Category Archives: 2010 Governor

Et tu, Chip? Not quite, but almost…

It says a good deal about Nikki Haley that even one of Mark Sanford’s closest allies is joining, however tentatively, the Greek chorus of Republicans concerned about her candidacy.

I thought it was remarkable enough that Chip Campsen’s sister would lead a dissident group of mainstream Republicans in challenging the Haley insurgency. Republicans don’t do that, not after the primary is over.

But now, Sen. Campsen himself is showing up in a news story about his sister’s group, as I learned from the Republicans for Sheheen Facebook page:

Sen. Chip Campsen, R-Isle of Palms, last week acknowledged that the questions surrounding Haley could have consequences.

“I’ve been on the sidelines,” he said. “Party loyalty is subordinate to principle loyalty. It’s important to commit to the principles the institution stands for more than the institution. If this stuff is true (about Haley), then there are certain principles in the party that are at stake. I’m not saying it is true, but if it is, my party loyalty would not override my commitment to principle.”

Campsen is Mosteller’s brother and a former senior policy adviser to Gov. Mark Sanford. Campsen has not disclosed publicly what he thinks about Mosteller’s efforts.

No, he’s not going to come out for Vincent Sheheen, any more than Bobby Harrell will openly do so in his tortured missives aimed at debunking what Nikki and her supporters say.

But folks, this is about as close as Republican officeholders, from the Harrell variety to the Sanford wing, are likely to come to screaming “Don’t vote for this woman!”

This is probably still too subtle for the people likely to consider voting for her. But to people who know the score, the message is clear.

Meanwhile, sister Cyndi — who was an acknowledged power in GOP circles before her brother was — is claiming her group has grown to 100, “including former Charleston County Republican Party Chairman Samm McConnell and Chairwoman Linda Butler Johnson.”

“The Brad Show,” Episode 3: Vincent Sheheen

Well, here it is: The third installment of “The Brad Show.” Our guest Wednesday afternoon was Sen. Vincent Sheheen, the Democratic nominee for governor of South Carolina.

We sort of did this one on the run. We found out on Wednesday that he would be in our neighborhood, and were told we could catch him over at Rep. James Smith‘s law office at 4 p.m. So Jay and Julia grabbed the equipment, and we ran over there. James and his staff hastily cleaned off a conference table that was covered with stacks of documents and other debris while Jay and Julia set up the camera and wired us for sound, and we were off. Twenty-five minutes later, we were packed up and ready to leave, the interview in the proverbial can. It all went so smoothly — no thanks to me; all I did was show up — that would you have thought we had done this 100 times before.

So thanks, Jay and Julia, and thanks, Capt. Smith, for accommodating us so generously.

I hope you can find something of value in this conversation. I’m sure you’ll tell me if you don’t…

Coming up on “The Brad Show:” Vincent Sheheen

My plan was to keep pressing until I got a commitment for a time that Vincent Sheheen would sit still long enough for us to shoot an installment of “The Brad Show” with him, and then to turn and press Nikki Haley for an interview as well — having heard she was reluctant to do such things. Sort of the way I’m currently playing Joe Wilson and Rob Miller off against each other. (Oh, wait — you don’t suppose they’ll read this, do you?)

But the strategy fell all apart today, when the Sheheen campaign called and said, “What about today?,” which set off a scramble to act on that opportunity. Jay and Julia gathered up the equipment, and at 4 p.m., we spoke with him in the conference room over at James Smith’s law office, a few blocks from ADCO. The interview ran about 23 minutes, same as the one with Dr. Whitson.

The show should be up on the blog by the end of the day tomorrow, if nothing more arises to prevent Jay from getting it ready.

To whet your appetite, I share with you the list of questions that I prepared as a crutch before the session. Back when I was at the paper, I almost never prepared questions (or anything else) ahead of time. In keeping with the Fremen dictum to “Be prepared to appreciate what you meet,” and being a believer in the Dirk Gently holistic method of investigation, I liked to go in and see where the interview would go. And often it went in interesting directions that I could never have anticipated.

But with video, I’m a little less confident still, and like to have some questions in front of me in case I freeze up and can’t think of anything to dispel “dead air.”

So I prepared this list ahead of time (it took no more than five minutes) — and we actually got to most of the questions, as you will see tomorrow:

Questions for Vincent Sheheen

“The Brad Show”

October 13, 2010

At the Columbia Rotary Monday, you said this is the most important gubernatorial election in SC in 40 years. I concur. Or at the very least, it’s most important since we missed our chance to have Joe Riley as our governor in 94. But what are YOUR reasons for saying so?

Early in 2009, you jokingly asked me, “Am I making you hopeful?” Well, at this point I would say that depends: Can you win this election? Elaborate.

Why should you win it? Compare and contrast.

One beef I hear from readers on my blog is that sure, maybe Vincent Sheheen is a nice guy from a good family, but what would he DO? Talk about your vision for South Carolina. What do you want to accomplish as governor?

I particularly enjoyed hearing you speak Monday about one of my favorite topics – reforming state government. You have a plan for doing that that originally I wasn’t too crazy about – it involved a lot of sweetener for the Legislature. But since then, I’ve reached two conclusions: One, that’s the only way we’re going to get reform, and Two, your approach actually points to an important difference between you and your opponent.

Could you summarize that plan for our viewers?

Issues, plans and programs aside, elections are, to some extent, about character. Is this one more so?

How do you deal with all the revelations coming out about your opponent without seeming to be too negative? Do you think you’re hitting that note at the proper “Goldilocks” point – neither too hard nor too soft?

And your opponent aside, what the most important thing voters need to know about YOU?

What are you hearing from voters?

Where do you go from here?

By the way, with both Caroline Whitson and Vincent Sheheen, I did an unconventional thing. I gave each of them a brief glance at the questions I had prepared before we started, just so they could be thinking about the answers as we proceeded. I’m more interested in getting thoughtful answers than I am in ambushing sources.

I’ll gladly do the same for Nikki, if she’ll sit down with me — while at the same time telling her what I told Caroline and Vincent, that the questions were not an absolute guide. If things start to move in a promising direction that I didn’t anticipate, I revert to form and run in that direction.

Will now SWEARS it’s true. For what that’s worth

As an old-time newspaperman, I still don’t know what to do with junk like this. In the old days it wouldn’t have been out there. But now it is. I mean, The Associated Press? It doesn’t any more MSM than that.

So what do we make of it? I leave that to y’all:

By SEANNA ADCOX – Associated Press Writer

COLUMBIA, S.C. — The political blogger who claims he had a physical relationship with married Republican South Carolina gubernatorial candidate Nikki Haley offered new details in a sworn statement released Tuesday.

In an affidavit to a group of Republican activists critical of Haley, Will Folks states he had “romantic encounters” with the state representative in her Cadillac SUV, his apartment and her Statehouse office. He said the physical relationship ended in June 2007, when he began dating the woman who is now his wife.

“Rep. Haley specifically requested that I notify her in the event this relationship was getting serious so that she could ‘back off,'” the statement reads.

Haley’s campaign again denied all of Folks’ claims, which were made without any proof.

“There is something about the days just before an election that make certain people want to get back in the newspapers,” said Haley campaign manager Tim Pearson. “These accusations weren’t true in June, they aren’t true now, and those who continue to be fixated on this nonsense really should look into getting some professional help.”

Folks, 36, provided the three-page affidavit to the two-week-old group calling itself Conservatives for Truth in Politics, which is questioning Haley on various issues. It was sworn before a South Carolina notary public and signed by both but is not filed in any court…

Personally, I don’t think it changes any minds one way or the other. Do you?

“Conservative,” that surprisingly malleable word

This morning as I parked on Assembly preparing to go in for breakfast, I ran into my good friend Samuel Tenenbaum, who was just leaving. He was agitated, as he often is. He and Patrick Cobb from AARP had just been commiserating about the general decline of our society, what Daniel Patrick Moynihan termed “defining deviance downward.”

And he couldn’t even get the first few words out without being interrupted by a beat-up car with a massive sound system, pulling up at the light right next to us, drowned his words. In frustration, he raised his voice higher to say that was just the kind of thing they were talking about — look at that guy; he’s not even embarrassed! Indeed not. He had his windows part way down, the better for us to hear the obnoxious sounds emanating from within (although not enough for us to see the darkened interior).

Of course, this was just part of the picture, the triumph of low and tacky that washes over us like a tsunami, from Sarah Palin (and such maids-in-waiting as Nikki Haley and Christine O’Donnell) to reality TV. I nodded and agreed that these were parlous, tacky times. (Oh, and no fair throwing that last post at me in this regard.) I tried to pull the conversation AWAY from booming basses, lest Samuel draw gunfire from the guy in the car. You never know.

What Samuel was exhibiting, of course, was a quality that people with a respect for the language would term “conservatism,” in the purest sense — decrying change, longing for a better time when people respected each other more. This may shock those who think of Samuel, with some justice, as one of the few actual liberal Democrats in South Carolina. But that’s what it was. Samuel was being as conservative as all get-out.

This brings me to something I read in the paper this morning:

House Republicans have a simple 2010 election agenda for S.C. voters — boost their Republican majority to 75 members, then watch conservative reform take hold.

Note the lack of quotations around the oddly oxymoronic phrase, “conservative reform.” Irony is often lost on news people, who have to play it deadpan. But what interested me is how a phrase that I remember hearing for the first time this year (it first jumped out at me back here) — I remember it because it struck me as odd — has now entered the lexicon so completely that an experienced reporter like Roddie Burris would use it, straight-faced, without attribution. And that his editors would go along.

My hat is off to the Tea Party and its allies, because a result like this would make any propagandist, even the propagators of Newspeak, envious. Causing people to adopt one’s own linguistic restylings is to propaganda what the hole-in-one is to golf, or the 300 game to bowling.

My problem with the phrase, of course, is that conservatism, rightly understood, is a resistance to change — not advocacy of it, whether the change is termed “reform” or not. If a conservative wants change, then he wants to change back to the way things once were, and then the term is no longer “conservative,” but “reactionary.” Properly understood.

Yes, I get that people want to reform the government in ways that they maintain are in keeping with “conservative” principles. And that’s not inherently oxymoronic, however much it might sound that way. For instance, the kind of restructuring of state government that I and Nikki Haley and (most effectively) Vincent Sheheen advocate would introduce such “conservative” values as accountability to entities and processes that now answer to no one.

My problems is that a lot of people call themselves “conservative” when they are not, according to any traditional meaning of the term. Nikki Haley, for one, whose politics would rightly be termed populist demagoguery (nobody ever called Huey Long “conservative”), and whose personal and business financial accounts exhibit anything but conservative accountability. But one can see why a politician would call herself “conservative” in a state that worships the word. And how he or she would term his or her ideas “reform” whether they are (and sometimes they are) or not.

All perfectly understandable, and perfectly within the honored traditions of political rhetoric.

What surprises me, though, is when I see the rest of us going along with the terminology. I say this not to pick on Roddie or The State. I think they are reflecting the fact that the term has entered the mainstream. I’m just surprised that it has.

I just hope he’s a better accountant than Nikki

Catching up with my e-mail, I see this came in this morning:

Truth In Politics Announces Forensic Accounting Expert

COLUMBIA, SC- Conservatives for Truth in Politics announced today that Charleston CPA, Ellie Thomas, has joined the group as its CPA.  He will join Ms. Cyndi Mosteller, former 1st Vice Chair of the SC Republican Party and Dr. David Woodard, Political Science professor at Clemson University, Co-Chairs and Liana Orr, Executive Director and Secretary/ Treasurer as the officers of the 501 (c)(4) advocacy association.

Thomas is recognized as an expert in Accounting and Tax Matters by the Circuit Court of South Carolina and recognized as an expert in Forensic Accounting by the Circuit Court of South Carolina.  He served on the Patriot’s Pointe Development Authority from 2001-2004, serving as the Finance Committee Chairman from 2003-2004.  He also served as a volunteer accountant for the SC GOP from 1987-1989.

In addition to adding a CPA, TIP is pleased to announce they have over 100 official members of the organization and almost 500 followers on Facebook in less than 2 weeks since its formation.  The organization is also receiving contributions to help get the word out that true transparency and answers to serious questions concerning Republican Candidate Nikki Haley are in the public’s best interest.

“We are very pleased to have Ellie Thomas join us.  One of the main issues that has raised numerous questions is Nikki’s numerous violations on both her personal and business taxes.  Thomas, a forensic CPA that specializes in these matters, will be a tremendous resource to TIP as we educate the public about her numerous tax problems,” said Mosteller.

In addition to Ms. Haley failing to come clean on her personal and business tax matters, TIP is also asking Ms. Haley to explain or clarify many questions that are still lingering:

“To our knowledge, there is no ‘”small business tax” that she keeps referring to in her campaign rhetoric.  We feel very strongly that if Ms. Haley doesn’t come clean on that issue, we will be forced to let the public know it is nothing more than smoke and mirrors,” said Thomas.

“We do know that she wants to eliminate the corporate income tax which significantly benefit large out-of-state corporations and does absolutely nothing for the majority of small business.  She may try to pull the wool over your eyes by making up things like the “small business tax,” but I can assure you as a forensic CPA that has spent my entire professional career knowing the tax code that this organization will not allow these statements to go on any further unchecked,” said Thomas.

It does appear that Nikki Haley will pay for this big business tax break on the backs of the working families of SC by increasing their taxes on groceries.  A recent Wall Street Journal article noted that this will hit families making less than $45,000 a year the hardest, especially in a bad economy when more people are buying groceries to avoid eating out.  “I can tell you that most of my clients are not making more money but trying to save.  Eating out less and buying groceries to feed the family is the trend these days.  I never thought I would see a Republican Nominee advocate a tax in this economy.  Interestingly, I saw comments made by Iris Campbell.  I doubt Gov. Campbell would have been advocating a tax on groceries when the unemployment rate was at double digits and the economy was so bad,” said Mosteller.

TIP has also asked for Nikki Haley to make copies of her tax returns, her State House computer hard drive and emails available to the press in the same transparent manner as Sheheen. TIP has also asked for sworn affidavits from her, Will Folks and Larry Marchant concerning the charges of infidelity.  “We have heard from Folks and Marchant who indicated that they will provide the affidavits.  We have yet to hear from Ms. Haley,” said Mosteller.

For more information on Conservatives for Truth in Politics, please go to www.sctruth.com

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The comic stylings of Vincent Sheheen

You can tell a lot about a candidate by the way he delivers a joke. And what I can tell from this is that we really need to elect this guy governor, to distract him from any plans he may have to pursue a standup career.

But seriously, folks…

You do see some of Vincent’s character on display here in the beginning of his speech to the Columbia Rotary Club — his casual, self-deprecating manner. And there’s a certain contrast to be drawn to Nikki Haley (who will speak to Rotary next Monday).

Whereas the joke is at the expense of a theoretical “South Carolina politician,” the gentle, warmly mocking way that Vincent makes a serious point stands in contrast to the angrier, grab-the-torches-and-pitchforks approach to “South Carolina politicians” that one might encounter at a Haley event. How Nikki manages to fool her supporters into believing that the South Carolina politician is “the Other,” that she is not herself one, is beyond me…

Ultimately, the issue of who will replace Mark Sanford is rightly a question of character. So I thought it worth sharing a tidbit from which you can infer something along those lines.

If anything, Vincent takes the whole lollygaggin’, easygoin’ thing to the point of being a fault. It’s why, I expect, Dick Harpootlian wanted Dwight Drake to run — Vincent is perceived as such a nice guy, and Dick wanted someone who would GO AFTER the Republicans. (One problem with that is that Dwight’s a pretty nice guy, too. But nevermind.)

And yes, I DO plan to post something more substantive about his speech yesterday. It’s just that I’m running out of time today, and this short clip was right at hand…

A thought-provoking note from SC Citizens for Life

Still catching up with my e-mail…

I got this message from Holly Gatling in response to this post:

Dear Brad,

Do you have a marriage license?  A piece of paper you were willing to sign your name to as a statement of commitment?

That’s the difference between Sheheen and Haley.  Haley put her name on a statement of the agenda of South Carolina Citizens for Life and Sheheen declined.  How sad.

And why is there such hatred across this land for conservative, pro-life, Republican women?  The misogyny is grossly apparent.  Conservative, pro-life women are the greatest threat in politics today to the abortion industry, the greatest destroyer of human life on the planet.

We’re in this economic crisis because 50 million members of the human family have been wiped out by abortion.  That’s 50 million members of a tax-paying workforce and ALL their progeny.

I urge and encourage you to THINK with the body part men and women share equally — the brain.

Committed candidate v. undecided. The choice is clear.

Your friend,

Holly Gatling, Executive Director
South Carolina Citizens for Life

I appreciate my friend Holly — we worked together at the paper years ago — taking the time to respond. Here are some thoughts that her note generates for me:

  • Regarding the marriage license analogy: It makes the very good point that Vincent does not want to be married to S.C. Citizens for Life — a fact that has nothing to do with his own convictions as a Catholic. Vincent wants to work with everybody — Republicans, pro-choice Democrats, Zoroastrians should any show up at the State House — on issues having nothing to do with abortion. So why should he want to draw a bright line that says I’m one of these good people over here, and you’re one of those bad people over there? Which is the purpose of such endorsements, from the perspective of a Nikki Haley. Nikki wants to make sure everyone knows she’s on THIS side and therefore against THOSE people. And as long as she accomplishes that, she’s happy. As someone who presided for years over an editorial board that was sharply divided on abortion, I never tried to force us to take a position on it, for two reasons: It did not bear upon the issues that were important to moving South Carolina forward (which is what we were about), and it would have been foolish to create ill will on the board that would have spilled over into areas where, if we could achieve consensus, we might be able to make a difference. I wrote a column on the subject once. So I understand Vincent’s position, even if Holly doesn’t.
  • Who has “hatred” toward “conservative, pro-life, Republican women?” Certainly not I, and I would challenge anyone to demonstrate the opposite. And if they go looking for such women whom I “hate,” they’ll definitely have to look for someone other than Nikki Haley. Yeah, I’ve been pretty appalled at some of the things I’ve learned about her the last few months, but my one big beef is that she’d be disastrous for South Carolina as governor. That could be said about a lot of women — and men — against who I hold no malice. I really don’t know where that statement in the note comes from.
  • Finally, THINK is exactly what I’m urging people to do in this election. That, in fact, was all I was saying back before the primary in this post (“Don’t vote with your emotions, people. THINK!,” June 6), which some thought was way harsh on Nikki. But all I was saying was, THINK before you vote. Don’t base your vote on such emotional nonsense as being excited that she’s an Indian-American woman (or that she’s a “conservative, pro-life, Republican woman”), any more than you should be excited that Vincent is the first Catholic, and the first Lebanese-American, to win a major-party nomination for governor in this state. Still less should you vote because of the ENTIRELY irrelevant fact that you don’t like Barack Obama, which has absolutely zero to do with who should govern this state. THINK. Please, it’s all I want.

Mind you, in the past I have praised SC Citizens for Life for THINKing rather than going with the emotional flow, such as in this column on Feb. 7, 1996:

The endorsement of Jean Toal by S.C. Citizens for Life last week constituted one of those little epiphanies that have the potential to enlighten public life, if only we would pay attention.

In this case, the lesson to be learned was this:
The terms “liberal” and “conservative,” as they are popularly used today, serve virtually no useful purpose. They help not at all in the increasingly onerous task of meeting the challenges that face us in the political sphere. In fact, they often get in the way.
The Toal endorsement, while making perfect sense to the objective observer, momentarily demolished the world view of self-described “liberals” and “conservatives” as surely as Galileo messed with the heads of the geocentric crowd. “Conservatives” lost their cozy view of there being two kinds of people — Christians and “liberals.” Meanwhile, “liberals” couldn’t quite bring themselves to celebrate the endorsement because having common cause with those “conservative” right-to-lifers makes them queasy.
It’s nice to see nonsense knocked on its rear end.

My purpose at the time was to contrast the good sense demonstrated by Holly’s organization, as opposed to the mindlessness of her frequent allies among “conservative” Republicans who wanted to boot Justice Toal for the sin of being a Democrat (and therefore, in their small minds, a “liberal,” a word they use with all the thoughtfulness, subtlety and understanding of the mob crying “Witch!” in Monty Python’s “Holy Grail”).

My point then, as now: THINK.

Poll shows Sheheen starting to gain on Haley

As I said earlier about the Crantford survey — I don’t know whether this is right, but I certainly hope it is. This just in from the Sheheen campaign:

A new poll released today proves what we already knew – Vincent Sheheen has captured the momentum in the race to be South Carolina’s next governor.

News reports stated just a few weeks ago that Nikki Haley had a 17-point lead.  Yet a national pollster just released two polls conducted a week apart that show a dramatic shift towards Vincent Sheheen.  Hamilton Campaigns conducted a survey last week that gave Haley a 51%-41% lead with 8% undecided.  The second poll, conducted this week, shows Vincent cutting the lead in half to 49%-44%.

Read the pollster’s analysis:

“Bottomline – As voters have begun to tune in to this race, the margin between the two candidates has been cut in half in a short period of time. Given the rapid movement and voter discontent with Mark Sanford, this race has certainly become one to watch over the closing weeks of the campaign.” (View entire poll results)

This race is a dead heat and Vincent Sheheen is the candidate on the move.  It’s not surprising that Vincent has the momentum in this race because voters are learning troubling new things about Nikki Haley on a daily basis.  Trust has become the dominant issue in the last few weeks and South Carolinians are beginning to realize that they cannot trust Nikki Haley.  Help keep the momentum going.  Donate today and spread the word by forwarding this email to friends and family.  We need your help to close the deal.

For some time, I’ve been having some pretty dark thoughts about the state of democracy in South Carolina. First Alvin Greene, then a fall electorate perversely bent on ignoring all the negatives about a candidate who would be very bad news as governor of our state.

Each bit of news like this makes me feel less cynical, and gives me greater hope in the wisdom of the voters as they finally begin to pay attention…

What worries me is that this may not be enough movement, fast enough. It does South Carolina no good if the majority completes its shift to Sheheen in mid-November….

Every time you turn over a rock…

… another problem from Nikki Haley’s past crawls out.

This time, it has to do with the House member leaning on the Employment Security Commission to suspend an audit of her family business:

Republican gubernatorial candidate Nikki Haley called a commissioner at the state’s workforce agency while she was a sitting lawmaker to ask that an audit of her family’s business be suspended.

Haley’s Democratic opponent, Vincent Sheheen, made Haley’s request public this afternoon while responding to Haley’s campaign statement that unemployed South Carolinians should submit to drug tests in order to collect unemployment benefits.

Haley says she asked for an extension.

Former Employment Security Commissioner Becky Richardson confirmed to The Post and Courier that Haley made the request. Richardson said she couldn’t recall all the specifics but said that the audit was indeed suspended, though she doesn’t remember for what length of time. Richardson said Haley told her “that it was a real busy time” when she made the request in early 2005. Haley has served in the statehouse since 2004…

How many more things will we learn about — before and after the election — that just don’t quite pass the smell test? It’s bizarre that she keeps trying to hammer Vincent over worker’s comp. Well, I guess Vincent decided he’d heard enough of that nonsense — particularly in light of how Nikki has tried to use the system.

And what on Earth is wrong with the people who still plan to vote for her?

I mean, isn’t this kind of abuse of power by politicians the very thing that riles up the Tea Partiers who are her base? Do those folks believe in anything?

Pro-life snub of Sheheen misses huge opportunity

Pat pointed out back here the fact that my old friend Holly Gatling (formerly of The State‘s Pee Dee bureau) and her compatriots at South Carolina Citizens for Life endorsed Nikki Haley for the thinnest, most procedural of reasons. That is indeed true:

Citizens for Life director Holly Gatling says Haley scored a 100 on its 19-question election survey. She says Democrat Vincent Sheheen has voted with the anti-abortion group and has “never been hostile to our issues.” But he did not return the survey, so the group backed the candidate who put it in writing.

The fact is that in Vincent Sheheen, the pro-life movement has that most rare and precious of commodities, a creature that those who care should want to warmly embrace, cosset and nurture — a pro-life Democrat. Not since Bob Casey won his Senate seat from Rick Santorum in Pennsylvania, despite the nasty blowback from the likes of NARAL, has there been such a chance to support a pro-life Democratic nominee for high office.

And SCCofL has blown that opportunity for the sake of a piece of paper not obediently filled out.

Thereby the pro-life movement misses the opportunity to demonstrate it is more than a lapdog of the Right, to be taken for granted, to be bought for a piece of paper filled out with the answers that everyone knows they want to hear. The state Chamber of Commerce has had the guts to demonstrate in this race that it is not slavishly Republican. Even Republicans, from Cyndi Mosteller to Bobby Harrell, have to varying degrees expressed their differences with the nominee of their party. Why pass up this opportunity to demonstrate some real, conscience-based, independence for the sake of a piece of paper?

As The State noted a month ago, the pro-life movement has TWO strong candidates in the major-party nominees for governor (the subhed was, “Voters who support procedures left in cold by major candidates for governor” — those of you who want to pause and hold a moment of silence for the folks Holly calls the “pro-aborts” because for once they don’t have a champion, go right ahead; I will move on), and one of them is someone who, being a Democrat, actually takes some political risk, who actually gets out of the comfort zone of a member of his party, for his support for life. Me, I’d want to give a guy like that some props. But that’s me.

Haley 45%, Sheheen 41%: Are the voters starting to pay attention?

I don’t know whether to be greatly encouraged or suspicious at the numbers. I’m going to choose to be cautiously encouraged by the poll numbers I learned about this morning from Tim Kelly’s blog:

A new poll completed just last evening shows some significant positive movement for Vincent Sheheen, with the race a virtual dead heat. Nikki Haley leads Sheheen 45%-41%, within the poll’s margin of error of 3.9%. Thirteen percent remain undecided.

The poll was conducted by South Carolina pollster Crantford & Associates. The survey involved 634 active registered South Carolina voters. Data collection occurred Thursday September the 30th between 6:00 PM and 9:00 PM.

While Rasmussen surveys have shown Haley maintaining a strong lead, the new results might signal that the accumulation of negative stories about Haley’s financial dealings is finally taking a toll. On Sunday, John O’Connor of The State explored the $110,000 fundraising job created specifically for Haley by Lexington Medical Center.

The Crantford poll also included the U.S. Senate race between incumbent Jim Demint and surprise challenger Alvin Green. Not surprisingly, Demint holds a 56%-23% lead in that race.

A copy of last night’s survey is available here (PDF).

I don’t know anything about this Crantford outfit. When I asked Tim what he knew, he said:

Carey does solid work. The knock on him would be that he’s a Democrat, but I’ve never known that to sway his numbers or sampling.

Could the voters finally be starting to pay attention to what we’re all learning? That would be wonderful news for South Carolina.

About that “business endorsement” Nikki got…

As you know, the premiere organization for South Carolina’s business leadership, the state Chamber of Commerce, is backing Vincent Sheheen for governor — as are most serious people who know how the world works and care about the future of this state.

Nikki Haley keeps looking for ways to counter the fact that she, a Republican, does not have such support. Yesterday, her campaign announced that it had received the endorsement of the National Federation of Independent Business. My first thought was yeah, she’d have to go to a national organization for such a nod, because the locals know better — but then I saw that this was the South Carolina affiliate of that organization. So I didn’t really know what it meant.

But then somebody brought this blog post to my attention:

Will the NFIB please go away…..

Let’s be honest–I absolutely abhor the so-called National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB). It’s not a representative business group. In 2004 95% of their members said they voted for Bush, compared to 53% of all small business owners. (Remember that election was 50–50) Nonetheless, the first line of the recent NY Times article on NFIB joining the Republican Attorneys-General lawsuit on the individual mandate is that they’re trying to depoliticize the “largely Republican assault” on the new health care law. Ha, bloody ha.

But I’m not grumpy that the NFIB is joining this pointless lawsuit. I’m grumpy that they’re so blatantly going against the interest of small businesses. And yes I run one! So to remind you how stupid the NFIB is (in global not political terms) I’ve reprinted an article I wrote on Spot-on back in 2006–-and sadly nothing has changed. (The great thing about being a relatively veteran blogger is that I can really recycle material!)…

If all that is right, that would tend to explain the Haley endorsement.

Better to ask questions about Nikki NOW than after it’s too late

The emergence of this small band of Republicans daring to ask the questions that every Republican — as well as every independent and Democrat — should be asking themselves about Nikki Haley (there’s little point of asking them of Nikki) is interesting.

On the one hand, it seems a spur-of-the-moment thing. “Conservatives for Truth in Politics” is sending out hurried press releases that are shot through with typos (here’s a somewhat cleaner version of the one they sent me via e-mail), and announcing a website that’s still under construction. The Facebook page had eight fans when I checked a few minutes ago, one of them being me — I had signed up to see if being a “fan” would get me more info.

But on the other hand, it may have been awhile in the making. Group Leader Cyndi Mosteller — former chair of the Charleston County GOP and sister of staunch Sanford ally Chip Campsen — wrote an op-ed piece that ran in The State Sept. 22, headlined “Haley puts GOP principles at risk.” An excerpt:

Since the June 2009 Sanford-Chapur expose, our state’s reputation has been tarnished by a leader compromised. A decade earlier, Congressman Mark Sanford stood for Bill Clinton’s resignation on the Lewinsky affair, declaring that “it would be much better for the country and for him personally” to resign. Unfortunately, a lack of shame is often the closest companion to lack of honor, and both leaders held tight their power of title, even after having lost the power of principle. With Nikki Haley, Republicans might be approaching that unfamiliar crossroads where victory of title and victory of principle are more perpendicular than parallel.

As former vice chairman of the state Republican Party, my political hemoglobin runs iron-strong red. I’m down the line for Republicans Alan Wilson, Mick Zais and Tim Scott — not just for their stands, but for their character. In contrast, facts and allegations regarding Mrs. Haley raise valid questions in many a Republican conscience.

Though running on a platform of transparency and accountability, Mrs. Haley has not paid her taxes by April 15 for the past five years, and has not even filed them by the end of her extension in three of those years — years she served in our General Assembly. And Mrs. Haley’s company, where she was the accountant, incurred three liens for withholding and income taxes not paid until 19 months past due. Yet Mrs. Haley continues to campaign on such statements as: “I know I’m the right person to go into this next position because I’m an accountant, who knows what it means to stretch a dollar.”

And what of the sexual allegations? They are so removed from core Republican values that if it weren’t for Mark Sanford, we could never imagine them possibly being true — nor imagine that any candidate would consider himself or herself worthy of governing if they were. When former Sanford press secretary Will Folks asserted “an inappropriate physical relationship with Nikki,” released more than 60 damage-control texts made to Haley’s campaign and published a detailed log of late night-calls with Mrs. Haley, she called them “categorically and totally false” and insisted, “I have been 100 percent faithful to my husband throughout our 13 years of marriage.” That denial drew an unequivocal “that is not true” from Republican lobbyist Larry Marchant, who said he had sex with Mrs. Haley and “I know in my heart it happened, and she knows in her heart it happened.”

But what do We the People know?

Ms. Mosteller was a county co-chair for Henry McMaster. Henry, a big believer in traditional GOP lockstep loyalty, has dutifully lined up behind the Haley insurgency, while Cyndi isn’t going so meekly into that dark night.

Yesterday we saw Henry’s successors as party chair, Katon Dawson and Karen Floyd, doing their duty by standing up to denounce the Mosteller group as being unrepresentative of Republicans. That will no doubt keep most of the rank and file in line.

But among your more knowledgeable Republicans, I suspect that there are a lot who are privately thinking what Ms. Mosteller is saying out loud. That’s one reason, I suspect, why Henry McMaster is the only one of Nikki’s primary opponents who is visibly supporting her, which is a fairly radical departure from the norm in this state.

Others, if they’re thinking at all, have to be wondering what else they will learn about Nikki after they elect her governor. Thus far, every rock that has been turned over in her general vicinity has had something troubling crawl out from under it.

Better to ask the questions now, rather than when it’s too late.

“Goldilocks planet:” Good news for the disaffected

For those of you who are wondering what to do, and more specifically, where to go, if Nikki Haley becomes governor of South Carolina (and if people actually continue to speak seriously of Sarah Palin as presidential material), there’s good news:

WASHINGTON — Astronomers say they have for the first time spotted a planet beyond our own in what is sometimes called the Goldilocks zone for life: Not too hot, not too cold. Juuuust right.

Not too far from its star, not too close. So it could contain liquid water. The planet itself is neither too big nor too small for the proper surface, gravity and atmosphere.

It’s just right. Just like Earth.

“This really is the first Goldilocks planet,” said co-discoverer R. Paul Butler of the Carnegie Institution of Washington.

The new planet sits smack in the middle of what astronomers refer to as the habitable zone, unlike any of the nearly 500 other planets astronomers have found outside our solar system. And it is in our galactic neighborhood, suggesting that plenty of Earth-like planets circle other stars.

Finding a planet that could potentially support life is a major step toward answering the timeless question: Are we alone?

I don’t know about you, but I’ve been talking with a learned gent, name of Jor-El, about a prototype spacecraft he has that’s capable of interstellar distances…

Don’t miss Cindi’s package comparing Nikki’s & Vincent’s records

This afternoon, a friend who is an experienced observer of South Carolina politics asked me whether I’d read Cindi Scoppe’s package on today’s editorial page comparing the records of Nikki Haley and Vincent Sheheen.

I said no, but I had glanced at it, which pretty much told me everything I needed to know. Or rather, what I had already known without tallying it all up. But Cindi did that for us, and the result is both superficially telling — because Vincent’s accomplishments take up so much more room on the page — and also substantively so. It tells the tale rather powerfully of who is better qualified to move South Carolina forward — or in any direction you choose. It shows that Vincent Sheheen is far more qualified, and inclined, to take governing seriously.

Of course, as I told my friend, the fact that Nikki has accomplished virtually nothing will be embraced as a positive by her nihilistic followers. They will vote for her for the same reason they voted for Strom Thurmond, and Floyd Spence — because they did very little in office — with the added Sanfordesque twist of blaming the Legislature, rather than herself, for her lack of accomplishments. But the truth is, Nikki simply hasn’t even tried to accomplish much at all.

Basically, what Nikki has done is get elected, introduce very few bills of any kind, gotten almost none of them passed because she doesn’t care about accomplishing anything, then run for governor. That’s Nikki in a nutshell.

Vincent, by contrast, has taken the business of governing as a serious responsibility, one bigger than himself and his personal ambitions.

And there’s much more to it than sheer volume. As Cindi wrote:

The easiest, though not necessarily most useful, way to compare the lists: Ms. Haley has introduced 15 substantive bills, of which one has become law and one has been adopted as a House rule. Mr. Sheheen has introduced 119 substantive bills (98 when you weed out the ones that he has re-introduced in multiple sessions), of which 18 have become statewide law and four have become local law….

What’s most striking about Mr. Sheheen’s list is its sweep, and the extent to which it reflects initiatives that either know no partisan boundaries or that easily cross them. Although his focus has been on giving governors more power to run the executive branch of government and overhauling our tax system, his bills touch on far more — from exempting small churches from some state architectural requirements and prohibiting kids from taking pagers to school to giving tuition breaks to the children of veterans and eliminating loopholes in the state campaign finance law.

This is the body of work of someone who understands what the government does and is interested in working on not just the broad structural and philosophical issues that politicians like to make speeches about but also the real-world problems that arise, from figuring out how to move police from paper to electronic traffic tickets without causing problems to writing a legal definition for “joint custody” so parents will know what to expect when they go to court.

One thing that’s notable in relation to this campaign: Ms. Haley attacks Mr. Sheheen as being anti-business because he does some workers compensation work (although his firm represents both businesses and employees), but he has written only one bill regarding workers compensation — and that was a “pro-business” bill that said employees of horse trainers didn’t have to be covered.

Cindi published this list of Nikki’s legislative record, such as it is, and this list of Vincent’s, in the paper. Vincent’s was obviously far more weighty. But in truth, she couldn’t fit all of the Sheheen record in the paper. Here’s the fuller record, including the ones that Cindi found too boring to put in the paper.

I doubt this will win over anyone, because the kind of people who would vote for Nikki view lack of experience, and the lack of the ability to accomplish anything in government, as virtues. They care about ideology, not pragmatic governance. I just publish this for the sensible, serious folk who see things differently.

Which is sort of the point of my whole blog, come to think of it…

No wonder The Washington Post dumped Newsweek

When Newsweek first put Sarah Palin (I mean, Nikki Haley — I know the difference, but the superficial, pandering twits editing Newsweek apparently don’t) on its cover, I wrote about how Vincent Sheheen faces a problem that no other candidate for governor of South Carolina had ever faced — an opponent who gets vast amounts of free national media coverage. It’s a disadvantage that no candidate can raise enough money for paid media to overcome. It distorts everything. (See “The Newsweek endorsement of Nikki Haley,” July 6.) I wrote:

Oh, you say it’s not an endorsement? Don’t bore me with semantics. As I said, the national media — not giving a damn one way or the other about South Carolina, or about who Nikki Haley really is or what she would do in office — is enraptured at the idea that South Carolina will elect a female Indian-American (Bobby Jindal in a skirt, they think, fairly hugging themselves with enthusiasm), which just may be the most extreme example of Identity Politics Gone Mad that I’ve seen.

I told you we would have to expect this. And this is just the beginning…

Hey, am I a prophet or what? Now, in their slavish devotion to all things Sarah (and Sarah surrogates are almost as good, especially if you can create a collage of them WITH Sarah), Newsweek has done it again.

And do they have any serious, substantive reason to do this? Of course not. The putative reason for putting Nikki’s smiling mug on the cover again is to discuss the burning issue of “mama grizzlies.” I am not making this up.

Of course, if you turn inside to one of the few remaining pages in this pamplet — right in there next to the scholarly treatise on “Men Look at Women’s Bodies: Is Evolution at Work?” — you can find some home truths about Nikki. Such as:

Haley, who has two children but has never referred to herself as a grizzly [so why the freak did you put her on this stupid cover? never mind; I realize there’s no rational answer, beyond maybe that you had a picture of her in red], is just the sort of pro–business, low-tax, limited–government conservative Palin loves. Her platform is focused mostly on economic issues: creating jobs and unleashing entrepreneurial energy by slashing taxes. She holds herself out as a paragon of fiscal responsibility (never mind that she and her husband have failed to pay their taxes on time in each of the past five years).

But I must ask you: How many of the undecided voters who might be gullible enough to be razzle-dazzled into voting for Nikki do you think will read that far into the piece? Just being on this cover is all Nikki could possibly ever want or need from Newsweek.

Folks, I gotta tell ya — I never thought a whole lot of Newsweek. Back in the day when I was even in the market for such a publication, I always read TIME — and I haven’t done that in 30 years. Whatever value that format had ceased to be anything you could take seriously so, so long ago. Those publications became pretty much everything I disdain about TV “news.”

Recently, The Washington Post apparently decided the same, selling the mag to a guy who made his fortune selling stereos. And as The Wall Street Journal observed:

Since he agreed to purchase the magazine from Washington Post Co. earlier this month, pundits have called Mr. Harman’s motives—and sanity—into question. He took on more than $50 million in liabilities and agreed to keep most of Newsweek‘s employees—all for a magazine on track to lose at least $20 million this year, according to documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.

Good luck with that, pal.

My advice to you readers? You want to read news in a magazine format? Go with The Economist. That is still a serious source of news and commentary. Interestingly, it calls itself a “newspaper,” in spite of its format. It’s certainly better than all but a handful of newspapers on this side of the pond. Yet another reason to love The Economist — so far, no Nikki Haley covers (that I’ve seen, anyway).

500 or so Women for Sheheen

A month or so ago, Phil Bailey brought my attention to the fact that former Rep. Harriet Keyserling was trying to counter all the “first woman” buzz that Nikki Haley had by putting together a bipartisan “Women for Sheheen” committee.

As y’all know, it’s hard for me to identify with people who actively want to see someone of a particular gender, or race, or whatever, elected. To me, every candidate should be evaluated on the basis of his or her suitability without reference to such considerations. But I know lots of women across the political spectrum — women of good will — who do care about such things. They actually deeply identify with other women, something that is unimaginable for me (personally, I get no charge one way or the other from the successes or failures of other white guys qua white guys), but I have to acknowledge that they seem to be sincere about it.

So when Harriet sent me a letter on behalf of 100 women, I was interested — but I wanted to see the list of women. She said wait a bit, and she’d be able to give me a list — a much longer one.

So I waited. And now I have this:

Dear Friends:

Well, here it is. Not the 100 signers I hoped for, but over 500 from all across  the state. And what a wonderful mix these women are: stay-at-home-moms, doctors, lawyers, ministers, artists, realtors, executives ,teachers, college professors, democrats, independents and Republicans.
I hope you will look over the list,  find some friends from your town,  then  together  find a way to spread the word. Talk to your newspaper editors,   have a press conference, write letters, sign up others.  Soon.  Time is fleeting.  To refresh your memory, I ‘ve attached my original letter.  We have also created a website “Women for Sheheen” and solicit your input.

For further information,  go to  “Women for Sheheen” on Facebook  to which 600 people have signed on. It was startedby Madeleine McGee who organized, in Charleston, a 90 women paying $90 to sponsor a Sheheen fundraiser in appreciation of his support of women,  and in honor of  the 90th  anniversary of the women’s vote. 296  people attended and they raised $20,000.  I hear women in other cities are planning similar events. Click here for the original letter.

Madeleine McGee* Kit Smith* Sally Huguley* Mary (Rab)Fleming Finlay* Page Miller*Susan Hilfer*Catherine Ceips* Patty Robinson*Leah Greenberg*Juliana W Weeks*Terri Hartley*Dr Catherine Anne Walsh*Ann Pincelli*Abbot Land Carnes*H Murchison*Catherine Rogers*Robin Copp*Jenny Rizo-Patron*Linda Ott*Jean Lindsey*Mary Ann McDow*Regina Carmel*Kate Bullard Adams*Eleanor Welling*Saundra Carr*Nancy Sargent*Virginia Nelson*Wilhemina Rhoe*Elizabeth Harris*Alice DuPre Jones*Judy Lineback* Lynn Teaque*Fay Brown*Katrina Sprott Riley*Shayna Hollander*JoAngela Edwins* Sara Castillo*Teri Hutson Salane*Suzanne Rhodes*Caroline Vreede*Anne Harmon*Jane Riley*Sandy Linning*Pat Symons*Barbara Lewis*Lolita Watson*Dr.Sissy Kinghorn*Julie Lonon*Gail Richardson*Sidney Thompson*Liz Wheeler*Lucy Waddell*Anne Beazley*Sally Powell*Claudia McCollough*Eleanor Hare*Lynn Robertson*Lenora K White*Cherie Mabrey*Dr Anne Osborne Kilpatrick*Barb Barham* Cary Lafaye*Carol Fishman*Lynn Baskin*Stacie Vulpen* Karen Hardy*Anne Wynn Johnson*Eleanor K Whitehead*Frances Mabry* Judy Kalb*Margit Resch*Katherine Nevin*Greta Little*Carol Ward*Jerue Richard*Laura Von Harten*Laura Williams*Cathy Tillman* Mariellen Schwentker*Caroline S Voight*Linda Hollandsworth*Beth Moon*Cathy Wilson*Elaine Nocks*Ann Timberlake*Sally Howard*Patricia Battey* Nancy Vinson*Carol Lucas*Kay Hanks*Dr. Paula Orr* Cathy Battle*Patti Knight Hilton*Johnnie Fulton*Doris Wilson*Priscilla Hagins*Joan Fensterstock*Barbara Burgess*Holley H Ulbrich*Dot Tunstall*Marion MacNeish*Amaryllis Duvall*Mary Noonan*Kelly Wilson*Beebe James*Caroline Rice*Joan Tumpson*Margaret Bell Hane*Lowndes Macdonald*Rev Elizabeth Wooldridge*Paula Jane Goldman* Karen Jamrose*Pam McAlpine* Geraldine Ingersoll*Judy Beazley*Katherine Hopkins*Loretta Warden*Caroline Jenkins*Barbara W Elow*Sandra O’Neal*Betts Bailey*Judith Waring*Virginia Koontz*Gail Touger*Mimi Wyche*Abbot L Carnes*Angela Viney*Marjorie Trifon*JeanneLove Ferguson*Billie Houghton*Pat Manix*Ellen Kochansky*Jan Collins*Kate L Landishaw*Heather Jarvis*Beatrice Bailey*Lesesne Hudson*Anne Knight Watson*Bert Bob*Evelyn Byatt*BettyJo Carson*Sue Olson*Barb Smith*Cary LaFaye*Julia Forster*Rev Joyce Cantrell*Carol Ervin*Barbara Young*Beverly J Hiller*Jo Ann Walker*Sally Knowles*Cynthia Bolter*Jane Smith Davis*Joy Pinson*Nancy Lewis Tuten*Hillary J McDonald*Lenora Price*NJ Nettles*Nancy Stockton*Martha D Greenway*Eileen Barrett*Anne B Macaluso*Grace Gifford*Katya Cohen*Kathy Belknap*Mary Bernsdorff*Libby Elbe*Catherine Malloy*Claudette Humphrey*Marjorie Spruill*Francie Markham*Krista Collins*Linda Gallicchio*Jane Freeman*Maittese Jasper*Betty Humphreys*Keller H Baron*Linda Combs*Carol Pappas*Ann Funderburk*Kay McCoy*Jill Halevi*Stephanie Hunt*Marguerite Archie-Hudson*Mimi Kinard*Edith T Chou*Heather McCalman*Dr Penny Travis*Barbara Scott*Courtney McDowell*Cathy Bennington Jenrette*Cassie Premo Steele*Lilla Folsom*Susan Gregory*Andrea Stoney*Patricia Maners*Amy Kinard*Judy Speights*Barbara Jackson*Judy Ingle*Carole Parrish-Loy*Tidal Trails*Kelly Draganov*Kay McCoy*Susan Shaffer*Elizabeth Sinkler*Gail Siegel Messerman*Liz J Patterson*Ellen S Steinberg*Gail Morrison*Karen Volquardsen*Maittese Lecque*Diane Fox*Linda York*Phyllis Miller Mayes*Fran Marscher*Holly Hook*Kristen Marshall Mattson*Polly Player*Linda K Combs*Giselle Wrenn*Ellen Reed*Linda Kapsil*Marie Meglen*Vida Miller*Pam Taub*Frances D Finney*Janet Marsh*Rubye Johnson*Jo White*Patrice Brown*Virginia Lacy*Sally Mitchell*Catherine Hammond*Diane Smock*Dallas Shealy*Patricia Berne Mizell*Harriet D Hancock*JanetDow Bailey*Josephyne Spruill*Elizabeth Hills*Holly Massey*Frances Heyward Gibbes*Kathy Folsom*Flo Rosse*Elizabeth Drewry*Katherine K Hines*Regina Moody*Marisa Sherard*Krista Ryba*Page Rogers*Elena Martinez-Vidal*Linda Gallicio*Catherine McCullough*Mary Louise Mims*Jill John*Kathy Belknap*Colleen Condon*Mary Jane Hassell*Natalie Kaufman*Dale Rosengarten*Amanda Payne*Della Jo Marshall*Marquerite Willis*Barbara Banus*Mateja Johnson*Clay Swaggart*Barbara Connelly*Sally Boyd*Margaret Feagin*Cappi Wilborn*Gayle Douglas*Mindy Johnson Saintsing*Ann Cotton*Audrey Shifflett*Gayle Douglas*Sylvia Echols*Helen Hicks*Allianne Duvall*Sally Boyd*Ann Stirling*Sheila Bickford*Rebecca Dobrasko*Becky Carr*Julie Tait*Diane Jerve*Alice Craighead*Norma Thompson*Betsey Grund*Eve Stacey*Pattie Robinson*Susan Pearlstine*Sandy Brooks Carr*Tina Forsthoefel*Linda Tarr-Whelan*Annie M Terry*Carol Dotterer*Kay K Chitty*Heather Ford*Terry Hussey*Cheryl  Lopanik Paschal*Martha Boynton*Rebecca Thompson*Natalie Dupree*Marsha Millar*Lucie Eggleston*Sue Inman*Dana Gencarelli*Libby Law*Diane Salane*Diane DeAngelis*Keller Cushing Freeman*Louise Bevan*Lucy Griffith*Mollie Fair*Dorothy Mungo* Dr J Kay Keels*Ellen Jean Capalbo*Ellen Graber Sinderman*Helen B Hicks*Lynn Nordenberg* Susan Biteyward*Helen H Farmer* Mary Sue McDaniel*Grace Dennis*Ellen Read*Sarah Smith Graham*Lauren Michalski*Cheri Crowley*Bailey Symington*Elaine Camp*Suzanne Galloway*Paula Gibbs*Jamee Haley*Gloria Douglass*Joanne Harper*Sheila Wertimer*Nancy Gilley*Kathryn Symington*Nan Johnson*Sandie Merriam*Rev Karin Bascom Culp*Evin Evans*Phyllis Martin*June Lee*Jenny Rone*Joyce Kaufman*Cynthia Gilliam*Stephanie Edwards*Libby Bernandin*Elise Evans*Alicia Mendicino*Sallie Duell*Susan Breslin*Lori Christopher Glenn*Susan Mathis*Mary Rose Randall *Betty Commanday*Diane Smith*Bonnie Gruetzmacher*Lucy Gordon*Karen Jones*Lucy Rollin*Susie Glenn*Karen Durand*Eleanor Evans*Toni White*Joyce Trogden*Drucilla Brookshire*Cynthia Smith*Brooke Caldwell*Sue Graber*Jean Denman*Polly Dunford*Diane Salane*Rheta Geddings DiNovo*Julie Dingle Swanson*Dot Gnann*Martha Hatfield*Melissa Herring*Laura Keenan*Mitzi Ganelin*Bonnie Smith*Sally Hare*Mary Rogers*Anna Griswold*Carolyn Means*Mary Hipp*Elaine Epstein*Beverly Guerre*Judi Murphy*Mimi Greenberger*Kathy Handel*Mary Ann Burgeson*Carlanna Hendrick*Barbara Kelley*Roxanne Cheney*Helena Fox*Janneke Vreede-Schaay*Gloria Bell*Valerie Bunch Hollinger*Toni White*Virginia Rone*Lynn Hanson*Nancy Jarema*Ann B Smith*Kate Heald*Jennifer Philips*Harriet Smartt*Diane S. Hirsch*Francee Levin*Susan Mathis*Cary Caines*Cam Patterson*Maria Kendall*Carol Plexico*Catherine Hammond*Lynne Ravenel*Stephanie Billioux*Jeanne Garane*Patricia Battey*Susan Hester*Carolyn Bishop-McLeod*Dr. Anne Osborne Kilpatrick*Michelle Shain*Olga Caballero*Cindi Boiter*Vickie Eslinger*Mary Elizabeth Blanchard*Chris Kenney*Helen LaFitte*Susan Shirley*Susan Hogue*Margaret Willis*Nancy Bloodgood*Glenda Owens*Jane Morlan*Nancy Tuten* Barbara Pinkerton*Lisa Rentz*Cassandra Fralix*Cecelia Byers*Patricia Barnes*Valerie Hollinger*Beverly McClanahan*Monica Boucher-Romano*Barbara Bettini*Anne Arrington*Sej Harman*Barbara James*Barbara Kelly*Barbara Burgess*Aleksandra Cahuhan*Liz Key*Coleen H Yates*Beth W Moore*Bee K Brown* Mary Burkett*Barbara Young*Beverly Hiller*Charlene Gardner* Renate Moore*Pamela Meadows*Mary Bundrick*Bootsie Terry*Gwendolyn Brown*Wanda Meade*Mary Bryan*Marian Brilliant*Brooke A McMurray*Katherine Brown*Susu Ravenel*Patricia Agner*Catherine McCullough*Amanda McNulty*Nancy Cave*Ashley Brown*Wendy Brown*Cary LaFaye*Laura Gates*Joan Rubenstein*Janet Swigler*Evadna Kronquist*Kathy McLeod*Louise A Allen*Joan McGee*Marsha Beazley*Margaret Glover Bruce*Virginia S Moe*Meg McLean*Lucinda Shirley*Grace Rice*Lil Mood*Andrena Ray*Teresa Bruce*Terry Murray*Elaine Fredendall*Cornelia McGhee*Betsey Carter*Edna Anderson*Jane Frederick*Sidney Heyward*Ann Dibble*Dottie Ashley*Carol Ervin*Jane McGee-Davis*Liz Carroll*JoAnne Liles*Martha Bryan*Carole Moore*Kathryn Rhyne*Audrey Shifflett*Marilyn Summers*Mimi McNeish*Kay F. Bodenheimer*Susan T. Julavits, Shirley Henderson* Helen H. Farmer*Dr. Alice McGill*Ethel Sims*Dr. Joann B. Morton*Cynthia Rosengren*Cynthia Setnicka*Linda G Sosbee*Betty Huntley*Bernadette Scott*Bonnie Dumas*Beth-Keyserling Kramer*Marilyn Shaw*Dr. Julia Lipovsky*Eva Dior*Cynthia B Carpenter*Sharon Smith-Matthews*Russell Holliday*Rachel Hodges*Eleanor Spicer*Barbara Warley*Catherine Campbell*Ellie Setser*Jennifer Parker*Connie McKeown*Marianne Currie*Francis Allison Close*Anne Springs Close*Caren Ross*Anne Frances Bleecker*Marianne Currie

Yep, there are a lot of Democrats on that list. But there are some Republicans, too. And some who might be nonpartisan like me, and those are the ones I care most about. After all, we independents are the ones who decide general elections. And independent women would seem to be more susceptible to the “let’s elect a woman!” mania that would lead the Identity Politics-oriented to disregard qualifications and vote for Nikki.

But I have to say that while it’s great that Harriet has gone to the considerable trouble of recruiting this list, I’m not sure how indicative it is of Sheheen’s strength.

Harriet is like me in this respect: Her list of acquaintances, and the acquaintances of her acquaintances, are likely to be highly engaged voters, whatever their political orientation. If only people who are highly knowledgeable about these two candidates voted, of course Sheheen would win in a walk. The more anyone knows about Nikki and Vincent, the less inclined one is to take a chance on Nikki.

Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of voters are not that engaged. They are more likely to vote according to party (and this is Republicans’ year), or on some fleeting glimpse of mass media (and Nikki was on the cover of Newsweek).

So it’s great that these 500 or 600 women are backing Vincent. But he needs many, many times that. And most of the ones he needs are hard to reach, by any means. The latest Rasmussen poll showed us that they just aren’t paying attention.

By the way, here is Harriet’s original letter:

Subject: Letter from former State Rep. Harriet Keyserling

Women Supporting Vincent Sheheen for Governor

Dear Friends and Colleagues:

I’m writing on behalf of a bi-partisan group of women who have long
hoped to see a qualified woman governor of South Carolina. Alas,
Nikki Haley is not that woman.

We support Vincent Sheheen for governor. He will lead us responsibly
to improved educational achievement, protection of our natural
resources and more and better jobs.

1. PRIORITIES:

How legislators vote best demonstrates their priorities. We are
alarmed that Haley voted to sustain Governor Mark Sanford’s budget
vetoes, which, if passed, wouldhave irreparably harmed the very
agencies South Carolina needs to attract new industries and provide a
future for our children.

Haley was one of the few legislators who voted for Sanford’s budget vetoes
on:

• K-12 Education – Extensive funding cuts to textbooks, buses, and
the prestigious Schools for Math and Science, and Arts and Humanities.
• Higher Education – Across-the-board cuts for all universities, which
already had less state support and higher tuitions than any other
Southern state; ending Clemson’s extension programs for farmers and
gardeners.
• Cultural Agencies – Crippling cuts to the State Museum; the State
Library, which services local libraries; the State Arts Commission,
which supplies grants for arts in our schools and local programs; ETV;
and the Department of Archives and History, which preserves our
historical records.
• Health Services – Severe cuts to state services for diabetes,
hypertension, infectious diseases, rural hospitals and community
health programs.

Haley abstained from voting on other vetoes her colleagues overrode
almost unanimously: Technical Education (106-0), Ethics Commission
(102-2)), Airports, (105-1) and Aid to County Governments, (97-9).

In contrast, Vincent Sheheen voted against these vetoes; the budget
sent to the Governor by the legislature was balanced, the money was in
hand, no taxes were raised. If Sanford and Haley had prevailed,
unemployment would have increased by thousands, and the infrastructure
for education, the economy and the humanities would have been weakened
for years to come.

2. INEFFECTIVE LEADERSHIP

• In Haley’s six years in the House, she sponsored only one bill that
passed (relating to cosmetology).
• Haley chose confrontation to pursue her primary campaign issue of
transparency in government. Rather than reaching for compromise, Haley
traveled statewidewith Governor Sanford, campaigning against leaders
in her own party, garnering publicity for her own campaign. This kind
of leadership style would continue the present gridlock and stagnation
for years to come.

Haley was removed by the Republican leadership from the powerful
Labor, Commerce and Industry Committees, which she had hoped to chair,
because of these issues and more.

In contrast, Sheheen has led bi-partisan reforms, including tax reform
and restructuring state government for more efficiency. Sheheen also
led the successful floor fight for the Conservation Bank. The South
Carolina Chamber of Commerce endorsed him, noting his ability to work
with others, as did the Conservation Voters of South Carolina for his
outstanding environmental record.

3. STAND ON PUBLIC EDUCATION

• Haley did not attend one meeting or subcommittee meeting in 2010 as
a member of the Education Committee, where policy is molded,
indicating her disinterest in our public schools and colleges.
• Haley vigorously supports vouchers and tax credits for private schools.

In contrast, Sheheen strongly supports public education following the
tradition of his mother, a teacher in the public schools for 30 years.
He strongly opposes diverting public funds to vouchers for private
schools.

4. HYPOCRISY

• Haley calls for transparency with mandatory roll call votes, but
personally avoids it. According to Sen. Larry Martin (R.), Chairman
of the Senate Rules Committee (The State, June 24), Haley could easily
have asked for roll call votes on any sections of the budget, but she
did not.
• Haley would not release her e-mails, although every other government
official, including the governor, must legally do so if requested.
Although the Legislature exempted itself from the law, there is no
reason Haleycould not do so if she wished.
• Haley did not declare on her legislative ethics statement the
$40,500 consulting fee that was paid to her by a private company to
“make contacts” for them.

In contrast, Sheheen has released ten years of tax records and his
e-mails.

For all these reasons, we support Sheheen. We hope to have 100 women
sign on to this message, which we will spread across the state before
Election Day by Internet and in the media. We hope you will be one of
them.

Please forward this to five or more friends.

Thank you,

Harriet Keyserling

Nikki and the “slush fund:” Belly up to the trough

Have you seen the latest Nikki Haley ad? As I said in a comment yesterday:

Wow. Did you see that incredibly weak, intelligence-insulting ad that Nikki released attacking Vincent?

It’s all about attacking him as a “liberal,” a “Columbia Insider” and a “trial lawyer.

So there you have it: Vincent criticizes Nikki for things that she — an actual, living, breathing woman actually living in South Carolina — has actually done. (You may have noted that the keyword here is “actual.”)

And her response is to throw some of the less imaginative canned, off-the-shelf, standard-issue GOP epithets at him — because, you know, since he’s a Democrat it must all be true, right?

How utterly pathetic. What total contempt she obviously has for the South Carolina electorate.

The only thing Nikki had to offer as a specific, relevant charge in her weak effort to paint Vincent as a tax-and-spend “liberal” was that he had voted to override the governor on the Orwellian-named “Competitive Grants Program” and Nikki had voted to sustain.

Of course, I take a back seat to no one in my disdain for the grants program. Sure, it’s not much money in the grand scheme, but it’s a textbook example of the wrong way to spend, with no regard for state priorities. The local projects the money tends to go to are sometimes worthwhile, but that money should be raised locally.

So bad on Vincent for going along with the majority on that. But Vincent’s voting with the Republican majority while Nikki voted with the minority says more about the fact that Nikki is one of Mark Sanford’s few reliable allies than it does about who is tighter with a buck.

Especially when you consider the following, which the Sheheen campaign was so thoughtful as to share today:

Nikki Haley’s Slush Fund Hypocrisy

Camden, SC – Nikki Haley’s credibility has taken another hit after she released a misleading advertisement yesterday criticizing Vincent Sheheen for supporting a “legislative slush fund,” a fund that she vigorously supported.  Haley requested over $1.5 million in legislative earmarks for her home district from the South Carolina Competitive Grants program but has campaigned boasting of her opposition to the program.

Nikki Haley has been a full-fledged participant in the program, requesting at least $1.5 million in earmarks for special projects in her district and county.  She has sponsored at least twenty-four applications for competitive grants including $90,000 for the Lexington Fun Fest.

After she ran for governor, Haley decided that she could score political points by opposing the program, claiming that she objected to state money funding her local Gilbert Peach festival.  Yet that same year, 2008, she requested at least $160,000 in other projects.

Kristin Cobb, Communications Director for Sheheen for Governor, had this to say: “Once again Nikki Haley has created an even greater level of hypocrisy with her recent attack ad against Vincent Sheheen.  Haley claims she voted against this program but apparently that was because her $1.5 million earmark requests were not approved.  She wasn’t against the program, she was just upset she didn’t get her share.”

“The more South Carolinians are learning about Nikki Haley the less they like.  If we can’t trust what she says on the campaign trail, how can we trust her to be governor,” Cobb concluded.

Here is a sample of Haley’s Earmark Requests:

West Columbia – Sewer Project $370,600
SC Parents Involved in Education $100,000
SC Office of Rural Health $100,000
West Columbia – Riverwalk Expansion $100,000
Newberry College – Nursing Program $99,000
Lexington County – Web-based Tourism $91,099
Lexington Fun Fest $90,000
Lexington County – Industrial Park $80,000
Lexington County – Clean Water Act $77,700
SC Philharmonic $69,274
Alliance for Women at Columbia College $60,000
Healthy Learners $50,000
Brookland Foundation $50,000
Outdoor Journalist Education Foundation $34,450
Killingsworth $30,000
Lexington Downtown Renovation $26,000
SC Office of Rural Health $25,000
Lexington Fun Fest $25,000
YMCA Adventure Guides Program $24,445
Girl Scout Council of the Congaree $21,520
Lexington County Museum $20,000
Lexington – Video Conferencing System $15,000
Lexington County Museum $10,000
Lexington Community Fun Day $3,500
TOTAL: $1,572,588

They also attached this PDF of supporting documents for your perusal.

That assertion about “She wasn’t against the program, she was just upset she didn’t get her share” reminds me of something. Nikki has a habit of being selectively principled — as in, principled when it serves her ambition. For instance, remember the Tweets Wesley Donehue put out a while back about Nikki’s effort to stop the Senate from passing a roll-call vote bill?

Wesley, who works for the Senate Republicans, was pretty insistent about making sure we knew how hypocritical she was on the subject:

Nikki Haley called me last year angry that the Senate filed a roll call voting bill.    about 1 hour ago  via TweetDeck
Nikki Haley told me that she didn’t want the Senate “stealing my issue.”    about 1 hour ago  via TweetDeck
Let me repeat – Nikk Haley asked me to get the Senators to pull the companion bill from the Senate.     about 1 hour ago  via TweetDeck

I haven’t heard Wesley mention this since the primary — since, that is, she has become his party’s nominee. I’m going to be with him on Pub Politics this evening, and will ask him about it…