Yearly Archives: 2009

Jake on the missing governor

From my files -- Jake Knotts at his endorsement interview in '08.

From my files -- Jake Knotts at his endorsement interview in '08.

Tonight I dropped by a Lexington County GOP confab at Hudson’s BBQ (last time I was there, it was to see Mike Huckabee when he still had a shot at the presidential nomination), and pretty much every member of the county delegation was there except for the two Nikkis (Haley and Setzler).

It was very hot — SO hot that even a seersucker suit was too much, so I went out and left my coat and tie in the car. Then, when it was all over, and the lawmakers had answered constituents’ questions about legislation and such, I went up and asked Jake Knotts about our missing governor.

I asked Jake because, near as I could tell from the reporting at thestate.com, he was the one who raised the hue and cry about the governor running off to who knows where in a SLED car last Thursday — leaving his security detail behind.

The senator said “when he didn’t show up the next day or the day after that, I called Chief Lloyd” at SLED. He said he raised to Reggie Lloyd the idea that it seemed improper for Jake — a former cop — to be driving around in a cop car equipped with blue lights when “he’s not a sworn officer.”

The senator also kept returning to the point that the governor was gone “on a Father’s Day weekend, and his wife says she didn’t know where he was.”

Further, Jake believes the governor was remiss in his constitutional responsibility by not notifying the lieutenant governor of his absence. And unlike the folks in the lt. gov’s office, the senator is completely unsatisfied by the governor’s chief of staff, who is not an elected official, saying he knows where the governor is.

Jake says he and the governor have had their differences — which may count as his understatement of the evening — but the gov had never done anything to concern him to this extent. “I’m really serious about his mental state,” he said, adding that he knew that the governor had had a rough time — with the stimulus battle, with seven years in office “with little to show,” with having gone 0 for 10 on his recent vetoes — and if he “wants to go on a sabbatical, I have no problem with that,” if “he turns the helm over to the lieutenant governor.”

Just FYI, folks, Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer, unlike the governor, is a political ally of Sen. Knotts. He kept praising Andre for not bucking his security (security which the governor believes the lt. gov. shouldn’t have, but that’s another battle he keeps losing). I said something about how I certainly feel better knowing someone other than Andre is driving. That wasn’t exactly the point Jake was trying to make, but he didn’t argue with me about it.

Jake made the point a couple of times that, if only for sake of emergency preparedness and Homeland Security issues, someone official should know where the governor is, which is one reason for him to have SLED agents with him. “The people of South Carolina’s security shouldn’t be jeopardized because the governor doesn’t want security.”

When I asked Jake to give me his updated contact numbers in case I needed to reach him later, he gave me four of them, adding, “And I guarantee you my wife knows where I’m at.”

Summing up the situation, Sen. Knotts said of the missing governor, “He’s suffering from the same thing he suffered from with the Senate — lack of communication.”

The senator added some remarks about how he’d like to see the governor turn things around and be more successful with lawmakers in his last years in office, but expressed doubt that will happen: “He’s done built that fence too high now.”

Anyway, for what it’s worth, that’s what the guy who was apparently the first official to ask, “Where’s the governor?” had to say about it tonight…

The governor vanishes

Having been busy today polishing my new material (fortunately, my thumbnail had already been polished for me), I just now picked up on the thing that has S.C. blogs buzzing today.

So no, this one was NOT a scoop for me.

So I refer you to the piece at thestate.com written by John O’Connor and Clif LeBlanc:

The whereabouts of Gov. Mark Sanford have been unknown to state officials since Thursday, and some state leaders are questioning who is in charge of the executive office.

Neither the governor’s office nor the State Law Enforcement Division, which provides security for governors, has been able to reach Sanford after he left the mansion in a black SLED Suburban SUV, said Sen. Jake Knotts and three others familiar with the situation but who declined to be identified.

Sanford’s last known whereabouts were near Atlanta, where a mobile telephone tower picked up a signal from his phone, authorities said.

First lady Jenny Sanford told The Associated Press today her husband has been gone for several days and she doesn’t know where he is.

The governor’s personal and state phones have been turned off and he has not responded to phone and text message since Thursday, a source said.

Jenny Sanford said she was not concerned….

I don’t even know what to add to that…

Health & Happiness today

As mentioned earlier on Twitter, today it was my turn to do Health & Happiness again at Rotary. For you non-Rotarians, H&H is when somebody gets up and talks about the health and personal news of club members, and tells jokes.

If you’ll recall, last time I did it was the first Monday after my last day at The State, and I led off with:

Did you ever hear the one about the guy who had to do Health and Happiness on the first working day after he got laid off?

And, to use the phrase of Kenny Bania on Seinfeld, on that occasion I killed. In fact, I got a standing ovation — although, truth be told, that was more an expression of support over getting laid off rather than because my material was so good.

Nevertheless, it set a high standard in my mind, so I couldn’t just go out there with some jokes copied from a “clean jokes” Web site (an accepted and time-honored H&H tradition). I needed new, original material. Or at least, new to my audience.

So I recycled some stuff from the last few days on the blog and Twitter. I used the IQ test anecdote for instance. It went over well. No standing O, but lots of plaudits nonetheless.

Anyway, in keeping with my rule of not writing anything without sharing it with as wide an audience as possible, here’s the script I worked from, which I threw together this morning:

Health and Happiness 6/22/09

Remember when our speaker last week asked, “Are you a negative person?” No one replied. So how many of you were like me, repressing the urge to answer, “What’s your POINT?” … [said with an angry, paranoid tone] ARRRGGHH …

Hey, y’all – check out my shiny left thumbnail …

Can’t see it? Well, if you’re nice I’ll show it to you after the meeting.

How many of you have been to Columbiana Mall lately? Well, somebody has, because I had trouble finding a parking space there Saturday … That’s gotta be a good sign for the economy, right? …

Anyway, I was there Father’s Day shopping for my Dad — walking through the Mall, minding my own business, when all of a sudden this pretty girl with an exotic accent grabs hold of my hand and starts buffing my left thumbnail, while giving me a sales pitch about cosmetics from Israel, from the Dead Sea.

I was completely unable to stop her. Men are not equipped to handle such situations. I felt like Barney Fife in that episode when Barbara Eden is doing manicures at Floyd’s Barber Shop. He’s all suspicious at first, saying “Not my trigger finger!” but before she’s done he’s saying Aw, go ahead – do my trigger finger …

But I finally got away. And as I’m walking, I post something on Twitter about it. Before I could leave the mall, I got messages back from two other victims. One was a fellow guy who confessed to buying several products. Another was Sunny Phillips, whom you may know as a Republican fundraiser. She reported, “she just wouldn’t let it go. She tried to stop me again on the way back up the other side 10 minutes later, even calling out for me by name!”

My former colleague Mike Fitts wrote to me, “Yes, they’re ex-Mossad agents (you know, the Israeli secret service) who’ve gone into the Mary Kay business, I’m pretty sure. Three minutes in, I told them where the explosives were hidden.”

Here’s what I’m thinking, as I contemplate my one shiny nail:

If The State had these ladies selling advertising, I’d still have a job!

But I didn’t buy anything, that time… Not that I’m bragging on my sales resistance…

Back to our speaker last week – remember how she talked about how older people fall for those e-mail scams…. You know, “Dear sir, I am the Interior Minister of Nigeria, and I’m trying to give you five million dollars…”

And I knew what y’all were thinking: Those dumb old people, falling for that…

But I wasn’t thinking it – no sir, not after my IQ test…

Have I got time to tell about my IQ test?

You know those quizzes people are always taking on Facebook — like “which ‘Friends’ character are you,” or “what’s your real nationality?” Well, I took one of those one day recently, and as I was taking it, a dialogue box popped up saying that some of my friends — one of them closely related to me — had “challenged” me to take an IQ test.

Well, this hit me in one of my weak spots. One of my few skills is that I’m good at tests. Whether it’s the SAT or a current events quiz or whatever, I tend to score way over what you would think by looking, say, at my high school transcript. I play way over my head. Some people have a natural ear for music; I test well. Just one of those things.

Add to that the fact that I was recently laid off, which makes me additionally vulnerable — all that much more eager to show off, if only to myself. You know, the “I’ve still got it” phenomenon.

So I bit. I went to take the test. And boy, did I do well. The questions were so easy as to arouse one’s suspicions under most circumstances. Sort of on the level of, “answer this correctly and you win a free dance lesson.”

One was how many states are in the U.S., and only one of the multiple-choice answers was anywhere near 50. OK?

But instead of thinking, “Hey, wait a minute — what kind of scam test is this?” I’m going, “Man, I’m really acing this! What kind of IQ do you get with a perfect score?!?”

Then, when I’m done with the test, and I’m all eager to see my score, I get a page that tells me I just need to do one thing before my score will post on Facebook — type in my cell phone number, and tell who my service provider is.

Which … I did.

First of all …

my extremely high IQ score never showed up on Facebook.

Second, I started getting these text messages on my phone. Really stupid, irritating text messages, saying stuff like “Which male celebrity from ‘The Hills’ is dating Paris Hilton?” That’s a direct quote.

I would have protested, except that, you know, I didn’t want to tell anybody how I had let myself in for this.

Anyway, earlier last week the Verizon bill came. And I had been charged $29.97 for 3 “Premium text” messages. Yes, ten bucks apiece. So now I knew what I IQ was: it was 29 point 97.

So I got on the horn to Verizon and got them to block all such messages subsequently, which they agreed to do. Of course, by this time one or two more had come in, which will be on my next bill, no doubt. And there’s nothing I can do about it. Because, you know, I had signed up for them.

When I got off the phone, I reported to my wife that I had taken care of the problem, going forward. All done. All fixed. Don’t worry about it.

She asked, how in the world I came to get such messages?

I said, “How about if we just leave it at, ‘I’ve taken care of the problem,’ and not delve into that?”

But she persisted, and I went on to explain…

and she agreed with me that yes, I had certainly flunked the IQ test.

How I flunked my IQ test

You know those quizzes people are always taking on Facebook — like “which ‘Friends’ character are you,” or “what’s your real nationality?” Well, I took one of those one day recently, and as I was taking it, a dialogue box popped up saying that some of my friends — one of them closely related to me — had “challenged” me to take an IQ test.

Well, this hit me in one of my weak spots, naturally. As y’all know, one of my few skills is that I’m good at tests. Whether it’s the SAT or a current events quiz or whatever, I tend to score way over what you would think by looking, say, at my high school transcript. I play way over my head. Some people have a natural ear for music; I test well. Just one of those things.

Add to that the fact that I was recently laid off, which makes me additionally vulnerable — all that much more eager to show off, if only to myself. You know, the “I’ve still got it” phenomenon.

So I bit. I went to take the test. And boy, did I do well. The questions were so easy as to arouse one’s suspicions under most circumstances. Sort of on the “answer this correctly and you win a free dance lesson” level. One was how many states are in the U.S., and only one of the multiple-choice answers was anywhere near 50. The hardest question was picking the 16th president — even if I hadn’t known it was Lincoln, he was the only option offered within a century of the right time. I think the closest ones before and after were Thomas Jefferson and Bill Clinton.

But instead of thinking, “Hey, wait a minute — what kind of scam test is this?” I’m going, “Man, I’m really acing this? What kind of IQ do you get with a perfect score?!?”

Then, when it was done, I get a page that tells me I just need to do one thing before my IQ score will post on Facebook — type in my cell phone number, and choose my service provider.

Which I did.

First of all, my extremely high IQ score never showed up on Facebook.

Second, I started getting these text messages. Really stupid, irritating text messages, saying stuff like “Which male celebrity from ‘The Hills’ is dating Paris Hilton?” I am not making this up.

I would have protested, except that, you know, I didn’t want to tell anybody how I had let myself in for this. Because as dumb as it was to fall for this, I was smart enough to see what had happened.

Anyway, earlier this week the Verizon bill came. And I had been charged $29.97 for 3 “Premium text” messages. Yes, ten bucks apiece.

So I got on the horn to Verizon and got them to block all such messages subsequently, which they agreed to do. Of course, by this time one or two more had come in, which will be on my next bill, no doubt. And there’s nothing I can do about it. Because, you know, I had signed up for them.

When I got off the phone, I reported to my wife that I had taken care of the problem, going forward. She asked, how in the world I came to get such messages? I said, “How about if we just leave it at, I’ve taken care of the problem, and not delve into that?” But I went on to explain, and she agreed with me that yes, I had certainly flunked the IQ test.

Oh, but the tale doesn’t end there.

Today, I was in the Harbison area shopping for Father’s Day for me Da. And suddenly, I got another one of those messages, from the same source, which the words “Premium Messaging” appearing in the headline field.

I immediately went over to the Verizon place, fuming, and got in the queue for service. The lady at the door urged me to call instead because I was in for a long wait, but I said no, obviously one couldn’t get this taken care of on the phone. I was all indignant.

Fortunately, the wait wasn’t long at all. When it was my turn, I went through my indignant spiel again, and the service rep took my phone, and clicked on the message. It said, “Premium Messaging to this mobile number has been blocked…”

Oh.

So I looked really stupid again. I thanked the guy, and thanked the lady at the front door, and left sheepishly.

But you know what? Deep down, I have this gut fear that it’s going to show up on my bill again anyway.

Of course, this kind of scam should be illegal. Anyone who practices it should be drawn and quartered.

But who’s going to report them? The victims know how stupid they’ve been…

Inez confirmed

Here’s another scoop (to follow my earlier one on Twitter today about Lourie’s being sold): Inez Tenenbaum has been confirmed to head the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

Lindsey Graham had this to say:

“I’m pleased the Senate has acted quickly on the nomination and confirmed her to this important position. I know Inez and am confident she will hit the ground running. She will look out for American consumers and provide the agency with the leadership it needs.

“I also want to thank President Obama. He made an outstanding selection in choosing Inez Tenenbaum for this job.”

I’ll add my own “Thank you, Mr. President” to that. Good one there.

Stay tuned to bradwarthen.com, always first with the burst, and on the spot while it’s hot. Etc. (I stole those zippy taglines from Heinlein, by the way — in the interests of full disclosure.)

Totally apart from the fact that Samuel and Inez are friends of mine, her quick approval is a feel-good story all around. She’s a positive, capable person whose admirable qualities easily overrode partisan considerations, and that is something to celebrate.

SC (official) jobless rate rises to 12.1%

S.C. unemployment in May rose to 12.1 percent, compared to 9.4 percent nationally — officially. This leaves us tied for third-worst nationally, again (Michigan and Oregon are worse). And one economist notes that the true picture is worse than that:

Coastal Carolina University economist Doug Schunk said the true unemployment picture is around 19.9% for the state and 16.4% for the nation, when factoring in people who have given up looking for work and people working part time for involuntary reasons.

Encouraging, huh?

I found it interesting to learn that I live in the county with the lowest unemployment rate in the state — Lexington, at 8.1 percent. Of course, when you’re one of those who have been laid off, that’s not much comfort.

And oh, I just found a more complete version of the story, by AP’s Jim Davenport, at Forbes.com.

If GOP serious about Sanford, Palin, Obama 2nd term a lock

If GOP seriously considers Mark Sanford and Sarah Palin, as we so often see blithely asserted as though it well might, then Obama has a rock-solid lock on a second term, maybe a third.

A third? Hey, the constitution can always be amended again, if the threat to the nation is sufficient…

Nothing, but nothing you can set forth as examples of how feckless the GOP is these days comes even close to the bizarre fact that those two are mentioned, without a hint of irony, as contenders. It was crazy enough, bordering on obscene, when people spoke of Sanford for the 2nd spot last year. But this…

Imagine there’s no traffic; it’s easy if you try…

Earlier this morning I got into one of those blue-sky conversations with someone else who dreams about a light rail system for the Midlands, and it reminded me of this post from last year, in which I quoted in turn from a column I wrote back in 1998 on the subject:

Imagine: Say it’s a few years from now, and you live in Lexington and work in Columbia. You drive the mile or so to the station and leave your car in a parking lot. You take your seat and ride the old Southern line that parallels Highway 1 into the city. Call it the A line.
Despite all the stops, you get downtown in less time than it takes to drive, while getting ahead on work or (better yet) reading the paper. You change trains at the Vista Center station near the new arena and conference center.
Say you work where I do, near Williams-Brice Stadium (and why wouldn’t you; this is my dream, after all). You take the C line down one of the very tracks that used to frustrate you in your driving days (if you can’t beat the trains, join them). You get off within a block of work.
A few hours later, when you have a lunch appointment in Five Points, you take a quick ride back up to Vista Center, then through the underground stretch beneath the State House complex and the USC campus on the eastern reach of the A line.
Need to shop after work? Take the C all the way out to Columbiana, or the D along Two-Notch to Columbia Mall. (Where does the B line go? Out toward Lake Murray, which means it runs between 378 and the Saluda River, right by my house.)

The amazing thing about that original column is that it was written years before I had the chance to ride on the NYC system, which is the one I love the most, because it is the most extensive I’ve ever been on. The systems in Atlanta and Washington are nice, but the NYC system is such an organic part of the city, with such magical properties — you descend into it, and moments later you emerge into a different world.

In the last few years I’ve gone out of my way several times to go to New York mainly to ride the subways. I like to do other stuff — walk across the Brooklyn Bridge, for instance. But the key to everything I do is the transit system.

This morning, Nathan Ballentine wrote on Twitter that I-26 was “backed up like a parking lot” to Lake Murray Boulevard. How much better to be able to spend that time on a train reading the paper, coming in from Irmo, or the Northeast, or Lexington. And then to get around from Five Points to the Vista to wherever without having to hunt for convenient parking?

It would be wonderful. And it’s worth dreaming about, and enduring the scorn of those who keep saying it will never happen. Imagine there’s no traffic; it’s easy if you try…

Weather haiku

Just thought I’d convert a tweet from this morning…

Is it too much to ask for a nice, steady drizzle for a day or two? My lawn needs it, these T-storms have been all boom, little wet.

… into verse:

This week’s thunderstorms
have been all big, crashing noise,
too little water.

This, of course, is more in keeping with the spirit of haiku (nature themes) than my usual news-oriented poems.

Comfort reading

People speak of “comfort food.” Not being all that much into food myself, that’s not what I turn to to settle me when I need settling. In times of stress, I tend to turn to certain books that are familiar and comforting to read.

Not because of…

SORRY! I THOUGHT I HAD SAVED THIS AS A DRAFT LAST NIGHT! I WOULD PULL IT IF Y’ALL HADN’T ALREADY LEFT MYSTIFIED COMMENTS.

ONLY THING TO DO IS TO GO AHEAD AND FINISH…

Not because of … the subject matter, necessarily, but because it is familiar. Sometimes “comfort books” for me are ones I enjoyed from the very first read — such as Patrick O’Brian’s Aubrey-Maturin novels, which I’ve got to get somebody other than Mike Fitts (who turned me onto them, several years back) to read, so we can exchange esoteric references, because it’s fun. Other times it’s books I didn’t even like the first time I read them, but got hooked on subsequently.

The Aubrey-Maturin books (which you may associate with the film “Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World,” which is based upon them, but which is an inadequate summation) are so engaging because they so completely put you in another world. But it’s not a fantasy universe like in Tolkien, but a magnificently detailed recreation of the British Navy during the Napoleonic Wars. Jack Aubrey, one of the two main characters (the other is his particular friend Stephen Maturin), is based loosely upon Lord Cochrane, and most of the naval engagements described come straight from contemporary logs and gazette accounts.

The detail, from speech patterns (both formal and casual) to politics to popular culture to social arrangements to politics to the complexities of sailing a square-rigged vessel in all conditions all around the world. is so engagingly rendered that it removes you from whatever is going on in your dull contemporary existence. And when you’ve been away from these books, you’re as anxious to get back to them as Jack is always anxious to get back to sea after another of his disastrous (and often comically so) spells on dry land.

There are 20 books in the series, which are wonderful read individually or as one long, magnificent work. Or at least, that’s true through the 16th book, which is as far as I’ve read because I dread getting to the end of them and having no more new ones to read. Having finished the 16th a few weeks ago, I’ve started reading the previous books for the fourth time, and they are as fresh as ever. They are just so rich that there’s always something new. But the remembered, familiar passages are so enjoyable that you’re glad you remembered them, and happy to be experiencing them again.

And, did I mention, comforting?

Some other comfort books, that I’ve read to tatters:

  • Stranger in a Strange Land — This is the one I was thinking of when I said a comfort book doesn’t HAVE to be something I enjoyed the first time. I wrote a rather savage essay about this one in high school, despising it at the start. But it really grew on me, and I’ve worn out a couple of copies. (Why, oh why has this never been made into a movie? I’ll write the screenplay if no one else will…)
  • Dune — ONLY the first book. I hated the sequels. I’m on my second copy. Yes, the book that inspired the worst big-budget movie ever made…
  • Battle Cry — Here’s a weird personal fact about Leon Uris’ opus about the Marines in WWII: I first read it at the same time I bought “Abbey Road,” in October 1969, and to this day listening to the album (especially the second side) reminds me of the novel, and vice versa. I told you it was weird.
  • The Dirty Dozen — You probably didn’t even know there WAS a novel. Well, there was, and it was way better than the movie (as close to a violation of the Guy Code as it may be to say that). I read it when I was 14, and it was the first “adult” novel I remember reading. Long and involved, I practically memorized it. For years, I could remember the names of every one of the dozen cons without looking at the book, and probably still could, if you gave me a few minutes. Talk about your useless information.
  • The Once and Future King — I’m really into Arthurian legend (hey, kids, guess why the Harry Potter story is so appealing! It only rips off the best legends of the English-speaking peoples!), and this is the best version I’ve run across. Although I also have read and reread and enjoyed an obscure attempt to place Arthur in a realistic 6th-century setting, The Pendragon.
  • High Fidelity — Again, a good movie, but a WAY better book. Nick Hornby is great. Probably the best-ever evocation of the differences between the way male and female minds work. We don’t come out looking too good, guys, but it’s a fun read, anyway. One great passage: The protagonist’s girlfriend is explaining that he’s just too miserable to be around, and that if he isn’t happy he should Get Happy, and she stops him before he interrupts and says, Yes, I know that’s the name of an Elvis Costello album; that’s why I said it — to get your attention… Boy, did that feel familiar.

Well, I could go on and on, but you get the idea…

100 followers, and counting…

Just reached the 100-follower mark on Twitter. So that makes me like a centurion, right? Like the one in Matthew 8:9:

For I am a man under authority, having soldiers under me: and I say to this man, Go, and he goeth; and to another, Come, and he cometh; and to my servant, Do this, and he doeth it.

OK, I’ve already figured out that no one is going to do what I say just because they’re my “followers.” But as silly and insubstantial as it all is, I’ve acquired a miser’s acquisitiveness on this point. How many MORE followers can I get? I picture myself like Spartacus (just to continue with the ancient Rome thing), roaming the countryside while hundreds, thousands flock to my banner… (Warning — it ended badly for Spartacus and his followers.)

And even though there are no rules, or even conventions I can think of, I have it in my mind that, if only I can have more followers than I myself am following, I’m … I don’t know… an influential person. Or at least, ahead of the game. Whatever the game is. It’s the only way I know to keep score, anyway. And currently my score is 100 to 75.

Wednesday’s top stories

So where was my virtual front page Tuesday? Hey, I’m not getting paid to do this, so get offa my back! Be grateful for what I give you.

Harrumph. You may now join me in harrumphing. Harrumph, harrumph. (I didn’t get a ‘harrumph’ outta that guy…”)

Where was I? Oh, yes, today’s virtual front page:

National/International

  1. Lede: Obama Would Take Bigger Role in Markets — OK, this is not a perfect “Buzz” lede because it didn’t quite HAPPEN, but the event was the president proposing it. And it’s more important than the gay benefits thing, and more new than the  continuing Iran story. And nothing local or state was really lede-worthy.
  2. Iran Regime Cracking Down — Continued post-election strife in Iran. Look for a sidebar to go with it. Lots to inform readers about here.
  3. U.S. to Extend Gay Benefits — Just another turn in the screw of the Kulturkampf, but a fairly significant one.

Local/State

  1. Handcuffed Tax Study Commission Created — OK, so I threw in an editorial modifier there. The thing is, you sort of need that to see why what happened is important. Two things were essential to making it possible for comprehensive tax reform to happen: There must be no sacred cows, and the Legislature must have a straight up-or-down vote on the final result — no tinkering. That’s the only way anything could pass that would really clean up the tax code. So what did they do? They passed a bill that walled off as sacred the biggest, baddest immediate problem in our tax system — the 2006 property/sales tax swap. (This demonstrates why a commission is needed, because the Legislature itself is too invested in bad policies it created.) Whether they required an up-or-down vote, I could not learn from the coverage I saw.
  2. Vetoes sidebar — The XGR (that’s wire-service jargon for “legislature,” by the way) overrode all 10 of the governor’s vetoes. But that’s pretty much a dog-bites-man story now, isn’t it?
  3. Tenenbaum Draws Bipartisan Praise — This good-news story (anytime you can document bipartisan consensus, it’s good news) is one where local and national intersect.

Hearing goes well for Inez

Got this report from Samuel T. about his bride:

Inez had her Hearing this morning. It was a love-in by both sides ! You often do not see this!!! History is thus made ! Now they have to confirm her which could be a week or two ? Then you can feel safe again !!! You all can call our two Senators and thank them for supporting Inez.

It has really been nice to see the level of support for her from our state’s two GOP senators. I wrote previously about the handsome things Jim DeMint had to say, and today there was this release from Lindsey Graham:

Graham Introduces Inez Tenenbaum at Senate Confirmation Hearing

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) today made this statement on Inez Tenenbaum’s nomination to serve as Chair of the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC).  Graham introduced Tenenbaum at a Senate Commerce Committee hearing this morning in Washington.

“American consumers will be in good hands with Inez Tenenbaum at the helm of the Consumer Product Safety Commission.  She has a wealth of executive experience and has been intimately involved in consumer advocacy issues as an attorney.

“The Chairman of CPSC holds the public trust and I could not think of a better person to hold this position.  Inez is someone everyone respects, whether you agree with her or not.  She will look out for American consumers and provide the agency with the leadership it needs.

“It is a big honor for South Carolina to have her nominated for this position.  President Obama has made an outstanding selection in nominating Inez Tenenbaum and I look forward to seeing her confirmed by the Senate.”

####

It’s good to see South Carolinians sticking together. Of course, Inez is a super-capable person, and everyone involved knows that, so that helps.

In any case, a very UnParty day in Washington, from a Palmetto State perspective. And that’s always worth celebrating.

Go get ’em, Inez!

I mentioned on Facebook that I might watch Inez Tenenbaum’s confirmation hearing (to head Consumer Product Safety Commission) today if I knew when it was.

So one one my Washington friends and ex-colleagues, Jeff Miller, answered with the following helpful info:

“You can watch streaming video of the hearing through the Senate Commerce Committee’s Website. The hearing begins at 10:30 a.m.”

Don’t you just love the “Wondering Out Loud” feature on the Web? You wonder out loud, and someone gives you the answer.

You know what? Now that I think about it, I think the first time I met Samuel was over lunch with Jeff. Jeff was covering the 88 presidential campaign, Samuel was of course involved in that somehow, and I was Jeff’s editor. Journalists used to lunch a lot in those days.

Well, I’ve got to run to a business meeting now…

Netflix guilt

Like I don’t have enough things to worry about, now I’m coping with Netflix Guilt.

It goes like this:

Once, a year or so ago, I put “Bloody Sunday” onto my list, figuring I should take more interest in how the Troubles started. Somehow it wriggles its way to the top of the queue, and comes to my house. I watch a bit of it. It’s shot in a documentary style. I can pick out, early on, characters who are Not Going to Make It. They are, of course, sympathetic characters. I know they represent real people, not fiction. I know there’s nothing I can do the inevitable slide toward this brief orgy of violence. It takes me about five tries to get almost all the way through the movie, and I still haven’t accomplished it, weeks later. I feel like I don’t care enough about violence in Ireland if I don’t watch it to the end, so I haven’t sent it back.

Trying to turn away from “Bloody Sunday,” I order “The Wrestler,” which has gotten all sorts of good reviews. I start watching it. I can see why it got good reviews. Have to wonder, does Mickey Rourke’s body actually look like that, or is that fake. Can see that this character’s “arc” is not upward. Quickly get tired of the seediness, and the character’s sadness, despite early glimpses of Marisa Tomei nearly nude. Feel like I have to watch it to the end, because this is a Serious Movie.

But I don’t want to.

Hence, Netflix Guilt.

I also have “Defiance.” Should I start watching it instead, if I actually get time for movie watching tonight? And… he asks with trepidation — will I like it any better? Will it be any better than the second James Bond movie he did? And if it isn’t, will I still feel like I have to watch it because it’s about a serious historical subject? Probably.

Monday’s top stories

Not having provided you with a “top stories” post for Sunday, here’s what I would have chosen for today:

National/International

  1. Iran Election Aftermath — This is our lede. Main story: Khameini calls for probe into fraud allegations against his boy Ahmadinejad while demonstrations continue.
  2. Iran sidebar — Lots of possibilities, but I lean toward this analysis by NYT that explains why Ahmadinejad may now be more powerful than ever.
  3. Bibi OKs Palestinian state, conditionally — This would have been in the paper yesterday, but I didn’t do one. So for me, as for the WSJ, this remains a top story. Not quite the lede, but big.
  4. Pirate Threat Grows in Gulf — Another WSJ story, which may not have been available to my theoretical newspaper. Still looking for a wire version. But it shows that the reach of piracy is getting wider.

Local/State

  1. Legislative advancer — Sets up this week’s mini-session.
  2. Girl Scout Camp Closing — Kind of soft, kind of featury. But it does a couple of things — tells us about a long-term trend, and reflects what’s going on in our community in a bit of a step-back way. See, I’m not just a hard-news guy; I’m flexible. This helps the mix, and has art to boot — although if you can find stronger art with the lede story, you might make that the focal point of your page, and run the camp art smaller.

Should lawmakers override payday veto?

Here’s one of those issues where I’d be better informed were I still at the paper: I would ask Warren Bolton what to think about the payday lending bill, and whether the governor’s veto should be overridden. Warren has kept close tabs on the legislation, and I have not.

Not that I see any merit in the veto itself; it’s standard Sanford ideology, nothing more.(For him, at bottom, it’s not that there are better ways to regulate, but that one should not regulate.) No, the issue is whether the governor’s wrongheadedness offers a chance to let an inadequate bill die.

Gerald Malloy’s suspicion about Advance America wanting the bill so badly gives me pause, too.

I’d like to talk to Joel Lourie about this. And maybe this offers a good excuse to go visit my friends at The State.

In the meantime, what do Y’ALL think?

Taking Sunday off

Kathryn asks where my Sunday edition of “top stories” is. Here’s how I answered:

Taking a day off. There’s not enough news for a decent front page by my standards. If I owned a newspaper, and it took a day of the week off, it would be Sunday. I generally ignore the Sunday paper myself, since it’s all make-work gotta-fill-the-Sunday-paper stuff. Almost no news.

I realize I’m not typical.

Apart from the fact that I don’t like working on Sundays, there’s just a dearth of news. For most newspapers, it’s their biggest seller of the week. I’ve always wondered why, because I’m a newshound, and it’s almost always the least newsy paper of the week. To each his own, I guess.

Mind you, I’m not saying there’s no news anywhere. We have this out of Israel, for instance. And the situation in Iran certainly bears watching. But there’s not enough for a full, rounded front page by my standards. And I don’t feel like straining at it.

Saturday’s top (afternoon) stories

Sorry to be a bit late with this — hey, it’s the weekend. Let’s pretend today that the stories I’m selecting are for the front page of an afternoon paper. I really miss those. Here goes:

National/International

  1. Ahmadinejad Claims Victory — Today’s lede story. The Iranian regime claims it won; the reformist opposition says it cheated. It’s hard to think of a scenario more likely to feed further strife, and there it is.
  2. N. Korea to Weaponize Plutonium — And if we try to stop them, they promise to take military action. This would be a good lede candidate, under the Buzz Merritt principle of “Is my world safe?,” if not for Iran.
  3. Obama to cut $313 Billion in Health Costs — The president says he’ll cut back on hospital reimbursements to pay for expanding coverage.

State/Local

  1. Gorilla escapes — Certainly not a lede story, but high local interest. I’d run it with that picture that was in the paper (but not online, oddly) showing the thin shaft of bamboo that amazingly supported the ape in his escape (bamboo is strong stuff). Plus a file mug of the erstwhile fugitive on the jump page.
  2. Sanford on Fox 46 Times — Note my emphasis. The fact that he used ETV studios for his anti-stimulus national TV appearances (for which ETV was reimbursed) is not as interesting as the fact that he took the time to appear on Fox 46 times in his effort to prevent his state getting this money. 46. That’s four more than the ultimate answer to life, the universe and everything.

OK, that’s only five stories, which is about one short for a proper front page. At this point, if I were playing the role I did at the Wichita paper back in the mid-80s, I’d ask the other editors to make suggestions for something to flesh out the page — preferably something local, something that fits in the interesting take-note-of category (like the Sanford story).

Oh, wait, I just remembered this is a p.m. paper. That means I’d have access to this breaking story today: Morning Fire Closes Bi-Lo — Not big enough to be worth the front by tomorrow morning, but it adds that local immediacy for which afternoon papers were once celebrated, and which I miss.