A bit late, but here are our top stories:
- Obama, Medvedev Say They’ve ‘Reset’ Relations (NPR) — Apparently, going by the picture, they decided this over cheeseburgers.
- Jobless Bill Dies Amid Deficit Fears (WSJ) — True, I have a job now, but plenty of people out there still don’t, so this is important. You know something I noticed while I was unemployed? These sorts of developments didn’t get as much coverage as they deserved.
- Financial overhaul negotiations focus on bank trading, derivatives (WashPost) — This, too, is important — but less interesting to me, I gotta tell ya.
- US can ‘no longer drive global growth’ (BBC) — Geithner delivers some home truths to the Brits. I guess he means somebody besides us needs to start buying some junk.
- Will GOP moderates defect to Sheheen? (thestate) — I thought this piece was fairly interesting. It makes perfect sense that business leaders would prefer Sheheen. But will this pattern hold?
- Is 3-D TV For Real? (WSJ) — Neither Roger Ebert nor I will run out and buy one, but maybe you will.
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Re #2: we’re spooked by the budget, so unemployed people have to eat less, lose their homes, whatever. Yet our military expenditures continue unexamined, hardly questioned seriously. When is this country going to wake up? We will be the best-armed, best-defended, hollow failed state in human history.
Oh, and re #5: Brad, you and Doug and some others have talked about the big national attention Haley is going to get, and the “big guns” she is going to bring in. Well, there’s yet more evidence that this is a mixed bag for Haley: specifically her being linked with Palin.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/plum-line/2010/06/poll_majority_sees_palin_endor.html
It put her over the top in the GOP primary: but if she’s linked too closely, especially with Palin’s latest woes (Alaska fund illegality, her likening forcing BP to help oil spill victims to Nazism) this could really go a long way towards portraying Haley as the radical extremist in the race. She’ll be more loved than ever—by 40-45% of the electorate. Not enough. Not even in SC.
@Phillip
You have to keep in mind two things:
1) the built-in 55-45 advantage that Republicans hold. Sheheen has to get 5% of the Republicans to switch AND keep every Democrat (where I think pundits underestimate the number of Democrat women who will vote for Haley for just for being a woman).
2) Sheheen is relatively unknown and is going to have drive voter turnout by himself to ensure that he gets every possible Democrat.
Alvin Greene won’t help. Sheheen doesn’t appear to have the “it” factor necessary. There’s no “Scott Brown” groundswell. Just compare the turnout numbers for the primary from both parties.
Since there was no Virtual Front Page on Friday, I’ll post this here.
As I predicted, here’s the news from The State:
http://www.thestate.com/2010/06/26/1351014/budget-board-finds-millions-to.html
“Budget board finds millions to offset cuts
Plan would cover $25 million slashed from state money”
The state agency thought to have been vetoed out of existence, along with the Confederate Relic Room and Museum, likely will continue business as usual.
The State Budget and Control Board is working on a plan that would cover the $25 million cut to its state appropriations, using funds it already has in accessible accounts.”
—
So many people were easily duped by the wailing and gnashing of teeth from all the agencies that claimed the world would end if Sanford’s vetoes were not overridden. It was a farce. All the money needed was always there. They just had to dip into their slush funds to cover the minuscule amount.
In hindsight, Sanford SHOULD have vetoed the entire budget. That would have forced some real decisions to be made.
And, as I summarized before, Sanford threw the baby into the river. A bunch of good people, through great exertions, saved the baby. Doug concludes from this that throwing babies into the river would be a fine thing. In fact, he thinks they should ALL be thrown into the river, to force us to make some choices.
No, the B&C Board is not a precious child, but a ridiculous monstrosity that should not exist. But it exists because it performs necessary functions of government that in any other state would be performed by people working directly for the governor. So until we set up a more rational system — which I will continue to push for strongly (and hope Vincent Sheheen gets elected to implement) — the B&CB needs funds to operate.
“A bunch of good people, through great exertions, saved the baby.”
Really? They moved money from one account to another. That’s it. If that’s great exertions, I’d hate to see what they do when they slack off.
@ Doug–
With Sarah Palin’s endorsement, Nikki Haley lost a whole lot of potential “women voting for women” Democrat voters. While Republicans seem to adore Sarah Palin, she is poison to Democrats, especially women Democrats.
Doug, right, like all the Democratic women who supported Palin because she is a woman… She was going to pick up all those Hillary-supporting women after all.
Turns out most women don’t think like that at all.
Doug, or Brad, or someone, correct me if I’m mistaken: but this 55-45 Republican majority in SC is not based on official registration figures, is it? We don’t register by party here, or am I wrong? And Doug, what of “independents”? I think it’s true that elections have recently generally split about along those lines (54-46 for McCain in 08 for example) but I don’t think that’s a hard and fast registration number because those don’t exist. Then there are the people still to be registered between now and November.
It’s not 55-45, because close to 30 percent of us (the good, sane people) identify as neither.
It would only be 55-45 or thereabouts if you look ONLY at those who identify with a party.
Republicans are a PLURALITY in this state, not a majority.
I’m looking at the recent history of the South Carolina elections..
2006 Sanford 55.1 Moore 44.8
2002 Sanford 52.9 Hodges 47.0
2008 Graham 58 Conley 42
2002 Graham 54 Sanders 44
2004 Demint 53.7 Tennenbaum 44.1
The closest race in the past decade was Sanford’s first win over incumbent Hodges.
DeMint over Tennebaum is probably most indicative of what Sheheen will be facing. Inez was probably the strongest candidate the Democrats have had in the past decade and she got smoked.
There’s no way 30% of South Carolinians identify themselves as independent. Maybe 20 at best… but even those are probably right leaning.
Doug, you’re right about the “exertions” thing. I got carried away with my metaphor.
You may also be right about the substance. I’m frustrated by that story coming out in The State today about the B&C Board because I’ve been working on a post explaining that they probably had plenty of money. But I haven’t had time to write it (or confirm all the info). All day today I’ve been wanting to write it, but have been at the ConvergeSE conference.
I took a laptop with me to the conference so I could work on the post during, but couldn’t get a wi-fi signal — in the Swearingen Engineering and Information Technology building, of all places…
Now that that’s over, I’m going to post as much of it as I can in a few minutes, but it will be inadequate. I need to get more info next week…
My husband first thought Swearingen was the Federal Corrections Center–it’s built like that, and I guess they jam signals like a jail, too.
Brad,
I know you think I want to abolish the government altogether but I really just want to see the waste eliminated. It’s there… My guess would be 20% of the budget could be cut from useless spending with no problem. I wouldn’t even be bothered if they took all that money and put it to providing food to the poor or money directly to college students. I just hate to see it spent on worthless overhead connected to cronies of the government.
@Doug–Agreed, except where is the useless spending? How do we find it? Who decides what worthless spending is? Is it parks? Is it the arts?