Well, we asked her to give it up, and she did. Not that I think the two had anything to do with each other.
I spoke yesterday to Scott Malyerck over at GOP headquarters, and while he said there were folks still out there beating the bushes for excuses to protest the outcome (actually, he didn’t quite put it that way; I’m paraphrasing), it didn’t sound like they were coming up with much.
That’s not surprising. Last week when I called both Zeke Stokes with Jim Rex and Hogan Gidley with Mrs. Floyd, Zeke was all charged up and optimistic and looking forward to the results of the recount, Hogan was more like, Who’s Karen Floyd. OK, I’m paraphrasing again. What I mean is, he sounded like a guy who had put the whole campaign behind him and moved on with his life. In short, disengaged and uninterested.
But it took Karen Floyd being lady enough to stand up and say the other guy won to put an end to speculation, and I appreciate her doing that.
Speaking of the other guy, it sounds like Mr. Rex has put together a pretty good, bipartisan transition team. Here’s hoping he lives up to his promises.
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As Randy stated, The State and Brad Warthen distorted this campaign with converage of only one issue: school vouchers. That was intended to simplify the issues in order to defeat Karen Floyd.
It did a disservice to the readers by ignoring the other issues, and insuring that whoever won would not have an promises or expectations to fulfill.
“It (the recount) also showed Richland County played a crucial role in helping Rex”… He outpaced Floyd, a 44-year-old Spartanburg businesswoman, by 30,827 votes.… (From the State newspaper)
The State newspaper played the “wedge” issues of vouchers/Howard Rich more skillfully than Lee Atwater or Karl Rove. The State’s apparent mission was to drive up the negatives of Mrs. Floyd in Columbia…a haven of government workers and the seat of the educational establishment. They did exactly that, and despite The State’s prior denouncement of such tactics, their accomplishment single-handedly denied Mrs. Floyd the office, and awarded it to Mr. Rex.
The State must be very proud of itself, and one can only assume that in the next 4 years one will read much about education…but little about educational accomplishment or improvement.
PS…RE: Brad’s latest post…what a bizarre and petty post. Have you never heard of the phrase…”gracious in victory”?
Chris, your expertise doesn’t explain why Floyd barely carried her own county. Maybe you think Brad wrote anonymous Op-Ed pieces for the Spartanburg Herald Journal pushing his “wedge” issue. Maybe he push polled Floyd’s mother in law to convince her to contribute to Rex.
Funny how this “logic” doesn’t explain why Lexington County, which is in The State sphere of influence, voted differently than Richland County.
According to Chris, Brad has been crossing the country stopping choice in its tracks. After all, after 15 years of this scheme in Milwaukee, why have so few cities adopted it?
Chris, you’ll read about education in the next 4 years. Your interpretation is clearly already skewed as you offer little more than demagoguery.
Randy…
Sometimes i make the mistake of thinking u are a serious person…then I realize I am wrong.
You are unable to read a post and see it for WHAT IT SAYS.
I pity your students.
Chris
The State’s apparent mission was to drive up the negatives of Mrs. Floyd in Columbia – Chris
Chris, I understood your petty and biased post just fine. Your warped reasoning is to blame, not my interpretation.
I pity your students – chris
Very mature.
Lee, Chrisw. et al,
Let’s give Jim Rex a chance. Truth is, no one knows how the next four years will go and how well he will perform. It serves no purpose to hope someone fails just so you will be proven right in not voting for him.
I voted for Alex Sanders but have been pleased with Lindsay Graham’s work thus far in the Senate. I’ve voted against Mark Sanford twice now but each time he’s won, I’ve given him the benefit of the doubt. He’s a smart guy and could do a lot for this state if he was as captivated by people’s real needs as he was by the world of ideas.
I wish him well. To do otherwise is to betray my state for the sake of revenge.
Therefore I ask you to hold your fire on Rex. Don’t prejudge him. Analyze his policies as he produces them-you may be pleasantly surprised. If not, then disagree and suggest an alternate course. But he’s our SI of education for the next four years and it behooves all of us to hope he performs well.
Amen, Paul! About Sanford and Graham as well as about Rex. So many people are so partisan that they truly ARE willing to betray their state, or country, for the sake of political vindication. They’d rather see everything go to hell than see someone they don’t support succeed.
In a much lighter vein — the pictures above remind me once again how little the pictures on those posters looked like her. Don’t get me wrong; I always thought she was every bit as pretty in real life as the woman on the posters, if not more so. It just looked like a different woman.
I’m often surprised by the pictures that good-looking women prefer of themselves — they tend to be ones that don’t look like them. It’s like they’re not satisfied with the way they actually look — even though most women would kill to look like that — but have some other ideal in their minds.
I could give some other examples, but I figure I’ve dug this hole deep enough already. I’m going to start turning Laurin into a femi-nazi again.
I guess it’s just human nature to be dissatisfied with your own appearance, no matter how good you look.
I’ll be interested to see what sort of publicity photo Segolene Royal puts forward as she runs for the presidency of France. Not because I care to prove my theory, or about who wins the French election. I’ll just be interested to see. Maybe she’ll go with the most famous photo of her. If I were her consultant, I would suggest it.
Aw, take it easy, Laurin.
Brad,
Check out Rex’s transition team-a couple of your bloggers made the list. We’ll try to make ya proud.
If that were a motion, I’d second it! Thanks Paul, for a great comment. Gloria Borger wrote a great piece in somewhat the same direction (re the national political scene), in the latest edition of U.S. News and World Report.
Paul, maybe you can get Rex to address, even in passing, the facts regarding the racial divide in SC. I didn’t see much on this issue during the campaign.
SAT ave score: Black 856 vs White 1037
HSAP English standard met: Black 76% vs 92%
HSAP Math standard met: Black 67% vs 90%
AP passing rate: Black 27% vs 59%
End of Course exams
algebra 1: pass rate Black 68% vs white 88%
biology 1: black 40% vs 75%
English 1: black 52% vs 81%
physical science: black 20% vs 55%
Brad, do not covet thy neighbor’s wife.
Jim is well qualified, and is raring to go, so I hope and pray he’ll make some progress for the sake of our state.
This should not be a partisan position, so I also hope and pray that the legislative leadership will work sincerely with Jim, and not trip him up for political reasons.
I think Karen would have won this election if she had not been so evasive on the vouchers issue(Brad tried to help her be more specific!).
Looks are fair game in politics. It is one of many factors in how people vote, whether we like it or not. Karen always seemed charming at campaign events, but seemed to be “acting” on TV. I’m not sure her consultants provided good advice.
I am not coveting Segolene Royal. I’m just remarking. Of course, I don’t think she’s anybody’s wife; I think they have one of them there continental “relationships.” But I get your point. As far as I’m concerned, her “husband” can (and should) keep her forever. I’m satisfied with my own arrangements.
None of that changes the fact that it’s going to be a lot more pleasant to follow French politics over the next few months than it’s been in my lifetime. Sort of in the same sense that readers found it more pleasant for me to post that picture of Andie MacDowell as a relief from looking at Borat. They didn’t want to possess her or anything. They just found her more pleasant to look at.
Come to think of it, in some of the photos I’ve seen, Andie and Segolene actually look kind of alike. But I don’t think Andie’s a Socialist.
Brad, forget Segolene, here is a French citizen we can all be thankful for on Thanksgiving. If CBS had been smart enough to put her on instead of Katie, they would be leading the ratings war. By the way, this link is approved for family viewing.
See Melissa!
I’ll give Rex the same time I give any private executive to start making a difference – 60 days. If he didn’t enter office with at least some ideas and plans, he had no business running for office.
We now have 36 years of educrats doing nothing or doing harm. 3 generations of children have been abused by politics. Those who take office now cannot expect more than 1 year to clean it up.
Count me in the group that hopes Rex succeeds. The question is what is the measure of success? Is it going from 49th place to 45, or 40, or whatever? I didnt vote for him but hope he can do something right to improve the current environment. One good thing is he likely wont be spending 2 years off the job running for Senator or Governor, will he?
And Randy, those stats you posted are considered to be racist by many. Just exposing the differences and how low the blacks are is considered to be racist. Sad but true. Looking at those numbers would indicate that the improvement programs should target the blacks. That means Lee, Marlboro, Calhoun, Williamsburg counties along with some others. Call me a cynic but my guess is Rex’s new programs will be focused moreso on the rest of the state. Time will tell.
By the way, I heard on the street that when Grady Patterson was asked to concede, he answered back, “You mean I ran?”.
Brad, I was kidding about coveting your neighbors wife.
Happy Thanksgiving to all, even my nemises 🙂
Lee sez:
I’ll give Rex the same time I give any private executive to start making a difference – 60 days. If he didn’t enter office with at least some ideas and plans, he had no business running for office.
Ho, ho, ho. Is that as long as you would have given Floyd, Lee? I think not. She wouldn’t even have assembled her “team of advisors” in 60 days.
But, you’re right, Floyd wouldn’t have needed 60 days to begin colluding with Sanford and Howie Rich to force vouchers down the throats of South Carolinians.
Of course, the only reason that Floyd came as close as she did is because she evaded disclosing Howie Rich’s real plan to SC voters.
Why is 60 to 90 days the normal expectation for a private sector CEO to start PRODUCING results, but unimaginable for government administrators to even start analyzing the situation?
We have Brad asking for another 12 years, an entire K-12 generation, to be used, even though the bureaucrats only serve a 4 year term. I think we can all agree that 4 years is too long to wait for results, much less 12 years.
The students and taxpayers have endured 36 years of continuous changes, fads, and spending at a rate far exceeding the growth of incomes in this state. That is, by any assessment, failure to fix the problems.
Hey, Brad, did I detect your trademarked selective memory in today’s (11/28) editorial tribute to Floyd for conceding the election that she lost?
Your recollection of the 2000 presidential election seems cloudy. You seem to think that the litigation concerning Ms. Harris’ partisan misconduct was just “bad sportsmanship”– like arguing with a rec-league ump. But, most striking was your dismissal of energetic dissent against the anti-American policies of Der Decider as “years of rabid opposition.”
Obviously, you’ve chosen to forget the multi-million dollar, eight-year campaign to bring down President Clinton. I guess that comparing Chelsea Clinton to a dog on television; accusing the First Lady of murder; and, impeaching the President for oral sex outside of marriage doesn’t qualify as “rabid” in your judgement.
I’m not surprised. You have conistently implied that opponents of the Iraq quagmire aren’t patriotic Americans.
In light of the implosion of Iraq maybe you should look in the mirror the next time you feel like questioning someone’s patriotism– or even judgement.
Considering that the Gore campaign already had lawsuits drawn up making claims of voter irregularities weeks before the election, and filed in several states before polls closed and any actual claims had been made, the entire thing smelled like Gore knew he was going to lose and just raised a phony stink.
When it was found that he also sued to stop our armed forces from voting absentee and to throw out votes from thousands in heavily GOP wards of Florida, America was reminded again what a slimy character Gore is.
The New York Times and other newspapers paid to recount the votes, and finally admitted that Bush won handily in Florida, yet the Lying Left Democrats persist in their big lie.
I can’t find the thread now, but Spencer questioned as to why we need school boards. I haven’t been back in the US long enough to really have a grasp on how it runs here, but I do have the impression that the parent board council of my kids’ German high school (which I was on for two years) had a lot more clout than the average PTA meeting here in the US. Inofficial clout, mind you, but I think the school administration pretty much listed to the advice of the parent board. We gave input on everything from curriculum to deciding how alcohol would be served at school parties (since the legal drinking age is 16, it was bit complicated, especially with younger students showing up at parties).
School administrators here undermined the PTA by forming their own group called the PTO, paying attention only to it, because they control it.