Traverse City Record-Eagle

Columns

February 19, 2012

George Weeks: A tale of three governors

By George Weeks, Syndicated columnist ----

A tale of three governors:

As Michigan's increasingly pivotal presidential primary looms on Feb. 28, Gov. Rick Snyder and former Gov. Jennifer Granholm, not surprisingly, offered sharply contrasting views last week in assorted venues about state native Mitt Romney, former governor of Massachusetts.

First came Granholm, appearing with U.S. Reps. John Dingell, of Dearborn, and Sander Levin, of Royal Oak, on an anti-Romney media conference call orchestrated by Democratic State Chairman Mark Brewer.

"Romney will stand for anything to get elected," Granholm said, asserting that "He stabbed us during our darkest hour" in opposing the Obama administration's $81 billion auto-industry bailout.

The next day, Granholm used her lively "War Room With Jennifer Granholm" cable show on Current TV to unload on Romney, saying he "has got me fired up."

Also on national TV, Granholm said regarding Romney trailing former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum in a number of Michigan polls: "He's getting his rear end handed to him. "¦

"If he loses Michigan, I don't know how he recovers," she said.

With less theatrics, Snyder made the case for Romney, announcing his endorsement of the son of 1963-69 Gov. George Romney in a joint appearance with the Republican presidential candidate, in media interviews and in a Detroit News commentary piece.

After a self-plug — noting that in electing him in 2010, "Michigan voters put their trust in a businessman," and asserting that "Our reinvention of Michigan is under way" — Snyder touted businessman Romney's record in Massachusetts and his vision for the nation.

He said that what Romney "is proposing is not a wish list drawn in the air, but something that can actually be accomplished collaboratively with Congress.

"As governor of Massachusetts, he balanced the budget cutting taxes 19 times, even as he was working with a Legislature that was overwhelmingly Democratic," Snyder said of Romney.

Although the sitting Michigan governor called Romney "this favorite son of our great state," former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum was slightly favored in most recent Michigan polls as of this writing. But so far in this year's roller-coaster GOP primary, pre-election favorites have not always been favored on election day.

Michigan, already deluged with primary TV ads for Romney and Santorum, will get another barrage this week, including the Restore our Future pro-Romney Super PAC spending a reported $800,000-plus.

There won't be much of a media stir here from former Speaker Newt Gingrich or Rep. Ron Paul.

The outcome of Michigan's primary could have a ripple effect on the March 6 Super Tuesday races in 10 states.

In 2008, when Sen. John McCain, of Arizona, won the GOP presidential nomination, Romney in the GOP primary carried Michigan by 9 percentage points. That was thanks in large part to voters affiliated with the auto industry.

This time around, Romney's opposition to the Obama administration's auto-industry bailout of General Motors and Chrysler has been widely criticized by Democrats, particularly organized labor.

President Bob King of the United Auto Workers, responding to a Romney op-ed in The Detroit News defending his views on the bailout, said: "He can try and rewrite history as much as he wants. But when we were at our darkest offer, Mitt Romney turned his back on the industry, their workers and the people of Michigan and in other places where Americans depend on the auto industry." Romney wrote: "Instead of a bailout, I favored 'managed bankruptcy' as a way forward." Among those defending the bailouts was former President George W. Bush, whose administration began the process in 2008. According to the Wall Street Journal, he said in a recent speech: "I didn't want there to be 21% unemployment. Sometimes circumstances get in the way of philosophy." So it was in the early 1980s when Republican Gov. William G. Milliken and other governors in auto states, and Democratic Congressman James J. Blanchard (who in 1983 succeeded Milliken) were among leaders in a successful federal and multi-state successful, but relatively modest, rescue effort of Chrysler, including $1.5 billion in federal loan guarantees.

Romney is on the wrong side of today's rescue controversy.

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