Sounding a theme he mentioned during our lunch Wednesday, Gov. Mark Sanford put out a press release today praising a handful of House members who pretty consistently voted to uphold his budget vetoes — and running decidedly against prevailing sentiment in the body in doing so.
On Wednesday, the governor’s legislative liaison Carl Blackstone told me folks in the chief executive’s office had been talking for some time about the emergence of a "reform caucus" — or as the release called them, a "Growing Nucleus," in the House. He ascribed this in part to the fact that 50 percent of the GOP caucus had been elected in the last six years. He stressed that they weren’t just Sanford clones, though: "They’re not carrying our water; they’re independents."
Of course, the governor has an erratic sense of the meaning of "reform." Carl cited the examples of these same folks supporting Sanford initiatives on government restructuring (which I would call real reform) and linking growth in the state budget to inflation (which I would call wacky). In his release today, the governor said, "There’s a growing core of House members who – like most working South Carolinians – realize that the good ole’ boy system of growing government at nearly three times the rate peoples’ incomes are growing simply doesn’t make sense." (There’s that arbitrary standard of his again. As I said to him Wednesday, and as we’ve said editorially, if the program’s not worth the money, say so and kill it. But don’t say it’s worthwhile, but that you need to cut it to match some arbitrary formula.)
Well, I think some of the lawmakers in question are genuine reformers myself. But that’s partly because of something something that both the governor and Mr. Blackstone choose to shrug off about them: They don’t support the signature Sanford tuition tax credit proposal, the "Put Parents in Charge" bill. I’m thinking in particular of Ted Pitts, Nathan Ballentine, Kenny Bingham and Joan Brady. (While she wasn’t quite the Sanford stalwart some of the others were, Mrs. Brady supported enough of the governor’s vetoes to draw the ire of colleagues.)
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