Michigan Republicans, having been beaten up for several consecutive election cycles, are starved for a big win in 2008. With two new polls of the state’s likely voters showing John McCain one point behind Democrat Barack Obama, they think they can finally make the case to voters and end a long losing streak.
They may be hoping for too much, but their chances at least cannot be discounted.
“We’ve seen this kind of campaign before in Michigan,” former senator Spencer Abraham (R., Mich.) told
National Review Online last week in Minneapolis, referring to Obama’s high-energy but low-content message of “change” and “hope.” He said that Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick and sitting Micigan governor Jennifer Granholm (D.) “both ran this sort of campaign — we were told to believe, to vote for change. They both made similar pitches — inexperienced politicians who frame themselves with great stump speeches.”
Kilpatrick agreed last week to step down as mayor of Detroit and accept a 120-day jail sentence on two felony charges relating to false testimony he gave in a police whistleblower trial. Granholm has presided over one of the nation’s worst state economies for six years now. As recently as last October 1, she was still blaming her predecessor, former governor John Engler (R.), for the state’s fiscal and economic problems. Under Granholm, who like Obama is a Harvard-educated lawyer and liberal Democrat, Michigan has long been in a one-state recession. It is the only state to have lost jobs each year for the last eight years. The economic situation in Michigan worsened noticeably after Granholm
broke a campaign promise and worked with Democrats in the legislature to raise taxes last year. The state’s unemployment surged this summer by more than 2 points, and is currently the nation’s highest at 9.1 percent.
“If you like what [Gov.] Jennifer Granholm has done for Michigan, you’ll like what Barack Obama is going to do for America,” says Saul Anuzis, the state GOP chairman. “More government programs, higher taxes on business.”
This will be the Republicans’ message in Michigan, not unlike the one adopted by national Democrats at their convention in Denver: Obama is “more of the same.”
Last May, Obama offered now-embarrassing full-throated praise for Kilpatrick at the Detroit Economic Club, providing a convenient audio-visual link between the two men. “He is a leader not just here in Detroit, not just in Michigan, but all across the country,” an exuberant Obama said of Kilpatrick. “We know that he is going to be doing astounding things for many years to come. I am grateful to call him a friend and colleague, and I am looking forward to a lengthy collaboration.”
At the time of Obama’s speech, Mayor Kilpatrick was already being sued for retaliating against whistleblowers — the case would later result in an $8.4 million settlement for the whistleblowers from the fiscally troubled city. Kilpatrick had also been
cited by the
Detroit Free Press in 2005 for putting $210,000 in entertainment, dining, and travel expenses on his city credit card during his first 33 months in office. The Associated Press wrote at that time that Kilpatrick “has been dogged by complaints about wild parties, lavish entertainment, and use of city vehicles for personal family travel.”
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