Falconfanjan

@RepThomasMassie

Michigan's Elites Are Sucking on Oysters and Sucking Us Dry They're holed up in the Grand Hotel with the cheerleading media to cook up new scams By Charlie LeDuff @Charlieleduff Work is for suckers. And if you don’t want to be a sucker, plan your trip next year to the Mackinac Policy Conference. It’s all about grafting and scheming, absolutely no work required. It’s pricey, but a little seed money goes a long way in getting millions of dollars you have not earned. The ferries to the historic island are owned by a hedge fund. The Grand Hotel where the event is held is owned by a hedge fund. And we have the Detroit Regional Chamber of Commerce to thank for it all. The Chamber books the entire hotel for the last week in May and hosts a conference attended by corporate titans, elected officials from the uni-party, and members of the corporate media who are made to feel they are part of the elite crowd. Tickets are $5,000 and do not include room and board (but again, a good investment for a non-sucker). And the best part is that the hoi polloi are absolutely forbidden from the grounds, creating a cozy cocoon stuffed with truffles and oysters. The media gets in free so they will publish glowing publicity about the latest scams concocted by the titans and bureaucrats to fleece you, the average guy and gal. Look! There goes Mike Duggan wearing the same blue-checked sport coat that he usually wears to convince you that he too is an average guy and gal. This year’s conference, which is still ongoing, was to be Mike’s coronation as governor. The Chamber wished to reward him for decades of making rich men even richer. The politicos were going for it and so were the media types. Just ply them with chocolates and champagne and listen to them bark talking points as if they were sea lions. But Mike bailed on his big gov bid because we blew him up. Contaminated dirt is really just a metaphor. There’s other stuff. A lot of stuff. The nurses remember. The coroner remembers. The teachers remember. The cops remember. White Boy Rick remembers. The Feds and the Democrats have a phone book of dirt on the guy. Mike’s malfeasance runs long and cuts deep, and there is no amount of corporate money to disappear it this time. For the first time in his career, Duggan’s political enemies have more money than he does. The chatter is that Mike is headed to Ann Arbor to run the university as a nice parting gift for going quietly. It’s fait accompli. Sure there would be a cursory national search, but wouldn't you know it? We couldn't find anyone better than Mike all along. That’s the purpose of the conference. Wheel and deal with other people’s stuff. Our university. Our land. Our money. To all the kleptocrats sleeping at the Grand Hotel tonight, let me spell this out in capital letters: THERE IS NO F***ING WAY And if you see him up there, somebody please tell that to Engler. And tell him he may want to jump on the 9 o'clock ferry and catch a limousine home. It’s over.