Voices include Mary Kramer, Phil Power, three bloggers and four Detroiters interviewed by Metro Times.

“The expert witnesses [against gay marriage] Bill Schuette has paid a lot of tax dollars to bring in aren't actually experts. One was a philosopher and another is discredited in his own profession. It's a cosmic joke.”
-- Eric Baerren, Mt. Pleasant blogger, posting on federal case in Detroit

“The science on this remains unsettled.”
-- Joy Yearout, spokeswoman for Atty. Gen. Schuette, quoted in Freep on impact of gay parenting

“You get the feeling you’re watching the next managerial star in the making.”
-- Kurt Mensching, Bless You Boys blogger, writing about Brad Ausmus in Detroit News

“If the Detroit Tigers can replace an entire goddamn baseball field’s worth of grass in the depths of this winter, why can’t we send a manned mission to Mars?”
-- Nancy Nall Derringer, Grosse Pointe Woods blogger

“This thought that the rest of the world is buying Detroit seems to be misplaced.”
--  David Szymanski, deputy Wayne County treasurer, quoted by Michigan Radio

“Detiquette” (Detroit Etiquette) Section
From Metro Times interviews by Michael Jackman

“The golden days of you just being young, white, educated and moving to the city with an idea and warranting, like, a Sunday feature in the Free Press are over. The fact that you’re living here is not newsworthy anymore.”
-- Sean Mann, southwest Detroit and founder of Detroit City Futbol League  

“I don’t know how many public meetings I’ve been to where people have said, “We don’t want to become another Brooklyn.’ ”
-- Michael Stone-Richards, College for Creative Studies professor

“A lot of white people moving in [to Detroit] are oblivious to ideas like white privilege.”
-- Lila Cabbil, northwest Detroiter

“The identity of Detroit was shit. Now it has a cachet about it. Now people outside Detroit want to make Detroit T-shirts about it and sell it back to us. People want to ride the Detroit train.”
-- Torya Schoeniger, owner of Good Girls Go to Paris Crepes

“Conyers has a lot of history behind him. But maybe Detroiters should be asking, ‘What have you done for me lately?’ Tough to name anything he has brought to his district in recent years.”
-- Mary Kramer, Crain’s publisher, in column

“With all the retirements from the Congress over the past few months, I keep wondering how many mature adults will be left next January.”
-- Phil Power, Bridge magazine publisher

Compiled by Alan Stamm