A tangled web of Big Business interests wants to disenfranchise YOU! When most of us think of the Chamber of Commerce, it’s likely that what comes to mind is your local Chamber working to promote local businesses in your community. But when it comes to state and federal level Chambers, however, the truth is that they have a dedicated agenda […]

Hello? Anybody out there? I really have to ask the question, “Where is the mainstream media on the challenge to Public Act 4 repeal petitions?” This is not just a wonky, technical discussion. This is an attempt to silence the voices of nearly a quarter million Michiganders on a concocted technicality. (If you’ve missed my previous posts on this, you […]

You fontin’ me, bro?

Yesterday, I took a look at the font size on the petitions to put the repeal of Public Act 4 — Michigan’s Emergency Manager law — on the November ballot. Recall that the group Citizens for Financial Responsibility is challenging the more than quarter million citizen signatures on a minor font-based technicality. As I said yesterday, it’s a desperate move and one that’s not even based on anything legitimate.

The rules (which you can read HERE [pdf]) don’t actually tell you what type of font is required. If you wanted to, you could use Comic Sans or anything else that is readable. However, the font choice makes a BIG difference in the height and width of font.

[More analysis with example fonts after the jump.]

Clear as mud

I was cleaning up my office today and came across a couple Public Act 4 repeal petitions. I thought it would be interesting to see how wrong the fonts are. Recall that Citizens for Fiscal Responsibility wants to toss out nearly a quarter million petition signatures because they say the heading font is smaller than the required 14-point boldface font (state regulation HERE (pdf).) They aren’t saying that the petition language itself is too small, just the heading.

Follow me over the jump for photos and comparisons and all sorts of fonty goodness.

Not all conflicts of interest are created equal

The continuing saga of the desperate attempt to derail putting the repeal of Public Act 4 — Michigan’s Emergency Manager law — on the November ballot continues with a piece published on the Michigan Radio website titled “Ballot box politics: Conflicts of interest for Michigan’s Board of State Canvassers”.

As I wrote about earlier this week, one of the members of the Michigan Board of State Canvassers (BSC), the group that will decide on the challenge to the petitions collected by Stand up for Democracy, is Jeff Timmer. Timmer works for a company that is intimately tied to the effort to defeat the repeal. His company, Sterling Corporation, is one and the same as the group “Citizens for Fiscal Responsibility” that is challenging the 226,000+ signatures because they font size of the heading is 12 rather than 14. Note that the printer’s affidavit certifies that the font is the correct size.

Like I said: desperate…

[More after the jump]