Michigan voters who twice delivered the governorship to a Republican computer executive-turned-venture capitalist are again being wooed by a wealthy outsider businessman with no political experience for the top post - this time a Democrat.
Shri Thanedar, who was unknown until six months ago, has spent millions of his fortune on TV ads in which he pokes fun at mispronunciations of his name, touts policy prescriptions like single-payer health care and, in recent days, jokes that some of the state's potholes are so big "you can see them from space."
"Our politics has become so polarized, and it's always demonizing the other side and grandstanding. Once a party comes in power, the other party focuses on trying to make them not successful," he said. "I'm a doer. I'm a commonsense, pragmatic person."