In an article for the Huffington Post, Gov. Jennifer Granholm pushes for a national program using federal grants to promote clean energy projects. Granholm envisions a federal taxpayer-funded grant program similar to the education Race to the Top program that pits states against each other to vie for the favor of federal officials who judge which states have the most effective public-private partnerships for clean energy.

According to Granholm: “If the states are the laboratories of democracy, Washington can take a lesson from what is happening in Michigan.”

Indeed, Washington should look to Michigan for a lesson in what not to do. During the past decade, Michigan has lost more manufacturing jobs than any other state and has consistently had one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation. Michigan's elected officials have jumped on the same bandwagon as other states in pursing green energy, which results in higher energy costs to consumers and businesses and ends up killing more jobs than it creates. It is much easier for the ruling class to hand out taxpayer money and pick winners and losers than to do the hard work of fixing the structural problems that make Michigan uncompetitive in job creation.

Let’s hope the incoming elected leaders roll up their sleeves and tackle the problems of a bloated and unresponsive regulatory process, a tax structure that punishes Michigan businesses and labor policy that makes it expensive to do business in the state. Politicians from both parties can once again look forward to the ire of voters if they do not do the hard work and make the tough choices they were sent to Lansing to do.

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