Last night, millions watching Saturday Night Live were laughing at Michigan, not with us. We deserved it after last week's legislative conspiracyfest. But how do we come back from that when we're still facing a deadly pandemic? Me, in the @michiganadvance. https://www.michiganadvance.com/2020/12/06/susan-j-demas-how-does-michigans-legislature-come-back-from-last-weeks-conspiracyfest/
Michigan's GOP-controlled Legislature last week hosted almost 12 hours of insane right-wing election conspiracy theories and (again) flirting with handing a not-close election to Donald Trump that made the national networks. via @MichiganAdvance https://www.michiganadvance.com/2020/12/06/susan-j-demas-how-does-michigans-legislature-come-back-from-last-weeks-conspiracyfest/
Republicans made sure nobody was under oath, so nobody could be held liable. The goal was to inject as many lies and conspiracy theories into the bloodstream so that even casual observers believe there was something funny about Biden's win. https://www.michiganadvance.com/2020/12/06/susan-j-demas-how-does-michigans-legislature-come-back-from-last-weeks-conspiracyfest/
In reality, Biden won the election by a whopping 7 million votes and 306 electoral votes to Trump’s 232. In Michigan, he earned a straight-up majority of 51% — a 154,000-vote margin that’s about 14 times the size of Trump’s 2016 victory. https://www.michiganadvance.com/2020/12/06/susan-j-demas-how-does-michigans-legislature-come-back-from-last-weeks-conspiracyfest/
Republicans are lying because they don’t like the results. But our entire understanding of politics is premised on the idea that a major party would not whip up such an obvious and sinister deception, so many have trouble believing that’s what’s going on. https://www.michiganadvance.com/2020/12/06/susan-j-demas-how-does-michigans-legislature-come-back-from-last-weeks-conspiracyfest/
The Giuliani Show and endless parade of GOP activists demanding to speak to the manager about Black Detroit poll workers would not have happened unless Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey and House Speaker Chatfield sanctioned it. via @MichiganAdvance https://www.michiganadvance.com/2020/12/06/susan-j-demas-how-does-michigans-legislature-come-back-from-last-weeks-conspiracyfest/
Shirkey, Chatfield and GOP leaders couldn’t jump on a plane fast enough to huddle last month with Trump (and Giuliani via phone) about what to do about the pesky fact that Biden won. That should dispel any myth that they’re noble protecters of democracy. https://www.michiganadvance.com/2020/12/06/susan-j-demas-how-does-michigans-legislature-come-back-from-last-weeks-conspiracyfest/
The Republican lawmakers who made Michigan a laughingstock this week are not serious people. Most of them are only in office because they represent heavily GOP districts drawn by Republican lawmakers, so they don’t have to be accountable to the majority. https://www.michiganadvance.com/2020/12/06/susan-j-demas-how-does-michigans-legislature-come-back-from-last-weeks-conspiracyfest/
But these are the leaders tasked with dealing with the most serious crisis we’ve faced in decades, the COVID-19 pandemic that’s killing more than 2,000 Americans every day. In Michigan, we’re closing in fast on 400,000 cases and 10,000 deaths. https://www.michiganadvance.com/2020/12/06/susan-j-demas-how-does-michigans-legislature-come-back-from-last-weeks-conspiracyfest/
So how is Gov. Gretchen Whitmer supposed to work on the pandemic with a GOP Legislature obsessed with conspiracy theories that’s just not that into democracy anymore? That’s looking more like an impossible task with each passing day, which is a tragedy. https://www.michiganadvance.com/2020/12/06/susan-j-demas-how-does-michigans-legislature-come-back-from-last-weeks-conspiracyfest/
Oh, here’s the coda to this morning’s column. Rudy Giuliani probably brought covid with him to Lansing this week. https://abcnews.go.com/US/rudy-giuliani-tested-positive-covid-19-trump/story?id=74571847