In what could be a new high water mark of anti-Washington sentiment, the city of Troy, Mich., is rejecting a long-planned transportation center whose construction would have been fully financed with federal stimulus money.
The terminal, which would help Troy become a transportation node on an upgraded Detroit-to-Chicago Amtrak line, was hailed by supporters as a way to create jobs and to spur economic development. But federal money is federal money, so with the urging of the new mayor, who helped found the local Tea Party chapter, the City Council cast a 4-to-3 vote this week against granting a crucial contract, sending the project into limbo.
“There’s nothing free about government money,” Mayor Janice Daniels said in an interview. “It’s never free, and it’s crippling our way of life.”
It's not the money they object to. It's the federal government itself. It's headed by a black Democrat, and therefore it's illegitimate, tainted, and evil.
It really is that simple. Does anyone think these idiots would be complaining if President Bush or -- FSM help us, President Romney -- were handing Troy, Michigan a fully paid for transportation hub that required zero local tax dollars to build? No, they'd be taking the Troy Chamber of Commerce's position.
Taking Tea Party reasoning to the local level has outraged supporters of the transit center, which has been in the works for a decade. Michele Hodges, the president of the Troy Chamber of Commerce, which supports the transit project, said that her organization “will be a pit bull for what’s best for this community.”
Hell, even Gov. Rick Snyder is pissed off at this. But the Tea Party wing doesn't care. Whatever it takes to get rid of "him" in the White House. And if it means Grinching constituents, local business owners and "job creators" out of business, it's acceptable collateral damage. If Troy's Tea Party was reduced to a squabbling enclave inside an armed city-state, that's fine with them.
It's what they wanted in the first place.
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