NHL Brawl - Hockey Fight - Detroit vs. Colorado

Wings have McCarty again but it looks like the Avs are getting their old gang together. Forsberg and Foote have rejoined Colorado. Hmm.

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Former Detroit TV anchor charged with embezzlement found dead

mlive.com

A former TV news anchor facing felony charges for embezzling $149,000 from a man she had dated and advised financially, has been found dead in her Detroit-area home.

Police Detective Don Swiatkowski tells The Detoit News that a relative found Suzanne Wangler "unresponsive" Saturday afternoon in her Royal Oak home.

He says Wangler was pronounced dead at 3:27 p.m. An autopsy has been scheduled.

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Michigan to pile on incentives to lure filmmakers

San Francisco Chronicle

With its striking visual images - urban landscapes, sandy shorelines, northern forests, lush vineyards, the Great Lakes - Michigan could be a film studio's dream. But in the end, decisions on where to shoot featured scenes are about the bottom line.

And Michigan long ago lost its competitive edge when other states started offering better deals in terms of incentives.

Now, state lawmakers and Gov. Jennifer Granholm are looking at increasing the size of rebates and adding other incentives to leapfrog Michigan ahead of states such as Louisiana, New Mexico and Connecticut.

Michigan offers a sliding-scale rebate of up to 20 percent to production companies that shoot movies, TV shows and commercials in the state. But that no longer carries the cachet it once did, film industry insiders say.

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Cold Arrival

Here's a snip from the latest post by my friend in Alaska, Todd Katke.

Buford T. Porcupine's Wild and Wacky Adventures

Temperatures minus 15 degrees! I had traveled by this area too many times before and knew what I was looking for. The snow was deep as I made my way in and around these tall evergreens, looking for just the right position to capture the morning's sunrise. Traveling in I saw many moose tracks so I knew they had passed through on the way to thicker more remote parts of the woods. Daily temperatures never rising much beyond the single digits. After about 3 hours of being out in those cold temps, I could think of nothing better than being back home sitting in my rocker by the fireplace and warming up. I must admit my adventures are lagging for the month of January. My daily routine has been making sure the bird feeders are filled and scattering some extra sunflower seed on the ground. With cold temps birds have to eat twice their body weight to survive such frigid cold. What little moving out and about has been through the woods on snowshoes looking for moose tracks or any other tracks I might find.

Michigan Sued For Denying Illegal Aliens Licenses

Judicial Watch

A new Michigan law that prohibits issuing driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants is being legally challenged by a national group that claims residents are safer and law enforcement is more effective when all drivers have licenses, regardless of legal status.

Denying driver’s licenses to all residents who live and work in the state is also unlawful and unconstitutional, according to the 13-page lawsuit filed this week by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in Ingham County

The complaint asks the court to order Michigan’s Secretary of State to immediately resume issuing driver’s license to all residents, because the state’s Vehicle Code specifically defines a “resident” as a person who resides in a settled or permanent home or domicile with the intention of remaining in the state. The ACLU reminds the court that the code also says that any person who obtains employment in the state is presumed to have the intention of remaining in the state.

Kilpatrick asks Michigan Supreme Court to rule on secret documents

MLive.com

Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick on Friday asked the Michigan Supreme Court to rule on whether documents from a secret settlement of a whistle-blowers' lawsuit should be made public.

The documents are related to embarrassing and sexually explicit text messages between Kilpatrick and his former top aide, but do include the actual messages, according to city Corporation Counsel John E. Johnson Jr.

The city filed its motion to take a state Appeals Court ruling to the higher court more than two hours ahead of a 5 p.m. Friday deadline.

A motion to seal the file prevents copies of the documents from being released, Supreme Court spokeswoman Marcia McBrien said.

A three-judge Appeals Court panel said Wednesday that a circuit court judge was correct in ordering the documents to be unsealed. They are part of an $8.4 million settlement the city made with former officers in last summer's whistle-blowers' suit.

Michigan dems deserve a do-over

The Flint Journal -mlive

Hey, Michigan voters, anyone else suddenly feel the urge to tell Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton (and the Democratic National Committee, and the state Democratic Party, and ...) to kiss our mitten-shaped petoots? All of a sudden, Michigan and Florida are THE hot states in the Democratic campaign, with party insiders arguing over what role, if any, our currently banned delegates may or may not have at the August convention.

The reason, of course, is the unexpectedly close race, plus a looming worry that enough Michigan dems will be mad enough about the primary debacle to either stay home in November or (gasp!) even turn a blue state red. (God forbid.)

Man, this is delish. Suddenly, Hillary Clinton, who left her name on the ballot but didn't campaign here, is demanding Michigan delegates be seated at the national convention. (Hey, Hill, where were you months ago when the punishment was being doled out?)