Life for Tiger Stadium?

Carl Levin and the ruins of DetroitBy Matthew May

Sen. Levin may well indeed wish to preserve something of Tiger Stadium. He has spoken movingly on its importance in his own life, growing up a Jew in Detroit and watching with pride and awe as Hank Greenberg was lifted up as a hero of the city, so much so that after one important game the Detroit Free Press ran a headline wishing him a happy Jewish new year in Hebrew. Nobody wishes to diminish the personal significance Tiger Stadium holds for Sen. Levin, as it does for countless Detroiters. But he is an influential man, no? Could he not lead or organize a private effort that could raise double the earmarked funds? Or would it not be time to stiffen up a bit and acknowledge that nothing lasts forever?

But no. Sen. Levin's plea on the Senate floor for an earmark to try and preserve a half-demolished relic is perfect, really. It is the perfect summation of the mindset and actions threatening to turn the nation into a giant Detroit. Here is the power-mad, lordly Senator-from-on-high arguing for the necessity of further tax confiscation in a boondoggle spending bill to save a building that was last barely useful at the end of the previous century. The disfigured stadium remains as but the freshest gaping wound on a clinically dead patient. Such an earmark passed through with nary a thought, least of all from the president - the same man who vowed to eliminate such provisions with his exacting scalpel. And there it stands.
Take a good look, fellow citizens. If you like what you see on the corner of Michigan and Trumbull, you will love the landscape of Obama's America.