"Because every dollar the government takes, that it doesn't absolutly needs, is theft."
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Dillon recall making news
Yesterday's federal court ruling rightfully restored the citizen recall effort against MI House Speaker Andy Dillon for his leadership role in raising your taxes.
Channel 4 News, WDIV Detroit, covered the judge's ruling and the restored recall campaign. See video of the story here: http://www.clickondetroit.com/video/17317410/index.html
The Detroit Free Press story is here: http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080828/NEWS06/808280355/1008/NEWS
and The Detroit News coverage is here: http://detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080828/POLITICS/808280377/1409/METRO
There are some important questions about the impact of yesterday's court ruling, however, that deserve answers. Specifically:
1. Can Speaker Dillon be recalled on November 4, yet also win a new term? How would that 'work'? Yes, voters in Redford Twp., and parts of Dearborn Heights and Livonia, CAN vote to recall Dillon and reelect him at the same time. If this were to occur, Dillon would immediately leave office on November 5th, miss about two months of legislative session, and then be reseated for his new term on January first.
This unusual situation was forced by the delay in the recall election that Dillon was able to force by his hiring of petition 'blockers' and other efforts to sabotage the recall petition drive that had targeted Dillon for an August 5th recall election date.
Voters can avoid the above scenario and dump Dillon forever by voting ‘yes’ on the recall and voting for Dillon's election opponent, Sandra Eggers.
2. If Dillon is recalled, will he be eligible for an additional, future term in office under Michigan's term limits law? No. A partial term of office counts as a full term if that partial term is longer than a year. Dillon would NOT be eligible to any 'bonus term' if his current term is cut short by his recall.
3. What does the court ruling mean for future recall efforts? It makes them far easier. The court struck down two state laws that required people circulating recall petitions be registered voters in the district of the targeted politician. These laws only applied to recall petitions, any other kind of petitioning of any sort allowed citizens to hire help or recruit any volunteers from anywhere. Also, existing laws allowed politicians targeted for recall to hire anyone from anywhere to help them fight the recall effort. The judge's ruling levels the playing field for citizens.
Importantly, Dillon's recall on November 4 would continue an important precedent for state politicians: raise taxes and face a possible career-killing recall from office. The precedent was set in 1983 after the last state income tax hike when two state senators were subsequently recalled from office. And yesterday's court ruling sends a chilling message to politicians who thought they could bank on special, restrictive laws they created to stifle citizens from seeking to hold them accountable.
Stay tuned,
Leon Drolet Executive Director Michigan Taxpayers Alliance www.mitaxpayers.org
MAJOR WIN! This morning, Federal U.S. District Court Judge Robert Holmes Bell issued an injunction that will likely result in Michigan House Speaker Andy Dillon facing recall in this November's election.
Judge Bell ruled that the MI Secretary of State MUST count the 2,053 recall petition signatures that had previously been rejected because the people who collected them were not registered voters in Speaker Dillon's district. Judge Bell ruled that Michigan's laws restricting circulators were unconstitutional violations of the First Amendment's right to free speech.
From Judge Bell's injunction:
"IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that Defendant Terri Lynn Land, as Michigan's Secretary of State, SHALL re-examine the petitions filed seeking a recall election against Representative Dillon of Michigan's 17th House District WITHOUT consideration of the M.C.L. § 168.957 requirements that (1) recall petition circulators be registered to vote, and that (2) recall petition circulators be residents of the legislative district of the official to be recalled.
If upon such re-examination Defendant determines that the required 8,724 valid signatures were gathered, then Defendant SHALL place the recall against Representative Dillon on the November 4, 2008, general election ballot."
Friends, this means that only 776 out of the 2,053 previously rejected signatures are needed to achieve the total 8,724 required to force Dillon's recall election!
Congratulations to Rose Bogaert (the plaintiff)! Congratulations to the Wayne County Taxpayers Association!
While Andy Dillon's and MI Democratic Party Chair Mark Brewer's nasty, ugly tactics to stop the citizens and taxpayers successfully kept the recall off the August primary ballot, they still must now face being the first Speaker in U.S. history to be recalled.
This development is huge. The Court has re-affirmed the citizens' right to recall. Politicians do NOT have unbreakable two or four year contracts, they are at-will employees of the citizens they are supposed to represent.
Now, on November 4th, the citizens have the opportunity to fire Dillon for raising their taxes. An opportunity they had a right to have had this past August 5th.
Stay tuned for a further update and THANK YOU to all who supported this recall effort!
Leon Drolet Executive Director Michigan Taxpayers Alliance www.mitaxpayers.org
Every day, while you're busy at work or taking care of your family, some people are watching your wallet with envious eyes. They covet what remains of your after-tax income. They want it. They believe they need it. But how can they, these government officials and government employees, get you to hand it over to them? Don't underestimate the cleverness of such highly focused individuals.
Take, for example, the proposed "Veterans Tax" that the Macomb County Board of Commissioners will be voting to place on the November ballot this coming Thursday. The proposal would levy a new .04 mill tax on Macomb County property owners that would generate over $1.2 million dollars to support county veterans programs. How could anybody vote 'no' on supporting programs that assist needy veterans? That sentiment is exactly what the tax takers are banking on. You see, they have a plan.
Macomb County Commissioner Pete Lund, who opposes the new tax, calls their plan: "Lottery Scam II". Remember how state lottery revenues were supposed to provide more money for K-12 education? After voters approved the lottery, those lottery revenues DID go to education, but Lansing politicians then took away much of the General Fund money that USED to be spent on education and squandered it elsewhere in the budget.
The lottery scam is being replicated with the proposed Macomb Veterans Tax. The money generated by the new millage WILL go toward supporting veterans. But where will the money that currently funds veterans programs go? You guessed it - that money will no longer be spent on veterans, but spent elsewhere in the budget.
It's a perfect scheme. The new millage proposal will be sold as a small amount that will support our deserving military veterans. It will pass. General Fund support for veterans will then end, resulting in more money for county politicians. And anybody that opposes the millage can be portrayed as ungrateful to our deserving veterans.
What can you expect next? A "Senior Services Millage" that will allow current senior services funds to be shifted elsewhere in the budget. Maybe a new millage for the Animal Shelter? You don’t hate puppies, do you?
As a Macomb County Commissioner, I was the only member of the Community Services Committee to vote 'no' on sending the new veterans' millage to the full Board of Commissioners for approval. If the Board approves the new tax this coming Thursday, then voters will decide on approving the tax at this November's election. Voters will see a proposal to support veterans. County politicians will see a proposal to shift more money to the general fund.
Stay tuned.
Leon Drolet Executive Director Michigan Taxpayers Alliance www.mitaxpayers.org
The Michigan Supreme Court put a fork in the campaign to recall House Speaker Andy Dillon on Friday by denying a request for an emergency hearing on the legality of 2,018 petition signatures of voters in Dillon's district that were not counted by the Michigan Secretary of State. The SOS did not count the signatures because Michigan law invalidates signatures collected by circulators who are not residents of a recall target's district.
The U.S. Supreme Court found that similar circulator requirements in Colorado were unconstitutional infringements of political speech rights guaranteed by the First Amendment. Ultimately, Michigan's restrictive law will be struck down, but not in time for a Dillon recall as ballots for the August 5th primary election are being sent to printers later this week.
We lost. Tax hike proponents won.
Why did we lose? Because I was not up to the task of helping overcome the incredible obstacles that the tax hikers put into the campaign to stop the recall. Ultimate responsibility for the failure is mine.
Congratulations are in order to Andy Dillon and Democratic Party Chair Mark Brewer on their victory. The vicious blockers, the hired thugs, the paid infiltrators, the taxpayer-paid mailings, the abuse of police power in Redford, the lies ("recall election = expensive 'special' election") all almost worked. I say 'almost' because, despite these obstacles, the Michigan Secretary of State found that 10,408 citizens of Dillon's district signed the recall petition - more than the 8,724 required. Former Michigan lawmakers bailed Dillon out by having written some of the most difficult (and unconstitutional) recall laws in the nation.
Since the death of the recall effort, Dillon and Brewer have been emboldened. They've been piling-on by asking for criminal investigations, writing attack editorials to newspapers, and engaging in a massive media blitz to discredit me personally. Check out Lansing Senior Capitol Correspondent (reporter) Tim Skubick's blog on the topic here. Skubick reports:
"Brewer has been on a mission from God to get Leon Drolet and when word filtered out that Drolet would appear on Off the Record on public TV this past weekend, Brewer was on the horn just to make sure that tough questions about illegal campaign activities were hurled at Drolet."
Skubick continues:
"While they won't say it, you can pretty much surmise that the D(emocrat)s want to make an example of Drolet as a warning to others who would try to boot lawmakers who vote for a tax hike.
If Drolet is shivering in his boots over the prospects of being charged with a crime, he sure didn't reveal it when he did the OTR (Off The Record television show) taping."
You can watch Off The Record with me on the hot seat by clicking here.
My message to Mark Brewer and Speaker Andy Dillon is: bring it on! The failure of the Dillon recall is a significant setback for me, politically, and for the Michigan Taxpayers Alliance. But your efforts to bury the MTA will fail, no matter how many shoes you pound on the podium.
The Michigan Taxpayers Alliance is barely over one year old. Taking on the most powerful man in the legislature, along with the political party of the House and governor, and most of the Lansing establishment is a enormous task. We fell 776 signatures short.
Friends, we will continue to fight as long as we love Michigan and the principles of limited government. The Michigan Taxpayers Alliance will get bigger and stronger. We lost our first really big fight, but so did Rocky Balboa.
Again, to Andy Dillon and Mark Brewer: congratulations on your victory and your tax hikes. We will see you soon.
Leon Drolet Executive Director Michigan Taxpayers Alliance www.mitaxpayers.org
House Dems and Rep. Ball, "Constitution is too pro-citizens."
The Michigan House of Representatives concluded this week of session in a most unusual manner. While House Speaker Andy Dillon was vacationing in Mexico, the Secretary of State concluded the first phase of the process that certifies petitions forcing Dillon to face a recall election on August 5th.
House Democrats, along with some Republicans, scrambled to try to help Dillon avoid being the first Speaker in U.S. history to be recalled. When citizens target a tax-hiking politician for recall, what's a group of fellow politicians to do?
Well, an official resolution of the House - that's what they'll do! What's a House Resolution? It's a vote by the House which expresses their 'official' opinion. What is the official opinion of politicians in the House? According to House Resolution 358, introduced by Representative Dick Ball (R-Owosso), it is that the Michigan Constitution is unfair because it gives citizens too much power. These politicians also believe, according to HR 358, that elections are bad for our democracy. Oh, also, citizens having the right to fire politicians who they believe no longer represent them is "chilling" to politicians.
Lets take a look at HR 358. It starts with:
"A resolution to express the sense of the House that recalls should be based on specific misconduct, criminal activity, or abuse of office and should not be based on a single vote and to denounce the effort to recall Speaker Andy Dillon."
The problem with the first sentence of the resolution is that it contradicts the Constitution, which states very clearly that:
"The sufficiency of any statement of reasons or grounds procedurally required (for a recall election) shall be a political rather than a judicial question." Article II, Section 8.
In other words, criminal acts go to courts, recalls are for challenging the policy (political) decisions of politicians. But Representative Ball and House leaders don't like the Constitution giving citizens so much power over politicians.
HR 358 further states:
"The threat of recall for reasons other than some measure of misconduct undermines the foundation of our democratic republic."
What? Recall elections undermine democracy? A recall involves citizens collecting the highest percentage of registered voters' signatures of any petition process allowed under law, and then requires a vote of the people in a scheduled election. How the heck is that damaging to democracy?
One more gem from HR 358:
"Whereas, Michigan's experience with recall seems to be a model of the potential for abuse at all levels of government."
Really? Michigan has only two experiences with lawmakers being recalled - Senators Serotkin and Mastin back in 1983 who were recalled for raising the income tax. Their recalls did not lead to "abuse", but rather to the legislature quickly rescinding most of that tax hike. Well, perhaps having to give money back to citizens makes some politicians feel abused.
What happened to the vote on HR 358? It never happened. I'm told that some legislators were actually concerned about challenging the Constitution. The other rumor is that Democrats freaked out after hearing that a Republican legislator was planning to offer an amendment to the resolution addressing removal of another politician from office - someone named Kwame Kilpatrick. Democrats quickly removed HR 358 from the agenda.
I'll keep you posted.
Leon Drolet Executive Director Michigan Taxpayers Alliance www.mitaxpayers.org
The phone call came less than two hours before our scheduled press conference in the State Capitol Building, where Rose Bogaert and I were set to announce the results of the petition drive to force a recall election of House Speaker Andy Dillon. The call was from Capitol Facilities, who awkwardly and contritely informed me that the room in the Capitol Building reserved for our press conference was, ahh, well, umm... "no longer available". In fact, I was informed that no room in the Capitol Building was available for our press conference, despite the fact that the room had been reserved for weeks.
Rose, Chair of the Wayne County Taxpayers Association, and I had to move the press conference outside the Capitol and call reporters during the lunch hour to inform them of the last-minute change. Fortunately, word spreads quickly among the tight-knit Lansing press corps and the conference was well covered.
Later, on the floor of the House of Representatives, a reporter asked Speaker Dillon why the campaign to recall him from office was not allowed to hold a press conference inside a Capitol room. Dillon's response says it all:
"They want to have a press conference in one of my rooms? Yeah, right."
His rooms. His Capitol. His government. His, and not yours.
Never mind that citizens' taxes built and restored the Capitol, and pay for its' utilities, staff and maintenance; it belongs to Andy Dillon. Dillon's arrogant sense of entitlement permeates Lansing, where lawmakers are wined and dined. These lawmakers receive tributes and awards from special interest lobbyists who laugh at their every joke and feign interest in their long-winded stories. They become seduced into believing that Lansing, and the Capitol Building, really is all about them.
Is it any wonder that these politicians, when faced with tough economic choices, choose to protect what they own? And what they own is the status-quo in Lansing. To protect their status quo, they decided to take more of what they think they are entitled to - your money. That is how the legislature and Governor Granholm ended up raising the tax on your income and on businesses by $1.4 billion, while also increasing the legislature's own budget by seven percent.
The announcement at the press conference? Over 15,000 citizens in Andy Dillon's district signed the petition to recall him from office. It seems that they want their House back.
Today's Detroit News editorial opposing the recall of Speaker Andy Dillon contains several embarrassing factual errors.
First, the News claims on three separate occasions that a recall election would be a separate election on a day other than the scheduled August 5th primary election day. A simple fact-check would uncover that the Dillon recall question would be added to the August 5th ballot, and NOT be a new election day.
Further, the News repeatedly equates the Dillon recall - which will be submitting signatures this week - to the failed attempt by Democrat Party Chair Mark Brewer to begin a recall of Republican House Leader Craig DeRoche. The News even claims that the non-starter DeRoche recall is "creating considerable bad blood" in DeRoche's district. Really? A non-existent recall is creating "considerable" bad blood among the masses in Novi?
The News also states that, on one hand, a recall election would be scheduled too close to a regular election and, on the other hand, that a recall election is a major distraction in Lansing. Pretend for a moment that the recall election IS on a separate day than a closely scheduled regular election. How is it that the recall would be a distraction in Lansing while the regular election would not?
I fully expect that most newspaper editorial boards will oppose the effort to recall Speaker Andy Dillon. Editorial writers love being invited to establishment cocktail parties and they hate it when the unclean masses undertake a political effort that is not officially sanctioned by Michigan's institutional elites. But for a major newspaper like The Detroit News to get so many basic facts wrong...embarrassing.
Below is the response that I sent to The Detroit News' editorial department:
Dear Mr. Finley,
The Detroit News editorial opposing efforts by citizens to recall House Speaker Andy Dillon from office contained numerous, substantial and repeated factual errors.
The editorial falsely claimed (three times) that a Dillon recall would add an additional election to the scheduled August and November election. The question of whether Speaker Dillon should be recalled would, under state law, be added to the existing August 5th ballot. Absolutely no additional election would be created and zero additional costs (outside of additional ink) would be bourn by taxpayers.
The editorial further claimed that the Dillon recall campaign is "vicious". Citizens exercising their constitutional right to recall their lawmaker by circulating petitions is hardly "vicious". "Vicious" better describes the response to the recall campaign by Dillon and state Democratic Party Chair Mark Brewer, who have hired an squad of blockers to intimidate petitioners and potential petition signers. These blockers have swarmed petitioners who are peaceably gathering signatures, handed out fliers containing falsehoods to potential signers, and even stalked petitioners by following them to their homes.
Dillon and Brewer call these intimidation tactics "educational" and their squadron of thugs "voter education specialists". Yet, as The Detroit News reported last week, Brewer hired a parolee convicted of eight different felonies - including armed robbery - as one of his voter educators. This convict has never even voted, according to Secretary of State records.
Recalls are hardly "pointless". The successful recall of two state senators for raising the income tax in 1983 resulted in the legislature's immediate rescission of most of that tax hike and the enactment of significant spending cuts. After those 1983 recalls, the legislature did not have the audacity to hike the income tax for twenty four years.
Speaker Andy Dillon, Governor Granholm and other Lansing lawmakers ignored the lesson of 1983 when they imposed a twelve percent income tax hike and a twenty two percent business tax hike on economically beleaguered Michigan citizens and businesses.
Citizens choosing to peaceably exercise their constitutional right to recall a lawmaker for supporting the largest tax hike in Michigan history is hardly pointless.
Michigan needs to lose Granholm, Dillon, and their tax hikes if we are to have any hope for economic recovery.
Leon Drolet Executive Director Michigan Taxpayers Alliance www.mitaxpayers.org
