What's the Diehl?: The Truth Doesn't Matter to Matty

I really don’t know how Matty Moroun can sleep at night.

The 85-year-old Grosse Pointe billionaire and owner of the 7,500-foot-long Ambassador Bridge – the busiest international border crossing in North America – has been running disingenuous commercials ad nauseam to promote Proposal 6, a b*llsh*t ballot proposal that would amend the state constitution to require voter approval of any new bridge or tunnel from Michigan to Canada.

The main problem with this proposal is that only the anti-tax, anti-expenditure, anti-progress cretins could turn out to vote – “no” is the default position for this group – and we'd never see another new bridge or tunnel anywhere. A small, Tea Party-esque minority could be deciding policy questions for the majority. The campaign with the best get-out-the-vote component could make important infrastructure decisions and not engineers, transportation experts or elected officials. Some decisions shouldn’t be left to unqualified, emotional activists.

I’ve written about Mr. Moroun before (“Matty Moroun’s Miserable Machinations," June 4, 2011; “Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire,” October 10, 2011; “I Hate It When I’m Right,” October 21, 2011; “Road to Redemption,” October 31, 2011; and “Matty Moroun’s ‘Get Out of Jail Free’Card,” January 16, 2012). It’s worth repeating, though, that the guy will apparently go to great lengths to protect his gravy train – the bridge is worth between $1.5 and $3 billion dollars – including inundating the airwaves with commercials that the Michigan Truth Squad, a project of the nonpartisan Center for Michigan, deems a “flagrant foul.”

An informative piece on Matty and this issue appeared in the Detroit Free Press last Sunday (“The Great Bridge Debate,” , September 23, 2012). Surely the man who bought the state legislature and then watched Governor Rick Snyder bypass it and sign an agreement with Canada knows that ominous threats and incendiary rhetoric resonate with an unsophisticated electorate. This is probably why his despicable commercials ask if we “want to pay more for gas?” and insist that “taxpayers will have to spend billions now and $100 million every year” and declare that “we don’t need it and we can’t afford it.” (Visit this link and this one and this one if you must.)

Don’t need it? More than 10,000 trucks and 4,000 cars cross the 83-year-old bridge each day, representing more than a quarter of all trade between the U.S. and Canada. Traffic congestion and resulting air pollution are documented problems. And the 6,000 new construction jobs and hundreds more to operate the new bridge are nothing to sneeze at either.

Can’t afford it? The agreement signed by Snyder and Canadian Transport Minister Denis Lebel this past summer states that our Canadian friends will pay for Michigan’s share of the project (about $550 million) and will recoup that money from future tolls. On the first page of the agreement, it says, “The Crossing Agreement provides a framework for a Crossing Authority established by Canada to design, construct, finance, operate and maintain a new International Crossing between Canada and Michigan…with funding approved by Canada, but with no funding by the Michigan Parties. The Michigan Parties are not obligated to pay any of the costs of the new International Crossing.” (Emphasis mine.) According to the Freep, legal experts who reviewed the agreement are convinced that Michigan taxpayers won’t have to cough up a dime for this. The truth doesn’t matter to Matty and his minions, however.

I wish it mattered to voters. Sadly, an EPIC-MRA poll of likely voters conducted earlier this month found that 47 percent supported Proposal 6, 44 percent opposed it and nine percent were undecided.

Guess who’s helping Matty, by the way? Americans for Prosperity, the far-right, multi-million dollar organization supported by the Koch Brothers which funds the Tea Party, opposes Obamacare, pooh-poohs climate change and engages in near-criminal behavior in order to achieve its goals. In June of 2011, the group placed fake eviction notices on people's doors in Detroit's Delray neighborhood. The organization's state director said they wanted to get people's attention and stir up opposition to a second bridge by claiming that their properties could be taken by the state to make way for the new project.

Matty Moroun

There's something wrong when someone with pockets as deep as Lake Superior can hide behind cleverly-named front groups like “The People Should Decide” and blatantly mislead voters with half-truths and distortions. It’s disturbing that people can say whatever they want, that there’s no requirement that advertising be factual, that honesty is neither demanded nor expected by the listener or viewer.

Since 40 percent of our registered voters don’t even vote in presidential elections, it’s no wonder that campaigns like Moroun’s – which rely on an ignorant subset of eligible voters – ultimately succeed. When the majority isn’t engaged in the process, that process is much easier to sully and stymie.

Maybe someday a majority of registered voters will turn out on Election Day and send a message to political consultants that deceptive commercials and bald-faced lies are unacceptable. Of course, voters would have to become more discerning.

I guess we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.