Why? They won't say, but given their past and/or ongoing arrogant behavior, it's probably part of the partisan game of wasting everyone's time and creating problems so the administration and government itself looks bad. Remember, Republicans need government to be dysfunctional for their talking points to stick, so, dysfunctional it shall be. Gongwer tonight-
Declaring Senate Republicans are engaging in McCarthyism, the Granholm administration stepped up the confrontation over the appointment of Colleen Pobur to the Liquor Control Commission, sending a letter demanding the release of information the majority party asserts disqualifies Ms. Pobur for the post. The letter was hand-delivered the day before it is now anticipated the Senate will reject Ms. Pobur's appointment.
A spokesperson for Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop (R-Rochester) dismissed the letter from Granholm legal counsel Kelly Keenan to as a stunt. "The administration knows what our problems are" with Mr. Pobur, said Matt Marsden.
Liz Boyd, Ms. Granholm's spokesperson, said, "We wish that Sen. Bishop and the Senate Republicans would spend more time on job creation than they are on character assassination" of Ms. Pobur.
Senate Republicans and Saul Anuzis (dead giveaway as to partisan motive right there) are alleging that Pobur was fired from her job at Detroit Metro Airport by Ed McNamara; supporters have released a letter written by Ed himself that shows that isn't true. So that's not it. Other rumblings about her qualifications are supposedly being made - but no one will offer any details.
What could it be? A simple power play to keep one of their people on the commission. Apparently Republicans at one time were offering to trade a Pobur confirmation in exchange for keeping Engler appointee Republican Judy Allen on the board. They had no problem with Pobur then, but no deal was at hand. Pobur was slated to replace Virgie M. Rollins, and when the Republicans claimed they had this "confidential information" and asked the governor to withdraw her name, right before the vote she re-filed Pobur for Allen's spot instead. Whoop, there it is.
Ms. Pobur's appointment was nearly voted down last week when Ms. Granholm withdrew it and then resubmitted it. In the second resubmission, Ms. Pobur replaced Judy Allen. Republicans had at one time offered to approve Ms. Pobur in exchange for Ms. Allen, a Republican, staying on the LCC.
But that offer was rejected and following that Republicans say they had received confidential information that challenged Ms. Pobur's qualifications. They have refused to publicly release that information in detail.
Uh huh. Maybe because it doesn't exist? Because Republicans didn't get their way, they are going to damage this woman's reputation by inferring that something is wrong with her - they just aren't going to tell you what it is or who said it. Besides, they don't have to anyway. So there.
Senate Republican officials have indicated that one reason they have not released the information brought them is to protect the sources from possible retribution.
And Mr. Marsden, Mr. Bishop's spokesperson, said there is no requirement in the Constitution that a hearing be held on an appointment (in fact the Senate only restored an active advice and consent process when Ms. Granholm was elected governor. The chamber routinely allowed the appointments of former Governor John Engler to take office without comment.) and that the chamber can reject an appointment for any reason or no reason. "We can reject an appointment for having purple hair or wearing the wrong shoes," he said.
Hair and shoes. With that one statement, Marsden reveals the Senate Republican's continuing arrogance and immaturity and dishonors the entire chamber once again. They can waste your time, waste your money, ignore the real problems in Michigan, hurt someone's reputation - all because they want to play their partisan games.
And they wonder why that ballot proposal looks so good to the public...
UPDATE 7/25: No action was taken; "not enough Republicans were present". Mike Bishop went running to Mike Cox for a legal opinion...
In the request for an opinion from Mr. Cox, Mr. Bishop said that state law requires that two LCC members, one from each party, be named as hearing officers. But with Ms. Allen's departure, the commission now consists of three Democrats and one independent, so can an independent member then be a hearing officer, Mr. Bishop asked. Mr. Bishop also asked if future liquor violation hearings could even be held without a Republican member of the commission.
... and the administration released more letters of recommendation for Pobur from top business executives.
End result - this gets put on hold until 8/13.