Auchtoon!

Several years ago, I had a job with a parts supplier in the automotive industry (not an uncommon experience for us Michiganders). It was the early 2010s, the industry beginning to recover from the devastation of the Great Recession. I was in a conference room with some engineers with the normal pre-meeting chatter.

One guy mentioned something about a contract we had with General Motors. But then another guy jumped in to say that there shouldn’t even be a General Motors, that GM should have been allowed to go bankrupt and dispersed. And then he got very animated about free market capitalism and the slippery slope of Marxist socialism and how the federal government was generally bad if not evil. There was a brief pause (a sort of acknowledgement of a “well that escalated quickly” moment), and then the meeting got started.

I was thinking about that guy when I saw the news the other day about President Donald Trump’s desire for the U.S. government to own a piece of troubled chipmaker Intel. What would he think about that? How would he reconcile his steadfast ideology with a president (who I’m guessing he voted for) actively violating it?

And it’s not like this is a one-off violation. Two weeks ago, Trump was openly demanding that the Intel CEO be fired. Recently, he may have crossed some legal lines in a deal to charge Nvidia and AMD a fee to secure export licenses to sell AI chips to China. And of course there is the endless tariff declarations and market manipulations.

So I’m curious. But mostly, I’m glad not to be in meetings with that guy anymore.

Democrats currently hold only a one-seat majority in the State Senate with one vacant seat. For over 200 days, Governor Gretchen Whitmer hasn’t called a special election to fill the seat, and it’s not difficult to figure out why. Elections (at least in Michigan and for the moment) cannot be guaranteed. A Republican win would change the balance.

Of course, this is not how it’s supposed to work. The particular party balance of the Legislature should simply be reflective of the electorate. How those elected officials operate from that point should be in the best interest of the people they represent. And when there are conflicts and it becomes necessary for judges to make decisions, everybody involved should be compelled to abide by those decisions.

I’m not naive. It’s never actually worked exactly that way. But I feel this party-first approach to government has gotten considerably worse in the past few decades. The Gingriching, the McConnellizing of American politics.

If a judge orders Whitmer to call an election, we’ll see how she responds. She may find a workaround like Speaker Matt Hall did to prevent nine bills passed by the previous Legislature from becoming laws. Whatever happens, I won’t be surprised or even disappointed. This, apparently, is just how the game is played now.

I’m on vacation this week, so I’m trying to stay focused on this beautiful (depending on your heat tolerance) Michigan summer. That’s probably just as well because the whole tariff and trade situation, particularly with the automobile industry, is so volatile and so complex, it really doesn’t lend itself to a hot take. But I do feel safe in saying that the only folks I imagine being happy about the situation are the ones receiving payments on those $1,000-per-month-for-84-months auto loans.

This is from the Associated Press:

President Donald Trump’s tax and spending law will add $3.4 trillion to federal deficits through 2034, the Congressional Budget Office reported Monday, a slight increase in the projection that takes into account the final tweaks that Republicans made before getting the legislation over the finish line.

Last week, under Trump’s direction (and threats), the Republican congress took back $1.1 billion previously allocated to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The primary reason offered by Speaker Mike Johnson: the need to reduce the national deficit.

As it turns out, there is a difference between a trillion and a billion. A large difference. A 1,000 times difference. And if you do the math, our Republican representatives and our current president just overspent 3,091 times more than they “saved.”

I have no joke to make or insight to offer. I just wanted to provide visual context for this serious dereliction of duty.

A story broke this week about two Chinese scientists at the University of Michigan’s research laboratories who have been charged with smuggling biological materials into the United States. The U.S. Education Department (at least as far as it exists today) has opened an investigation into U of M’s foreign funding, which is in line with the priority President Trump has cited for increasing transparency in these matters.

It’s no secret that I tend not to agree with the President about much, but, good! Investigate. Find out what happened. Let the legal system (at least as far as it exists today) do its work and release the findings.

But my dear Mr. President, let us not be so selective in our demands for transparency. You and many, many of your appointees rode the Jeffrey Epstein story into office. Release the findings.

If, as Karl Marx is often paraphrased, religion is the opiate for the masses, then major league sports may just be the alcoholic beverage. Think about it. People have always turned to focus on their favorite teams for a refreshing respite, but especially during difficult times. Taking in a ball game as a metaphoric beer or two to relax and escape for a moment from this frightening bizarro world we’re currently experiencing.

And sure (to carry this thread perhaps further than necessary), overindulging in sports fandom is a bad idea and addiction to it can bring ruin. But for the most part, it’s a positive. Sometimes a big positive. The success of the 1968 Detroit Tigers is famously credited for helping the city avoid a repeat of its disastrous 1967 riots.

Right now, it’s a particularly good time to be a Michigan sports fan. To the astonishment of all, the Tigers have the best record in Major League Baseball. The Lions are a popular Super Bowl pick. The Pistons are ascending. Detroit will be getting a WNBA team in a few years. And hopefully the Red Wings will figure it out soon.

So here’s to their success and the feeling of community that their success brings to us. Cheers!

Happy Independence Day to our fragile young republic — here’s to all the good we’ve been and to all the good we hope to be!

Mike Lee: “This is what happens when Marxists don’t get their way,” in reaction to the fatal shooting of a Minnesota lawmaker and her husband.

Joni Ernst: “Well, we are all going to die,” in reaction to likely deaths that will come from Medicaid cuts.

Mitch McConnell: “They’ll get over it,” also in reaction to death and suffering from proposed Medicaid cuts.

It’s not that I’m surprised by the astonishing callousness of these Republican US Senators. In fact, it helps explain the cruelty of the budget bill they are crafting.

But — good news! — some of the billions in the proposed bill for capturing and deporting people will be spent on private, for-profit prisons. This will create jobs in rural communities such as Baldwin, Michigan, which will compensate a bit for the closed medical facilities, reduced food assistance, and increasingly limited education opportunities.

So, on the whole, not actually good news.

It’s easy to say you want transparency in government when you aren’t in government. It’s even easier to say it when you want to get elected. But apparently it’s very difficult to make it happen once you’re elected.

At least, that’s what I gather from observing Michigan state government. Exhibit A: Governor Gretchen Whitmer. Exhibit B: House Speaker Matt Hall. (And seemingly, there is an entire alphabet of additional exhibits.) Perhaps one day, hopefully soon, we will run out of exhibits.

I have the person being bullied in the cartoon as representing NPR. But I could have just as well labeled her CPB, PBS, CDC, FDA, NIH, FEMA, NOAA, University boards, Kennedy Center, or many other public entities, and the cartoon would still make sense.

It’s the same pattern: the Trump administration berates, belittles, and threatens a public agency (while remaining steadfastly incurious about its actual operations or purpose), and then laments that its staff or board aren’t properly populated with their people. Well, duh. If you actively dislike an organization and don’t believe in its worth, why would you expect them to want people like you to be on their team?