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" We have been keeping careful track of the lame-duck legislative session in Michigan which is turning into a public mockery of democratic self-government of a kind unseen since someone introduced Richard Nixon to home electronics. There was the right-to-work law. And the ladyparts bills. Liberals aghast! Blogosphere inflamed! Ed Schultz beside himself! Kindly Doc Maddow contemplating the ethics of applied euthanasia! The Michissippi Republicans their own selves? Onward and upward!Excesior! The biggest surprise was another stab at a citizenship statement for voters. You may recall earlier this year the push for a citizenship check box for voters,which Democrats complained was a voter-suppression tactic. Republicans - andparticularly Secretary of State Ruth Johnson - argued it would keep illegal immigrants from showing up at the polls. Snyder earlier this year vetoed the idea. This bill, which popped up unexpectedly overnight, may meet his criteria for clarity by requiring voters to simply sign an affirmative statement of one&amp;#039;s citizenship along with the address and date of birth. Surprise? Also, too: Voters rejected Public Act 4 in November - the emergency manager law supported by Snyder but many felt was an overreach. Under that law, managers of financially distressed school districts and cities could negate collective bargaining agreements and the authority of local boards and commissions. That didn&amp;#039;t stop the Legislature from coming back with a new EM law on Thursday, providing locals more choices on how to emerge from their crises, including Chapter 9 bankruptcy. You have to love this. Only a month ago, the voters of Michigan voted against this power grab. They also turfed out a great number of the people who yesterday voted to roll the stone away from the tomb. The first chance they got, those people reversed the clear will of the people. At 4:30 in the morning, which I guess is not specifically &amp;quot;in the dark of night,&amp;quot; but it&amp;#039;s close enough for government work. &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s not a good way to conduct legislative business,&amp;quot; state Rep. Brandon Dillon, D-Grand Rapids, told WOOD-TV. &amp;quot;It was a pretty aggressive effort by Republicans in Michigan to put through legislation with very little debate ... ultimately people are going to question the value of the legislation.&amp;quot; Conduct legislative business? Doing everything at once at 4:30 a.m. is a bad way to conduct business in a saloon. Today, bless his optimistic soul, Paul Krugman suggested that the 30-year Republican run at getting our politics to dance to their own mad fiddlers may be coming to an end. I am less sanguine than he is. Remember, always, that the Michissippi Republicans currently entertaining us represent the GOP&amp;#039;s farm team, their Triple-A ballclub. That&amp;#039;s where the next generation of Republican congresscritters are coming from. The Republicans will stay in Michissippi because that&amp;#039;s where they&amp;#039;re happiest to be. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a16957/michigan-illegal-immigrants-voter-suppression-121412/>