Many folks would like a new bridge that can take transport trucks between Detroit and Windsor. There is a good bridge there now - the Ambassador Bridge carries 25% of Canada - US trade. That’s a lot of trucks.
The Ambassador Bridge is 83 years old. That’s fairly old for a bridge, so a new, additional bridge would be good. It would be especially good for Canada that relies heavily on trading back and forth with the US.
So good, that Canada has agreed to pay for the bridge. In full. Including any cost overruns. Including any liabilities. Sounds like a great deal, eh? Pretty much everyone thinks so, even the Canadian taxpayer who will foot the bill.
Not so fast! There is one group - well, one person who is against this whole idea. Who you might ask?
You see, he owns the Ambassador Bridge. Makes about 80 million dollars a year off the bridge. Is a billionaire. He does not want the competition. Might make less money.
So what does he do? Pushes to have ballot initiative Proposal 6 put on the ballot.
He really, really does not want a competitor:
Lies. Plain and simply, this greedy old billionaire is lying to the public so that he will not have a competitor to his monopoly.
Holy shit. What moneyed interests are in favour of the bridge? Is there any substantial campaign for it? Are any newspapers or other ostensibly independent outlets supporting the criticisms? It’s mind-boggling.
Another great capitalist resorts to communism. It’s very difficult to find a successful business that doesn’t owe it’s continued existence to government regulation. Yeah, he built that.
t looks like pretty much everyone opposes the old man’s proposal - both sides of the political spectrum, local, state, federal, as well as the chamber of commerce and business.
He’s getting “the people” to buy into his proposal by lying to them in his paid advertisements. That’s what could be “wrong with that”
Yes, that would be great, if true. But the quotes in the article from people are worrisome, in that they show that they believe the lies that they have been fed by this old rich monopoly-benefiting bastard.
So if they relied on their common sense, they would see that a new bridge would be built, at no cost to anyone in the state, paid for entirely by another country. They would see that the bridge would benefit hundreds of businesses, and is supported by business and all politicians.
But they are NOT relying on their common sense. That’s rather the point of this thread. They are being swayed by millions of dollars of advertising, ads that are featuring lies in support of a single monopolistic individual who is paying for the ads.
It appears as if he’s trying to illustrate the fact that the Republican governor is being sensible here, while the Democratic Rep is either complicit in the scheme or at the very least easily manipulated by the ad campaign.
In other words, part 463 of Bricker’s ongoing gotcha campaign to show us how partisan we all are.
I don’t know, I’m perfectly happy siding with Snyder here. Irwin’s being a tool.
Clearly not that, since the OP and all subsequent posts are showing outrage over this. If anything, it seems to be there to show how venal and reprehensible a Democrat can be, despuite the EP later saying that “It looks like pretty much everyone opposes the old man’s proposal - both sides of the political spectrum, local, state, federal, as well as the chamber of commerce and business.”
Venal Deocrats? Horror! But I live in Massachusetts. I’ll readily agree there are Democrats Behaving Badly.
I don’t think Bricker is attempting to blame Democrats. Irwin is describing what’s going on, not supporting it. The People Should Decide is supported (according to them) by a bizarre array of national right-wing groups (Americans for Tax Reform, Americans for Prosperity) and local groups which I assume are left-wing (Detroit Association of Black Organizations, Mexican Patriotic Committee of Detroit).
If anyone is to blame, it’s arguably Snyder’s party mates; the bridge would already be under construction except that Republicans on the Economic Development Committee blocked it (the Democrats didn’t help matters by abstaining).
My take on the ‘what did he mean’: if it doesn’t pass, then all complaints about campaign financing or Citizen’s United are automatically invalid–this proves that money has no impact or effect on elections and should not be regulated in any way.
Actually, even if it doesn’t pass yet there are a non-trivial number of votes for it, and controlling for the few votes of self-interest (I expect he will vote for it, as would businesses right at the end of his bridge), strongly suggests that unlimited campaign spending is detrimental to democracy. Whether or not this would have been covered under existing or struck-down law, or whether this particular context could ever be avoided is irrelevant–a statistically significant swaying of a vote based on intentionally erroneous, misleading facts underscores the need to break the money=speech equivalence and implement/enforce strong campaign finance reform.
ETA:
Those quotes are part of the ad. Further, from the article: