Yearly Archives: 2009

Biden swears in Inez

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inez-sworn-in

Here’s a photo of the ceremony Wednesday night in which Inez Tenenbaum was sworn in as chair of the Consumer Products Safety Commission. The photo was taken by Scott Wolfson, a self-professed photographic amateur who works for CPSC (and follows me on Twitter, so hello, Scott). The guy who is not Joe Biden is Samuel, of course.

Scott reports that Veep Biden had the following remarks:

On Wednesday evening, Chairman Tenenbaum had the honor of being ceremonially sworn-in by Vice President Joe Biden at the White House.  The Vice President remarked that the agency plays a vital role in keeping children and grandchildren safe and giving parents confidence in the safety of the consumer products they purchase.

So congratulations again, Inez!

There’s something backward about this: Sanford’s on vacation, and I’m not

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This morning, The State continued to mine the e-mails and phone records it has FOIed from the governor’s office. We learned among other things that Commerce Secretary Joe Taylor was hunting for Sanford when he went MIA last year with his girlfriend.

My former paper also had a story about what I wrote about yesterday — the fact that the governor is taking time off from work yet again. I particularly liked what Boyd Brown had to say:

“I thought he was going to focus on getting the state back on track,” said state Rep. Boyd Brown, D-Fairfield. “It doesn’t sound like he’s with the program.”

Sanford canceled a meeting with John Rainey, chairman of the Board of Economic Advisors, to discuss state revenue data. Sawyer said Sanford’s canceled meetings will be rescheduled….

Another concern is the state’s 12.1 percent jobless rate, tied for third-highest in the nation. New jobless numbers are expected Friday. E-mails released by the governor’s office show Sanford declined at least one meeting with a company looking to expand its S.C. operations because he was in Argentina.“It might be a wise idea for the governor to be out of town when the new unemployment numbers come out,” Brown said.

You can say that again.

But the most meaningful part of the story, to me, was this:

Since June 18, when he left for Argentina, Sanford has spent 12 of 28 calendar days in Columbia or on the road on gubernatorial duties, according to his governor’s office. Sanford did not work on six of 19 business days during that period.

The rest of Sanford’s time has been spent at his Sullivan’s Island home or on family retreats.

Twelve out of the last 28 days actually on the job… Folks, I’ve been unemployed since March, and I haven’t had the spare time to so much as go to the beach for a day. I’m busy on a freelance job today (which I’m about to get back to), and I’ll be busy tomorrow, and I’ll continue to stay busy until I land a full-time job, and will be busy for a long time after that.

But I’ve always had trouble understanding the governor’s work ethic. When he first started running for governor, he had been out of Congress for a couple of years. I asked him then what he had been doing. “Nothing,” he said, adding something about hanging out with the boys, changing diapers.

I think it’s great for a man to spend time with his family. A man who doesn’t spend time with his family can never be a real man. And Mark Sanford right now really needs to be working on that. But at some point, we have to talk about the fact that the man is being paid to do a job, and he wasn’t doing it very well to start with …

Today’s header: Sanford, the media and me

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Just a quick note about the latest header picture on my Home page.

This was taken by Jim Hammond of SCBiz (formerly of The State) during the gov’s confessional press conference on June 24. I’m there representing The New York Post. Around me you can see Temple Ligon of the Columbia Star (to my right, your left), Tim Smith with The Greenville News (cowboy hat), Peter Hamby of CNN, John O’Connor of The State (on crutches) and Mary Ann Chastain with The Associated Press (photographer, far right of photo).

You know the rest of the story.

Tonight’s header picture: Rusty and Rudy

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Since I unveiled the New Look several people have complimented me on the photos. Of course, I’ve been changing them out so fast that you’ve probably missed some of them. For instance, I just took down one of Stephen Colbert and me, and put up the one you see now on my home page, which shows Rudy Giuliani in Columbia back in 2007, while he was still a contender in the GOP nomination race.

Like most of the pictures I’m using (except the ones other people shot of me with somebody), I shot it with my little digital Canon, which you see me using to shoot video of Obama in the picture you get when you call up individual posts. Here’s the video I was shooting, by the way.

The one now gracing my home page was taken on August 14, 2007, at the convention center in Columbia. Here’s video I shot at the same event. I chose this image because, even though the focus and resolution aren’t great, it worked with the extreme-horizontal format. So we’re talking form over content. But let’s examine the content: Local political trivia buffs will see some familiar faces sitting listening to Rudy, such as Gayle Averyt and Rusty DePass. Rusty, who plays piano at my Rotary, made some news of his own recently, until the governor was kind enough to draw attention away from him.

And just to get WAY deeper into the recent political past than you probably care to go, here’s a piece Rusty wrote back at about this time explaining why he was for Rudy.

One thing this blog’s got, folks, is depth. Layers upon layers of info, whether you want it or not…

I’ll explain another picture tomorrow. And yes, the photo below is from the same event.

rudy-050

No public schedule for YOU!

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A working journalist friend has been forwarding me the governor’s public schedule, and she’s tired of doing it, and says I should just ask Joel (Sawyer, the gov’s press guy) to send them straight to me, and I haven’t asked him yet. Do you think he’ll send me one? Am I, as a blogger, sufficiently legit? We’ll see. When I get around to it. I’m kinda busy job-hunting and stuff.

But if he’s going to refuse to send one to anybody, it will be the folks over at the state Democratic Party. I mean, the poor guy tries to take a few days with the wife (he just sent out a new schedule postponing the rest of the week’s appointments so he can have some time with Jenny) under extremely trying circumstances, and they get all over his case:

SC Dems Outraged By Sanford Second Summer Vacation

Columbia, SC – South Carolina Democratic Party Chair Carol Fowler released the following statement today in response to Governor Mark Sanford taking another vacation after being back on the job for less than a month. Sanford canceled pending work for the rest of the week.

“A good many South Carolina families with out-of-work breadwinners had been hoping their governor would stick around and look for ways to bring more jobs to the state.  He’s essentially been off the job for a month, and now he’s off again for a week’s vacation.

“Of course, unlike most South Carolinians, Mark Sanford gets paid whether he shows up for work or not.  Once again it’s clear that there is one set of rules for Sanford and another set of rules for everyone else,” said Fowler.

Now, you see, Sanford’s thinking about now, this is why I didn’t put out public schedules before now…

I strongly suspect that — apart from when he was doing his executive budgets, which he was very obsessive about, and I mean that in a good way — one reason the gov never put out schedules before was because they would have looked kinda thin. I don’t know that; I just infer it from all the complaints I got from people who said this governor wouldn’t meet with them, unlike previous governors. Such as the folks over at Employment Security, who can be seen complaining about that very thing on this video.

So unless the governor starts doing a lot of gubernatorial stuff he didn’t used to do, his public schedules are going to give his critics lots of ammo. Which is why South Carolina’s Democrats are so thrilled that he keeps saying he’s not going to resign. They really, really want this state of affairs to continue through the 2010 election. It’s like Christmas every day for them.

“All the News that Gives You Fits”

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Most of the reactions to my blog’s new look have been positive — so thanks to all for that (and I’m still working on it, so I hope you’ll like it even more as we go forward).

But the new look has caused a number of you to question the tagline that I’ve used for the last few years (you can still see it here on my old blog): “You’re either on the blog or you’re off the blog.” It was, of course, a paraphrase of what Ken Kesey told the Merry Pranksters: “You’re either on the bus or you’re off the bus.” More specifically, here’s the full quote from when he spelled out the policy — which was a reference to state of mind as well as physical location:

There are going to be times when we can’t wait for somebody. Now, you’re either on the bus or off the bus. If you’re on the bus, and you get left behind, then you’ll find it again. If you’re off the bus in the first place — then it won’t make a damn.

Anyway, for years, I’ve thought about whether to stick with that, or go with the one you see up there now: “All the News that Gives You Fits.” This is a play on the Rolling Stone slogan (“All the News That Fits“), which is in turn a play on The New York Times‘ “All the News That’s Fit to Print.”

It’s also the official motto of The Status Quo, the fictional newspaper featured in a comic strip that Robert Ariail and I planned, but never fully executed, back in the 90s. The strip was set in the capital of a small Southern state, and it also featured:

  • A protagonist named Hampton “Sugarboy” Shealy Ravenel (or something like that), who was a lobbyist and general all-around fix-it man who may not have been the sharpest knife in the drawer, but knew everybody and meant well. I got the nickname from Robert Penn Warren, and the idea for the character from Randy Newman (“…college men from LSU/Went in dumb, come out dumb, too./Hustlin’ ’round Atlanta in they alligatuh shoes/Gettin’ drunk every weekend at the barbecue…”).
  • Auntie Bellum, the owner of the boarding house where our anti-hero lived. She is already a regular character in Robert’s cartoons. You’ve seen her before — such as in this cartoon and in this one and in this one — you just didn’t know she had a name.
  • The state’s junior senator, Grits Holler, and the senior senator, Storm Thunder. We thought we’d introduce the characters by initially introducing Grits merely as The Junior Senator, and he would be drawn looking like a centenarian.
  • Two mice, named Sol and Edgar, who lived in the Statehouse and who, unbeknownst to everyone except our hero, actually wrote all of the legislation that ever passed. They did so at night, when no one was looking. The protagonist’s value as a lobbyist arose from his close relationship with the mice.

Anyway, you get the idea. A mix of political satire and Mayberry-style downhome gags. Sometimes the strip would consist merely of dialogue among boarding house residents settin’ on the porch shelling peas for Auntie Bellum, a la Andy and Barney. Other story lines were less down-to-earth — such as a recurring thing where Sugarboy gets taken up into the spaceship by aliens who take the form of two-headed Elvis impersonators. Anyway, the whole thing was too Southern for the folks in New York who Robert tried to sell it to. So we set the project aside.

I’m sufficiently fond of some of the characters and situations that, since the strip didn’t fly, I now and then think of writing a novel based on the characters — less cartoony, of course, more serious, but some of the same characters and situations. Now that I’m unemployed, I’m thinking more and more about that novel…

All of which makes me happy to turn to The Status Quo for my new catchphrase, which — knowing the backstory as I do — at least makes me smile…

Wish me luck (and iron): I give blood today

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I’m starting to slosh, I’m drinking so much water. And I doubled up on my iron pills yesterday, to make sure I don’t get rejected (I hate it when that happens).

I’m giving blood over at the American Red Cross on Bull Street at 11:30 today. Hopefully (if the iron is high enough), I’ll get to do the double-red-cell thing.

You should come join me…

Eckstrom declares stimulus failure after 13 days

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I saw that among the gov’s appointments on his public sort-of schedule was a briefing from S.C. Comptroller General Rich Eckstrom, having to do with the stimulus. The schedule didn’t say when or where said meeting would take place, but maybe it was today, since we now have this report:

Eckstrom: Revenue down 10% in June; stimulus not working

Monday, 13 July 2009
Staff Report

COLUMBIA — State general fund revenues for June were down 10%, or $71.7 million, compared with revenues for June 2008, evidence that the stimulus funds are not having the desired effect, S.C. Comptroller General Richard Eckstrom said.

For the past 12 months, the general fund revenues were down 12.5%, or $828 million, Eckstrom said.

“While everyone wants to see our economy improve, these revenue numbers indicate that it’s just not happening, even months after the president’s trillion-dollar stimulus spending bill. State and national unemployment rates keep climbing higher, so there’s certainly no evidence that jobs are being created or saved through the massive deficit spending that’s occurring in government,” he said.

How do you like that? We finally get the full stimulus coming to us after months of his ally doing all he can to stop it. It was to be spent in the budget that started 12 days ago, on July 1.

But ol’ Rich has already declared it a failure on the 13th. How about that?

You don’t suppose that, like some folks of the other party with regard to Iraq, he wants us to fail — do you?

Sanford’s “public” schedule, sort of

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Here’s Mark Sanford’s second-ever public schedule. Still no actual public events, but there’s no news in that — he never has been much of one for such events. One of the minor complaints I’ve gotten about this guy since Day One was that he has a tendency not to go to the kind of schoozing events that most politicians love.

One reason I predicted a couple of weeks back to ETV that he would decide soon to resign was because he has NEVER liked the “being on display” thing. This is a guy who would MUCH rather be digging holes on the “farm” than interacting with humans. Since a governor of South Carolina can get away with doing very little, it wasn’t so hard on him, until the Argentina trip. I predicted that it wouldn’t take long before, with all this new scrutiny, he would decide it wasn’t worth it. Not because of people demanding he resign or anything, but just because it wasn’t worth it to him. Perhaps, if he ever starts having actual public events, my prediction will turn out to be correct. But so far, I missed the call. (If you want to see actual video of me getting it wrong, click here.)

I’ve always figured that the reason his office didn’t put out a public schedule was that they didn’t want anyone to notice just how little he did in public — or worse, how little he did in private, either.

But with the new “openness,” he’s putting them out — sort of. Here is his list of chores for the week, without days or times — just stuff he says he’ll do sometime this week:

Gov. Sanford’s Public Schedule – Mon., July 13 – Fri., July 17, 2009

Columbia, S.C. – July 13, 2009 – No public events are currently scheduled for this week, but we will advise individually for any event added. Gov. Sanford will be working in Columbia for the week, with intermittent trips to Sullivan’s Island.

Meetings and briefings Gov. Sanford will take part in this week include:

– Meeting with staff and First Steps Director Susan DeVenny regarding the potential transfer of the Baby Net program from DHEC to First Steps

– Meeting with new Emergency Management Division Director Ricky Platt, who was named recently to succeed retiring director Ron Osborne

– Briefing by Comptroller General Richard Eckstrom regarding the work of the Stimulus Oversight Task Force

– Briefing by Board of Economic Advisors Chairman John Rainey regarding revenue forecasts in advance of the following week’s BEA meeting

– Receive a revenue update from state Department of Revenue Director Ray Stevens

– Receive an economic development briefing from Secretary of Commerce Joe Taylor and Deputy Secretary for New Investment Jack Ellenberg

– Briefing by Department of Social Services Director Kathleen Hayes regarding the upcoming release of an LAC audit of DSS.

-###-

Meanwhile, in the middle of the Pacific Ocean…

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… my high school classmate Burl Burlingame, who actually still has a newspaper job (30 years with the Honolulu Star-Bulletin), is taking note of our governor’s doings (and what I’ve been saying about them):

Fascinating Apathy

Written by Burl on July 10th, 2009

Brad Warthen may not be a classic good ol’ boy, but he’s a good ol’ Brad. Headlong in the blogging game after being riffed by South Carolina’s The State newspaper, he’s keeping us up to date on the resident weirdness of Gov. Mark Sanford. Naturally, The State never needed him more these days.
Yesterday, the folks who want Sanford to abdicate held a rally, and pretty much no one came. Now, we have our own governor who’s acting oddly — so much so it’s a topic of discussion — but Sanford is something else.
I don’t care that Sanford is having an affair. Even if he’s a complete hypocrite about it, having viciously chastised President Clinton in the past. These Type A politicians seem to always be having something on the side. President Kennedy was boinking a different bimbo every night, Wilbur Mills was bouncing stripper Fanne Fox, Grover Cleveland was busy siring little Clevelands elsewhere, and we all know who Thomas Jefferson was galloping.
Deal is, despite all the tut-tut, affairs are a fact of life. Sometimes they might even be necessary.
The ew-ew-ew thing about Sanford is not that he’s been thrown for a loop by his heart, but that, as far as affairs go, the guy is wildly incompetent. We want our leaders to be human beings, but we also want them to be smarter and more accomplished than we are. There are meth-addict doorway dwellers who poop in public who are more capable of keeping their affairs discreet than this governor.
Sanford is acting like he needs to be wearing a helmet and a leash. His mistress is in Argentina, for cripes sake. No one would have ever figured it out if he’d had a lick of smartness. The only thing the South Carolina legislature should be debating is whether they need road signs up in Columbia that say SLOW GOVERNOR AT PLAY.

To which I felt compelled to reply:

July 10, 2009 at 9:02 am

Hey, and Burl, don’t forget to tell your readers in Hawaii that ol’ Brad is a graduate of Radford High School, class of ’71.

One thing about our governor… yes, he’s incompetent. Those meth-addicts you mention would probably put forth a more credible effort at getting the Legislature to enact their agenda. But with this governor, that’s comforting to know.

There was a time when I was distressed that he was so incompetent, because it meant he not only wasn’t getting the GOOD things he advocated done — such as badly needed government restructuring — but he was so off-putting to lawmakers that he was actually setting those causes BACK several years.

But I’ve adjusted to that, and now take more comfort from the fact that he is just as bad at getting his BAD ideas acted upon — such as private school vouchers, and trying to turn down the stimulus money that we’d be paying for anyway.

Ya gotta look at the bright side.

And Burl, if I can ever help you out with your governor, just let me know…

Yesterday’s UNrally

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First, I have to say that I didn’t stay for the whole thing. I was going to, but I got an emergency call from my youngest daughter just after 6 — she was on the side of the road on I-26 between the I-20 and St. Andrew’s exits with an overheated engine — so Daddy had to run.

And the “rally” proper had just begun. A 19-year-old kid named Zach (I’d have gotten his full name if I’d stayed) was giving a speech about why Mark Sanford should no longer be governor, and not doing a bad job for his age. He was getting a smattering of applause and cheers from the handful of watchers there (and jeers from one of the two counter-protesters I saw). And I see that Phil Noble spoke later. But I had already spoken with Phil — he came up and tapped me on the shoulder just seconds after I finished shooting the above video. He had expressed his disgust that more people had not shown up, which he attributed to apathy. Citing a poll showing 60 percent of South Carolinians wanted Sanford gone, he indignantly wondered where they all were.

But the fact that I was able to shoot the video at 5:55 of a “rally” that was supposed to have started at 5:30 testifies to there being more wrong with this rally than public apathy. It’s rather telling that in the mercifully brief account in The State today, SC Democratic Party Chair Carol Fowler made a point of saying that she didn’t organize this.

Folks, I’ve been to a lot of demonstrations at the State House over the years — from the stunning first “King Day at the Dome” in 2000 with its 60,000 marchers to more modest, yet still-respectable, affairs, such as the recent one in favor of the stimulus (which featured FAR more people demanding Sanford be impeached than showed up for this one) to the “Tea Party” shortly thereafter), and this was the saddest one I’ve actually witnessed.

One of the actual organizers, my Facebook friend Catherine Fleming Bruce (who posted this picture of me from the event; you’ll note that I don’t exactly have a crowd around me), tried hard to get things rolling when she started the rally proper, introducing Zach at about 6. She rattled off an impressive list of folks who had suggested the governor resign, Democrats and Republicans both (prompting the heckler to say “all liberals!” which was almost as pathetic as the rally itself — Glenn McConnell a liberal? please…). But that merely raised the painful question — so where were all those prominent people? Catherine and Phil were the only two on the steps I recognized.

So, try as Catherine and Phil (and Zach) might, this was a bust. By the way, here are my Tweets on the subject yesterday in real time, up to the moment I got the urgent call from my daughter:

As I arrive, late, for the anti-Sanford “rally,” it looks like a pathetic bust…

The neo-nazis had a better-attended (and better-organized) State House rally than this sad little anti-Sanford affair…

There are a couple of stolid Sanford-supporting counter-protester, who must be thinking “Why bother?”…

Catherine Fleming-Bruce is up there trying, but it’s time to face the fact: this rally ain’t happening…

Catherine cites list of leaders of both parties who have called for resignation — but they’re not here…

A 19-year-old kid is addressing the crowd, and making a brave effort. Smattering of applause…

Did I say “crowd?” Sorry… I meant the, um, assemblage…

If you were there after I left, and would like to contradict me — hey, that’s what the comments function is for. Good luck…

unrally

Did it! I’m John Adams

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Just took a “Which Founding Father are You Quiz” — and no, I didn’t give them my phone number this time — and managed to answer the right questions to have it come out as follows:

John Adams

Visionary – John Adams was one; you are too. You are very critical and you are a perfectionist. Where you find faults, however, you have good suggestions on how to fix them or make them better. You are extremely intelligent, and an excellent judge of character and situation. Your causes are often altruistic, and you have a clear vision of what the future will be like. However, people have the annoying habit of not believing you, even though you always seem to be right. You also seem to never get the credit you deserve. People often find you to be ‘obnoxious and disliked.’ Never fear! Your ideas will come to fruition, and one day you shall be remembered beautifully for your efforts. Just keep at it!

Yes, I answered the questions honestly, but there were a couple of times when I could answer honestly more than one way, and I chose the one that sounded like Adams. Once or twice, though, I bowed to accuracy and answered in a way that I thought was more Jeffersonian — but it turns out that for the purpose of the quiz, they counted those as Adams as well (I think). This of course reinforces my impression that he was the one I’m most like — particularly his more annoying, negative traits.

Anyway, I’m pleased with the result, since — whether I’m like him or not — he’s my fave.

Israel readies itself for Iran move

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One of my most trusted sources of naval intelligence, a veritable 21st century Stephen Maturin — and no, I can’t just come out and tell you his name; that would be indiscreet — brings to my attention this Reuters item:

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – An Israeli submarine sailed the Suez Canal to the Red Sea as part of a naval drill last month, defense sources said on Friday, describing the unusual maneuver as a show of strategic reach in the face of Iran.

Israel long kept its three Dolphin-class submarines, which are widely assumed to carry nuclear missiles, away from Suez so as not to expose them to the gaze of Egyptian harbormasters.

It was unclear when last month the vessel left the Mediterranean. One source said the voyage was planned for months and so was not related to unrest after the June 12 re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whom the Israelis see as promoting the pursuit of nuclear weapons to threaten them.

Sailing to the Gulf without using Suez would oblige the diesel-fueled Israeli submarines, normally based in the Mediterranean, to circumnavigate Africa — a weeks-long voyage. That would have limited use in signaling Israel’s readiness to retaliate should it ever come under an Iranian nuclear attack….

Egyptian officials at Suez said they would neither confirm nor deny reports regarding military movements. One official said that if there was such a passage by Israelis in the canal, it would not be problematic as Egypt and Israel are not at war….

So let’s see — maybe Israel has nukes, and maybe not (officially, that is). And maybe their missiles can reach Iran from the Med, and maybe they can’t. But in case they can’t, one just took the shortcut to the Red Sea. And the Egyptians watched them do it. Or maybe they didn’t; they’re not saying…

Israel is making sure its pieces are in the proper places on the chessboard, in case Iran decides to go beyond bluster and make a move. And who wouldn’t, if they had (or didn’t have; they’re not saying) the pieces to move?

Don’t judge too quickly (clever ads from extinct company)

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A friend shared with me these video ads that have apparently been making their way, in a viral form, across the Internet. First time I had seen them, though, and I enjoyed them enough to pass them on to you.

Ironically, the service it advertises — Ameriquest Mortgage — ceased to operate under that name two years ago. So I guess cleverness isn’t everything.

Otis to Sanford: It’s not personal; it’s strictly business

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You may recall that a while back I chided the head of the state Chamber for not taking a stand against (or for, for that matter) our governor during the stimulus farce (“Otis, tell him what YOU think,” April 30).

Well, Otis Rawl has gotten over his shyness about the gov, of so this item seems to indicate:

State chamber exec: Sanford’s departure now or later could benefit I-85 project

Embattled Gov. Mark Sanford’s woes could be good in the long run for a development off Interstate 85 and State 14 in Greer that legislators have said may include a Bass Pro Shop, according to the president of the South Carolina Chamber of Commerce.

Sanford opposed special tax breaks for magnet retailers, such as Bass Pro, and “if everybody was playing by the same rules, that’s fine,” state chamber president Otis Rawl said.

But other states offer incentives, he said, adding “If we don’t play the game, we lose jobs.”

“I think that all that’s happening around Sanford and depending what Sanford does will lend itself positively to whether Bass Pro Shop decides to locate here,” Rawl said. “It’s awful hard for a company to look at South Carolina and your governor, who’s supposed to be your biggest cheerleader, not supporting trying to get a company that would create anywhere from 500 to 1,000 jobs in the community.”

A Sanford resignation would put Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer in power, who would be “one of our businesses’ biggest cheerleaders,” Rawl said.

If Sanford does not resign, “It’s got to be a step forward for us to look toward 2010 to have a new governor that focuses on jobs and economic development,” he said.

In other words, whether sooner or later, Otis — like many in positions of business or political leadership — is really looking forward to the day when Mark Sanford is out of office. And it’s nothing personal. It’s strictly business.

Imagine you’re Janet Napolitano, and you’re meeting Mark Sanford…

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This morning, like many of you, I read the highly important, yet fairly routine, story about security at the port of Charleston:

NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. — Project Seahawk, a port security effort developed in South Carolina, is vital to waging the war on terrorism and a model for ports around the nation, U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said Monday.

Graham, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, Gov. Mark Sanford and other leaders had a private briefing on the project during a visit to the Project Seahawk headquarters at the old Charleston Navy Base.

Seahawk, created in 2003 in response to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, brings together representatives of state, federal and local law enforcement agencies who meet each day in a command center to share and compare information on harbor activity.

But as I read it, all I could think was: Say you’re Janet Napolitano. You’re the U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security. You’re a serious person, with a serious job, and you’re here for a serious purpose. As you enter the room, visiting dignitary that you are, serious people turn to greet you… and Lindsey Graham introduces you to Mark Sanford.

So… do you have to suppress the urge to crack up? Do you say to yourself, Don’t smile, because then you’ll crack up! But then think, I have to smile, or it will seem unnatural… must make it the right kind of smile… And just when you think you’ve got the situation mastered, suddenly some line from a late-night comic, or something about crying in Argentina, or something else wildly incongruous to the sober subject of Homeland Security pops into your skull, just for a second, and you’re in trouble again…

Is there any way to carry on a normal conversation? And what about that first moment or so of small talk, when the natural thing is to mention something you’ve heard or read about the person you’re meeting, and naturally you think that just last week, this guy was going on and on with the press about his soulmate, going out of his way to cement his reputation as a total flake…

If you’re not a South Carolinian, and have no other context for perceiving this guy, how can you think of anything else upon meeting him? After all, while in South Carolina the headline on this story is, “Graham: Charleston port security project vital,” on CNN’s political ticker, it’s “Graham: Sanford says there’s hope’ for reconciliation with his wife.” Which was actually an element in the S.C. story; but to CNN, that’s all they care about.

Seriously. Follow the links. Previously, he was known nationally at the anti-stimulus guy. Now, he’s far better known (partly because of the same lurid popular culture that gives us obsession over Michael Jackson) as the runaway-to-Argentina guy.

Mind you, my imagining of the scene probably has flaws in it. Since they were both elected governor in the same year, Ms. Napolitano and Mr. Sanford may have already known each other. But still. A solemn, serious moment with this underlying sense of total absurdity.

That’s the way I imagine it, anyway. And if it didn’t happen that way this time, there are going to be plenty of times in which an important visitor keeps thinking, Here I am with the famous runaway governor! He actually runs this state (People from out of state wouldn’t know how insignificant the office of governor actually is here)! How weird the people of South Carolina must be!

Karen Floyd thinks it’s over. The party censures him and it’s over. Fat chance. As several people no doubt pointed out during that four-hour conference call, every minute that this guy is still governor, still going through the motions representing our state to the world, is a gold-plated gift to the Democrats in next year’s election.

No wonder the GOP executive committee was so divided:

Twenty-two committee members voted for a reprimand, 10 called for his resignation, while nine voted to support the governor.

Before we move on, could you (briefly) explain the Jacko thing to me?

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My first thought glancing over the news today is, OK, after today can we move on? No more Michael Jackson this, Michael Jackson that, wherever I turn?

But then my second thought was, While I don’t want to delay the moving-on thing, could someone explain to me what everybody is worked up about?

I don’t get it, and I never will. It’s related, I think, to the phenomenon on reality shows in which the audience screams constantly — not when something remarkable happens on the stage, or someone shouts “fire!” — but at everything that happens, everything that is said. It drives me nuts, and my wife and daughters get tired of me complaining about it when they’re watching their dancing shows, but it still bugs me because I don’t get it. Why is it that exciting?

As for Michael Jackson — well, I don’t want to speak ill of the dead; I just look forward to when we’re not speaking about him at all. What I think about him now is what I thought four years back:

Tuesday, 14 June 2005

What’s WITH these people?

Celebrity worship is a mystery to me. This puzzlement is deepened by the case of Michael Jackson.

OK, I can sort of understand how someone might have become a fan of his at one point. In the early ’80s, he was a remarkably talented young black man. But now that he is no longer young, or black, or manly in any way you’d notice, and hasn’t put forth any striking evidence of talent lately, about all he’s got left is being remarkable. And not in a good way.

I’m not saying this to be mean or anything like that. I just don’t see how, beyond memories of some catchy tunes and dancing that seemed to defy physical laws, anybody would feel any sort of emotional involvement in anything that Mr. Jackson does, or anything that happens to him or doesn’t happen to him.

And yet there are people who really, really cared what happened in his trial. Michael_jackson_fans They were willing to put their whole lives in suspense over whether he was found “guilty” or “not guilty.” They made it their business to be there at the courthouse, as close to his side as possible. They were ecstatic at the verdict.

What I want to know is, Why? It seems to me that even a cursory examination of the stipulated facts regarding Mr. Jackson would give any sensible person considerable pause. I mean, I can seeing pitying a man who lives in a fantasy world and sleeps with young boys to whom he is not related (even innocently), and has obsessively done bizarre things to his own body. But I can’t see how anyone would admire him, or hitch one’s own happiness to his fate.

I’d appreciate any insight that anyone out there has into this phenomenon. If I could understand this, maybe I could understand the whole celebrity culture.

Anyway, before we move on, does anyone have an explanation for me? Preferably, a brief one?

That settles it: Miss SC says Sanford should stay

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I posted this on Twitter this morning, but I didn’t want y’all to be left out of the loop. The Spartanburg paper reports that the newly-crowned Miss South Carolina says our governor should stay, even though she was “a little shocked” by his recent confessions:

Newly crowned Miss South Carolina Kelly Sloan said in an interview Sunday that the embattled governor of the state she’s now the public face of should be allowed to finish his second and final term…

“People make mistakes,” Sloan said. “I was a little shocked, to tell you the truth. But as a governor, he’s done his job. I do not think he should resign. He’s asked for forgiveness, and I think forgiveness is something we should all have for one another.”

One wonders what she means by “He’s done his job,” but hey, who’s quibbling? Could I win a beauty contest? I don’t think so. Then I should ne’er presume to second-guess her. As Theodoric of York would say, “Who’s the barber here?”

No word yet on what Her Majesty thinks about the abdication of former beauty queen Sarah Palin, or the all-important, burning issue of Michael Jackson still being dead.

Speaking of which, did you see that TV networks plan to anchor the news from his memorial service? In a world in which priorities are that far out of whack, I suppose it’s not out of line at all to ask a beauty queen about who should govern us…

Tom Davis appointment a case of qualification trumping connection

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Here’s something you don’t see every day in South Carolina:

Columbia, SC – July 6, 2009 – South Carolina Senate Majority Leader Harvey Peeler announced today that he has recommended State Senator Tom Davis (R-Beaufort) for appointment to the State Ports Authority Legislative Oversight Committee.  The 10-member legislative committee was recently created with the passage of the port-restructuring bill to help ensure stability and efficiency in state ports operations.

Tom Davis is one of Gov. Mark Sanford’s closest friends and advisers, and has said the gov should stay in office. Harvey Peeler was one of the first GOP senators to call on the governor to step down. Tom served previously on the Ports Authority, as a gubernatorial appointee. And he holds up the Jasper port deal with Georgia as a key achievement of the Sanford administration (when I suspect it is actually a key achievement of Tom Davis).

But Sen. Peeler appointed Sen. Davis anyway. We need to see more of that in South Carolina, a lot more: People being chosen for office because of their qualifications, rather than who their friends are.

Anyway, good choice there, Sen. Peeler.