Meet the 87th candidates- Brian Calley

Brian Calley — This fair-haired golden boy is a Yuppie throwback from Portland who works at a bank and is an Ionia County commissioner. He says all the right things, knows how to kiss babies and schmooze with all the right-thinking, well-connected people. He's gone to virtually all meetings of villages, cities and townships to introduce himself as a clean-cut boy next door developing expertise in how to blow smoke up your ass. Hence, he's a terrific slick politician, well versed in the art of telling you what you want to hear rather than what you need to hear. His broken record mantra is a carbon copy of so much of what we've heard from before — "tax cuts... tax cuts... tax cuts..." We've been cutting taxes for over a decade in Michigan and yet the state economy still flounders- usually, the first step to getting out of a hole is to quit digging but that's a message lost on the people living on our dime in Lansing. Calley is a man of money, well established in mainstream conservative GOP political circles. The difference between him and Newell politically is very little. The difference between him and the philosophies handed down by most on high from the GOP power brokers in Lansing and Washington is even less. Expect Calley to be just another puppet of the lobbyists who now control our state capitol by showing the wet-behind-the-ears legislators the way the game is played and making it known to them that the only way they get to keep their cushy jobs is to play along.

To support Calley is to support the status quo, to affirm the notion that everything is going just fine, stay the course. It also is to ignore, as the State Legislature routinely does these days, that there are serious problems that need swift and decisive action. Because of this guy's slick skills and ability to attach himself to the movers and shakers and special monied interests inside and outside of the 87th District, he's considered the man to beat in the August primary. And remember, he (or she) who wins in August most certainly wins... period!