Michigan's Proposal 1

I am vehemently opposed to Michigan's Proposal 1,  to be voted on May 5, 2015, and its promise to fix Michigan's roads, which have been in a poor state since the winter of 2013-2014 and earlier.

The "yes" side is spending millions. Every time I turn on the TV I see some establishment type bleating "yea"!

Proposal 1raises the Sales Tax to do so.
Not the gasoline nor the diesel tax; the Sales Tax, that people who do not even own a car pay.

It comes with assurances that the monies so raised will be only used for roads.
They have done that before, and the promises always are broken.

A Politician's promise... politician pinkie swear.

If a state government granted large tax cuts to its corporate friends years ago then suddenly finds itself without the fund to repair dangerous roads, I think they should abolish those tax cuts which they mistakenly instituted years ago.
If the treasury is short due to tax cuts to the wealthy, I do not think that the wealthy and the Poor should be called upon to pony up more money.

I read this in a progressive publication:
Proposal 1: The issue that has turned too many Michigan progressives into tea partiers
By Eclectablog on April 27, 2015
http://www.eclectablog.com/2015/04/proposal-1-the-issue-that-has-turned-too-many-michigan-progressives-into-tea-partiers.html

... Here’s the reality: the Republicans, a full 70% of whom voted FOR putting Prop 1 on the ballot, would like nothing more than for voters to kill it. Then, the “lesson” they will have learned, one they are counting on, is that Michigan voters don’t want their taxes raised. Once that has been established, they will feel free to start cutting our state budget. If you think that means rolling back the corporate tax cuts that we all fought so hard against, you couldn’t possibly be more wrong.

We already know where they will find the money to put into the roads because they have been showing us for the past four years. They will cut programs that impact those in the most need – the elderly, the young, and the poor – and they will continue to cut education. In fact, conservative Senator Patrick Colbeck has an 83-bill package of legislation waiting in the wings in the event Prop 1 goes down in flames to begin these cuts.

Failure of Prop 1 will also embolden them to continue to privatize crucial government services, a move that has lead to the debacle seen with prison food vendor Aramark, an unmitigated catastrophe that I have documented ad nauseum here on this site.

What we won’t get is constitutionally-protected funding for schools and local governments. We also won’t get a restoration of the Earned Income Tax Credit, an important tax credit for our working poor citizens...

The events to which the writer refers are well known to me, and they are of such great magnitude and importance that merely voting "yes" on a sales tax increase will not make things better. More money for roads will reduce the number of deaths due to faulty roads,  but it will not save the State from a predatory group of ideologues.

If they have power now, let them destroy what they have!

We shall re-build upon the ashes of perfidious Republican Neo-Conservatism.

Let them bring their Deluge upon themselves, and then let us rise up like Noah with a new covenant of the future.

 Diluvian Michigan Republicans Trying to Climb the Capitol in Lansing, Michigan

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