Former Amway head DeVos to run for Governor of Michigan

[UrbScotty]

http://www.woodtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=3424009&nav=0RcdaaZH

Dick DeVos, the former president of Ada-based Alticor Inc., has told 24 Hour News 8 that he will run for governor of Michigan in the 2006 election.

<snip>

"At this point I am able to confirm that it is my intention and my plan to run for governor in '06. And we'll be announcing a campaign sometime down the road. But I wanted to, once a decision was made, just square up and tell people exactly where I'm at," DeVos told us.

DeVos is no stranger to politics, as he is one of the top contributors to the GOP in last year's presidential cycle and the son of Richard DeVos, a consistent top tier Republican benefactor.

<snip>

"I'm looking forward to traveling around the state, as I already have all of my life…and traveling around the state, talking to people…as someone who's been involved, had led a business organization. I know how important it is to listen, to learn and then to make decisions," DeVos told us.

http://www.woodtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=3424009&nav=0RcdaaZH

[LuckyTheDog]

1. And next, the White House?

DeVos no doubt sees the governor's job as a stepping stone to a presidential run. He must be stopped. He's like GW with on an extra dose of crazy pills.

[indigonation]

7. Agreed, the DeVos/VanAndel cult are perfect neocons and insiders.

Dick and Betsy DeVos recently made news as the 5th largest individual donors in the US - of course all to GOP campaigns.

They must be stopped!

[TahitiNut]

15. Even worse, they're Dominionists.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominionism

[meppie-meppie not]

32. what a fucking nightmare! they have so much money just hand

them the bloody keys :scared:

[UrbScotty]

20. That's my big concern (nt)

[Pithlet]

2. Ugh

I'm glad I no longer live in Michigan. I hope he loses, for my old homestate's sake.

[UrbScotty]

21. Well, Michigan has gone blue these last couple Presidential elections

And we have two Democratic Senators.

[Pithlet]

22. True

Just the thought of the possibility of DeVos for Governor... :scared:

[Roland99]

3. Great...maybe one day he'll make the WH and we can have MLM for our gov't

[coloradodem2005]

4. Oh. Just what my birth state needs.

A governor coming from the mother of all network marketing scams. May he get destroyed.

[Botany]

5. Great I hope everybody in Michigan tries .....

..... to sell him useless crap at all his campaign stops.

Hey, Dick wanna buy some soap?

[goclark]

11. Is he as worthless as his products? nt

[MADem]

37. Hahahaha!!!

I guess everyone has met or knows one of those pathetic assholes who get in on that scam!!! They can't understand why people run when they see them coming!

[indigonation]

6. This is expected, but really bad news.

I hope the Michigan Dems do a good job of spinning how corrupt and partisan and cultlike these people are. This is not good news for Jennifer Granholm. He will have support from the business community. And they have more money than God.

DeVos also was the one who introduced Shrub at the notorious Calvin College commencement speech a couple of weeks ago.

[coloradodem2005]

8. I understand the concerns about the business community.

But anyone in Michigan needs to expose him and his fraudulent ponzi schemes for what they are.

[AlCzervik]

10. ding ding ding!!!!

oh i hope there is a least one intrepid reporter out there.

[coloradodem2005]

13. I had an unfortunate experience with a MLM company.

Not AMWAY, mine was Excel Communications. The company actually did quite well for many years and then went for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last year. But that is beside the point. I was sucked in just as I was finishing high school and I tried it and the people who got me in backstabbed me and I was out $250 and I got virtually no customers and absolutely no representatives. I simply wanted to make an honest dollar and it was represented to me as honest work and easy work. I was 18 young and cocky. They took my money and I got virtually nothing back. I don't understand how something that is on the edge of legality can continue for such a long time.

[AlCzervik]

14. that sucks and i don't know how they survive either

either people don't care or don't wanna know or they just dont know period.

[coloradodem2005]

17. I'm betting most of them don't know.

That and those who get involved don't want to realize that they bought into a myth.
The ultimate myth that making a lot of money can be easy.

[Dave Reynolds]

9. Well,

that cements my vote for Jennifer, then.

[MichiganVote]

12. The ultimate pussy whipped male. Right Betsy?... who has been

drummed out of repub. politics for ineffectiveness? These two are the ultimate billionaire losers.

Just what we need in America, another millionaire/billionaire wannabe politician.

[1monster]

16. He's a bit long in the tooth by now, isn't he?

[LizW]

18. When is it enough for these people?

DeVos is a billionaire. He's bilked thousands of little people out of fortunes, driving many to bankruptcy and ruin, even suicide. http://www.smirkingchimp.com/print.php?sid=21105
He owns members of Congress, and once got Newt Gingrich to engineer a $200 million tax break for his company.

On top of his obscene wealth, he's considered a devout Christian by the fundamentalists. He receives all the adulation accorded to him as a "fine Christian man".

But that's not enough, apparently. He wants more power. He wants to destroy public education in Michigan with his voucher scheme.

You know, I believe that good and evil in the universe balance each other. For all the evil we see, somewhere there is good. I believe this. But sometimes it gets hard to remember because evil is just so darned "in your face".

[pfitz59]

19. This is far worse than I can ponder.....

http://www.mediamouse.org/static/betsy_devos_connection_to_war_profiteering_in_iraq.php

"Betsy DeVos, current chair of the Michigan Republican Party, has a little known connection to war profiteering and private security forces in Iraq. Betsy DeVos' younger brother, Erik D. Prince, is the founder of Blackwater USA, a private security firm currently working in Iraq."

more.....

http://www.usndemvet.com/blog/archives/001735.html

http://www.newsobserver.com/nation_world/blackwater/series/v-printer/story/1476580p-7623132c.html

http://www.thinkingpeace.com/pages/arts2/arts206.html

http://www.jihadunspun.com/newsarchive/article_internal.php?article=102488&list=/newsarchive/index.php&

much, much more. evil scummy people!

[cosmicdot]

23. he's been a member of the Council for National Policy (CNP)

what is Michigan doing re to BBV?

from:
Amway's GOPyramid Scheme

~snip~

Billionaire Richard DeVos, who appears regularly on the Forbes magazine list of richest Americans also owns the National Basketball Association's Orlando Magic and has been a member of the highly secretive Council for National Policy. He once served as the finance chairman of the Republican National Committee. He also created a conservative philanthropy for he and his wife called the Richard and Helen DeVos Foundation.

For more than 35 years, the DeVos family has been a major benefactor of both the religious right and the Republican Party. In the final weeks before the 1994 election, the Amway Corporation gave the GOP $2.5 million, which at the time was "the largest political donation in recent American history," the Washington Post reported. And in 1996, the company donated $1.3 million to the San Diego Convention and Visitor's Bureau "to help fund a Republican cable TV show to be aired during the party's national convention," the Associated Press reported. The program featured "rising GOP stars as 'reporters,'" and aired on the Family Channel which was owned by Pat Robertson.

~snip~

http://www.mediatransparency.org/stories/amway.html

how can a secretive group be allowed to organize as a tax exempt organization recognized by the IRS/US gov't?

[mitchum]

24. DeVos also has LONGTIME CIA connections

[UrbScotty]

26. CIA? 11/22/63 just popped into my mind (nt)

[Strawman]

25. Good. He doesn't have a chance unless turnout is really low

Too extreme, too much of a West Michigan conservative. Maybe his $ keeps it somewhat close, but most undecideds will hear Amway and be immediately turned off. The Repugs would be wise to tell him to just keep writing checks and be satisfied with being the power behind the throne.

Wonder what anti-gay or church/state ballot measure they'll hoist upon us next year to raise the fundie turnout? I bet they'll also cool it on the Ward Connerly crap lest they increase turnout in Detroit.

[UrbScotty]

27. I hope most people in Michigan hear that (nt)

[msrbly]

31. You don't know Grand Rapids well enough

He's worshiped like a god in West Michigan. Between the arena, museum, hotel, cancer research center, college buildings and children's hospital wing they own Grand Rapids. If he runs, I'm not sure Detroit can stop him.

[bleedingheart]

33. my father in law lives in Grand Rapids and thinks the DeVos Klan is

detestable...

A lot of people in GR may take his money but they know it was earned on the suffering of those on the bottom of they pyramid.

[msrbly]

34. I agree with your father in law

but, there are a lot of "good little republicans" in Grand Rapids who won't bite the hand that feeds them.

[bleedingheart]

36. yeah but with all those lay offs at Steelcase and the banks locally

there are a lot of good little republicans who are realizing that corporate america isn't their friend.

I have heard that even Meiers is having problems due to Walmart...

[UrbScotty]

44. I live in suburban Grand Rapids (nt)

[leesa]

28. Very, very , very BAD thing if he wins.

[meganmonkey]

29. This is scary. This man is a f*ckin' nutjob

Granholm has a very low approval rating right now, IIRC, and if he makes it through the repub primary I think he has a good chance of winning...

Our economy is TERRIBLE right now - I think we are 2nd or 3rd worst in the country, and a lot of people blame Granholm. Which is ludicrous considering our economic woes are following three terms of repuke Governor "I believe in 2-term limits" Engler (I seldom use words like 'repuke', but it is certainly appropriate for him).

They also don't like her because she's Canadian, and a woman, and a REASONABLE person (I am, by no means, her biggest fan, but I will happily work to get her reelected). I know people who despise her as much as I despise bush** .

:scared:

We are a blue state, but not by a whole lot. I think our biggest hope is that the Repubs are making such asses of themselves nationally, and that may help some...

[Madrone]

38. "I believe in 2-term limits" Engler

I thought I was the ONLY one that remembered that. You're the only one I've ever seen mention it - and I get the deer in the headlights look when I mention it. :hi:

Gawd - I hated that asshole.

[msrbly]

30. Please say this isn't true!

I won't deny that the DeVos and VanAndel families have done great things for Grand Rapids but don't let them take over our state. I'm actually surprised that Dick would run and not his wife, Betsy. Betsy has said that Michigan economic woes are the result of "high wages" that make the state uncompetitive (Wednesday, April 28, 2004 By Steven Harmon The Grand Rapids Press)

They are a bunch of elitist doofuses who have no grasp on reality.

Jennifer Granholm isn't perfect but she's a great governor and great for Michigan.

[coloradodem2005]

35. What have they done that is so great?

THey just became the perveyors of one of the first legal ponzi schemes and in fact made it a cult.

[msrbly]

39. Maybe you misunderstood me

I don't think the DeVos'/VanAndels (can't mention one without the other - they're partners in crime) are great. I don't think Amway is great in anyway either. That being said, they have fronted the money (invested, sponged whatever you want to call it) for an arena, a public museum, a cancer research institute, and a children's hospital in Grand Rapids. Without "their" money (ill gotten gains from their reprehensible pyramid scheme) Grand Rapids would be empty. Since they started pouring money into downtown GR it has done a 180. I guess you have to live there to understand it.

Even so, I don't support the DeVos family in any business venture, let alone aspiring for the highest office in my home state. I will work diligently to keep the DeVos family out of Lansing.

[President Jesus]

40. Dick DeVos campaign contributions

Amway = Republitard

Dick jr: http://www.newsmeat.com/ceo_political_donations/Dick_DeVos.php

Big Daddy Richard DeVos (Amway founder): http://www.newsmeat.com/billionaire_political_donations/Richard_DeVos.php

[FuriousMNDem]

41. "Tell people exactly where I'm at" - yeah, where's your brain at?

nt

[noonwitch]

42. He's a christian dominionist

Rich and Betsy have been trying to get voucher funding for christian schools for decades. There was a major rift between Betsy and John Engler a few years ago, because he wouldn't back a voucher initiative on the ballot. Considering the bill did have the endorsement of the archdiocese of Detroit, it still went down in flames, with like 2/3 voting against it.

The GOP would be very stupid to run Rich. Oakland County republicans like L. Brooks Patterson hate the GR religious nuts. They'd be far wiser to run Gorcyca, a very popular Oakland County prosecutor who is well-liked. He could beat Granholm-I know Oakland County democrats who would vote for him.

[UrbScotty]

45. DeVos? Christian?

"Inasmuch as you did it to the least of my people, so also you did it to me." Matthew 25:39

[denverbill]

43. Amway isn't a legitimate business. It's a Ponzi scheme.

He's the perfect Republican candidate. He's made his fortune screwing people out of their money with phony dreams of riches.