Maybe I’ll get a chance to post something later, but so far it’s been on meeting after another (although in between, Lora from ADCO and I did manage to get lunch at Mojitos, which was awesome as always).
So for now, I’ll just give you an Ariail cartoon to enjoy and discuss…
In the print version, the headline on this story in The State was, “Have debates become unnecessary?” (Why it’s different in the online version I don’t know; it happens sometimes.)
The story is about the fact that, as things stand, there will only be two debates between Nikki Haley and Vincent Sheheen before the Nov. 2 vote.
I take keyboard in hand to answer the question:
No, they have not become “unnecessary.” In fact, in this election, it is more necessary than ever to have as many debates as possible. Having only two is unconscionable, tantamount to flipping a huge bird at the electorate.
One of two relatively little-known candidates will become our governor for four years. After having twice made the awful mistake of electing Mark Sanford — who as a congressman was much more widely known than either Haley or Sheheen before he ran — it is critically important that voters get as many unscripted opportunities as possible to hear them questioned, and compare them side by side.
This would not be for my benefit. I’m not the typical voter. I’ve known them both for years, well enough that there is not the slightest question in my mind: Vincent Sheheen would be a far better governor than Nikki Haley.
I believe firmly that if voters had the opportunity to observe and/or interact with them as much as I have, the majority of them would reach the same conclusion. Multiple, in-depth, face-to-face sessions with each voter is impractical. The best we can do would be to have multiple debates — 10 (the number that Sanford and Jim Hodges had) would not be too many. Far from it — 10 would merely be a good start. While Nikki, who is a very charming and presentable person on first acquaintance, will likely come through a couple of debates all right, each additional debate makes it more likely that voters will know her, and her opponent, a little better. And that would be a very good thing.
Nikki knows this. Hence the two debates.
Yes, I understand the conventional wisdom, and it’s correct as far as it goes. But the fact that she leads in the polls as her motivation for resisting more debates distracts us from a deeper, more strategic motive. You may have noticed that the more information that dribbles out about Nikki Haley, the more she is shown to be something other than what she lets on to be. That’s a far better reason for avoiding debates than her poll numbers.
But as I say, let’s not have more debates for me — or for Vincent, or for Nikki. Let’s have them because the people deserve more information about these young people than they currently have. And the more information they have, the more likely they are to make a decision that they will not regret later.
I’ve been in one meeting after another all day, and need to run now, so I won’t be doing a Virtual Front Page today.
But as compensation, here’s an Ariail cartoon that alert reader Ralph Hightower brought to my attention.
Enjoy.
For one thing, ex. Gov. Dean is really a pretty calm, well-behaved guy most of the time. At least, that’s the way he impressed me both times he came in to see our editorial board. The Scream, in his case, was but a momentary aberration.
But not so with this guy.
The first thing I thought as I watched the above clip was, “Everybody who sees this will forget about ol’ Howard’s indiscretion.” The second was, “This makes all of our candidates here in SC look good. Even Alvin Greene, who only howls when provoked.”
NPR characterized him as the “Craziest Stump Speech Ever Candidate,” which pretty much captures what I see when I watch it.
You’ll be relieved to know Phil Davison did NOT get the nomination for treasurer in Stark County, Ohio. The GOP has been moving toward the angry fringe this year, but thank goodness, not quite this far…
Alert reader J brings our attention to this AP story, which shows that not only can Nikki, the accounting whiz (just ask her; she’ll tell you), not pay her personal taxes on time, but neither could the business for which she acted as bookkeeper:
COLUMBIA, S.C. — A business owned by the family of South Carolina Republican gubernatorial candidate Nikki Haley has been penalized for failing to pay taxes three times since 2003, according to records obtained by The Associated Press.
Haley has frequently cited her experience as an accountant for her family’s clothing store, saying the state needs such business knowledge at its helm.
Records show the store’s taxes were at least 19 months past due each time the state filed a lien.
Two of the tax liens were for failing to pay corporate income taxes and one was for not turning over taxes withheld from employee checks. The company paid nearly $4,000 to remove the liens.
In response, Haley’s campaign said Thurday she is running for governor in part because she wants to cut red tape and taxes that are too burdensome. Her campaign declined to discuss the specifics of the liens.
“As a family, we saw how hard it was to make a dollar and how easy it was for government to take it,” Haley, a state House member, said in a statement. “I’m committed to making government friendlier to the people and businesses it serves.”
A key part of Haley’s economic plan is to eliminate corporate income taxes, an idea the Legislature rejected earlier this year….
Run that nonsense by us again, Nikki:
“As a family, we saw how hard it was to make a dollar and how easy it was for government to take it…”
Yeah, right! Where, precisely, did y’all SEE that? Obviously, in the case of your family business, the gummint had a heckuva hard time taking it.
And this is, apparently, what Nikki means when she says she wants to run government like her business.
I’m guessing that like George Bailey, Vincent Sheheen expected a bigger reaction to the release he put out yesterday about his latest endorsement:
Today Vincent Sheheen, candidate for governor, will join the South Carolina Education Association for a press conference at 4:30 PM at the SCEA Headquarters, where they will be announcing their support of his campaign.
WHAT: SCEA Endorsement of Vincent Sheheen for Governor
WHEN: TODAY, TUESDAY, September 7, 2010 at 4:30 PM
WHERE: SCEA Headquarters, 421 Zimalcrest Drive, Columbia, SC
####
But like Mr. Carter, I’m underwhelmed. I didn’t even bother to show up. I suppose Sheheen did, but I haven’t checked.
The SCEA endorsed the Democrat for governor? Well, I guess they do those things… now let’s look at your books, so I can get back to my family in Elmira… (And if you know me, you know I’d just as soon drill a new hole in my head as look at anybody’s books.)
And I say this as a guy who really, really wants to see Vincent Sheheen elected governor.
For that reason, and knowing what it takes to win, I want to hear about more endorsements like the one from the S.C. Chamber of Commerce.
And I’m not just putting this on the Sheheen campaign. I’m saying that some of you business leaders and independents and community leaders who could actually exert influence in Republican and swing voter circles — including some who have shared with me off the record their fervent hopes that Vincent (and NOT Nikki) get elected — need to get out of your comfort zones, and stand up and be counted.
Yeah, standing up for something might cost you something. But not as much as it will cost South Carolina to waste another four years the way we have the past eight.
There are a lot of good, smart people in South Carolina who want the best for our state. But you know what I’ve noticed over the last couple of decades about good, smart people who want the best for South Carolina? They tend to be spineless. Whereas the demagogues and peddlers of negativity never rest, and aren’t a bit shy. (I’m not saying the SCEA aren’t good people. I’m just saying that they’re the usual suspects. Statewide elections in SC can be won by Democrats only when they can demonstrate support far beyond the usuals suspects.)
Vincent Sheheen is a good guy who’s standing up. So should you. And you know who you are.
The way I can tell is that the election-related interview requests have started coming in at a brisk clip.
Last week there were three. I meant to tell you about them because one of them was New Watch on WIS, which aired Sunday morning. So unless you’re some kind of heathen who sits around watching TV on Sunday morning (and I say that without meaning any aspersions upon the heathen community), you missed it, because I forgot to tell you about it.
Ex-Mayor Bob Coble saw it, and sent me a note to say “Good job on Newswatch,” which I appreciate. Not to say Mayor Bob is a heathen. He’s just way into politics; he can’t help it.
I taped that Thursday afternoon. Then I also taped a segment over at ETV on Friday, also about the election. That won’t air until sometime in October. (It was broader, big-picture stuff, not as pegged to the news of the day.) I’ll get the date and try to remember to let you know.
Back on Thursday, I got an e-mail from Chris Haire with Charleston City Paper, to the following effect:
Just wanted to see if you have time to talk. I’m working on a story on the ongoing Nikki Haley rumors. Here’s the angle: With no proof out there, the only way to truly address this is as a smear. And, what’s particularly odd here, is that it’s such an ongoing smear — and truth be told, arguably the most ineffective smear in history. The question here is why it’s still happening.
I found that cryptic. I assumed it was a reference to this. But it wasn’t. It was a reference to something else, something I hadn’t heard about (and wish I still hadn’t), specifically this. (Which led later to this.)
I talked with him, and tried to say something coherent, but what are you supposed to say? Frankly, I’m just like most folks in South Carolina — uncomfortable as hell talking about this stuff. Which is why I sort of doubt it will emerge as visibly as it did back during the primary. At least, I hope it doesn’t.
Anyway, I asked Chris to let me know when that is published. If and when I see it, I’ll give y’all a link. If I forget to look, and y’all see if first, remind me. I want to keep y’all in the loop. I just forget sometimes.
I haven’t written anything about the supposed ethics investigation of Joe Wilson because I don’t have the slightest clue what it is supposedly about. Neither the MSM nor the campaigns themselves have been particularly helpful on this point.
For instance, this release I just got from Rob Miller:
Dear Brad,
By now, I’m sure you have all heard the news. Congressman Wilson is under investigation for breaking Congressional ethics rules. Joe would have you believe that this is about some “glorified shot glasses” that he bought on one of his many taxpayer-funded junkets. You and I both know that you don’t get investigated over $12 in trinkets.
Joe Wilson knows that, too– it’s why his staff won’t stop talking about $2 goblets, but won’t say if those are the limit of the investigation.
I believe in the iceberg rule. The corruption we see in Washington is only 10% of the problem; the rest is hidden away, protecting the insiders, because if the public knew what was going on, they wouldn’t stand for it. Joe Wilson was willing to steal $12 from taxpayers in public. What is he willing to do in private? Pocketing any amount of taxpayer money is not only wrong, it’s illegal.
From raising his own pay five times, to giving away hundreds of billions of dollars to Wall Street, to voting against South Carolina teachers and jobs, to being investigated for breaking the public trust, Joe Wilson is everything wrong with Washington today. We deserve better. Stand with me and fight for it.
Semper Fi,
… which as you see doesn’t indicate one way or the other what is allegedly going on. It merely insinuates, and lamely. Personally, when I see the tip of an iceberg I at least know, by implication, what lies below. I have no such helpful clues here.
Mr. Wilson himself is no more helpful, merely sending out such nonsense as the following:
Dear Subscriber,
Public disapproval with the liberal establishment in Washington is at an all time high. Folks have become aware that the path of smaller government and Reagan conservatism will lead us out of this dark era of liberal recklessness. This sentiment is felt all across the country, and people in South Carolina are demanding that their legislators respond with conservative solutions.While many representatives are hiding under their desks in fear of the public outrage, Congressman Joe Wilson is out touring the state to help cultivate this rich environment for change and reform. He is meeting with the real economic experts in this state – workers and small business owners.
On the “Joe Means Jobs” bus tour, folks in every corner of the state are talking with Joe and telling him how much they want the era of Big Government to end. Joe strongly agrees with this demand and is under attack from the liberals in Washington because of it. Nancy Pelosi and her liberal friends are funneling money into South Carolina’s liberal campaigns, in an effort to oust honest conservatives like Joe Wilson from office.
It is a long uphill battle that Joe must fight until November, but he is not backing down from Nancy Pelosi’s intimidation tactics. It is imperative that Joe stay out on the campaign trail to help spread the word about what liberals in Washington and even here in South Carolina are doing to bankrupt this state and country. And to let folks know what he is going to do about it.
Click here to watch a video of Joe while on his bus tour!Will you stand with Joe today and help him defeat the liberals in Washington? It is obvious that they desperately want Joe gone, since they specifically targeted him with their opposition money.
Please help Joe by clicking here to make a donation today!
I don’t know about you, but “It’s Nancy Pelosi’s fault” doesn’t help me any more than when the Dems moan about everything being Bush’s fault. Just another sad attempt at misdirection. In fact, he doesn’t even mention the charges in this particular piece, merely alluding darkly to “Nancy Pelosi’s intimidation tactics.” Sigh.
Has anyone read anything that I’ve missed that would shed a light? If so, please share…
This morning, Henry McMaster dropped by my table at breakfast, opening our conversation by saying, “Are you blogging somebody over here?” Which I took to mean that he was somewhat wary of talking with me after this incident. Or maybe he was referring to this piece involving his protege Trey Walker.
In any case, we didn’t dwell on the subject, but moved to something more important. Henry, apparently seeing I was reading the paper, mentioned The State‘s series this week about the survivors of the Battle of the Bulge. He immediately fixed on the very thing that always fascinates me about that battle — the day-to-day, routine human suffering apart from the combat. He said something like, “And we think WE have it tough sometimes…”
Indeed. As one who has never been tested by combat, but have certainly thought a lot about it, the thing that I’ve always found most intimidating about it is not the actual shooting part. Yeah, if you survived something like the landing at Omaha Beach, you’d be marked by the trauma for life. But in my own imagination at least, that part would be easy compared to the day-to-day misery of living in the field in harsh conditions.
And what the men trapped by the German blitz in the Ardennes went through is an extreme example.
This Bulge reunion is a particularly poignant event for my family, because when I first heard about it, I had thought of how we might be able to bring my father-in-law here for it. But he didn’t make it. He died in January. And when I told y’all about it on the blog, I wrote the following:
My father-in-law, Walter Joseph Phelan Jr., lived a full and worthwhile life. I was thinking yesterday as we mucked through the ice and snow about some of the far-harsher hardships he endured along the way. He was there in the Ardennes in late 1944, the coldest winter in Europe in a century, when the massive, unexpected German attack came. He was a member of the ill-fated 106th Infantry Division (like Kurt Vonnegut). That means he was right at the point of the German spear, right where it smashed through the Allied lines. A friend fell right beside him in the snow, victim of a bullet he felt was meant for him. If he had been the one it found, I’d never have met my wife, and our children and grandchildren wouldn’t exist.
Like Vonnegut and thousands of others, he was captured and held in a German stalag in the last months of the war, when the Germans didn’t even have enough food for themselves, much less for prisoners. After that experience, he never wanted to go to Europe again, and didn’t.
The coldest winter in Europe in a century… That detail from Stephen Ambrose’s Citizen Soldiers has stuck with me ever since I read it. Some of our troops, such as members of the 101st Airborne, were out in that, living in foxholes, for over a month. Every morning, as they stirred, their clothing would crackle as the ice that had formed in it overnight would break. In many instances, they couldn’t build fires for fear of revealing their positions.
I find the idea of soldiering on under such conditions inconceivable. Even if you weren’t killed, or captured (like Mr. Phelan), or wounded (like Bill Guarnere, who lost a leg in an artillery barrage), how on Earth did they not break? Many did, of course. But who could blame them.
Right now, I’m reading With the Old Breed by Eugene Sledge. Many have noted that for the Marines in the Pacific, the entire war was just as miserable as what the Army endured at the Bulge — only it was mud and blood and jungle rot rather than sub-freezing temperatures — and such books as this one and the one I just finished, Bob Leckie’s Helmet for My Pillow, present compelling evidence to that effect. As Sledge wrote of Okinawa, the Marines lived day after day in “an environment so degrading I believed we had been flung into hell’s own cesspool.”
There was a passage Sledge’s book that sticks with me, about how after that experience, the veterans had trouble relating to the rest of us back home; they had to struggle “to comprehend people who griped because America wasn’t perfect, or their coffee wasn’t hot enough, or they had to stand in line and wait for a train or bus.”
People like me. I just notice my coffee has grown cold as I was typing this. As I go to replace it with hot, I am mindful of the privilege, and those who suffered and died to make my life so easy.
Since I griped about the lede headline in The State today (and I wasn’t picking on John there, it was just the headline that got me), I want to direct you, with my warm approval, to Cindi Scoppe’s latest today.
The subject: Nikki Haley’s habit of misleading, and just generally saying stuff that isn’t true. After taking Vincent Sheheen to task for HIS misleading question, “When will she release her tax returns?,” when she sorta kinda had, Cindi went on to demonstrate how such misstatements are a regular thing with his opponent.
I’ll excerpt here the last few grafs of the column:
The day after her WLTX interview, Ms. Haley appeared on Greta Van Sustern’s cable talk show and stepped up her usual attack on Mr. Sheheen for “making $400,000 as a trial lawyer” by calling him “a trial lawyer that makes $400,000 a year off the state.”
It’s pretty audacious, in a state with a median household income of $42,000, for someone who made $196,282 last year to castigate someone else for making $372,509. But the more serious sin here is the total fabrication about where Mr. Sheheen’s money came from.
Contrary to what you’d think if you listened to the Republicans’ drumbeat for Mr. Sheheen to reveal the sources of his income, legislators already have to report all the money they receive from state and local governments. In addition, attorneys must report the money they receive representing clients before the Workers Compensation Commission and other state boards.
As our news department noted on Sunday, last year Mr. Sheheen reported receiving $29,000 in salary and expenses as a senator, and his law firm received $13,000 from the Kershaw County Medical Center, $4,700 from the Cassatt Water Co. and $2,400 from the S.C. Guardian Ad Litem Program. That’s a total of $49,100 “off the state.” I suppose it’s possible that he made money that he didn’t report on his economic disclosure statement — you know, like that $40,000 in consulting fees that Ms. Haley didn’t report from a state government contractor who hired her for her “good contacts.” But since there’s no gray area in state law about reporting government income, I seriously doubt it.
Mr. Sheheen also reported that his law firm made about $170,000 in workers comp fees last year. Now, I would like more details about where the rest of his income came from, and I think he probably could provide them without violating legal ethics, say by telling us how much he received in contingency-fee awards, in retainers, in hourly fees. But it’s more than a little misleading for Ms. Haley to demand more transparency from the candidate who has been far, far more transparent than she has about his income as well as his communications on the taxpayers’ computers and e-mail accounts. Unfortunately, that sort of thing is becoming commonplace.
Cindi, by the way, is about the last person in the MSM you’ll ever see mistake feeling for thought. Always has been. Here, she has demonstrated that laudable trait once again.
By the way, you may want to read her previous column, which she links from this one, on the disturbing Jekyll and Hyde quality Mrs. Haley has demonstrated over time.
Turning from Nikki Haley’s foot-dragging on transparency regarding her taxpayer-issued computer and e-mails, let’s take another look at her problems with paying her taxes on time.
This is particularly relevant because of her oft-stated wish that government be run like a business, and her touting of her proven skills as an accountant.
Let’s take a look at Cindi Scoppe’s column Sunday. Cindi, a meticulous reporter if ever I’ve met one, didn’t think much one way or the other about Nikki’s failure to pay her taxes on time until she looked into it further herself. Here’s an excerpt from what she found, going well beyond what had been previously reported:
The problem wasn’t that the Haleys sought and received extensions. It is in fact quite common for people to get a six-month extension to file their tax returns. But as the IRS makes clear, the extension applies only to the return, not to the tax payment itself. Taxes are always due by April 15 — at the latest. The Haleys have not paid their taxes by April 15 in any of the past five years…Even more significantly, the extension gives people only until Oct. 15 to file. The Haleys filed their 2005 tax returns on July 30, 2007 — eight months after the extended deadline. They filed their 2006 tax returns on July 23, 2008 — also eight months after the extended deadline. Their 2007 returns were filed Nov. 5, 2008, just a few days after the extended deadline. (Their 2004, 2008 and 2009 returns were filed after April 15, but before Oct. 15, so the IRS doesn’t consider them late.)Now, in my book, anytime you have to pay the government a penalty, you’ve done something wrong, and the Haleys have paid the IRS $4,452 in penalties in the past five years — $2,853 for filing late, and $1,599 for paying late…Still, the idea that paying your taxes late, and waiting eight months after the extended deadline to file a return, is doing “nothing wrong” is more of a stretch.But the biggest stretch is the way Ms. Haley has sought to spin her income tax problem into a virtue. She talks about how she and her husband fell upon tough economic times and cut back on their spending and learned to live within their means, which she says demonstrates what a fiscally responsible governor she would be. It seems to me that her actions demonstrate just the opposite.The Haleys didn’t pay their taxes late once or twice, when things were bad; they paid their taxes late in every one of the past five years — not just in 2006, when their income dropped by half, but also in 2005 when it was going up, and in 2007, 2008 and 2009, when it was going up substantially, topping out at nearly $200,000 last year….… the fact is that part of her strategy was to avoid paying her bills on time, by essentially giving herself a loan from those of us who paid our taxes on time. A bailout if you will, albeit temporary, for the candidate who deplores federal bailouts. And since she failed to pay her taxes on time five years in a row, it raises questions about her stewardship of money….I questioned Ms. Haley’s campaign several times to make absolutely sure that the Haleys had not somehow managed to get an additional extension, and her spokesman never attempted to give any sort of justification for their missing the extended deadlines. I’m not sure what the repeated delinquent tax filings suggest: Poor organizational skills? Inability to delegate authority — or, if delegated, to choose trustworthy people to whom to delegate? A disregard for the laws the rest of us have to obey? What I am sure of is that if it were me, I wouldn’t be bragging about it.
First, for you youngsters who’ve only been alive for five minutes or so, here’s a definition of “limited hangout.” Or perhaps we should refer to what Nikki has done as a “modified limited hangout,” the extra-special version invented by Richard Nixon and his droogs.
In any case, this passage from The State‘s story today pretty much tells you all you need to know about what Nikki means by the word “transparency” when it is applied to her. To be helpful, I’ve boldfaced the most important parts, in this passage and subsequent ones:
Sheheen released his legislative e-mails, copies of his hard drives and campaign receipts two weeks ago in response to identical open records requests The State sent to both campaigns. Haley released her e-mails, but said she would not release any other documents or allow reporters to review her state-issued computer hard drives. A hard drive keeps a permanent record of e-mails.
Then there’s this little elaboration, which I suppose Nikki put out for the benefit of the technological Neanderthals among the electorate:
“I think 10,000 sheets of paper is a lot,” Haley said, referring to the volume of e-mails in defending the decision not to match Sheheen’s disclosure. “I’m comfortable with how transparent we have been. I’m not going to get into this tit for tat about whether that’s enough sheets of paper.”
Ahem. Nikki, if you’d just go ahead and release the hard drives — you know, the public hard drives that belong to us, the taxpayers whom you allegedly love so much — nobody’s asking for so much as ONE “sheet of paper.” This is the 21st century. Give us the frickin’ hard drives, and we’ll have all that we need. Your good faith will have been demonstrated. Those “sheets of paper” you’re touting are the emblem of your refusal to just go ahead and be transparent, the physical manifestations of your selectivity. And you say there are 10,000 of them. Ten thousand documents attesting to your refusal to simply open up access to a public resource.
Then there’s this:
The Haley campaign emphasized she is exempt from state open records laws as a lawmaker, and all compliance is voluntary.
Wow. Yeah, Nikki, lawmakers ARE exempt, because they write the laws, and refuse to abide by the openness they have statutorily imposed on the rest of government, from the governor to the guy who sweeps up in the offices of our bureaucracy. This is an exemption they carved out for themselves, and themselves alone. This is the very cult of stonewalling that someone we know constantly berates her fellow legislators about. That someone’s initials, in the spirit of limited hangout, are N.H. And I’m not talking New Hampshire.
And you want to hide behind THAT? Really?
Amazing.
Photo courtesy of Nathan Ballentine...
The former Sherry Shealy has put up a couple of blog posts about her brother Rod, which you can find here and here.
An excerpt:
Rod was a gift to many people. He ran winning campaigns for lots of candidates who probably wouldn’t have won without him…Two years ago, he had a cancerous brain tumor. He had surgery in August 2008; one hour after the brain surgery, he was on the cell phone doing business as usual. Rod quipped: “I can see the headlines now: ‘Shealy Survives Surgery; Dies of Boredom’.”That surgery removed the tumor – totally – and he was fine.At least for a while.Some time during the summer of 2009, he learned that the cancer was in his lungs.This year, we learned it was back in his brain.Rod had maintained a very positive and upbeat attitude. Sometimes he said things like, “The folks at the hospital like me ‘cause everybody else is sick.”I first ran for office in 1970; he helped me in that campaign and then ran every campaign of mine after that one. He ran my campaign for lieutenant governor in 1990; it’s was my first loss and I believe he took it harder than I did. …When I asked him several years ago if it was too late to throw my hat in the ring for a particular race, he replied, “Yep. By about 34 years.”Whether it was politics, family, or anything else, Rod enjoyed life to the fullest. He had a dry wit, a keen sense of humor and a heart of gold. He loved to play the guitar and sing. He loved being creative.Other than in the hospital bed, I can’t remember the last time I saw him without a bright floral Hawaiian shirt. That was one of his trademarks. In fact, he went to an inaugural ball; like others, he wore a tuxedo – but with the Hawaiian floral print bowtie and cummerbund, along with tennis shoes, I believe.
This just in from SC Democrats:
COLUMBIA- South Carolina Democrats fired the opening shot of election season with a television ad criticizing Republican gubernatorial candidate Nikki Haley for her tax hypocrisies. The ad, titled “Thanks Nikki,” will begin airing today in Columbia.
In the ad Mark Sanford’s disciple, who voted for a two percent rise in the sales tax and against a sales-tax exemption for groceries, is “thanked” by her constituents for failing to vote for South Carolina interests. Video may be also viewed on the ad’s companion site, http://thanksnikki.com.
South Carolina Democratic Party Chair Carol Fowler said today that the ad will inform voters about Haley’s real legislative record.
“Voters deserve to know the truth about Nikki Haley and her record of broken promises,” said Fowler. “This ad only skims the surface of Haley’s hypocrisy and highlights the stark contrast between her campaign promises and her actions in the legislature. Voters are already starting to realize that Nikki Haley’s candidacy is all smoke and mirrors. South Carolinians are ready to move forward with real leadership.”
Nikki certainly asks for sarcasm, by running on transparency while dragging her heels on being transparent, and by touting her accounting abilities while failing repeatedly to do what most of us do every year (file our taxes on time).
But whether this approach will work remains to be seen. For one thing, it’s too focused on taxes, rather than the items that she’s really begging for sarcasm on. And yeah, Nikki voted for the execrable Act 388, which is a big reason why the Chamber is backing Vincent Sheheen. And while that act foolishly and carelessly raised the sales tax, it did so in order to (equally foolishly and carelessly) drastically reduce property taxes on owner-occupied homes. And if I’m a Haley supporter, I’d protest vociferously the use of a house (for the “through the roof” metaphor) to illustrate the point that she raised sales taxes, thereby subliminally giving the erroneous impression that she raised homeowner property taxes.
Of course, she DID raise property taxes — on businesses and rental property (thereby raising rents on those who can’t yet afford to buy) — by pushing the burden from those whiny people with houses on the lake to other categories of property tax. But this doesn’t make that point, at least not overtly.
There are two main problems with this ad. First, that it oversimplifies. Nikki is definitely guilty of voting for very bad ideas in the realm of taxation. She is one of the reasons why we so desperately need comprehensive tax reform, because she has so thoughtlessly participated in fouling up the system, making it less logical, less fair and less effective.
Second, this sidesteps the two things Nikki is most vulnerable about in order to go after her on taxes. This is no doubt based in an assumption (possibly backed by polling or focus groups, but I have no idea) that voters care more about taxes than about the fact that Nikki is such a hypocrite on her signature issues. It’s a risky move, trying to out-anti-tax a Republican in a general election. (Also, if you’re a Democrat, do you really want to call your opponent a “tax and spend…” anything?) But I guess they figure, what do they have to lose?
You’ll say that this calculation and oversimplification is just the way the game is played. Yep. And that’s a shame. Because there are very good reasons why no one should vote for Nikki Haley, and this ad only skirts them.
Today I got this from the S.C. Democratic Party:
Dems Challenge Nikki Haley: Where Are Your Emails?
Sanford disciple says she’s “compiling” taxpayer-funded email for release; what’s she hiding?COLUMBIA- It’s been three days since The State reported that Nikki Haley, Mark Sanford’s favorite to succeed him as
Governor, was “compiling” her taxpayer-funded email for public release, but she’s not moving fast enough for South Carolina Democrats. This morning the SCDP re-launched HaleyinHiding.com, a website devoted to holding Mrs. Haley to her own promises of transparency.
“Mrs. Haley has been refusing to release her taxpayer-funded emails for months now, so naturally I’m happy to see her even giving lip service to a position that was the heart of her primary campaign,” said SCDP Chair Carol Fowler. “Unfortunately, she’s tipping her hand by stalling and delaying. Just as with her tax returns, it’s clear that there’s something in those emails that Mrs. Haley doesn’t want us to see.”
Sigh… I guess that’s the party’s role to play in this.
Nikki, end this silliness! Release the blasted e-mails already…
Twisted Sister — whose music both Nikki Haley and Sarah Palin employ as a theme, in spite of their Family Values messages — represents one kind of irony. Here’s another kind, and it also involves a sister — specifically, Nikki’s. (At least, it’s her sister unless there’s another person with the same name who looks this much like Nikki.)
When I first saw the picture above, I thought it WAS Nikki — maybe Nikki in an alternative universe — but then I saw it was her sibling, Simran Singh. Her Web site describes her this way, in part:
Simran Singh, Visionary, Life Coach, Talk Show Host, Publisher of 11:11 Magazine, Founder of C.H.O.I.C.E. (Collaborating Holistic Organizations Inspiring Conscious Empowerment) and Creator of BELIEVE…Choices for Conscious Living, utilizes the mind, body, and heart to support individuals in realizing authentic personal expression by tapping inherent power and potential via self-inquiry and conscious choice. Through honoring and illustrating value for each step in the journey, her products and services bring to awareness one’s inherent value.
So many choices! N.O.W. has “reproductive choice.” Nikki has private school “choice.” And her sister has “Collaborating Holistic Organizations Inspiring Conscious Empowerment.” What a country we live in! Something for everybody.
Be sure to check out the video on the site. Way, WAY New Age:
Tune in and turn on… feed the mind… embrace positively… release the tension… step out of fear. Host Simran Singh will help you broaden your mind and open your heart toward a greater understanding… on Seventh Wave radio… because shift happens.
You might want to check out the recordings of some of her shows. Like this one about Jesus’ “30 Lost Years” and his connections to Eastern religions. The coming Age of Aquarius and the quest for the philosophers’ stone are mentioned in connection with her guest, “a renowned American clairvoyant.”
Yup. It’s a very interesting world we live in.
I’m glad to see Vincent Sheheen took my advice. OK, so maybe he didn’t do it because I advised it; likely he figured it out for himself.
In any case, I was glad to see this release come in on my Blackberry today:
VINCENT SHEHEEN RELEASES SENATE EMAILS
“Sheheen calls on Haley for transparency and full disclosure.”
Camden, SC—-Today Vincent Sheheen, candidate for governor, released his legislative emails for the public to review. He released information from both the L Drive and the G Drive for his Senate office.
In releasing his emails, Vincent stated, “ In order to restore trust, honesty and integrity to our state, we as candidates must be transparent in our actions. Today, I have released my legislative emails and I challenge Representative Haley to do the same. Candidates must practice what we preach. It is about a true and open government.”
This keeps Vincent way out ahead of Nikki on the transparency front — you know, the issue that she chose to run on…
She’s probably starting to regret making a big deal of this issue. Today, her campaign released some tax records, although not for the full 10 years that Sheheen has released. And even though she picked the years she released, she has revealed a record of late filings and having to pay fines. From the AP story:
COLUMBIA, S.C. — South Carolina Republican gubernatorial nominee Nikki Haley has repeatedly paid late fees and penalties for not paying her income taxes on time. Tax records released Wednesday by Haley’s campaign show she and her husband filed more than a year late on two occasions. They have not filed by the usual April 15 deadline since they began owing money five years ago.
No wonder she’s such an anti-tax zealot. She has so much trouble paying them.
The state Democratic Party is of course loving this; they’ve put out a release to chortle:
“Nikki Haley not only refused to release 10 years of tax returns to match Vincent Sheheen’s record of transparency, her attempt to save face has backfired,” said Fowler. “At no point in the past five years has Ms. Haley paid her taxes on time, but she’s running for office citing her experience as an accountant and claiming to be a fiscal conservative. If this is how she manages her own books, imagine what she has in store for South Carolina. This reeks of the worst kind of hypocrisy.”
So now we’re all left waiting to see the rest of those tax records — and the e-mails, of course. There are shoes left to drop in this saga…
I ran into Nikki Haley at lunch today, at M Vista on Lady Street. She was there with Rob Godfrey and Tim Pearson of her campaign.
I think it was the first time I’d conversed with her since that time at Starbucks on Gervais shortly after the 2008 election. That day, she had a young woman in tow whom she introduced as being “with my campaign,” and I thought that was odd. The ’08 campaign was over, and it was early for a House candidate to be having meetings about the next campaign. I was probably the most shocked guy in South Carolina when it came out a month or two later than she was running for governor — it just seemed so totally unlikely that she would see herself as ready for that. It was the beginning of me seriously wondering about Nikki…
Anyway, Nikki was pleasant and charming as always when I went up to chat with her today. I don’t think Rob or Tim were all that thrilled to see me, though. They certainly didn’t smile, but then we guys don’t, do we, under such circumstances? Nikki did, but then ladies do.
We didn’t talk shop. She did the standard thing polite people do when other topics are awkward — she asked after my family. Then she asked how I was doing, and I told her that I was with ADCO and having lunch with my colleagues over there, and gave her one of my ADCO cards. She said I was probably glad not to be at the paper any more, and I thought that was perceptive of her. Or a good guess. Maybe it was just an understated slap at the paper; I don’t know. So I asked how she was holding up, and she said great, and I said something about how things had probably gotten a lot less crazy in the last few weeks, and she agreed. And then she asked me again about my family. So I began to dismiss myself, thinking I should wish her all the best but wanting to be honest, and ended up saying something totally inane like, “Well, as long as you’re enjoying yourself; that’s the thing…”
My ADCO friends thought it odd that I had gone to speak with her. Maybe they thought I was showing off, as in That Brad! He’ll just do any crazy thing! But that’s because they only know about Nikki and me through what I’ve written on the blog lately. They don’t realize that I’ve known her for years, and we’ve always had a very cordial relationship. I’ve happily endorsed her twice — in 2004 and 2008 (those were the only elections in which she had opposition), and always enjoyed chatting with her. I always had good hopes for her — before she embarked on her quest to become the new Mark Sanford and darling of the Tea Party, South Carolina’s answer to Sarah Palin. Which is deeply unfortunate.
So it was nice to see her, even though there was that slight awkwardness.
In fact, it’s quite awesome.
I missed it when Robert put it out week before last, and I’m glad it’s been called to my attention now. It’s hard to imagine a more pointed evocation of exactly what’s wrong with Nikki Haley. Or one of the things wrong with her, anyway.
What might be harder to imagine, to a sensible person who understands the concepts of satire and the idioms of topical visual communication, is the controversy it engendered.
It wasn’t all that much, of course. Just intimations that he was essentially calling her a “raghead.” Or check this one out, helpfully headlined, “Reminder: Nikki Haley is a Secret Muslim Whore.” An excerpt:
Now, just a month after Haley’s victory, one Republican cartoonist has emerged from his gutterto dredge up the same vile race-baiting and sexism that failed to derail her primary campaign. In a cartoon published Tuesday (pictured above), Robert Ariail portrays the Indian-American gubernatorial candidate as a bikini-clad pageant queen in the first panel and a niqab-clad Muslim in the second. The cartoon explicitly echos previous race-, religion-, and gender-based attacks against Haley, a practicing Methodist raised in the Sikh tradition by her immigrant parents.
Ariail depicts Haley as a radical Muslim posing as an all American pageant contestant so she can put one over on voters. He claims that’s totally different than when State Senator Jake Knotts described Haley as “a raghead that’s ashamed of her religion trying to hide it behind being Methodist for political reasons.”
All utter … let me think of a nice word… nonsense. An ironic side note: Robert’s used to getting this kind of … nonsense… from the left, so at least this is a change of pace, reflecting the extreme right’s recent and sudden discovery of the power of Identity Politics.
Silly as it all was, Robert was nevertheless asked by a local TV station to account for himself, which he dutifully did:
The cartoon on Ms. Haley is, I think, pretty straight forward: It contrasts her campaign’s message of open government and transparency ( which I support ) with her recent closed-door meetings, her refusal to release House e-mail accounts and her explanations on consulting fees and what she did to earn them. The cartoon is neither salacious nor an ethnic or religious slur. I came up with the idea of her as “Miss Transparency” wearing the title sash and bikini and chose the burqa as the best clothing metaphor representing the opposite of transparency. The burqa is a visual metaphore I’ve used before to make similar points. It is not about Ms. Haley’s religion- after all, she was a Sikh, not a Muslim, before she became a Christian. Anyone who claims this cartoon is an ethnic or religious slur is deliberately misconstruing its simple, issue-oriented meaning.
Robert Ariail
robertariail.com
I appreciate Robert’s extreme patience in providing this “hold-you-by-the-hand-and-explain-the-obvious” explication, but it almost ruins the cartoon for me that he had to. Explanation is death to comedy. And if there must be an explanation, I prefer the one that Robert suggested to me when I told him this morning I might post something about the foolishness that some chose to read into the cartoon. He suggested that I tell y’all, “Robert’s not thinking about s__t like that” when he does his thing. Please excuse his technical newspaperman jargon.
My message is, this is everything a cartoon should be: It makes an excellent political point that needs to be made, and it provides a laugh along the way. Good job, Robert.
Oh, one other thing. Today Wes Wolfe raised a new question about the cartoon (which is what got me to thinking about it): After saying that “After discussing the piece with friends, we decided that was perhaps not the best way to go” (which suggests to me he might need some new friends), Wes suggested that the cartoon may have had something to do with Robert parting company with The Nerve, the S.C. Policy Council Web pub Robert had done some cartoons for recently — since, you know, Nikki’s their kind of gal.
Well, that seemed unlikely to me, and Robert confirms: When you go back to work for the MSM, you can’t still be associated with what is essentially a propaganda entity. It’s just not a good fit. So he chose, wisely, the Spartanburg paper over The Nerve — and those folks understood, and they parted on good terms — as Wes notes. And now Robert’s back doing what he ought to do.
Finally, a bonus: Robert’s gotten into hot water over burqas before, ALSO over a hilarious, pointed cartoon that had absolutely nothing wrong with it. It was the one making fun over the controversy in the Legislature over young female pages being dressed too provocatively. The hoo-hah over that one at least led to something good — a conversation between me and Robert about how everybody seemed to be after him with the torches and pitchforks, which in turn led to the cover of his last book.
Anyway, for your enjoyment, a look at that earlier “offensive” cartoon:
Well, I was sort of looking forward to seeing ol’ Joe Biden again for the first time since fall 2007. He can be quite entertaining, especially when he’s talking about his old buddy Fritz Hollings. Also, I hadn’t seen Fritz in a while, and was interested to know how he was doing.
So I was glad to RSVP that I would indeed attend the dedication ceremony for Fritz’ new library, and grateful to Harris Pastides et al. for remembering to invite me. (Still am, so thanks again for including me in your plans.) Then, after I RSVPed, I put it on my calendar and put it out of my mind.
Then this morning, I had a new thought: It was Friday. I knew from memory that I had no meetings with ADCO clients. So I decided to go casual like everybody else at the office. Or casual for me, anyway. I put on some worn-out, rumple gray chinos and a sport shirt I bought several years ago for $3 at a Wal-Mart up in Pennsylvania. And a jacket from an old khaki suit. I have to wear a jacket, so I have someplace to put my stuff (wallet, keys, notebook, other junk).
And no tie. Which to me is like walking down the street naked. This is only like the second time I’ve done this since starting at ADCO.
Then at breakfast, I read that the Hollings library thing was today. OK, so I do have something to do today. Forgot that. Fine. It will give me something for the blog, maybe something good.
Then on the way out after breakfast, I saw myself in a mirror. Oh, no. I was going to have to go all the way back home and change. I looked like a seedy character from a Graham Greene novel, on acid (the strangely colored shirt being the acid part).
(At this point, you highly organized people are wondering, “Why don’t you consult your calendar every morning when you’re getting dressed, so you know how to dress ahead of time?” And you’re wondering it with that really irritating tone that highly organized people have. Well, I’ll tell you … years ago, I decided to dress in a suit and tie every day so that it didn’t matter what I had to do that day, since often things came up during the day that I couldn’t anticipate, things that weren’t on my calendar yet anyway. So I started waiting to consult my calendar when I got in. It just had not struck me, standing half asleep in the closet this morning, that deciding to do something as radical as not wearing a tie required entirely different assumptions about daily procedures. In the future, I’ll think of that.)
But I needed to get to the office and do SOME work. So I went, and feeling like I neglected the blog yesterday, I posted something quick and easy and then plunged into my e-mail and getting organized on a couple of ADCO projects. Next thing I knew, it was 11:13, with the Hollings thing starting at 12.
For a second, I thought about going as I was. That way there’d be no rush. I could walk over to the event. But then I thought, no, your invitation is at home. And this isn’t a typical university event; you’re going to be dealing with the Secret Service, and you know what obsessives they are. They aren’t just going to say, “Oh, it’s Brad; come on in.”
So I ran home, knowing I could still be on time if unless I ran into really bad traffic.
When I’m a block from the office, I realize I don’t have my camera. Damn, damn, damn. Turn around? Try to swing back by the office to get it on my way after changing and getting the invitation? Neither. I decided I’d make do with the Blackberry. I wanted to be on time. Any other event like this, the speaking wouldn’t start until half an hour into it, but the Secret Service was involved. I had to be on time.
And at this point, I would have been. At least, I would have made it by noon — fairly easily.
So I get home, a little impatient with the traffic, but it’s OK. I’m good. I change into a good suit, white shirt, tie. No problem. And then I start looking for the invitation. It’s not on the dresser. Damn, damn, damn. It’s not on the desk in my home office. Damn, damn… I suddenly remembered: Even though I had received the invitation at home, when I had called to RSVP, I had done it from the office.
Oh, damndamndamndamndamndamn.
At this point, having turned up the thermostat in the house when I’d left that morning, I’m starting to sweat in the suit. So I jump back in the car, and rave at the traffic all the way back from the office. I’ve got the AC on me full blast, but the sweat is taking hold. I go to park in front of ADCO, and for the first time since I’ve started here, there’s a guy standing right there checking meters. So I get out my SmartCard and put 20 minutes on the thing, when I just need 20 seconds. Then I rush up the stairs, tripping on one, causing a co-worker to call out, “Are you OK?” Yeahyeahyeah, I’m fine.
The invitation is not readily at hand. I start picking up piles of paper and other junk and rifling through it, dropping every pile on the floor as I finish going through it. Of course, the invitation is at the bottom of the very last pile. I jam it into my pocket and grab my camera, long as I’m here…
Damndamndamn…
I get back in the car, head over toward campus, and as I start looking for a parking space, it’s noon. Well, I failed. By now I’m sweating like a pig in the new suit, and I’ve gone to so much trouble that I figure I’ll try to go anyway. Luckily (my first bit of luck all day), I find a space only a block away, since it’s summer. I get out, put an hour and a half on the meter, take off my coat and head for the library. Sweating like mad.
As I’m heading there, it occurs to me that I don’t know exactly where I’m supposed to go, beyond the fact that it’s the Thomas Cooper library. The new thing is on the other side of the building, so where should I approach from?
I’ll bet the invitation will tell me…
Mind you, this is the first time that I had had any reason to look at the invitation beyond the time, date and place (“Noon on Friday, July 23, 2010,” it had said). I mean, what else do you look at an invitation for, aside from dress code and how to RSVP? And sure enough, there was a card inserted into the invitation with a map on one side saying to enter through the library main entrance. Good. That I can find.
Then, on the other side of the card from the map, there was a bulleted list of information, which if I had noticed before I suppose I had thought it was information about the new collection. You know how there’s usually an insert about that sort of thing. But it wasn’t. It was a list of instructions beginning with “Please bring this ticket with you to the dedication ceremony.”
Well, I had done that, but my heart sank. I had a premonition that there were going to be other requirements, perhaps requirements that had something to do with the fact that even though I was only five minutes late to an event that I knew would involve everybody being carefully checked at the front door, meaning people would still be filing in at this point… and the front of the library was deserted…
Yep. There it was. Third bullet: “Doors open at 10:00 a.m. All attendees must be in the Thomas Cooper Library by 11:45 a.m. Please allow ample time to find parking, walk to the Thomas Cooper Library, and be processed through event screening. There will be no exceptions made to this time frame.”
So that was that. After all that, I had failed to make it. I was too hot and harried at this point even to go, “Damndamndamn” any more.
But being the world’s most persistent optimist, rather than turning back to the car, since I had already walked halfway, and since I had spent a rushed hour trying to get this far, I kept going to the door.
And was turned away by a USC security guy who explained that the doors to the event were closed and the Secret Service, as is their wont, weren’t allowing anyone else in. “No exceptions.” I saw the Secret Service guys standing there, looking around with no more crowd to deal with, and reflected from long experience that no exceptions meant no exceptions. I’ve been pushed out of the way and yelled at for standing in the wrong place by these guys often enough in my career to know that they are no respecters of persons, and there is no arguing with their procedures (which is why I was never fond of covering events that involved them, since as a reporter I always sort of assumed that boundaries were for those other, less enterprising, reporters). I lamely, foolishly, gave the guy my excuse about having to run home looking for my invitation, because at a moment like that you want people to know that you weren’t being cavalier about the time, and he was sympathetic, but…
Sheesh.
Anyway, that’s why I don’t have a report for you on Joe Biden’s visit, or on how Fritz is doing. And why I’ll have to get the sweat cleaned out of my good suit even though I didn’t even make it to the event I put it on for. And why I’m feeling the frustration of knowing that the punctual people among you, the people who have judged and harangued and lectured me all my life because I’ve always tried to do to much and put myself in these situations, will smugly judge me again for this failure. Y’all are like that.
But I tried. I tried hard. It just didn’t work out.
Sorry, Fritz — I had wanted to see you again. Sorry, Joe. Sorry, Harris, for not making it to your event. I really wanted to.
Dang.
