Category Archives: Civility

The Lebanon debate

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Mideast
At one point during the civility discussion from Sunday, Paul DeMarco suggested that:

… if you posed some of your introductory columns as an either/or (i.e
should smoking be allowed or banned in public places) and allowed us to
vote (preferably in a way that the vote tallies were by name as in a
legislature) then we could get a better sense of the mood of the blog
as a whole rather than only that of the loudest contributors.

There’s something to that, although what interests me more than the idea of a "vote" per se is the debate that precedes the vote. That is what distinquishes the deliberative, republican approach from pure, government-by-plebiscite democracy. And that’s what I want to encourage here. A vote, by definition, is either-or, and therefore encourages simplistic, yes-or-no "answers" that usually lack the nuances necessary to address the complexities of real problems in the real world.

Real solutions — the kind that unite a community rather than dividing it — result from consensus, whether it is arrived at by a formal process or not.

So, just as an exercise, let’s try an issue. I see that in my absence my colleagues ran a sort of brief point–counterpoint on the fighting in Lebanon. The exchange was between very young people, and therefore engaged the subject along the lines of the sort of yes/no dichotomy that we’ve trained the present generation to embrace as the only approach.

Let’s see if we can take it to another level. For my part, I gladly defend Israel’s right — nay, duty — to protect itself and its citizens from forces that seek no practical end beyond killing Jews. At the same time, I recognize the moral as well as practical problems presented in trying to destroy an enemy who not only has no compunctions about hiding among noncombatants, but who gains what victories it can from the broadcast images of dead women and children.

What say you? What is the solution? Is there one?

Or should I start with something easier?

Child

Blog civility column

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Making the blogosphere
safe for decent folk
    Lee and LexWolf are ruining your blog for everybody else. They… don’’t just disagree, but demean and ridicule all those who don’’t hold to their position. They… are blog bullies.
            –— "Herb"
    Trust me, Herb, when and if you ever come up with real arguments I will be sure to give them proper respect. So far arguments from your side are rather thin on the ground, if you catch my drift…
            –— "LexWolf"
    (E)xpecting civility on a blog where anonymity rules is a bit like expecting mud wrestling to be played under the same conditions as cricket.
            –— "VOA"

By Brad Warthen
Editorial Page Editor
After more than a year of lively participation –— and in some cases "lively" should be read as a euphemism –— I wonder whether my Weblog is a useful forum. And if it isn’’t, what can be done to make it so?
    These may seem odd questions to ask regarding something to which I, and many of you, devote so much energy.
    How much energy? Well, since I started on May 17, 2005, I have written more than 600 times on that site. In the same period, I’’ve had 68 columns in the actual newspaper. Readers haven’’t been exactly watching the grass grow, either. Back here at the regular paper we have never received many more than 300 letters to the editor in a single week — including unpublishable scraps without signatures. In the seven days that ended June 16, there were more than 700 comments on my blog.
    We’’re talking a lot of activity here. A lot of heat. The question is, how much light?
    I’’ve noticed a disturbing trend in the comments lately. It’’s not that many of them are rude, dismissive, narrow-minded, combative and hostile to anyone who dares to disagree. I mean, many of them are all those things. But that’’s not the problem. That has been a factor since the first posts in May of last year. It’’s the nature of the medium.
    In the daily newspaper, we have a thing called "standards." Letters have to be signed. Writers have to be prepared for phone calls from us asking them to back up assertions of fact.
    On the blog, very few sign their full names. Add to that the fact that so far, I have deleted only one comment ever for being unacceptable. That one was grotesquely obscene. (Of course, I delete "spam" messages on sight.)
    This creates an atmosphere that some find, shall we say, liberating. And I don’’t mind that. Call me what you like. If you say something I haven’’t heard before, maybe I’’ll send you a nice prize.
    Here’’s what I am worried about: My less mature correspondents are running off the serious, thoughtful people who came to the blog hoping for the very thing I would like that venue to be — a place to exchange sincere, constructive ideas about the challenges facing South Carolina and the rest of the world.
    Lord knows we need a place like that. Check the "debates" in the Legislature, the Congress or on all those shouting matches on 24-hour cable TV "news." Where do most of those get us? Nowhere. Political parties, professional advocacy groups in Washington and closer to home, news directors who see themselves as entertainers, the Blogosphere itself and, yes, the pliable "mainstream media" have in a single generation dragged public discourse down to the point that it seems that a majority of us believe that public policy is about nothing deeper than scoring points with stupid, simplistic bumper-sticker quips.
    They make me want to hurl, and I am far from alone. Why do you think voter turnout and involvement is so pathetic?
    I have always wanted this page to be something better, and the blog was intended to augment that mission, not replace it in any way. The idea was to broaden the discussion, and share a lot of material that either I didn’’t have room for in the paper, or just wasn’’t ready for prime-time exposure as an editorial or column.
    You have responded, and I have been humbled and gratified by your participation — at least, by some of it.
    But now I’’m trying to figure out how to make that space more hospitable to the most thoughtful respondents, a place where they are greeted with respectful dialogue rather than low-minded derision. I’’m not talking hugs and kisses. I want the arguments lively, and no intellectual punches pulled. The childish stuff, however, needs to go.
    Here are my options, as I see them at this point:

  •     Require registration to leave a comment, with full names. Free people should stand behind their words.
  •     Let those who want to maintain their anonymity do so, but cull out the comments that I personally see as destructive.

    Of course, the best thing would be for everyone on the left, the right and the loony middle to learn how to be cool and play better with others. But if I have to be Daddy I will. And don’’t look at me like that, mister.
    People on the Blogosphere hate this kind of talk. But there are plenty of partisan blowoff sites for them to go to. I’’ve never made a secret of the fact that I’’d like this to be something more. And if I didn’’t know that some of you want it to be something more, I would have quit trying long ago.
    Anybody have any other ideas? Go to the blog, and speak up. I’’m going to give this process a couple of weeks before taking any overt action, drastic or otherwise.
    In the meantime, if you have visited the blog in the past and been discouraged, now is the time to come back and help me make the place safe for decent, law-abiding smart folk.
    If you haven’’t been there at all, what’’s wrong with you? The address is right here…

Enough with the silly pictures

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OK, in response to my readers’ justified cry for a little dignity, I will post no more silly pictures (unless, of course, they are really, really silly, and it would be a crime to pass on them). And I think y’all are completely right. This blog should be better than that. It was an experiment in different ways to communicate using this medium, and I think I exceeded the envelope on acceptability.

In fact, I will take down the offending posts, if y’all think I should go that far.

I’ll give the voting until the end of July 4th. Say whatever you like, but be sure to include a clear "yes" or "no" rather than leaving it up to me to interpret your comments. No hanging chads here.

OK, I’m smoking now…

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I suppose Kathleen would call me a Nazi or something for even bringing this up, but …

What do you regard as an appropriately cruel and unusual punishment for somebody who saturates a non-smoking hotel room with cigarette residue?

I checked into this room with the standard international nicht rauchen sign on the door, and when I opened the door, the room hit me with a reek that made me think I might be better off going down to sleep in the bar.

Mind you, this is not an esthetic thing to me. I’m very allergic to the stuff, and in fact am at this moment in the middle of a second course of prednisone to treat sinus inflammation that’s been killing me for the past couple of months.

The lady at the desk was very nice, but there wasn’t another room available tonight that met our needs. They promise to switch us ASAP tomorrow. Meanwhile, I went down to the car to get my breathing machine so I wouldn’t have to fetch it at 3 a.m., just in case. Meanwhile, I’m thinking positive thoughts.

Never mind about me, though. I’ll be fine, I think. But don’t you think whoever last occupied this room should at least have his credit card billed double or something?

Thoughts?

Don’t let ’em bug you, Sally

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Hey, Sally, don’t let those abusive comments about your appeal to reason bother you. It’s pretty much par for the course these days, particularly if you ask people to rise above factionalism.

You’ve been out of the political sphere for awhile — as you say, teachers are so wrapped up in the day-to-day practical matter of education that they tend not to follow this stuff too closely.

Anyway, in the last few years, partisanship has more or less driven the country mad. Pragmatic, good-faith observations such as yours are actually beyond the understanding of most people who take an active interest in political matters.

If they call themselves Republicans, or conservatives, they will accuse you of trying to — how was it Lee put it? — "sabotage the Republican primary." Imagine that. People so far gone in the partisan game that picking up a Republican ballot in order to vote for the BEST CANDIDATE, the one you honestly would prefer to see win, is seen as "sabotage."

If they call themselves Democrats, or liberals (excuse me, they don’t use that outside Nancy Pelosi’s district; let’s say "progressives"), they’ll have a fit because you dare to suggest that anyone who MIGHT otherwise vote Democratic should vote Republican — even though that is obviously the thing to do if you truly want to advance public education, which Democrats SAY they care about.

Forget about superintendent of education for a moment; forget about governor, for that matter. Forget even about public education. Anyone who cares about good, straightforward, honest government — for that matter, anyone who believes that South Carolinians ought to determine the course of their state, rather than moneyed ideological outsiders who don’t even know anything about our state — should grab a Republican ballot if they live in the House district of one of the Republicans that these unpricipled groups are targeting.

If you didn’t get it the first time, go back and read Cindi Scoppe’s column on the subject. And if you still don’t get it, read it again. Follow the links. THINK. These honest people — including the one member of the House to vote against this budget every step of the way — are being attacked in generic mailings as "big spenders." Why is that? Because the outsider’s true agenda — attacking every Republican who took a stand against tax credits for private schools — doesn’t play well.

THINK. Whatever partisan label you choose, or if you don’t choose a label (and if you don’t, God bless you for it) THINK about what these people are trying to do. Think about how stupid they think you are, and how much money they’re betting that they’re right about you.

And then go back and read what Sally wrote.

By the way, one added thought: Note that I refer to people who "call themselves" Republicans or Democrats, or "choose a label." I say that because in South Carolina, no one is a registered member of any party. It’s amazing how many people don’t know that. If you don’t believe me, check your voter registration card.

Every time you go to vote in a primary, you get to choose. Next primary, you can vote in the opposite party. Next time, you can vote in the first one again. It doesn’t matter. In this state, you are actually free to vote as you choose.

Almost. There are two restrictions, and I really wish they didn’t exist, either. First, you have to vote in one or the other primary in a given election. Second, you can only vote in the runoff of the primary you voted in. (Actually, that’s another reason the Republican primary vote should be relatively huge this time: You choose a Democratic ballot on June 13, and then you look at the critical choices remaining to be made in the Republican runoff on June 27, and you’re out of luck. You’re disenfranchised. Think about it: Are there any Democratic contests with enough viable candidates to have a runoff? Not in any races I’ve been following. But there are certainly going to be some GOP runoffs, and the contrasts between the remaining candidates in those are likely to be stark.)

Now see, I’ve just set off the partisans again. They are OUTRAGED that I imply you should be allowed to vote in BOTH parties’ primaries on a given day. You bet. I’m sick and tired of what I as an independent am left with in the way of choices come November. I’m sick of having to decide whether it’s more important to have a say in this primary or the other one. For once, I’d like to get to vote for having TWO good candidates in the general election. I’d like to have a choice in the fall between good and better, rather than bad and worse.

Moreover, any reasonable person is likely to care about a Democrat winning in the primary for one office, and a Republican in another contest on the same day. Basically, this system condemns said reasonable person to being disenfranchised, either for (say) governor or superintendent.

The thing that makes it easy for a reasonable person such as Sally to choose Republican over Democratic this time is that the candidates for governor aren’t that terribly different on the issue that is of overriding importance to her. So she can leave that alone. The momentous decision on education will be made on the Republican ballot.

Oscar and Ann Coulter

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Man, I thought I’d never write a post with "Ann Coulter" in the headline — the wars of the ideologues interest me only to the extent that I sometimes find them morbidly fascinating. As in, "See, that’s what wrong with the country!"

I must have been in one of those moods, because I finally gave in to the fact that she had beenCoulter mentioned repeatedly in recent days in comments on this blog, and always in a context that suggested that everybody else but me knew why she was the subject of the day. You see, I’ve been sort of busy right here in South Carolina. In any case, I’ve never read anything by Ms. Coulter (does she mind being called that, by the way?). Nor have I seen her on the telly, but I’ll just bet she’s one of those shouting heads I don’t see because of not having cable.

Anyway, I Googled her (and is it OK if I say that?). And I’m guessing the reason folks are talking about her so much has something to do with this. She must have really gone over the line if the National Review is saying this about her:

Apparently, in Ann’s mind, she constitutes the thin blonde line between freedom and tyranny…

Oops, no. I see that it must be something else, because that’s from way back in 2001. It must be this
— which I found on the old-fashioned wire service. If it was something else, perhaps y’all can enlighten me, if "enlighten" is the word.

But more interesting to me, and the only reason I am invoking the woman’s name, is that I clicked on her official site, and checked her archived writings. I immediately clicked on one of the more inflammatory-looking headlines, and found this. No, not the article — I didn’t read that. I’m talking about the little ad at the top, the one that says:

Republican Oscar Lovelace
The Next Governor of South Carolina
Mark Your Calendar, June 13 Primary

You click on it, and you get his Web site.

Interesting choice of an advertising venue. I would think there were better ones for reaching a South Carolina readership, but what do I know?

Correction: It was just the opposite, partly

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Altman
I now have a firsthand report, and the previous one was exactly backwards on the second point. If you follow me.

Apparently, what Rep. Altman actually said about editors at The State was that we can’t get anything for free at any stores — even temporarily. More specifically, he is said to have said that the newspaper’s owners won’t let us get so much as a box of paper clips on credit, on account of how we’re such terrible business people.

With regard to myself, I must endorse the representative’s remarks on this score. I am not a businessman, terrible or otherwise, but if I were I’d probably be a lousy one. And while the paper clip thing may be a tad hyperbolic, he’s caught the gist of what it’s like working with Knight Ridder. I can get the paper clips, but then we have to go through all sorts of gyrations to get the expense processed.

There are many reasons why we’ll all be glad to be owned by McClatchy soon.

As for the other — well, my first source seems to have gotten it right. Of my having called him a "jerk," he seems to have observed that "that is the extent of his erudition."

So, bottom line: John Graham Altman is still a jerk, but that doesn’t mean he’s always wrong.

‘Mary’ stands accused

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I’ve decided to set before this "community" an interesting proposition. Buried deep among the record 108 comments on my lengthy March 26 column is the following, from fellow Unpartian (I think) Paul DeMarco:

Thanks for trying to keep the debate civil. Personal attacks simply
demonstate that the attacker’s argument won’t stand on its own merit.
Mary’s "worthless piece of garbage" routine is tiresome and mitigates
any impact the substance of her message might have. If I were Brad, I
wouldn’t stand for it. I’d warn her and her like and then ban them from
the site if they continued. If not, I predict, the ugliness will only
worsen.

As you can see, the Unparty — assuming I’m right about Paul’s affiliation — is not for libertarians. We believe in the rule of law.

The thing is, the shifting community that has formed on this blog has no laws as yet. And we are still small enough that we have not formed a republic, therefore to the extent that we deliberate, we must do so through the "town-meeting" sort of direct democracy.

But now Citizen DeMarco has proposed not only a law, but presented its first test. He says that Mary Rosh‘s behavior is unacceptable in these virtual parts. He proposes a community standard, and a means of enforcement — a warning, followed if necessary by excommunication.

This is fascinating. We are present at the birth of a society, however rudimentary it may be. I’d like to see where the group will take this. I expect a wide variety of viewpoints to be expressed, but I’m curious to see whether we can nevertheless move toward a consensus — one way or the other, or in between somewhere.

Since I have a rather unique role in this society — you might say I’m sort of a unitary executive in a very liberal (in the classic sense) democracy — I’m not going to say what I think about Mary’s case at this point.

Anyway, we have the bill before us. Let’s debate it.

Mayor Bob controls himself

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One of my colleagues who attended the Columbia city candidates’ debate last week told me that Mayor Bob Coble got pretty passionate about the issues.

In fact, on one occasion, he said he "violently" disagreed with the idea that part of the old CCI should have been preserved as a tourist attraction. When I heard that, my eyebrows went up at the idea of our studiously self-effacing Mayor Bob losing control of his emotions to such an extent.

Perhaps the mayor saw eyebrows also go up in the live audience, because he quickly added:

"… not physically, but violently…"

I’m sure all eyebrows went back down at that. The world was still in its proper shape, and everyone felt safe.

But I’ll mention it here

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A colleague and I were having lunch today with Tom Davis, whose title I’m always forgetting but who was described in a recent news story as "the governor’s deputy chief of staff and his top liaison to the
General Assembly" (see why I forget it?).

Most of it dealt with the rough couple of weeks he had had with the blowup between Gov. SanfordDavis and House Republicans over his spending cap, and the defeat Sanford forces suffered over the billboard issue.

But it strayed when he admired my discipline (after all, it’s a Friday in Lent, and he and I are both Catholic) in not only abstaining from meat, but forgoing dessert. Unwilling to take undeserved praise, I reminded him of my severe food allergies, and he said something about how I was kind of like Meg Ryan’s fiance in "Sleepless in Seattle." I suppose that’s right. (You ever notice how often allergies and asthma are used in the movies as shorthand to indicate weakness of character or lack of attractiveness as a mate, which is how it was used in this one — completely at odds with my own experience, I might add? Let a character take a quick puff on an inhaler, and you know that sooner or later, he will be found wanting.)

Anyway, Tom (shown above, in a photo that doesn’t do justice to his Pullmanesque qualities, but is the only picture I have) then mentioned something about that character having been played by Bill Pullman. At that point, I  exercised great restraint by not observing how much Tom looks like that actor. I was proud of myself. I mean, you never know — Tom might have been insulted. I would never, ever wish to embarrass him or make him feel awkward in public over such a trifle.

Of course, the blog is another matter.

“White House Reporter Syndrome”

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Those of you who are cursed with good memories may recall my previous reference to my disdain for the White House Press Corps. Well, maybe they are to be pitied rather than vilified.

I credit TheColumbiaRecord.com blogger Bob McAlister for pointing out The Washington Post‘s revelation that what really keeps those nabobs nattering is a mental illness. And we should not blame the victims of affliction, should we?

The Post reports that Clinical Psychologist Renana Brooks has even named this malady: "White House Reporter Syndrome." She has treated several poor sufferers. And they do suffer, poor things:

"We’re one of the most reviled subsets of one of the most reviled professions,"  Dana Milbank, a  Washington Post reporter who covered the White House during Mr. Bush’s first term, said. "We’re going to lose the battle every time."

Awww. There, there.

And after all those mean things I said. Turns out they’re just plain nuts, just like those people over there.

OK, my turn on the Folks op-ed

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OK, now that the comments on the Will Folks op-ed have reached critical mass of 34 comments and rising (including two from Mr. Folks himself), I will take a few moments to address some of the points raised by readers.

First, though, let me give you a brief summary of my thinking as it went before the piece ran — before the storm, as it were.

When the proof landed on my desk, I saw Will’s mug and thought, "Oh, man — what, again?" Then I remembered the earlier conversation in which it had been mentioned that this piece was in the pipeline. A board member responded by asking, "Is it something we would run if someone else wrote it?" That’s pretty much our standard response whenever the question arises whether we should give this person or that person space on our pages — what if it were from someone else? If the answer is "yes," we generally go with it. The answer was "yes."

So I read the piece on the page and agreed with my colleague who had put it there that yes, if this had been from some other similarly situated advocate on that side of the debate, we would have run it. But note that qualification of "similarly situated": It probably NOT have run if it had come in from someone who had never been a player of some kind in the debate. I say that because the arguments were pretty weak, and persuasive only to someone who already believes all this stuff, regardless of evidence to the contrary. Coming from Will Folks, its weakness was interesting in and of itself. Coming from someone unknown to the readers, it would have had little value.

To elaborate on that, some folks have asked why we would "give a platform" to someone who pleaded guilty to criminal domestic violence. Well, we wouldn’t. But we would "give a platform" to someone who is writing on a subject that is important and timely and who:

  • Was the spokesman, until quite recently, of the current governor.
  • Demonstrated his temperamental unsuitability for the job a number of
    times during the four years he spoke for the governor, but continued to
    hold the position until, as I just said, quite recently.
  • Is still advocating, as hard as he can, policies that are priorities for that governor.
  • Writes with a tone and style that is much the same as the way he spoke when he was in the governor’s office — lashing out, dismissive toward those who disagree, etc.
  • Brings to the surface, in a particularly stark manner, something that has been hinted at more subtly up to now — the growing tension between the governor and those who think like him and an increasingly unified business leadership.

My friend Samuel Tenenbaum said "Shame!" over our having run this piece. But I feel no shame. Well, I will admit that one thing about the
decision to run this does nag at my conscience just a bit: the fact that the piece was so
weak in its arguments that it undermined Mr. Folks’ point of view, with which
I disagree. So should I have waited for a stronger piece expressing that
point of view to come in? Well, if I had, I’d still be waiting. It’s not like we had a strong piece and this one, and picked this one. This is what we had.

Another respondent says critics are attacking Mr. Folks, but dodging the substance of what he said. Well, let’s discuss two or three points of that substance:

  • Will dismisses the financial acumen of some of the heaviest business hitters in South Carolina (or as he puts it, "prominent leaders of the so-called ‘business community’"), and does so in a way that takes for granted that HE and the governor know better than they do what is good for business in South Carolina. He sneers at the "left-leaning S.C. Chamber of Commerce" (note to Hunter Howard — better quit wearing those Che T-shirts around the State House). He calls Darla Moore and Mack Whittle "self-appointed dilettantes." To provide a little perspective, as the governor said to me awhile back about his having hired Will in the first place, "You take someone who was playing bass guitar in a rock ‘n’ roll band and you give him a chance." Yeah, OK, let’s see — to whom would I go for credible financial advice? Darla Moore, or Will Folks? Mack Whittle, or Will Folks? Harris DeLoach, or Will Folks? Don Herriott, or Will Folks? Ooh, that’s a toughie.
  • While the governor can be said to have more experience in business than his former protege, to suggest that he is someone whose credentials suggest more real-world experience in financial dealings than the people Mr. Folks dismisses is ludicrous. Mr. Sanford’s record in the private sector before he took up politics is by comparison to these people — and this is charitably understating the case — less than impressive.

Actually, I’m going to stop there, and not get into his strong suggestion that ONLY the kind of tax cut the governor wants could possibly help our economy, or his indulgence in yet another gratuitous slap at public schools ("unquestionably the nation’s worst") or his mentioning that "state spending jumping another 9.1 percent" without noting by how much it had been cut in the several preceding years (some agencies, such as the Corrections Department, by more than 20 percent during that period). Basically, I’m tired of typing.

But before I go, let me address a few reader comments specifically:

  • Scott Barrow says "you’re giving him credibility and helping him restore his bad name by printing his columns." I don’t see how.  If anything, I’m hurting the cause he advocates by running a piece from him (I already addressed the fact that my conscience nags at me about that, even though my conscience, yaller dog that it is, doesn’t know what it’s talking about).
  • Uncle Elmer asks, "Does Mr. Sanford really need cool-headed, articulate friends like this?" Well, no, he doesn’t. In fact, the last time
    we ran a piece by Mr. Folks, the governor’s office called to question our having done so.
  • Honesty says, "The fact that you found the need to edit his previous editorial due to
    his apparent dishonesty while deeming him worthy of now being published
    as a guest editorialist borders on bizarre." Well, not really. We edit everybody, and a lot of what we edit out are unsupportable statements that are wrongly presented as fact. Sometimes we miss such mistakes and instances of outright attempts to mislead, but we try.
  • Will Folks himself complained that "Just once… it would be nice to submit an article and actually
    have folks debate its merits instead of venting their spleens with all
    this anonymous speculation regarding a domestic situation they didn’t
    witness and don’t possess the slightest bit of insight into." Well, once again, Will, I tried. I refer you to the above.
  • Finally, Don Williams raised a broader complaint "about the plethora of conservative local columnists which have been given platform" on our pages. Well, first, I wouldn’t call Will Folks a "conservative." I think that term refers far better to the "left-leaning" Chamber of Commerce than to him. And Mr. Williams lumps him in with Bob McAlister and Mike Cakora as being three who "arrive at the same conclusions time after time." Well, Bob works for those "dilettantes" over at the Palmetto Institute, and is therefore pushing very different views from Mr. Folks on these issues. Mr. McAlister is also a very conservative Southern Baptist, while last I read, Mr. Cakora was an atheist. I have no idea where Mr. Cakora (whom I met once, about six years ago — a fact I thought I’d throw in for Mark Whittington‘s benefit) stands on the tax issue (maybe you can find out on his blog). Beyond that, we usually get complaints about running too many liberals. I don’t know whether we do or not. I particularly don’t know on local columns. Basically, we generally take what we’re sent, and choose between them based on quality and relevance (and whether they’ve been published somewhere else, which is generally a disqualifier). Mr. McAlister sends us far more columns than probably any other local contributor — more than we actually run, I would point out. Joe Darby — who is no one’s definition of a conservative — probably comes in a distant second (we hear from him less since he moved to Charleston). Tom Turnipseed? I would say he submits columns less often that Mr. McAlister, but more often than than Mr. Darby. (Mr. Turnipseed is also regularly published elsewhere). We run letters from him more often, including a short one on Dec. 18.

As for nationally syndicated columnists, here’s a blog by a fairly nonpartisan guy who takes the trouble to rate columnists according to how much they lean either Democratic or Republican. Of the ones on his list we run regularly, he sees five as Dems and only one as GOP. But then, he lists George Will, of all people, as being slightly Democratic, so… Also, he doesn’t include some of our conservative regulars, such as Charles Krauthammer and Cal Thomas. I guess "left" and "right" are pretty much in the eyes of the beholder, which is one reason I hate using the terms.

That’s all I have to say about that. For now.

USC/Clemson column

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Gamecock, Tiger team up against caps
By Brad Warthen
Editorial Page Editor
WEEK BEFORE last, I ran into USC President Andrew Sorensen as he was on his way to an “unprecedented” meeting with House Speaker Bobby Harrell. They were going to talk budgets.
    What was so new about that?
    “Carolina and Clemson are talking to him at the same time,” Dr. Sorensen said. “And we’re using the same numbers.” To those who remember the old days of tigers and chickens fighting like… well, like cats and birds, over funding, this was remarkable. Mr. Harrell was so “overwhelmed,” Dr.Bobby_presidents_1 Sorensen later said, he sent for a photographer to record the event.
    “Jim and I have become increasingly close in terms of… what we want to do and how we want to do it,” Dr. Sorensen said when he and Clemson President James Barker visited the editorial board last week.
    Mr. Barker stressed that this new level of cooperation was “not because of the governor’s ‘tax.’ ”
    In his latest executive budget, Gov. Mark Sanford proposed “a one percent reduction for Clemson, USC, and MUSC that will result in savings of $3,232,091 in general funds to encourage such further collaboration.”
    “Yes,” said Dr. Sorensen, “he takes away a million from each of us to stimulate us to collaborate…. if you can understand the logic in that, please explain it to me.”
    This is not the only area in which the two presidents agreed with each other and disagreed with the governor.
    For instance, there is the governor’s proposed cap on tuition increases. Sounds good, doesn’t it? It would help me out, with my fourth child now in college.
    And I like the governor’s stated goal, which is to force consolidation and reorganization of the state’s non-system of public higher education.
    But are caps a good idea for the state of South Carolina? No, and not just because this isn’t going to convince lawmakers to cut the number of institutions.
    Tuition started shooting up when the Legislature decided to cut back on direct funding of colleges, and give middle-class voters scholarship checks paid for by poor folks suckered into playing the lottery.
    South Carolina’s public colleges have experienced a larger percentage decrease in state funding than those of any other Southern Regional Education Board state over the last decade — a period in which most SREB states increased funding.
    Of the 16 states, only West Virginia funded its colleges at a lower percentage of the regional average last year. South Carolina was at 72.45 percent of that average. North Carolina was at the top end, at 136.95 percent.
    Higher state funding means lower tuition. Not coincidentally, Kiplinger’s recently listed UNC-Chapel Hill as the best deal in the country, measured by quality compared to cost. Out of 130 public colleges listed, Clemson was 24th, and USC 31st — in spite of those tuition increases.
    Or perhaps because of them. The money to improve academics had to come from somewhere. And since the General Assembly has seen fit to turn the money over to the students, via scholarships, that’s where the institutions have turned for funding.
    At USC, said Dr. Sorensen, 96 percent of entering freshmen get “one of the lottery-funded scholarships.” At Clemson, it’s 99 percent. In fact, said Mr. Barker, “At Clemson, not one freshman from South Carolina paid full tuition” this year.
    OK, so the heads of the schools don’t want tuition caps. Big surprise. What about the students? I don’t know about all of them, but some student government leaders at USC sent a letter
to the governor last week asking for a meeting “to make you aware of our concerns with these proposals, as we feel they do not completely address the desires of students.”
    One of the signers, student body Treasurer Tommy Preston, was diplomatic about the governor’s plan when I asked about it, saying that it was “our opinion that there’s just not enough information” to know, but it seemed the caps “potentially could be harmful in the future.”
    Never mind what the treasurer thinks. What does Tommy think?
    “Personally,” he said, “I think our state has a bigger problem with higher education funding.”
    Smart kid, that Tommy.

Hey! Leave those kids alone

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The job of editorial page editor — the way I choose to do it, anyway — involves a curious mix of leadership and collaboration.

As I frequently tell readers, our editorial board makes decisions by consensus, meaning that even if not everyone in the room buys into the position completely, it has been shaped to the point that each member can live with having the editorial appear beneath his or her name (which, while editorials are by definition not signed — only columns have bylines — is always up there on the masthead with the rest of our names for all the world to see. For an illustration, zoom in on the upper left-hand corner of this page.)

My colleagues occasionally say I’m not being entirely candid when I say that because we don’t always reach consensus, and sometimes we take a certain position only because I insist , despite the lingering objections of one or more members. True, there are times when I consider it necessary to take a position, and a consensus proves impossible — on some political endorsements, for instance. Unlike other issues, an endorsement picks one candidate or another, yes or no — leaving no room for the compromises that make consensus possible. And I firmly believe that failing to endorse — when one of these people will be elected — is a copout.

My response to this gentle remonstration is that just as often (if not more so), I give in and go along with the consensus. An example is today’s lead editorial. Personally, I’d like to see summer vacation start at Memorial Day and end after Labor Day. I sympathize with those who want their kids to enjoy the same sort of three-month idylls that I remember
from my own youth. And while I’m a big advocate of standards in the schools, I personally fail to understand what is magical about 180 days of instruction. I seem to recall many thousands of hours that I spent in school as being superfluous. I believe what I learned between kindergarten and 12th grade could have been taught in half the time.

But my colleagues pretty much unanimously insist that I’m completely WRONG on this, and since I have to confess that to some extent my position is based in sentimentality rather than evidence and logic (and I tend to treat positions based in "feelings" rather than thought with contempt), I’ve gone along with them.

But I only go along so far, and the copy has to get by me to get on the page. An example — a paragraph in today’s editorial originally read like this:

On a practical level, the bill approved Wednesday by the House Education Committee isn’t quite as bad as some previous attempts to set local school calendars: It allows schools to start back as early as the third Monday of August, rather than holding them to the agrarian, post-Labor Day schedule that the businesses on the beach seem to think will benefit them. But then, if you want to talk practicalities, the whole notion that starting school in August somehow shortens the summer vacation is nutty: An early start means kids get out of school by the end of May instead of mid-June. The actual length of summer vacation is the same no matter when it starts and stops.

I was willing to go along with all but one word of that. I paused in the editing process to send an instant message to the writer:

A couple of points re this…
1. Summer vacation IS shorter than it used to be. Kids didn’t get off in mid-June; they got off around Memorial Day.
2. August is more summery than June. It’s hotter. In June, the ocean water is sometimes still cold. Most of June occurs in the spring. All of August (and most of September) occur during the summer.
I guess what I’m saying here is, I object to "nutty." "Unconvincing," perhaps — at least, to a consensus of our board.

So, being the editor, I changed the word, and the writer did not protest. But she still thinks it’s nutty.

Beyond that, what’s up with Andre and Democrats, period?

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At lunch today, I ran into former Gov. Jim Hodges. And I went up to him to say hi, and we were both perfectly civil. Really, we were — I even introduced him to my boss, Publisher Ann Caulkins. He was most cordial. Ad man Kevin Fisher, with whom Ann and I were meeting (more about that later), even remarked upon it.

But that’s not what I wanted to tell you about. What I wanted to tell you about was what happened a few minutes after that. Mr. Hodges was seated at a round table with several other people at the Capital City Club. Eventually, he was joined by Andre Bauer. He made a joke to Andre — something about asking for his help with Medicare. I know it was a joke for three reasons. First, everyone at the table laughed. Second, Jim Hodges is younger than I am (even though his hair is much whiter now than in this picture). Third — and this is the really funny part — the Legislature not long ago placed the state Office on Aging under the lieutenant governor’s office, for reasons that remain unclear in spite of Sen. Jackson’s oped. The senator wrote that my colleague Cindi Scoppe was wrong to call that move "nonsensical," but still didn’t explain why lawmakers saw fit to take that function away from the governor and give it to the gov lite.

Anyway, this is an interesting juxtaposition of events. First the op-ed from Sen. Jackson. Now, we see the lieutenant governor getting all convivial with the former governor over lunch.

I knew that Andre was a determined and hardworking campaigner who would pursue anyone’s vote, but this is taking it to a whole new level.

Dale, don’t give up on us!

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I just posted a reply to a comment on my Sunday column, and what I had to say was important enough that I thought I’d also publish it as a separate post. Hmm. That sounded pompous. What I mean is, it’s important in terms of explaining what this blog is all about (or what I would like for it to be about) that I thought I should make the statement a little more prominently.

The comment was from a blog newcomer called "Dale" who chimed in after a series of, shall we say, overheated remarks from some of my regulars. Here is his comment, in its entirety:

Mr. Warthen:

Good column today, much livelier than usual. In our house we agree
with your conclusion that we have to stay and finish in Iraq. Thanks
for cluing us in on Joe Lieberman’s remarks.

A few other thoughts:
This is my first blog visit. Based on the posts before me I’d say
you’re going above and beyond putting up with the stuff people say. If
blogs are limited to ranters, I doubt I’ll pick up the habit.

How come Congressman Murtha’s Iraq remarks got intense coverage and Senator Lieberman’s did not?

I’m a subscriber to the Economist too and agree that they do a good
job providing news. They’re pretty liberal but even so I think they do
a better job than the American media by presenting more facts and
also by providing both sides of partisan issues. Why do I learn more
about current US news by reading the Economist than I do by reading The
State or watching CNN?

Thanks again.

And here is what I had to say to him in reply:

Dale, please don’t be put off by the other comments — at least, not to the point of giving up on blogs. We need more comments from people who are put off by extreme partisanship and personal attacks. If that description fits, that means we need YOU.

I’m trying to create a space here where people with various opinions can interact in a civil manner. But I also let anybody have their say (I haven’t used my ability to delete comments once since starting the blog in May — except for cases when the same comment is published twice, because of a glitch in the software). But it is my hope that people who are open-minded, reasonable and respectful of others will ultimately flock to this space in sufficient numbers that they will help distinguish this blog from the all-too-many partisan screamfests out there.

In fact, in case you haven’t read them, here are a couple of my recent attempts to tilt at the madly spinning windmills of partisanship. If you agree with what I’m saying there, and you agree with Joe Lieberman, you might want to give this blog a chance for a while before giving up.

As for your question, "How come Congressman Murtha’s Iraq remarks got intense coverage and Senator Lieberman’s did not?"… well, that was one of the oversights by the media that my column was meant to address, to the extremely limited ability I have to address it. The only defensible answer to the question was that Mr. Murtha was rather dramatically changing his point of view, and Mr. Lieberman was not — thereby making the Murtha comments more newsworthy, according to the basic standards of news judgment. But his comments weren’t nearly as important as the play they got, or the reactions from other politicians, or the reactions to the reactions, or any of that other destructive nonsense that happens in the echo chamber inside the Beltway.

One more thing: Your assessment that The Economist is "pretty liberal" is spot-on, although possibly not in the way that you meant it. The Economist refers to itself as "a liberal newspaper." That is to say, it is "liberal" in the classic sense of the term. It is very libertarian, particularly in the economic sense — very free-market-oriented, opposed to the welfare states of Europe, etc. Of course, over here, people tend to call that "conservative," even though it’s technically wrong to do so. (And even in explaining itself, the publication occasionally uses the modern, popular sense of the term, as illustrated in the above-referenced link.) Therefore, Steve Aiken has a point when he disagrees with your characterization — although I have to differ with him when he seems (at least by implication, although I may be misreading him) to equate calling that publication "liberal" with calling people with whom one disagrees "retarded."

Of course, I now welcome responses to my response.