"Chrysler will slash more than 3,600 factory jobs in the Detroit area by eliminating a shift at its truck plant in Warren and cutting work at engine plants, stamping plants and other facilities.
Add to that the 2,000 salaried jobs Chrysler is getting rid of, most of them at its Auburn Hills headquarters, and Metro Detroit stands to lose more than 5,500 jobs..."

Do you remember the shocking announcement by Pfizer that they'd be giving the ax to 2,100+ Michigan employees a couple weeks ago?  The bad-news train was just getting warmed up.  The announcement by Michigan's second largest car manufacturer makes 2,100 jobs look like a drop in the bucket.

And there's something important to remember here.  Every single job being eliminated represents an actual living, breathing person, and more than that, a family.  It's tough enough for a family to rebound from something like this when the economy's doing OK, but in a single-state recession?  

Thank goodness Jennifer Granholm's on the job and she's going to fix things.  When asked for her comment she issued the following statement, calling the companies decision:

"market-driven in the face of tough global competition and the continued refusal of the Bush administration to advance American manufacturers' ability to compete or least keep the playing field level."
"We will be marshaling our resources to help those workers and continue our work with the company as it strengthens its business model."

Of course we've heard all of that before.  She's practiced it a lot.  Every time there's a major plant closure or people hurting anywhere in the state she trots out the same line, shifting the blame.

It is funny, though, that she talks about tough global competition and ignores the tough national competition.  Michigan bore the brunt of this announcement but all of the closings and all of the lay-offs and all of the hurting families are here in North America where we're all dealing with the same national issues and problems.  

Granholm remains a pawn of organized labor.  Granholm goes out of her way to slam the management of companies like Delphi in the press, leading directly to consolidation away from our state.  Granholm proposes tax hikes that will cripple Michigan's only growing industry while sucking billions out of the pockets of residents already struggling to make ends meet.

Sure, yesterday Deleware took a shot.  So did Missouri.  And those shots hurt.

But when there's a complete devastation of a work-force on the order of yesterday's announcement, and over 40% of the damage is done to Michigan in particular it's pretty clear that it wasn't the President's fault, John Engler's fault or Dick DeVos' fault.  

No.  This was Jennifer Granholm's Valentine's Day Massacre.