SCHUETTE GETTING HIS NAME OUT

Why Bill Schuette? Why right now?

Two months ago, it appeared the medical marijuana ballot initiative,
Proposal 1, was going to slide past Election Day without any
organized opposition stopping it.

Then Schuette, an outgoing state appellate judge, emerged out of
nowhere at the 11th hour to lead the charge against Proposal 1.

He corralled all of the police groups (after all, more dope in
Michigan allegedly means more dope in our children's hands, heavier
drug use, which leads to more crime, etc.) and the Michigan Health
and Hospital Association and other physician groups, whose officials
say they don't necessarily have a problem with medical marijuana but
think Proposal 1 isn't as lock-safe as it could be. (Despite the fact
that the proposal was crafted after Rhode Island's law, where there
doesn't appear to be much of a problem.)

But why bother? Schuette says, as a father of two young children, he
doesn't want marijuana more available or being viewed as socially
acceptable. "Everybody knows" marijuana is a gateway drug to the
harder stuff, and it's unnecessary to allow folks to grow it, he says.

I'm sure his feelings are genuine. As a former Republican congressman
and Michigan Senator, Schuette is as conservative as Corn Flakes are bland.

He's also ambitious. He won his first congressional election at age
31. He opted not to seek re-election six years later because he
wanted a crack at U.S. Sen. Carl Levin. When that didn't work out,
former Gov. John Engler made him state agriculture director. In 1994
he won a state Senate seat. When term limits ended that run, he
hopped to the state appellate court.

So why would Schuette, 55, leave a practically lifetime gig as a
state appellate judge? The popular scuttlebutt is Schuette has his
eyes set on attorney general, a position current AG Mike Cox can't
run for in 2010.

If so, there's no better way to boost your name: get in good with law
enforcement and take a hard public stance against crime then lead a
public campaign against legalizing marijuana (even if it is only for the sick).

Tim Skubick confronted Schuette with this scenario on his WKAR
television show, "Off the Record." Schuette told Skubick that
defeating Proposal 1 wasn't about him and that he was "absolutely
not" using the issue for personal gain. When asked if he'd connected
the dots between an anti-Prop 1 campaign and an AG campaign, Schuette
quickly shot, "I have not."

The head of the pro-Prop 1 campaign, Dianne Byrum, is skeptical.

"I think it's a possibility," she said in the broadcast. "A lot of
free publicity ..."

To date, the fledgling anti-Prop 1 group has relied on free media to
get out its message, calling numerous press conferences, making
outrageous comparisons between the loosely written California medical
marijuana law and the 15-page Michigan proposal.

Schuette's cadre squeezed the Michigan Health and hospital
Association for $100,000, GOP gubernatorial wannabe Dick DeVos for
$10,000 and some Florida-based anti-drug group (the Drug Free America
Foundation, which is run by Betty and Mel Sembler , who formerly ran
Straight Inc., a chain of now defunct and allegedly abusive teen
rehab centers) for another $15,000. That'll cover the administrative
expenses and maybe a couple robo-calls. There's no money for TV
commercials and probably no radio, either.

In fundraising, they're not going to get anywhere near the pro-Prop 1
folks, which is bankrolled to the tune of $1.7 million by the
D.C.-based Marijuana Policy Project.

But in the meantime, Schuette is front-and-center at press
conferences and always accessible for media interviews, even when the
subject is about his own experience smoking dope as a student in the '70s.

It reminds me of 2001 when the Republican Party was holding its
biennial leadership shindig at Mackinac Island. Schuette was hosting
an evening party at the Village Inn and everybody was invited.

Schuette stood on the front steps with his wife, Cynthia, greeting
everyone as volunteers handed out campaign stickers with only the
word "Schuette" printed on the front.

The rumor was Schuette was angling for AG, but nobody had nailed that down.

When my turn came to shake his hand, I said, "Senator, I have this
sticker, but it doesn't say what you're running for."

"No," he grinned. "But they spelled my name right, and that's the
most important thing."