Snyder unveils plan for broadband throughout Michigan

This was the headline in The Detroit News today.  I have two things to say:

1. Hey Rick:  FIX THE DAMN ROADS!  If you've got money to do this, you should be spending it on the roads.  I'll bet there would be a much bigger economic impact from good roads than broadband to 350,000 rural households.  And if there are a couple of billion in positive economic impact in those 350,000 households, why aren't companies building the infrastructure themselves?  They want to make money, don't they?

2. If the government has so botched and mismanaged road repairs over the years, why would anyone think government could construct and manage a project like this?  Road technology doesn't change nearly as quickly as data infrastructure does (I know - I worked with a lot of it in my years in IT), so we'll end up with outdated infrastructure that will take more billions to upgrade in addition to the roads you've already messed up.

Jim Brandstatter Out as Lions Color Man? Wow.

This was rather surprising news today (for Brandstatter too!).  Given the proverbial "going in a different direction" by WJR execs today.  Being replaced by Lomas Brown?  Really?  I loved Lomas as a player but he's hard to listen to as a speaker.  Just another painful color man to go along with a pretty good play-by-play guy, joining Jim "art of pitching, double buggywhip" Price (Tigers), Paul uhh Woods uhh (Red Wings), Jason "that's right George" Strayhorn (MSU Football).

It almost makes me want to listen to a UM Football game, just to hear someone who knows the game and can speak intelligibly as well.  Almost.

Jim Miller deserves better, as does Dan Dickerson and George Blaha.

Dear Mr. President: No Pardon for Kwame

Yes, for those of you who follow my blog, I am still alive and kicking, and have finally found a topic that has my dander up enough to fire up the computer and write about it.

I nearly choked on my morning peanut butter sandwich when I read in The Detroit News that Kwame Kilpatrick, former Detroit mayor and current federal inmate, has appealed to President Trump to commute his sentence for swindling the taxpayers of Detroit, Wayne County, and the State of Michigan out of millions of dollars during his term of office.  To say nothing of the excruciating process and more millions of dollars it took to drag Detroit through the bankruptcy that got it back on the right track. 

It is not known if he has filed a new request or if this is a holdover from his prior appeal to the now ex-President Obama.  The article goes on to detail Kilpatrick's conversion to Christianity, his earning a Culinary Arts certificate, and all the mentoring he does in the prison as reasons for the pardon.  Additionally (and incredibly, in my mind) Kilpatrick actually has supporters out there who have given statements in the article and have set up a website to garner support for him.

So, since I know he reads my blog whenever I post (although probably at 3 am while he is Tweeting!), here are my thoughts, Mr. President:  DON'T YOU DARE!

Now, if Kilpatrick's prison conversion and subsequent good work with young prisoners are all true, no one will be happier about it than me.  God rejoices when anyone finds his way back to him, and all Christians should do the same.  So God bless and keep you Kwame, and guide you in all his ways.

However - none of this really releases you from the consequences of your prior actions that led to your conviction and incarceration.  You still have to bear the consequences of that, and that means a long prison term for you to serve.  Billy Graham would still have to pay his speeding ticket if he had been caught speeding.  His relationship to Christ would have no bearing on that infraction or it's consequences and he couldn't expect to get off because he was a really godly man who made a mistake.

So Mr. President, as a citizen of Michigan whose tax dollars have gone to recover from the mess this guy made in our state, I implore you NOT to pardon Kwame Kilpatrick.  It would be a slap in the face to all of us here in Michigan who still suffer from his past corruption.

Astroturfing the Brat March (via Aaron at "The Shekel")

Reposting Aarons summary of a Sultan Knish article on the Malevolent roots of the supposed Parkland Kids and their F-bomb dropping leader, young Mr. Hogg.

Aaron's article

March For Our Lies

Over at Sultan Knish, there's a very thorough look at the forces behind the so called "student-led" March for Our Lives push: Who Runs March For Our lives?
Interestingly enough, checking the Delaware Corporations filings, you can see that within 7 days of the Parkland shooting, on February 21 the March for Our Lives Foundation, the March For Our Lives Action Fund (Per Sultan Knish donations are funneled to a company in California) wre incorporated. The March for our Lives Lodging LLC soon followed on March 2 (you have to wonder what that one is for exactly - providing hotel space for activists perhaps?), and were all setup as Delaware companies.
If you think a bunch of teenagers set these up, that quickly, there's a lovely bridge in Brooklyn up for sale woth a special deal just for you. On top of that there was a very, very quick 501(c)4 filing to allow donations without disclosing the identifies of the donors. Kids did not set these up.
Professionals setup the Delaware corps and did the IRS elections, not your average teen that just learned to stop eating Tide Pods.
It's astroturfing from the Bloomberg and Friends through and through with the kids as a front.
If you think this was a sudden spur of the moment teenage-led attack on our rights you're wrong - it's a professionally planned, professionally propagandized, professionally organized, and professionally funded effort and needs to be answered accordingly.