Michigan Dem chairman unsinkable?

There's at least one change that Michigan Democrats don't believe in.

What term limits can't kill, scandal, blunder and simple miscalculation usually do.

But for 15 years, Mark Brewer has commanded the Michigan Democratic Party as its chairman and Machiavellian mastermind. Taking aim at both the jugular of Republican opponents and in-house Democratic challengers -- and bolstered by the support of the UAW -- he has quietly emerged as the nation's longest-serving state chair in either party.

He's the last chair standing, the Fidel Castro of Michigan politics, a hard-nosed operative who keeps his seat, even when Democratic candidates don't. A slew of Republican party chiefs from Susy Avery to Betsy DeVos to Saul Anuzis served and departed during his reign.

Even his own party's governor couldn't depose him when she tried. In 2002, Brewer thwarted Gov. Jennifer Granholm's attempt to replace him with Melvin "Butch" Hollowell. Instead, Brewer served briefly as executive co-chair. He resumed solo leadership after Hollowell resigned amid personal turmoil, and Granholm bowed.

"He (Brewer) was more powerful than she was," notes Bill Ballenger, the Lansing-based political editor.

Within the Democratic Party, failed candidates mutter about Brewer's old-boy network and shrewd manipulation of the convention system. Journalists periodically predict his demise, inaccurately.

"He's a survivor," says attorney Geoffrey Fieger, who was furious at Brewer when the party dawdled in backing his 1998 gubernatorial bid.

But as Democrats suffer from mounting anxiety about gubernatorial nominee Virg Bernero's ability to go the distance, Brewer's long tenure ought to be up for review.

Farmington Hills lawyer Richard Bernstein, who failed in his bid for attorney general at a Democratic party caucus, pins no blame on Brewer.

"The party went with a different person," he says, of David Leyton, the Genesee County prosecutor who's now the Democratic Party candidate for AG. "That's politics."

Try to name another chief who has served at the helm of a statewide entity for 15 years.

The Harvard and Stanford Law-educated labor lawyer has weathered it all, demonstrating an appetite for winning -- and the stomach for the tricks that make that possible. While Republicans howled at the 2008 "sleeping judge" commercials that blasted Supreme Court Justice Cliff Taylor -- and Taylor insisted he'd never slept on the bench -- the label stuck and Taylor lost.

In this primary season, the Teamsters and other trade unions backed Andy Dillon for governor, and may now be courting Rick Snyder.

There's growing tension, even within the UAW, between private and public sector members, as teachers and state workers cling to wages and benefits the private sector rank-and-file have already lost.

Now Brewer's dodging accusations that he helped brew a discredited petition campaign to put Michigan Tea Party candidates on the ballot. In the mystery of Brewer's longevity, here are a couple of clues: He's too shrewd to leave his fingerprints and too clever to wind up in November taking the blame for defeat.

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