Our Michigan Governor Gets Some National Attention

George Will, writing in Townhall has noticed something.

INDIANAPOLIS -- Indiana likes having the nation's highest portion of workers -- 20 percent -- in manufacturing, so five days before Delphi, the Michigan-based automobile parts manufacturer, entered bankruptcy, Gov. Mitch Daniels, a Republican who believes that ``conservatism can be active,'' called Delphi. He praised Indiana as a paradise for even more Delphi operations than are already there.

Michigan's Democratic governor, Jennifer Granholm, responded to Delphi's travails differently, denouncing Delphi's executives, Washington and globalization. In the game of entrepreneurial federalism -- states competing to lure businesses -- score one for the Hoosier State, which in the four years before Daniels became governor had a net job loss.

The attitude of our governor, Jennifer Granholm, is one that exemplifies the old school politics of envy.

Here is a governor that clings to an exorbitant gas tax because it is too important to the economy of Michigan. Here is a governor that is perched atop one of the most regressive business tax formulas in the nation (and wanting more taxes.) And, here is a governor that is decidedly pro-labor vs. business in an atmosphere where our businesses must compete with global adversaries not to mention other states. Does that sound to you like a recipe for business growth?

Our Canadian born/California raised/and Harvard educated Governor is abiding by that most disgusting of liberal screeds--that government is the solution to economic problems--when in fact it is government that is the stumbling block to employment and economic growth. Throw in a dash of class envy so that re-election isn't difficult, and you cannot wonder why the exodus of business employers will continue.