Michigan's major parties nominated the ballot's final candidates on Saturday

I hinted that I would continue my coverage of minor parties at the end of U.S. Taxpayers Party of Michigan candidates for 2016 when I wrote "This is also one of the few contests in which the Natural Law Party has nominated a candidate, but that's a story for another entry."  I'll keep that promise, but first I'm going to give the major parties their due.  WOOD-TV has video in advance of the story in Michigan parties picking Supreme Court, other nominees.

Democratic and Republican party activists are meeting to pick Supreme Court candidates and other nominees for the November ballot.

In case the woman speaking in the background at the Michigan Democratic Convention, it's Wendy Davis, who I featured in Today is primary day in Texas.  She may have lost the election for Governor of Texas, but she's still a celebrity in Democratic circles.

The stories from both MLive and the Detroit Free Press emphasized the presidential contest, which only applied to the weekend's conventions as far as choosing the Electors for the Electoral College.  Both papers buried the actual candidates on the ballot as well as their significance far down in the story.  I'll let the Free Press report that news.

The state Board of Education and the boards of the University of Michigan, Michigan State University and Wayne State University all are dominated by Democrats, and Republicans are hoping to eat into those majorities this election year.

Not very likely.  About the only way that will happen is if Schuette wins the state's appeal to permanently prohibit straight-ticket voting before the ballots are printed.  I doubt that will happen.

Toward that end, the Republican delegates nominated: former state Rep. Tom McMillin and Nicolette Snyder for the state Board of Education; [Ron] Weiser and [Carl] Meyer[s] for the U-M board; William Deary and Dan Kelly for the MSU Board of Trustees; Michael Busuito and Kim Shmina for the Wayne State Board of Governors and incumbent Supreme Court Justices David Viviano and Joan Larsen for the two open seats on the bench. Both judges were appointed by Snyder.

The Republicans have the state educational and university governing boards as their goal for this election.  The Democrats have their own.

[L]eaders told delegates that they need to get engaged so Democrats regain the majority in the state House of Representatives and cut into the GOP majority on the state Supreme Court.

These are the Democrats' nominees.

Democrats nominated: Wayne County Circuit Judges Deborah Thomas and Frank Szymanski for the state Supreme Court; incumbents Denise Ilitch and Laurence Deitch for the U-M board; former state Sen. Dianne Byrum and Diann Woodard for the MSU board; Mark Gaffney and Yvette Anderson for the Wayne State board, and incumbent John Austin and Ismael Ahmed for the state Board of Education.

I was thinking of going to the Democratic convention on Saturday, but after an hour in the dentist's chair, I decided I'd rather stay home and hope that I found the nominees satisfactory.  Since most of the nominees were incumbents and better qualified people than me vetted the nominees for State Supreme Court, I'm fine with the results and looking forward to voting for all the Democratic nominees in November.

Stay tuned for a final story about the minor party nominees for state and federal office followed by the final entry of the month.