A turning-point week for Michigan starts with a blistering Detroit Free Press editorial that accuses Gov. Rick Snyder of betrayal in the right-to-work fight.
Pointedly sharp language aimed at the Republican governor includes "grotesquely disingenuous," "dishonest" and "pure greed."
Dickerson notes that the editorial page backed "many compromises Snyder maintained were necessary to advance his pro-growth agenda."
We trusted Snyder's judgment. That trust has now been betrayed -- for us, and for the hundreds of thousand of independents who voted for Snyder with the conviction that they were electing someone more independent, and more visionary, than partisan apparatchiks like Wisconsin's Scott Walker or Florida's Rick Scott.
Last week, in an abrupt about-face . . . the governor unleashed a legislative blitzkrieg that seems certain to bring a bill barring closed-shop contracts to his desk next week.
The Free Press derides Snyder's "insistence that the legislation was designed to promote the interests of unionized workers and 'bring Michiganders together.' " As evidence to the contrary, the editorial notes that the Michigan State Police is "locking down the capital in anticipation of protests by angry unionists."
In his social media post, editorial page editor Henderson says:
This might be the best editorial I've published as ed page editor at the Freep.
Brian Dickerson did a masterful job articulating the editorial board's reaction to Gov. Rick Snyder's chicken-hearted about-face on right-to-work.
The 900-word editorial, headlined "A Failure of Leadership," concludes:
Michigan voters who provided Snyder's margin of victory in 2010 feel betrayed, and they have every justification.
