Anybody live in Michigan?

[SineSwiper]

Because you are fucked!

No police, no fire dept, no DOT, no cigarettes, no alcohol, no lottery. I'm taking bets on how long it's going to take before martial law gets declared.

[Zeus]

Don't they allow concealed weapons in Michigan?

I'm sure they're gonna have a wild time now.....

[Nev]

That's *nuts*. I've never heard of a state government shutting down completely before. I wonder how many times this kind of thing has happened in our history.

What the balls happened?

EDIT: No cigarettes? Is that because they're federally regulated? If that's true, Sine, I agree with you - I'd expect riots all over the place if an entire state has to go through nicotine withdrawal. Detroit is especially gonna be fucked, because it's already fucked by economic depression. I almost spelled it "Detriot" and maybe I should have left it that way.

[Nev]

Somehow I skipped the fact that it includes alcohol, too - plus the fact that the state police will be shut down, putting the entire burden on the city police departments.

"Liquor sales are regulated by the state and therefore will stop during a government shutdown. Stores will be able to sell the inventory they have on hand, but will be unable to purchase additional inventory."

"In order to be sold, cigarettes must contain a State of Michigan tobacco tax stamp. Stores will be able to sell the inventory they have on hand. However, if a wholesaler does not have sufficient stamps, cigarettes that do not carry a stamp cannot be sold to retailers."

You know, I didn't even see 8 Mile, but something tells me if they fail to fix this crisis before people start running out of liquor and cigarettes, two things will happen.

1. Rumrunning and illegal cigarette shipments are going to have the entire state rocking like it was 1929. Buy an Al Capone pinstripe suit and your girl a flapper costume for extra style points.

2. Detroit is going to burn right to the fucking ground.

[Nev]

Idly, I wonder why this is not on CNN. It seems like the kind of thing *I'd* like to know about my country.

I really gotta find better news sources.

[SineSwiper]

1. Rumrunning and illegal cigarette shipments are going to have the entire state rocking like it was 1929. Buy an Al Capone pinstripe suit and your girl a flapper costume for extra style points.

I doubt it's going to last that long. If it lasts more than a day or two, I would be really surprised and well, the public might as well raze the state congress for not fixing the problem. After all, US history has taught us that nothing motivates politicians more than the threat of getting the shit kicked out of them.

[Nev]

Hah! So, so true. Oh, man, I know we've had our differences over the last few weeks, but that was classic. For some reason the line "I'll show you a Boston Tea Party!" floated through my head.

I prefer the peaceful coup though...

[SineSwiper]

I was thinking of the Irish Draft Riots, but the LA riots and countless others are good examples.

[Blotus]

I can't be bothered to comb the site, so could somebody just tell me why they're doing this?

[Julius Seeker]

I'm with Black Lotus on this.

[SineSwiper]

The State Govt is in a budget crunch, and can't pay its employees, so they are going to shutdown for a time. I think it's more of a political move than anything else.

[Ishamael]

It's bad, but not all *that* bad. It's not like police stations and hospitals will be shut down.

[Shellie]

An agreement was reached apparently..I guess the threat of shutdown worked.

[Nev]

Serves me right for awfulizing!

I stand by Sine's point that any state in the union deprived of cigs and alcohol for longer than a few weeks is likely to start rioting though.