Curiosity brings out best in party-goer

I was at a party last Saturday night.

Parties make me uncomfortable these days. I don’t follow or care about sports, so that’s an automatic conversation killer. I only knew about three people at the party, so I took my drink and retreated to the dining room, as most of the action was in the kitchen.

Another fellow was already at the table. He introduced himself as an engineer who worked for one of the auto companies. He looked to be about 15 years younger than me, so I wasn’t expecting much in the way of conversation.

Was I wrong.

He’d listened as I was introduced around and wanted to know what life was like as a journalist. I told him a couple stories, but he wasn't satisfied. His real question was bigger than my answers.

He said he was outright upset about the declining state of newspapers here and across America. “Who’s watching the politicians these days? The police? The school boards? They’re all getting away with murder!”

He continued and I lit right up. I told him he was not only correct, but the situation was likely to worsen as newspapers are forced out of business. I hadn't heard such rhetoric coming from a non-journalist in years.

We entered into a discussion that lasted about an hour. Turns out he’s very well-read—something I don’t expect of most people anymore. He uses his local library frequently. He listens to National Public Radio and watches a couple of current event programs on public television.

I was happily stunned.

I agreed with what he was saying. We agreed things aren’t the way they used to be just a few years ago, when newspapers still had some money, guts and could get things done. These days time and budget constraints keep reporters from digging too deep into corruption. One online news source, Propublica.org, is kicking that trend because it has private funding and a pretty nice mission statement:

“To expose abuses of power and betrayals of the public trust by government, business, and other institutions, using the moral force of investigative journalism to spur reform through the sustained spotlighting of wrongdoing.”

The private funding I mentioned is important. I was once told by someone who works at Propublica.org that their staff can dig with impunity because no one can threaten to apply political pressure to shut them down.

I was thinking of The Detroit News when I wrote that last paragraph. Owned by a passionless and sterile investment company, I’ve heard from former News journalists who said they couldn’t expect much in the way of support for their investigative work.

I had all but given up hope of finding someone like this engineer, who would have made a good reporter himself. I can only hope there are more out there like him, who see through the shame of Fox 2 Entertainment (I can’t call what they do news because it just isn’t) and demand accountability. 

Ignorance reigns supreme in Lansing

The two headlines read:

“State chamber is neutral on sales tax hike to mend roads,” and

“House panel votes to end Michigan film incentives”

It’s hard to decide which to take on first, so we’ll go with the Michigan Chamber of Commerce, which the Associated Press out of Lansing has said will remain neutral on the May 5 vote that would increase the state sales tax as part of a road funding plan.

It’s not the chamber’s job to remain neutral. Their job is to show leadership and offer an opinion and back it up, popular or not. It follows that if the chamber isn’t doing its job, particularly on the tough issues, then it should disband.

The chamber cannot pick and choose which issue it wants to weigh-in on. This is an important vote; everyone in Michigan will be affected by the outcome. This line from the AP story kills me: “If the chamber hadn’t stayed neutral, it might have spent millions advocating the proposal’s passage or defeat.”

That’s the way it goes. If you do or don’t believe in something these days, you embark on a costly path to support your decision. The chamber is an institution that is supposed to lead, not abdicate the throne when things get difficult. Remember this the next time the chamber asks you to support this or that issue.

As for the film incentives, Michigan’s House Panel, clearly a no-fun, rabidly ignorant bunch, voted this past week to end them as of Oct. 1.

The numbers speak for themselves on this one.

The tax committee says film incentive dollars blew a $325 million hole in Michigan’s budget. Actually, according to the Free Press, Michigan spent closer to $425 million on the incentives, which were introduced here in 2008.

What the tax committee is ignoring is this: the incentives generated $1.3 billion in Hollywood spending, in Michigan, on things like wages, sound and lighting technicians, lumber yards to build sets, carpenters and electricians and food and lodging.

So, let’s do the math. Michigan spent $425 to get a return of $1.3 billion. My father used to be a stockbroker – he’d take those figures any day of the week.

The latest film shot here, as we all should know, is “Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice.” It brought press from around the world to Michigan. When they got tired of reporting about the movie, they wrote flattering articles for their home papers on how Detroit’s comeback seemed to be real.

Remember? You can’t purchase that kind of press.

So rather than almost tripling our money, our wise House team shut the moneymaker down. That’s what passes for wisdom in Lansing these days. 

Vignettes

Is it just me, or:

• Are you, too, losing your resistance to the cold? I have no memory of winters this cold and unforgiving. I work for a hospital group and it seems our emergency rooms are all reporting increased incidents of patients with COPD, the same thing that killed Leonard Nimoy. I used to walk outside for exercise; not any longer. It’s all I can do to stay warm.

• ·         Is this a great idea? My wife and I take different freeways to work, but it seems there are enough people who dart in and out of traffic and text while driving to cover both freeways. My wife’s idea is to invent a screen that would fit over your front windshield and print what you say, in reverse type, so the person in front of you could read it in their rear view mirror. “Quit texting and drive, jerk” immediately comes to mind. I can see me getting into a ton of trouble with this, but having a good time all the while.

• ·         Are you going to vote NO on May 5 to increase the sales tax to fix roads? A gas tax won’t work either – the last time I read about a possible gas tax, Gov. Rick Snyder said it would be around 14 cents extra per gallon. A lot of people grumble about what they see as big government, but I think it’s time to send Gov. Rick to Washington to get some cash. Michigan, with economically inspiring news here and there, is still way behind other states in recovering from The Great Recession. We just can’t pay any more than we are and continue the recovery.

• ·         Did you snicker, too, when the Republican-led Congress in Washington failed to pass a bill funding Homeland Security? We all thought Speaker John Boehner had his troops moving in lockstep – what an embarrassment for him to find that he was presiding over a bunch of splinter groups.

• ·         Do you think the local media should have better things to do than report on Geoffrey Fieger being snubbed for membership in the Detroit Athletic Club?

• ·         Are you looking forward to the release of Harper Lee’s new/old book? I know I am, but since most people don’t read books anymore, I don’t know what kind of reception Lee’s book will get. As for me, I’m rereading “To Kill a Mockingbird” right now and finding that it has withstood the test of time. The last time I read it was in high school.

• ·         Would you, too, like to know who’s really behind these seemingly benign tests that pop on Facebook? Everyone complains about their online privacy, yet it seems the complainers are the first ones to provide answers to “Which State Are You?” or “What’s Your Real Age?” and then happily publish the results. My God. Go read a book if you still can.