for Michigan is as profound as the Great Depression. Overcoming that is what really matters. So let's work for the day when once again, Michigan unemployment is below the national average. And when that happens, we can give ourselves permission to wallow in a really juicy sex scandal.

Essay: Keeping On - 2.22.10

There have been an astonishing number of congressional retirements this year, but the longest-serving member in history isn't planning on leaving. Michigan Radio's Jack Lessenberry looks at the career of John Dingell.

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Senator Evan Bayh of Indiana shocked his fellow Democrats last week by announcing he wouldn't run for another term this fall.

Congress is broken, he said, and badly needs to be reformed, though it's not clear how he can advance that cause by leaving. There have been a lot of congressional retirements this year. Many Democrats are disillusioned about their failure to pass health care reform, despite having large majorities in both House and Senate.

Then, two days ago, it was John Dingell's turn to make an announcement. Dingell has served in the House longer than any man in history. He was first elected, by the way, thirteen days before Evan Bayh was born. Dingell isn't the oldest man ever to serve in Congress; Strom Thurmond turned a hundred on the job. Dingell will be a mere 84 in July. Still, he's had a hip replaced in the last few years, knee surgery and two heart operations.

Additionally, he was humiliated last year when his fellow Democrats voted to take the chairmanship of the powerful Energy and Commerce Committee away from him, something that was a slap at the now-weakened auto industry as much as at Dingell.

Nobody, then would have been especially surprised if John Dingell also decided to retire. Nobody, that is, except for the folks who know him. Guess what: Dingell isn't planning on going anywhere. "Now is not the time to walk away," he said.

National health care was a priority of Dingell's father, when he was a congressman back in the 1930s. His son isn't about to give up, especially now that a serious health care bill has come so far.

"I think it is time for all hands on deck," Dingell said, before addressing a group of college Democrats in Ypsilanti. The nation is facing a lot of challenges, and he thinks he can use his seniority and experience to help get things done. Nor does he intend to let his physical limitations get him down.

The day after his announcement, Dingell was back in Washington, lobbying the Senate to stop dragging its collective feet on a food safety bill the House passed in March.

Food safety, like other consumer protections, has been a cause of Big John's for a long time. In a sense, it is hereditary. There is a famous photograph of FDR signing the Social Security Act in 1935.

Standing over his shoulder is one of the bill's main sponsors, Congressman John Dingell. Not this Dingell, but his dad.

Father and son have represented Michigan's Fifteenth District for a combined seventy-seven years now. The younger Dingell first got to Congress in a special election after his father died in 1955.

Before that, he was a house page as a boy, and was on the floor when President Roosevelt made his famous 'day of infamy' speech declaring war against Japan.

Now it needs to be said that nobody's reelection is automatic, and that Republicans are making noises about fielding a serious challenger. But odds are that Big John will still be there next year.

"I creak a little more each year," he said recently, "but I still give my people a full day's work. I still work hard on legislation."

He isn't going gentle into any good night.

And I think you've got to admire that.

Essay: It's Only Fair - 2.19.10

Last fall, Governor Granholm vetoed funding for the Michigan State Fair, saying the state can no longer afford this almost two-century old tradition. Now, Michigan Radio's Jack Lessenberry says there may be hope for the fair yet.

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Last fall, at the end of Lansing's annual budget battle, the otherwise stingy legislature added in $7.1 million for the Michigan State Fair. But when she received the final budget, Governor Jennifer Granholm immediately used her line-item veto to kill the fair. She said only, Given current revenue constraints, tax dollars can no longer subsidize state fair operations.

Why she felt so strongly the need to do that isn't clear. The event wouldn't have actually cost the state $7 million, but more like $500,000. The fair would have generated most of its operating cost itself, through ticket revenue and other sales.

Perhaps the governor wanted to use canceling the fair as a dramatic way of getting Michigan's attention, of making us all realize that the world has changed forever, and that this isn't the old economy any more. And I also understand that spending any money on the fair might indeed be hard to justify these days. After all, the budget the governor submitted this month cuts off health care for thousands of poor adults, many of whom have dependent children.

Yet the Michigan State Fair is a state tradition which has been going on since Zachary Taylor was in the White House. For many urban kids, the fair was probably the only chance in their lives they had to see farm animals alive and on the hoof.

Kids in Detroit looked forward every year to two traditions that linked them with their parents generation. The fair, which occurred just before everyone had to go back to school in the fall, and the Shrine Circus, which was also held at the fairgrounds in late winter.

Governor Granholm didn't grow up in Michigan, and may not have realized the importance of those traditions as part of the fabric of life hereabouts. For Detroit, they ranked right up there with Opening Day at Tiger Stadium, and the week in the fall when the new car models were introduced every year.

This winter, circus organizers asked if they could continue to perform at the now-shuttered fairgrounds. To the circus managers? surprise, the state's answer was a terse no. This was baffling, since the circus was not subsidized, and actually made the state an annual profit of forty thousand a year or so.

The circus isn't as old as the fair, but has been around for more than a century. A spokesman for the governor said they were looking to use the fairgrounds for an unspecified job creating project.

Well, I drove by the fairgrounds yesterday, and didn't see any jobs, or people for that matter. Eventually, the circus found a temporary home at the Hazel Park Raceway.

And now, there is a glimmer of hope for the Michigan State Fair. The Huron-Clinton Metropolitan Authority is going to meet next week to consider leasing the fairgrounds, developing them into a year-round park, and continuing the country's oldest state fair.

This is far from certain, but I hope it works out somehow. One of the reasons the Michigan State Fair started being held in Detroit was because the folks running the state way back when thought it was important that urban and rural Michigan not completely lose touch with each other. That was a good idea then.

I think it might be an even more important one now.

Essay: Bridging the Gap - 2.18.10

MDOT’s director took a stand recently over the controversy about a new bridge across the Detroit River. Michigan Radio’s Jack Lessenberry says that isn’t so surprising when you look at the facts.

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Kirk Steudle, the director of the Michigan Department of Transportation, isn’t a politician. He‘s a engineer and a career political servant who has been with MDOT since 1987. He isn’t in the business of courting controversy; he just calls them as he sees them, whether the politicians like it or not.

This week, he told the legislature it was significantly underfunding our highway system, and, as a result, we can expect to see our roads swiftly deteriorate. And last week, he asked the lawmakers to do something that was very unpopular with the Ambassador Bridge Company.

MDOT wants the legislature to approve financing for the opening phase of the proposed internationally-owned Detroit River International Crossing bridge between the United States and Canada. MDOT’s director says extra capacity is needed, and that the way to go is with a modern bridge, built with both public and private funds, but jointly managed and inspected by both nations. Governor Jennifer Granholm supports the DRIC bridge. So do the governments of Windsor, Ontario and Canada, and most Michigan business interests.

But one man doesn‘t support it: Manuel J. “Matty” Moroun, the sole owner of the Ambassador Bridge. He wants to do everything he can to stop the DRIC bridge from being built. Instead, he wants to build a second span next to his old bridge, which was built in 1929 and has serious signs of wear. Environmentalists think putting two bridges in the same place would be a poor idea, and it makes little sense from the standpoint of traffic patterns.

The government of Canada is refusing to give him the necessary permits. But he isn’t giving up. Right now, he is focused on preventing the other bridge from happening. Moroun has never been shy about spreading campaign donations around, and he has his champions in the Michigan Legislature -- principally, State Sen. Alan Cropsey, who argues that Michigan doesn’t have the money to spend on a bridge, and this should be left to the private sector.

That argument might have some merit, except for two important considerations. This isn’t merely about a bridge, but the United States and Canada’s most important international crossing. More than a hundred billion dollars in trade flows across the river every year. To allow one private citizen to have complete control over that makes no sense.

For years, Mr. Moroun refused to allow either nation to thoroughly inspect his bridge. The Ambassador is also old, and has many well-documented security concerns.

Additionally, Matty Moroun has been anything but a poster child for good citizenship. Last week, a Wayne County Circuit Court judge ruled that he had illegally constructed a duty-free store and gasoline pumps on property owned by the City of Detroit -- and ordered him to tear them down. The U.S. government is suing his company for improperly referring to itself as a “federal instrumentality.”

And late last year, another Wayne County judge found that Moroun had illegally occupied part of the City of Detroit’s Riverside Park and ordered his company to leave. Yet the Ambassador Bridge Company hasn’t left the park, and is now belatedly appealing.

If our lawmakers exercise even the smallest amount of common sense, and have even the slightest desire to protect Michigan’s most important trading connection, doing the right thing about building a new bridge should be crystal clear.

Essay: Do We Want Bad Roads? - 2.17.10

Michigan roads are in bad shape -- and the federal government wants to give us $2 billion to fix them. But Michigan Radio’s Jack Lessenberry says there’s a real threat we’ll lose that money.

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You probably know that Michigan’s state bird is the robin, but you could argue that the real symbol of our state is the orange barrel. We really have two major seasons: winter, and road construction.

Nobody likes being held up by a construction zone. But there is one thing worse than being inconvenienced by road repairs. It is living in a state that lacks the money to make them. If you have ever had a tire destroyed or an axle broken by a pothole the size of an elephant’s head, you know what I am talking about.

And if present trends continue, the roads are going to start getting far worse, because Michigan is going to miss out on a whole lot of federal funding.

Governor Granholm talked about this in her state of the state speech. Washington is offering us an enormous deal. To quote the governor, “The federal government will give us $2 billion over the next four years if we can come up with a 20 percent match in state funds. That's like an 80-percent-off coupon.” How can we turn that down?

By the way, those funds would not only help fix our crumbling roads, but would create, the governor said, 10,000 construction jobs each year. Yet, incredibly, right now we stand to lose that money, because Michigan may not be able to come up with the matching funds, according to the Michigan Department of Transportation.

Kirk Steudle, the department director, told a legislative subcommittee yesterday, “We as a country and we as a state are significantly underfunding our infrastructure.“ What’s the bottom line? Today, more than 90 percent of Michigan’s roads are rated as being in good condition, although that might seem like an exaggeration. According to the transportation director, if we lose the federal funding, in ten years only 45 percent of Michigan roads will be in good condition. Perhaps our next car should be a Sherman tank.

This is something that should be relatively easy to address, politically and otherwise. Polls have consistently shown that even voters who oppose tax increases for any other reason are often open to spending money to fix our roads. Traditionally, the matching funds have been provided by money the state gets from the gas tax and new vehicle registration fees. Revenues from both are down, and projections say that next year, we will fall about $84 million dollars short of what we need to get the matching funds. Losing that money would be insane.

Fortunately, State Representative Dick Ball, a Republican from Laingsburg, is sane. “No one likes to have their taxes raised, but sometimes there isn’t much alternative,” he said. Accordingly, he and his colleague Pam Byrnes, a Democrat from Chelsea, have introduced bills to raise the gas tax by four cents a gallon and diesel fuel by six cents, now, and again in three years. Ball added sensibly that we can either pay a little now, or a lot more later.

But unless this gets public attention, these bills could just quietly die -- and our roads and economy with them. As the governor put it: “Common-sense dictates that we shouldn't leave money on the table in Washington for roads and infrastructure that would create jobs in Michigan.” Now, the legislature needs to make common sense a road repair reality.

Essay: Dropping Out - 2.16.10

John Cherry, Denise Ilitch and now Bob Bowman all flirted with seeking the Democratic nomination for governor -- and then said no. Michigan Radio's Jack Lessenberry takes a look at what's really going on.

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WANTED: Charismatic, appealing, candidate for governor. Should be able to self-finance cost of campaign, need at least ten million dollars. Need to be able to completely distance yourself from unpopular Granholm administration without criticizing current governor and her policies in any way. Need to be able to convince voters you can straighten out current economic mess, but cannot make any of our big interest groups feel threatened. Apply care of Mark Brewer, Michigan Democratic Party.

The Democrats aren't likely to place a want ad like that, but if they did and they were honest, that's how it might read.  And even though Michigan is filled with people looking for jobs these days, the Democrats are having a hard time finding someone who fits that job description. In fact, they are having a hard time finding so-called 'top tier' candidates at all.

I could tell you why, but it's a secret. Okay, well, I guess I can trust you: There's a strong feeling that the Democrats are going to lose, pretty much regardless of whom they nominate. The economy is bad, and people tend to blame the party in power, which, for the last seven years, has been the Democrats.

Democrats have known for a long time that they were going to have trouble this year, but figured they had their sacrificial lamb ready:  Lieutenant Gov. John Cherry,

In fact, party leaders did their best to shoo other candidates out of the race. Then, last month, Cherry staged a mini-earthquake by pulling out of the race; he said he'd had trouble raising funds.

That left Democrats with only one official candidate.  Alma Wheeler Smith, a state rep from Washtenaw County. She is smart, funny, gutsy and attractive, and has a comprehensive and thoughtful tax plan. But the big boys don?t think she can win.

And current filing reports show she'd raised less than forty thousand dollars. Since then, Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero has gotten onto the race too, but party leaders don't see him as a heavyweight either, especially in the name recognition or money departments.

So, they've been looking desperately and almost pathetically for a savior. They turned to Denise Ilitch, the pizza heiress. She eventually said thanks, but no thank you.

Yesterday, Bob Bowman, who had been a very young member of former Governor Blanchard's cabinet, also bowed out.

His excuse was that the six months before the primary isn't long enough to put together a campaign. And the fact that he now lives in Connecticut may have been a tiny factor too.
So, the next big question is whether Speaker of the House Andy Dillon will take the plunge. We'll find out soon.

Meanwhile, there's a sense of gloom among Democrats, But Republicans shouldn't get too smug. Two years ago, the only person they could find to run against Carl Levin was a term-limited state senator who had no money and lost by a record margin.

And never forget that you never can tell. Twenty-eight years ago, the only person Democrats in Toledo could find to run for Congress was a graduate student who worked in the Carter White House. But that fall, voters turned against the GOP.

Marcy Kaptur won that race, and she's been in Congress ever since. We've got a long way to go this election year.

 So stay tuned.                              

Essay: Sheltering Under The Dome - 2.15.10

In a world worried about the future of journalism, Michigan Radio’s Political Analyst Jack Lessenberry has discovered a new magazine he thinks does an excellent job of covering the state capital, all online.

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Whatever your politics, this much is clear: Michigan is facing enormous challenges and difficulties, and state government is facing a vast and continuing crisis. Every year sees huge deficits, cuts to major programs, and nasty partisan battles about what to do.

But how do you sort this all out? I firmly believe that Michigan Radio does the best job of any station at explaining what’s happening. But we can‘t possibly do enough.

Where can a regular person go to read fair and balanced stories and background about our state, its leaders, and the reasons we got into this mess -- as well as weigh possible solutions? Michigan newspapers say they no longer can afford to cover politics and government the way they once did. Some cities don’t even have daily newspapers anymore. There are private services that provide coverage and analysis of what’s happening, but they cost hundreds or thousands of dollars a year.

So now for the good news. There is a wonderful new magazine where you can read about, as its slogan goes, “the people, issues and events shaping Michigan politics and policy.” It has well-written, entertaining stories by some of the best-informed writers in the state. It is attractive to look at and has nice photos and graphics.

It is called Dome Magazine, and the price is right: It is absolutely free. The only catch is that it is only available online, at www.domemagazine.com. I’ve been reading it since it started more than two years ago, and have been impressed.

Last week, I went to have lunch with the editor and publisher, Tom Scott, who years ago was former Governor Jim Blanchard’s press secretary. What’s all this about, I asked?

Scott’s been a senior vice president of the Michigan Retailers Association for years, but he “never really got journalism out of my veins,“ and noticed the decline in coverage of state issues.

So, after having tried a magazine for Michigan lobbyists, he launched Dome, which now occupies most of his spare time.

“This isn’t a blog, or a partisan website,” he told me. “It’s meant to be a stylish, smart magazine explaining the issues and airing views from across the political spectrum.” Dome isn’t intended to cover daily political developments, but means to provide a bigger picture and behind-the-scenes look at issues and personalities.

“We do things like in-depth profiles of key players, something long abandoned by newspapers,” he said. He can’t afford to pay a lot of money, but many of Michigan’s best reporters and writers are lining up to write for Dome. “No one else in Michigan is doing what Tom Scott is doing,” said Susan Demas, a young columnist who is sort of Lansing’s Maureen Dowd. She added, “As a writer, I can honestly say that Dome is a godsend.” Scott does get some advertising, from places like university programs and the Michigan Chamber of Commerce, and would welcome more.

But if he has a weakness, it is that he isn’t much of a marketer or a self-promoter. He ought to be: Dome is not only excellent in itself. In a world where we worry about the future of journalism, Tom Scott’s internet magazine is a ray of fresh hope.

Maybe there really will be life after the dinosaurs.