Photos from MadMI, Lansing

/in /by

Thought I’d share some pics from the rally today in Lansing. It’s a decent sized crown–6,000 around noon; they expect to get a whole bunch of teachers out for the last set of speakers at 4:30.

Here’s the crowd just outside of the Capitol in Lansing. Lots of signs about the Constitution protesting the Emergency Financial Manager law.

Look who showed up to Lansing to control Rick Snyder?

The mitten they’re afraid of.

Obviously, this one isn’t from the rally. I took it while I was walking McCaffrey the MilleniaLab this morning. But I thought I’d share it because it seemed like such a hopeful omen and because it gives you a sense of what a magical spring day it is today. You could literally hear the sap dripping into the buckets.

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  1. ubetchaiam says:

    Any insight into why 100’s of thousands turned out in WI and so few in MI? The MI legislation is much more odious than the WI even though both are anti-democratic.

    Hell, WI’ers even came out in snowstorm while your pictures show a really nice day in MI.

    • emptywheel says:

      Lots of reasons. Most of the protests are on weekdays. They had a different one w/the AARP yesterday (so institutionally they’re splitting up). Lansing is 1.5 hours from Detroit, whereas Madison is closer to the base of population in WI (it was a racially mixed crowd, but not like you’d expect at a liberal gathering in MI).

      And I think a lot of people in MI are just totally dispirited. We’ve been fighting this fight for a decade already and a lot of people have lost hope.

      • cbl says:

        Moore posted some bittersweet tweets about Michiganders being dispirited late last night – he wasn’t blaming anyone, he understood.

        and I concur, 6,000 mid week is huge.

        p.s. oldnslow thought we saw you for a sec when the Ed Show showed the crowd arriving :D

    • emptywheel says:

      Also, people in MI are really used to the EFMs (we’ve had 8 cities plus Detroit’s schools go through the process, and 3 cities are still in it), which I think has made it harder to educate about what’s different with this version.

      I think a lot of Michiganders are more pissed about the cuts to EITC and education, the taxes on pensions, and the big tax breaks for corporations.

      • ubetchaiam says:

        “which I think has made it harder to educate about what’s different with this version.”; thanks; that’s the first understandable explanation I’ve read/heard.

        What can be done to have MI’ers understand that this is not what has passed for EFM’s in the past?

    • phred says:

      The protests in WI started small and they grew. Plus, as EW pointed out the really big ones were on Saturdays. 6000 is a great turn out for a Wednesday.

      Glad you made it EW!

      So what is the appropriate cheer for MI? I’m assuming “On Michigan”, isn’t it ; )

  2. piehole says:

    COMMENT FORMATTING QUESTION: why do I end up with a bunch of backslashes when I try to use apostrophes and quotation marks?

    For example: when I write “blah blah blah” and then write that’s annoying.

    The underline function also does not work for me.

    All the other functions work great.

    • piehole says:

      OK, now I see. The problem shows up when I preview but it doesn’t appear in the submitted comment.

    • DeanOR says:

      The Democratic grass-roots is waking up. I think the numbers turning out are very impressive, and there is a lot of energy there. The national party leadership remains very passive and the media are uninterested. Still, it’s happening. The base is the only place that can make a difference.

  5. katiejacob says:

    Some one who spoke to Snyder today told me he indicated that he is uncomfortable about the protests.

  7. SharonMI says:

    I thought I saw you EW crossing Capitol Ave but wasn’t sure it was you. Were you sans glasses with hair in a looped ponytail?

  8. JohnLopresti says:

    Republicans* efforts to ban public sector unions constitute a longtime plank of the Republican party. It simply fits with the Republican anti-laborunion, anti-bargaining rights perspective.

    The antiunion stance has a key initial tenet of weakening the Democratic Party by eliminating the largest donors to the Democratic Party.

    For example, in CA in 2005 there was a Republican sponsored initiative, Proposition 75, which lost at the polls. The Republicans called that initiative the **paycheck protection** measure. The idea was a fairly transparent attempt to prevent the Democratic Party from receiving donations from public employee unions altogether. The Republican hype said that workers had the right to demand the union not make political donations unless the employee specifically authorized each donation. The gambit has appeared in many guises in different states.

    re: the McCaffrey found image, I have seen maple syrup plantations, but that tree looks larger than most near where I lived awhile in New England.