Shall we talk about Michigan?
Michigan is part of the blue wall of the rust belt, that string of states that Democrats used to believe were solidly Democrat because of the union affiliation of their workers and the government dependence of their welfare class.
Democrats say – out loud – that they are confident about Michigan, despite the polls. But it is said that they specifically decided against the “Jewish In Name Only” Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro because his presence on the ticket would cost them the anti-semite vote in Michigan. That doesn’t sound like “unwavering confidence” in Michigan, does it?
In fact, the polls have been roughly tied for the past month in Michigan. According to Real Clear Politics at this writing, there have been seven Michigan polls worth paying attention to in that time; Trump is ahead in two, Harris is ahead in three, and two reported it as dead-even. The RCP polling average of that data says that Harris is ahead by just 0.7% at the moment.
But we should never look at a polling average in a vacuum. The RCP gives us the opportunity to compare against this same point in 2016 and 2020. On this day in 2020, former Vice President Joe Biden was ahead by 4.8%. On this day in 2016, Hillary Clinton was ahead in Michigan by 5.2%. Donald Trump came back to win Michigan in 2016, and knowing what we know of the various types of fraud in 2020, he may well have really won Michigan in 2020 as well.
(author’s note: in the four days between writing this column and its publication, RCP has added a couple of new polls and dropped a couple of others. These things are always in flux, but the argument stands. See here for the latest from RCP, and here for the counter-argument from Rasmussen, that things really aren’t bouncing around the way that RCP’s rolling averages might indicate).
So, it is certainly no exaggeration to say that Michigan is in play, as well it should be, because Michigan is a perfect example of many of the failures – both accidental and intentional – of the modern Democrat party.
Consider:
At one time, auto manufacturing jobs made up 7.4% of the workforce of the state of Michigan. Today that’s down to 3.7% of the state labor force, which sounds like a big drop – it’s been cut in half – but it’s still significant. The Democrats would love to get the auto workers to believe that Democrats are the party that will help grow their jobs again, but who could believe that today?
It was the Democrats, after all, who essentially took over two of the big three – Chrysler and GM – at the beginning of the Obama-Biden administration, forcing Chrysler to sell to Fiat and forcing GM into a literal government-union partnership management – in clear violation of the United States Constitution.
It was the Obama-Biden regime too, that needlessly shut down hundreds of American auto dealerships all over the country, reducing the outlets to sell American cars and therefore giving an automatic boost to foreign carmakers’ models.
It was the Obama-Biden regime that created the concept of Cash for Clunkers, an insulting program that convinced gullible Americans to turn in their perfectly good American vehicles to be destroyed (they poured concrete into the engines to seal the deal), in exchange for money for a downpayment to purchase mostly Japanese and Korean econoboxes. Imagine that. Countless thousands of Americans who would never consider an imported car before, were talking into getting their first one – by the US government.
But as if these three direct attacks on the Michigan economy weren’t enough, the Biden-Harris regime launched fresh assaults on the industry. Among the executive orders signed on Day One were orders to assault the petroleum and natural gas industries, by closing down or slow-walking federal leases and permits for exploration, drilling and pipeline construction. After four years of wonderful advances during the Trump administration, the Biden-Harris regime set out to reduce traditional energy production, which both kicked off the crippling inflation of the last four years and assaulted the market for new American vehicles.
Next, the Biden-Harris regime doubled down on government encouragement of so-called electric vehicles (EVs), offering subsidies to buyers, promising the installation of thousands of charging stations at taxpayer expense, and funding the development of politically-connected EV-manufacturing companies in direct competition with Michigan’s pre-existing American automakers.
The Biden-Harris regime also started a preposterous ramp-up of the CAFÉ standards and other federal efficiency targets for American-made vehicles in an effort to put the final nail in the coffin of the internal combustion engine, eventually reaching utterly unachievable demands that required an insane rebalancing of the vehicles that Detroit could produce in order to average out anywhere close to CAFÉ compliance. This served the eventual purpose of stopping Detroit from being able to manufacture many of the products that traditionally had actual, willing buyers, and forcing Detroit into producing vehicles that nobody wants. Nobody.
And so today, Michigan is suffering.
Well, of course it is.
There’s more going on as well, of course, much more. The longstanding American government attack on domestic manufacturing hit Michigan hard. It used to be a home for all sorts of other manufacturing, both heavy and light, both in support of the auto industry and completely outside it. But as high taxes and overregulation have taken their toll on such industry nationwide, it has hit Michigan especially hard.
When the automakers had to cut corners, they reached overseas for their components and systems, which put nearby parts makers out of business. So it was that not only the auto industry, but all industries have seen bankruptcies, downsizings, and acquisitions by foreign companies before moving production abroad. It’s happened nationwide, but the metro Detroit area has been ground zero for this epidemic in recent decades.
The general galloping inflation that hits the whole country, known as Bidenflation, hits Michigan too.
If people can’t afford vacations, the many vacation spots of a tourism capital like Michigan suffer too.
If young people can’t find jobs in their field anymore – and they can’t – then unemployment is bound to climb in Michigan too.
From groceries to home prices, from transportation to education, from mortgage interest to health insurance, everyone’s costs are skyrocketing at a time when employment simply can’t come close to keeping up.
Again, it’s a problem everywhere, but all the more so in Michigan, because many of these calamities must feel like intentional, direct hits that were aimed squarely at Michigan.
Do the people of Michigan notice it?
Do they remember how one job was enough a generation ago, and today two or three jobs aren’t enough to get buy?
Do they remember how they could afford a new car and a small house in the old days, and now they can’t afford a used car and an apartment?
Do they remember how they used to stop for fast food anytime without a thought, only to find today that the once-cheap menus of fast food are now as expensive as a good restaurant, in these days of Biden’s and Harris’ America?
Is Michigan in play? Of course it is.
This bunch has aimed many of their boldest, most malevolent policies directly at the heart of the state of Michigan. If the people of “the mitten and the hat” are awake this fall, they will deliver for President Trump yet again.
This, after all, is Michigan’s only chance to fight back.
Copyright 2024 John F. Di Leo
John F. Di Leo is a Chicagoland-based international transportation and trade compliance professional and consultant. A onetime Milwaukee County Republican Party chairman, he has been writing a regular column for Illinois Review since 2009. His book on vote fraud (The Tales of Little Pavel) and his political satires on the current administration (Evening Soup with Basement Joe, Volumes I, II, and III), are available in either eBook or paperback, only on Amazon.
His newest nonfiction book, “Current Events and the Issues of Our Age,” was just released on July 1, and is also available, in both paperback and Kindle eBook, exclusively on Amazon.
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