County prosecutors in Michigan reject request to charge Michael Moore

No Moore prosecution.



The Associated Press  

DETROIT (AP) — A request by Michigan Republicans that filmmaker Michael Moore be charged with violating election law has found little sympathy among county prosecutors.

The state Republican Party asked prosecutors in four counties to file charges against Moore for offering underwear and food to college students in exchange for a promise to vote. State law prohibits a person from contracting with another for something of value in exchange for agreeing to vote.

Prosecutors in Isabella, Ingham and Antrim counties said they determined no action was warranted. A spokeswoman for Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy said Thursday that election law violations should be handled by the attorney general's office.

The harshest reaction came from the two Republican prosecutors, Antrim County's Charles Koop and Isabella County's Larry Burdick. Worthy and Ingham County Prosecutor Stuart Dunnings III are Democrats.

"Alleging that a person is attempting to buy votes is a serious allegation, and one that is taken seriously by this office. However, your request to prosecute Mr. Moore trivializes the intent of this section of the election code," Koop said Thursday in a letter to Greg McNeilly, executive director of the state Republican Party.

Burdick said he chooses "to devote our resources to prosecuting those who are delivering cocaine to our young people rather than underwear."

Randall Thompson, a spokesman for Attorney General Mike Cox, said Cox's office would consider the issue only if a complaint was forwarded from the secretary of state's office.

Michigan Republican spokesman Chris Paolino said the party did not file a complaint with the state, deeming it an issue best dealt with at the local level.

Moore is touring the country and imploring "slackers" who usually don't vote to head to the polls this year. During each program, habitual nonvoters are invited on stage to pledge to vote. First-time student voters are offered gag prizes such as clean underwear.


They've got a sickly heart and a tiny little soul
Blacker than blackest of the deepest buried coal.
Care little for their country, and less for their countrymen.
Nothing for the truth and everything for spin.
A thousand soldiers dead and they'd do it all again!
What insanity it is to be a damned Republican.

Trying to put someone in prison for their political beliefs is fascist. Plain and simple. It pisses me off. Also fairly plain and simple. Why does this go on? I can't explain it. Have these Republicans no decency? Uhhh No. Duh Sil. It makes me sick. It takes a special breed of bastard to want for the imprisonment and suffering of their fellow man when they have caused no harm to anyone. "I don't like you. I wish you were in prison. In fact I'm going to keep tabs on everything you do and campaign to have you imprisoned." You may have heard this another way. "Love it or leave it. This country is not yours. It's mine. Your citizenship is not a right. It's a privilege granted you so long as you agree with me."

Certainly tries my faith. It's hard to pause and take the time to see these kinds of Republicans' humanity through the mists of their indifference to suffering and the veil of their intolerance for any ethics save their own mutated morality. How hard it is to see the soul inside. It's one thing to cut a person to pieces in the press. It's another to attack their person. Throwing someone in prison is more than assault. You can get over a bloody lip, a black eye, even a broken nose or jaw. But a few years in prison? There is no cure for a broken heart and mind. It's a little late to be surprised by stuff like this. But it's never too late to take the outrage it inspires in me and turn it into Blog-Power.


I have the Powerrrr!!!