Federal Communications Commission chairman Thomas Wheeler has proposed increasing the current Lifeline telephone subsidy to help the poor get Internet service. Such access is good for the economy, good for job and service searches, and good for connecting poor children and their families to their schools, churches, health care providers, and governmental institutions. Most of us know the Lifeline program […]

The decision by 75th District Court judge Michael Carpenter to stop ALL marriages in the 75th District Court in Midland to avoid having to marry same-sex couples sent a shockwave of outrage and disbelief throughout the country yesterday. What he did was legal in the technical sense because District Court judges are authorized, not required to perform marriages. However, given […]

Everything LGBT people need to know about signing up for health insurance after getting married. Last week’s historic ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court affirming marriage equality for everyone across the country means there are going to be a lot of weddings this summer. But that’s just the beginning of the good news. Many LGBT people may not realize that […]

Bill Nowling is a longtime Republican spokesman and strategist. He was Governor Rick Snyder’s spokesman for a time. Then he was Detroit Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr’s mouthpiece. Now Nowling is cashing in on Atlantic City’s current financial emergency: Atlantic City’s Emergency Manager, Kevin Lavin, appointed by Gov. Christie in January, did not issue an updated report this month as promised […]

Virgil Smith (r) shown hanging out today with Senate Republican Leader Arlan Meekhof and Republican Mike Kowall On the morning of May 10th, Democratic Senator Virgil Smith from Detroit pumped 10 rounds into his ex-wife’s car from a rifle. Smith admits to having done it saying it was “stupidest thing he had done in his life”. Last Friday he was […]

This post has been updated several times. See below. It hasn’t been particularly surprising to see marriages being halted in places like Mississippi, Alabama, and Texas. In these states, some government officials are refusing to marry or issue marriage licenses to ANY couple, same-sex or opposite-sex, in order to avoid having to marry same-sex couples. However, this bigotry has now […]

Not just predictable. Predicted.. Republicans in the Michigan Senate have a plan to fix the roads and they are going to raise $1.4 billion to git ‘er done. It’s going to happen by raising the gas tax, something I am 100% unequivocally totally completely entirely supportive of. That’ll raise about $700,000,000 by their reckoning. So, where does the other $700,000,000 […]

The time has come for me to make a direct appeal to the progressive organizations that we support every single day here at Eclectablog. Whether your cause is the environment, labor, education, LGBTQ, legislative, or the myriad other issues that we cover on this site, our writers work very hard to make sure your message gets out, particularly here in […]

Earlier this month, in an exclusive report here at Eclectablog, I reported that teachers in the Education Achievement Authority (EAA) were not receiving Teacher Incentive Fund (TIF) payments as promised. The “District for Wayward Schools” had received millions of dollars in TIF grants from the federal government – $11.5 million over three years – to give teachers financial incentives for […]

Last month, Michigan Republican Senator Patrick Colbeck had an op-ed pulled and then republished at The Detroit News with modifications after he was busted lying about various aspects of the Affordable Care Act.

Colbeck is now at it again. He recently published an op-ed in the Canton Observer attempting to convince readers that everything is fine with education funding, Republicans have actually INCREASED it, and that the problems that Plymouth-Canton Community Schools (P-CCS) are having are their own goddam fault.

However, shortly after it was published, the Canton Observer posted this on their Facebook page:

Last Friday while many of us were celebrating the Supreme Court decision making marriage equality law across the USA, two black churches in the South were burned down. That came on the heels of two others in the days just before. Via FaithGardner at Daily Kos, here’s the list: College Hill Seventh Day Adventist church in Knoxville, Tennessee on June […]