![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Schadenfreude
Jan. 26th, 2019 01:56 pmThere was an article in Slate earlier this month about John Engler’s departure as president of Michigan State University. Engler, formerly the Republican Governor of Michigan, did not sexually abuse any gymnasts himself, so far as we know, but he behaved disgracefully in treating the victims with contempt.
I know of him because of something else he did, which was presumably a matter of having been misinformed by the supposed experts, not of moral turpitude on his part: he cut property taxes, while raising income and perhaps other taxes to make up the revenue. He and Jennifer Granholm, a Democrat who was governor afterward, share discredit for helping to make Michigan, and Detroit in particular, the mess it now is. Most of the people who lost jobs thanks to Engler’s policies don’t make the connections, not having read Henry George, but there is a certain measure of justice in Engler now losing his own job.
I know of him because of something else he did, which was presumably a matter of having been misinformed by the supposed experts, not of moral turpitude on his part: he cut property taxes, while raising income and perhaps other taxes to make up the revenue. He and Jennifer Granholm, a Democrat who was governor afterward, share discredit for helping to make Michigan, and Detroit in particular, the mess it now is. Most of the people who lost jobs thanks to Engler’s policies don’t make the connections, not having read Henry George, but there is a certain measure of justice in Engler now losing his own job.
