Category Archives: History

Origins of the Moonwalk (video)

Just to take a break on a different subject, I thought I’d share something that my friend Cheryl Levenbrown in New York posted on Facebook. It’s a link to a blog post with a couple of interesting videos tracing the history of Michael Jackson’s Moonwalk. Its lineage goes back to Cab Calloway in the 30s.

I’m not what you’d call a Michael Jackson fan, and I’m certainly not the dance connossieur that my wife and daughters are, but I always did find the Moonwalk pretty impressive. It seemed to defy gravity and time simultaneously, as though we were looking at film of someone in near-zero gravity, and the film was being run backward. Or something. Basically, it didn’t look possible.

And while Jackson added his own refinements and earned the distinction of uniqueness in this area, everything has roots. And these videos show the roots.

Netflix guilt

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

It goes like this:

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

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

But I don’t want to.

Hence, Netflix Guilt.

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

Today’s news that matters

Lately I’ve been missing my Wall Street Journal (the subscription that the paper paid for ran out, and they wanted $299 to renew), particularly the “What’s News” feature on the front page, which provided a nice briefing each day of the news that mattered. If all I had time to do was read that, I at least was aware of everything important that had happened nationally and internationally.

It took me a while to get used to that. For years, I had thought in standard newspaper-front-page language to get my cues on what was big. There is nothing, of course, standard about the WSJ; they do things their own way. The New York Times is typical of the traditional, conventional approach, which as a newspaperman (who was once a front-page editor, many years ago) I appreciate. It’s probably meaningful to you as well, only subconsciously rather than overtly.

It works like this, in part: The most important thing that happens in the world appears in a vertical element on the far right-hand side of the page, usually, but not always, touching the top of the page. In a newspaper with a truly conservative approach such as the NYT (I’m using “conservative” in the true meaning of the word, not in the popular political sense, folks), most days that lede story (that’s the newspaper spelling for “lead,” by the way) will only have a one-column headline. That’s because most days, there is no earth-shattering news. History moves gradually, for the most part.

When the lede hed (newspaperese for headline) gets bigger than two columns, watch out. It could be good news, but it could be really bad. In any case, it’s really something.

A lede-worthy story is several things:

  1. It’s important.
  2. It’s probably interesting, but it doesn’t have to be. Quite often, the most important developments are dull, and your attention naturally drifts to other things on the page. Those highly interesting other things may be more prominently displayed on the page — toward the center top, or left-hand side — and they may have art with them (newspaperese for photos, graphics or anything that’s not plain text).
  3. It happened. It doesn’t advance something that’s going to happen (although there could be rare exceptions, such as a story that builds up to something like a presidential inauguration — but even then, something has to have happened leading toward that). It’s not a trend story — it doesn’t take a step back from the news; it is the news. It’s not analysis.

This may seem all terribly pedantic, especially as it has to do with a dying industry. It may seem like I’m providing a connossieur’s view of horses and buggies. But a lot of you out there are confirmed newspaper readers, and you probably understand these things I’m explaining instinctively. I’m talking here about you true aficionados; the people who not only take The State 7 days, but the NYT or WSJ as well. You are the people who are the most avid editorial page readers, because you are the most committed readers of the paper overall.)

Editors informed by that tradition certainly assumed you did. Buzz Merritt did. Buzz was the executive editor at The Wichita Eagle-Beacon (now known once again merely as The Wichita Eagle) when I was its front-page editor in the mid-80s. Buzz had come up in the business at The Charlotte Observer, which was always of the traditionalist school (I don’t know if it is now or not, because I never see it). He’s the one who drilled those three qualities of a lede, and the permissible ways to present it on the page, into my head.

And Buzz explained that a lede should communicate one thing very clearly to the reader, even the casual reader, whether consciously or not: Is my world safe? Usually, the answer will be yes, at least relatively so, and your eyes will merely brush over that reassuring fact as you move on to dig into news that interests you more. For that reason the lede should often be unobtrusive, occupying the minimal space on that right-hand edge. But when you really need to sit up and take notice (the collapse of credit markets, the USSR moving missiles into Cuba) it needs to be big enough to reach out and grab you.

Most of these subtleties, of course, are lost on you if you read your newspaper online. As useful as the Web versions can be (and the NYT and WSJ are very good at adding value via the Web) that medium just hasn’t developed the same visual and organizational language to convey the same messages about what’s important today. And that’s one reason why, consciously or unconsciously, many of you still cling to your print editions.

Anyway, as an Old School newspaperman, with a traditionalist’s sense of what matters — and one who thinks some of you might be of a similar orientation — let me offer a briefing glimpse at the news that actually mattered this morning. No Britney Spears. No “Idol.” No sports (except, of course, during the World Series or the Final Four, and then just as leavening in what we call “the mix”). Just news that matters.

Here goes:

National/International

U.S. to Regulate Tobacco — A good lede candidate. It happened. It’s historically important, with extremely wide-ranging implications across the country. And it’s also interesting. (From an SC perspective, it’s another step forward on the national front while we can’t even raise our lowest-in-the-nation tax.)

Iran Votes Today — This couldn’t be the lede, because it hadn’t happened yet. But there’s nothing bigger on the horizon today, and demands prominent front-page play. Barring something huge and unexpected overshadowing it, a likely lede candidate for tomorrow (if we know anything about results).

Al Qaeda shifting Out of Pakistan — Not a lede either, but a very important trend story. Seems to have been exclusive to the NYT, although I could be wrong. (Of course, if you’re a paper that subscribes to the NYT news service, you would have had access to this in-cycle.)

TV Finally Goes Digital — This story, after the years of build-up, is pretty ho-hum. But it is happening today. And even though most folks won’t notice the difference, this is a significant milestone that affects, even if unobtrusively in most cases, technology that all of us have in our homes, and that too many of us spend too much time staring at. A small, take-note-of headline on the page.

State/Local

BEA Issues Gloomier Forecast — A good lede candidate for a South Carolina paper (and indeed, that’s how it was played in The State). You might want to run, as a sidebar, this more upbeat indicator: Lowcountry Home Sales Up. There are promising signs, and you need to keep readers apprised of them, while not sugarcoating the situation.

USC Tuition Holds to Inflation — Important consumer news, to be sure. But this also contains currents of several things of strategic importance to the state, addressing as it does economic development, the federal stimulus, the state budget cuts, and accessibility to a college education in a state in which too few adults have one.

I’ll stop there, because that’s enough for a respectable front page with most newspapers.

Anyway, if y’all like this, maybe I’ll do it more often. Like daily.

Happy, peaceful D-Day, Maj. Winters


Someone mentioned recently all the personal heroes he’d had the chance to interview in his career in journalism. I’ve had some of those — such as my friend Jack Van Loan. But on this day I think of one I DIDN’T interview, because I wouldn’t let myself bother him. I didn’t feel I had the right to.

Over the last few years I had occasion to visit central Pennsylvania multiple times, while my daughter was attending a ballet school up there. Almost every time I went there, I thought about going over to Hershey to try to talk to Dick Winters, the legendary commander of Easy Company of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment in the 101st Airborne Division during World War II. He was the leader — one of several leaders, but the one everyone remembers as the best — of the company immortalized in Stephen Ambrose’s book Band of Brothers, and the HBO series of the same name (the best series ever made for television).

But I never did. As much as I wanted just to meet him, to shake his hand once, I never did. And there’s a reason for that. A little while ago, I was reminded of that reason. The History Channel showed a special about D-Day, and one of the narrators was Winters, speaking on camera about 60 years after the events. He spoke in that calm, understated way he’s always had about his heroics that day — he should have received the Medal of Honor for taking out those 105mm pieces aimed at Utah Beach, but an arbitrary cap of one per division had been place on them, so he “only” received the Distinguished Service Cross.

Then, he got a little choked up about what he did that night, having been up for two days, and fighting since midnight. He got down on his knees and thanked God for getting him through that day. Then he promised that, if only he could get home again, he would find a quiet place to live, and live out the rest of his life in peace.

I figure a guy who’s done what he did — that day and during the months after, through the fighting around Bastogne and beyond into Hitler’s Eagle’s Nest itself — deserved to get his wish. He should be left in peace, and not bothered by me or anyone else.

So I’ve never tried to interview him.

(The video above and below is the televised dramatization of the action at Brecourt Manor for which Winters received the DSC. I was struck by how well the actor Damien Lewis captured a quality that Ambrose had described in his book. Winters had the rare ability to stay cool under fire, and more importantly to analyze the situation instantaneously and know exactly what to do in the given situation, and convey it to his men. Nobody who hasn’t been in those circumstances knows how he would react — neither did Winters, before this day — but everyone hopes he would perform exactly the way then-Lt. Winters did.)

Bring ‘stirrups’ back to baseball

OK, that last post was so heavy and depressing, I feel the need to lighten the mood by mentioning another story from the WSJ’s front page, this one about “stirrups” in baseball.

You know, the leggings — the socks you wore over your socks, the colorful ones with the heel and toe cut out.

This piece was about how the major leagues have abandoned the stirrups, mainly because the players don’t want to wear them — you may have noticed that in MLB, they wear their pants right down to their shoes, which means they don’t look like ballplayers any more — and the players are such big shots and make so much money that nobody can tell them what to do. But in the minors, discipline still reins, so the players still wear them.

Some points of interest from the story:

  • It leads and ends with a game in Myrtle Beach. You know, Myrtle Beach has a minor league team and Columbia doesn’t, in case you haven’t noticed.
  • The sole remaining source is a funky, homey little factory just up the road in North Carolina.
  • The fashion started because, starting in about 1905, there was an urban legend in baseball that held that some players had suffered blood poisoning from the dye in their socks getting into abrasions on their feet. This led players to wear white socks under their colored team socks, and that was bulky, so somebody came up with the idea of cutting the heel and toe out of the oversock. (The infections did NOT come from the dye, by the way, but from plain old germs, it was later determined.)

A story such as this appeals to my own particular sort of instinctive conservatism. I believe players should not only be made to wear stirrups but should WANT to in the same way that “woods” in golf should be made of persimmon. It was good enough for our daddies and granddaddies. Of course, as I type this, I’m looking at a picture of my own grandad, “Whitey” Warthen, pitching a game in the 19-teens. He’s wearing full colored socks, not stirrups, because in his day men were men. Me, I’d settle for stirrups. Because I’m still not sure about that blood-poisoning thing. You can’t be too careful.

I love the way the WSJ story ends:

On the field, as the Pelicans and Blue Rocks lined up for the anthem, half-moons glowed along the baselines. Kicking high, Michael Broadway pitched two perfect innings. In the fifth, Cody Johnson stepped into a fastball and sent it over the right-field fence.

It fell apart for the Pelicans in the ninth: walks, hits, errors. They lost, 9-2. “I want my $7 back,” a fan yelled on his way out. But for the stirrup-conscious in the crowd, the final score didn’t matter. On this spring night in Myrtle Beach, the socks won.

‘The Russ’ had a more tragic future than Paine foretold

I was struck by the ironic contrast between two things I read today. First there was this passage from Thomas Paine’s Rights of Man:

Never did so great an opportunity offer itself to England, and to all Europe, as is produced by the two Revolutions of America and France. By the former, freedom has a national champion in the western world; and by the latter, in Europe. When another nation shall join France, despotism and bad government will scarcely dare to appear. To use a trite expression, the iron is becoming hot all over Europe. The insulted German and the enslaved Spaniard, the Russ and the Pole, are beginning to think. The present age will hereafter merit to be called the Age of Reason, and the present generation will appear to the future as the Adam of a new world.

Perhaps “the Russ” was beginning to think. But that nation’s future was not nearly so glowing as Paine envisioned. Note this piece by George Will from the same op-ed page that contained the Harrell piece I praised earlier. It speaks of a Russia that is falling apart, and a people that is rapidly fading away:

Nicholas Eberstadt’s essay “Drunken Nation” in the current World Affairs quarterly notes that Russia is experiencing “a relentless, unremitting, and perhaps unstoppable depopulation.” Previous episodes of depopulation — 1917-23, 1933-34, 1941-46 — were the results of civil war, Stalin’s war on the “kulaks” and collectivization of agriculture, and World War II, respectively. But today’s depopulation is occurring in normal — for Russia — social and political circumstances. Normal conditions include a subreplacement fertility rate, sharply declining enrollment rates for primary school pupils, perhaps more than 7 percent of children abandoned by their parents to orphanages or government care or life as “street children.” Furthermore, “mind-numbing, stupefying binge drinking of hard spirits” — including poisonously impure home brews — “is an accepted norm in Russia and greatly increases the danger of fatal injury through falls, traffic accidents, violent confrontations, homicide, suicide, and so on.” Male life expectancy is lower under Putin than it was a half-century ago under Khrushchev.

Martin Walker of the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, writing in The Wilson Quarterly (“The World’s New Numbers”), notes that Russia’s declining fertility is magnified by “a phenomenon so extreme that it has given rise to an ominous new term — hypermortality.” Because of rampant HIV/AIDS, extreme drug-resistant tuberculosis (XDR-TB) and alcoholism, and the deteriorating health care system, a U.N. report says “mortality in Russia is three to five times higher for men and twice as high for women” than in other countries at a comparable stage of development. The report, Walker says, “predicts that within little more than a decade the working-age population will be shrinking by up to 1 million people annually.” Be that as it may, “Russia is suffering a demographic decline on a scale that is normally associated with the effects of a major war.”

Apparently, the arrival of the Age of Reason was not enough for Russia.

Welcome to ‘Sanfordville’

Have you reserved your space at the “Sanfordville” tent city set to go up tomorrow at Finlay Park? Here’s where to sign up, and here’s the release I got about it today:

South Carolinians to protest Sanford’s refusal to use stimulus money for education and law enforcement with “tent city” near Governor’s Mansion

On Tuesday, April 7, concerned citizens from all over South Carolina will erect a “tent city” in Finlay Park (Taylor and Gadsden Street) near the Governor’s Mansion in Columbia. The “tent city protest” will run from 10:00 AM until midnight. The symbolic protest is in response to Governor Mark Sanford’s continued refusal to accept $700 million in federal stimulus money meant for public education and law enforcement. State leaders from both political parties predict that Sanford’s actions could lead to the firing of thousands of teachers and hundreds of prison guards.

South Carolina’s unemployment rate is currently the second highest in the nation and education and law enforcement budgets have already endured deep cuts.  Sanford has consistently ignored pleas from teachers, parents and law enforcement officials to use this funding to prevent disastrous consequences.

Special guests will visit the “tent city” throughout the day. A list of guests will be distributed by tomorrow morning.  Contact Brady Quirk-Garvan for more information at 843-743-5453 or [email protected]

——————–

###

Yes, you’ve seen this before.

Video: A brief history of cartooning at The State

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Robert Ariail delivered a lecture last Thursday night, as part of the prestigious Calhoun Lecture Series at the Strom Thurmond Institute at Clemson U. It was about the history of cartooning in general, and at The State in particular.

Today, he dropped by my office to share an anecdote that he told up in Clemson, one which seems particularly apropos to share today, the day the news came out that his career at The State is coming to an end.

It's about the only other cartoonist The State ever actually employed full-time, back in the days of the Gonzales brothers, and why it took 74 years for the paper to hire one
after its first experience...

Never mind maneuvers…

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Just watched the end of a movie in which Lawrence Olivier was strutting about in Napoleonic-era admiral’s uniform with an empty right sleeve, which could only mean he was portraying Lord Nelson. And there was Vivien Leigh talking about Lord Keith and St. Vincent and the rest, so I was hooked to the end of it. Saw a highly melodramatic rendering of Nelson’s death at Trafalgar.

As you know, I’m a huge fan of the Aubrey-Maturin novels, and Lord Nelson was Jack Aubrey’s hero. In the books, Jack is the one to whom Nelson said, “Never mind maneuvers, always go straight at ’em.” In reality, he said that to Lord Cochrane, upon whom Aubrey is largely based.

Here’s the kicker: After the movie, the guy who introduces the features on TCM said the movie was so chock-full of homilies about the importance of standing up to dictators that the director was summoned to Congress — still gripped by isolationism — where our lawmakers were investigating pro-war propaganda by Hollywood. He was scheduled to appear on Dec. 12, 1941, so he lucked out there. By his appearance date, isolationism was no longer quite the thing, you know.

Imagine that — Hollywood being investigated for pro-war propaganda.

I’d better go to bed now.

A secessionist Freudian slip

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My favorite part of the concurrent resolution described in my last post is this:

Whereas, the several states of the Untied States of America, through
the Constitution and the amendments thereto, constituted a general
government for special purposes and delegated to that government
certain definite powers, reserving each state to itself, the residuary
right to their own self government. Now, therefore,

Yep, you read that right, and all I did was copy and paste if from the online text of H. 3509. It does indeed say "the Untied States of America."

Hey, if you can't break up the Union one way…

Nullification: Are we going to do it again?

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Michael Rodgers over at "Take Down The Flag" is worried that we are, with S.C. House bill 3509, which seeks a concurrent resolution. And you know, you can easily see why he would think that, given such language as this:

Whereas, the South Carolina General Assembly declares that the people
of this State have the sole and exclusive right of governing themselves
as a free, sovereign, and independent State, and shall exercise and
enjoy every power, jurisdiction, and right pertaining thereto, which is
not expressly delegated by them to the United States of America in the
congress assembled; and
…

I found that "sole and exclusive right" bit interesting, with the way it seemed to brush aside the federalist notion of shared sovereignty. That language seems to go beyond the purpose stated in the summary, which is:

TO AFFIRM THE RIGHTS OF ALL STATES INCLUDING SOUTH CAROLINA BASED ON
THE PROVISIONS OF THE NINTH AND TENTH AMENDMENTS TO THE UNITED STATES
CONSTITUTION.

The point being, of course, that since we do HAVE the Ninth and 10th amendments, every word of this resolution is superfluous unless it means to negate federal authority in some way not currently set out in law.

And a certain neo-Confederate sensibility is suggested with the very first example of the sort of action on the part of the federal government that would constitute an abridgement of the Constitution under this resolution:

(1)    establishing martial law or a state of emergency within one of
the states comprising the United States of America without the consent
of the legislature of that state;…

As Dave Barry would say, I am not making this up: The bill's sponsors are indeed suggesting that this resolution is needed to declare that we won't let Reconstruction be reinstituted.

Because, you know, that Obama is such a clear and present danger. Or something. I guess.

Of course, not everyone is shocked, appalled or amused at the notion of a new nullification movement. Check out this op-ed piece we recently ran online, about Mark Sanford and nullification.

Historic Isadore Lourie speech

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Running into Joel Lourie today at Rotary reminds me of this historic speech of his Dad's that he shared with me back in January, saying, "I thought you might enjoy a speech given by my father in 1970 when I.S. Leevy
Johnson and Jim Felder became two of the first three African-Americans elected
to the SC House since the early 1900s. Given the upcoming inauguration in
Washington, it is a great example of how far we have come."

He said I should feel free to share it, and I meant to. Now, belatedly, I do so, in a spirit of gratitude for the leadership that Joel's late father gave this community:

Remarks

By the

Honorable Isadore E. Lourie

On the Occasion of the Installation
of the

Richland County Legislative
Delegation

November 13, 1970

House Chamber, The State House,
Columbia, South Carolina

 

For most of us … our youth was a
pleasant time when bare feet carried us through happy summers and warm
breakfasts carried us to schools where learning and friendship mixed to fill
our minds with new ideas and our characters with strength.  The world was at our feet.  Every one of our mothers and fathers held
out unlimited hope for our futures.  No
barriers stood in the way of our dreams. 
In every sense of the word … we were free … free to look forward to
tomorrow … free to be ourselves … free to be proud … free to harbor all of the
hopes of youth … free to daydream of conquering challenges. 

 

At the same time … some of our
neighbors felt the frustration of limited dreams.  History had written that theirs was a smaller world where hope
was rationed in small portions and daydreams were not visions of things to come
… but fantasies of wishful thinking that would be shattered by a world where
clouds of misunderstanding blackened the horizons of hope.  To eight generations of Black children … the
time between birth and death was an age of frustration and broken dreams.

 

The days of our youth were times of
different worlds when we saw things in different lights … one world illuminated
by unbounded future … the other illuminated by the dismal gray of limited
fortune.

 

The years since we were young have
ticked away waiting for those two separate worlds to confront each other.  In some places that confrontation has been
marked by spilled blood … by the clash of raw emotions that have turned
neighbor against neighbor.  In some
places … the shrill sounds of separatism and hate have been the chorus which
accompanied that confrontation.  In some
places … both worlds have been washed away by changing times only to be
replaced by even more intense bitterness. 

 

Last week … thousands of Richland
County citizens stood quietly in lines before polling booths pondering the
course of our history.  In orderly
processes … they marched one by one into gray metal machines which would
register their decisions.  Alone …
unwatched … unaided … they pulled the levers that bring our people together.  Silently … without a word … thousands in
company of only their own thoughts … reached and pulled and then walked away to
let collective judgment steer the dreams of the next generation of young
daydreamers. 

 

In an old warehouse … the men sworn
in today … waited for those secrets to become known.  Men who work with their hands … women who raise children …
lawyers … doctors … black men … white men … children and grandparents crowded
together in front of television sets which lit the campaign headquarters with
anticipation.  All eyes found a common
direction and calculated silently as returns flashed on the screen.  The favorable early returns began the crowd
buzzing … and discussions of hope started in each corner of the red, white and
blue bunted room.  Ten precincts …
twenty precincts … thirty … then forty … and finally all precincts reported
their judgments.  The two worlds had
come together peacefully.  In Richland
County, South Carolina, we had chosen the road to decision that allows every
man to take part. 

 

Jim Felder and I.  S. Leevy Johnson have become Representatives
in the General Assembly of all the people. 
Today … they are very special because they are the first.  But they will never be special again.  And that is what it was all about … making
it an everyday occurrence to be a lawmaker … making it normal to serve your
fellow man no matter what the color of your skin is.  Some newsmen have predicted Jim Felder and I.  S. 
Leevy Johnson will be very special Representatives.  But it is our hope that they will just be
Representatives … providing answers to the problems we all face.

 

Governments are established to solve
our common problems.  Lawmakers seek
solutions for all the people … and none of the people can be a special
case.  Perhaps now … it will be that way
in South Carolina. 

(Note – the speech is for the installation of
the Richland Delegation which included I.S. Leevy Johnson and Jim Felder.  Herbert Fielding, from Charleston, was the
third African-American elected to the House that year.  These three men were the first
African-Americans elected to the SC House of Representatives since the early
1900s)

But how about those spiffy MODERN blue laws?

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Got a release today from the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States, calling my attention to a NYT editorial headlined "A Dry Sunday in Connecticut," and saying that in case I wanted to write anything about Sunday sales of liquor, to consider the following:

  • Archaic Blue Laws make no sense in a 21st-century economy where Sunday has become the second-busiest shopping day of the week.
  • Beer, wine and spirits are already permitted for on-premise consumption at bars and restaurants seven days a week.  Allowing the sale of beer, wine and spirits at off-premise retail outlets on Sunday would simply give adult consumers more choices and added convenience.
  • The state will benefit from the increased tax revenues generated by an additional day of package store sales.  Contrary to some who believe that Sunday sales will just spread six days of sales over seven, recent implementation of Sunday Sales in 12 states (Colorado’s repeal was too recent for data) shows that in 2006 Sunday sales generated $212 million in new sales for retailers.  This figure is expected to increase annually.  See economic analysis of those states here.
  • No legislation forces any package store to open on Sundays. It simply gives store owners the right to decide for themselves which days to open. 
  • Sunday liquor sales will not lead to increased drunk driving.  According to an analysis using government data on alcohol-related fatalities, there is no statistical difference in states that allow Sunday liquor sales compared to those that do not.

Which provokes me to say,

  • First, we have no plans to do any editorials on the subject. I doubt we would reach consensus, partly because I'm such a mossback. I miss having a day of rest, so pretty much anything that is still proscribed on Sunday, I'm for keeping it. And before you secularists have a fit and fall in it about "establishment of religion," yadda-yadda, I don't much care which day of the week you pick. Make it Tuesday, if that makes you feel less threatened and oppressed. Just pick a day on which we can all kick back and not be expected to run around and get things done, just because we can. And don't give me that stuff about how I don't have to shop just because the stores are open. Yes, I do. There is so much pressure on my time that I can't possibly get everything expected of me done in six days, and if you give me a seventh on which to do them, I'll have to use it. And if you don't understand that, there's no point it our talking about it. The only way to have a day of rest is for there to be a day in which we roll up the sidewalks, so to speak, and everybody understands that you couldn't do it that day, so they don't expect you to. Now I know we're not going back to those days, but I am not inclined to add anything else to the list of stuff going on 24/7. You remind me that "Sunday has become the second-busiest shopping day of the week," and you think that's an argument for doing something else on Sunday? You're kidding, right? It just makes me tired thinking about it. Get somebody else to write your editorial; you're barking up the wrong tree with me. And all of you kids, get off of my lawn! Dagnabit.
  • Is your use of the term "archaic blue laws" meant to suggest that there's another category of spiffy, modern blue laws that you don't mind so much? Or are you just being redundant?
  • Correct me if I'm wrong, but your point about increased tax revenues means that people will be buying more liquor, right? I see how that's a good thing for you and the fine folks at the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States, but how is that a good thing for the rest of us?
  • Yeah, right — nobody would be forced to open on Sunday. This reminds me of when I worked in Jackson, TN, and the owner of the largest department store in town fought against lifting the blue laws because he said that if you lifted them, the big chain stores would come to town and drive him out of business. Besides, he liked giving his workers Sunday off. And he was Jewish, by the way. The newspaper ignored him (even though he was its biggest advertiser, for those of you who keep track of such things) and kept advocating for lifting blue laws, that eventually happened, the big chain stores came to town, he had to open on Sundays, and he soon went out of business anyway. When it comes to competition, folks, "choice" can be a myth. If your competitors are all doing it, you have to.
  • I'll take your word for it on the drunk driving. Although it seems a bit weird that you'd be selling MORE liquor (remember the tax revenues thing), but people won't be driving drunk more. Whatever.

Just look upon me as a disgruntled beer drinker — one who was perfectly happy buying enough on Saturday to make it through the weekend, and thinks anybody who wasn't organized enough or self-aware enough to know ahead of time that he might want a beer on Sunday is pretty pathetic. Dagnabit.

Historians: Lincoln is tops; W. ranks 36th

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Just for a talker, I thought I'd share the results of this C-SPAN survey on how historians rate the leadership of presidents:

C-SPAN RELEASES SECOND
HISTORIANS SURVEY OF

 PRESIDENTIAL
LEADERSHIP

      Abraham Lincoln Retains Top
      Position;

Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush
and Bill Clinton Advance Since 2000 Survey; George W. Bush Ranks 36th
Overall By Historians

(Washington, DC, February 15, 2009) –  Timed
for Presidents Day 2009, C-SPAN today releases the results of its second
Historians Survey of Presidential Leadership, in which a cross-section of 65
presidential historians ranked the 42 former occupants of the White House on ten
attributes of leadership.

As in C-SPAN’s first such survey, released in
2000, Abraham Lincoln received top billing among the historians, just as the
nation marks the bicentennial of his birth. George Washington placed second,
while spots three through five were held by Franklin D. Roosevelt, Theodore
Roosevelt, and Harry Truman, in that order.

Based on the results of historians surveyed,
George W. Bush received an overall ranking of 36.  Among other recent
Presidents, Bill Clinton who was ranked 21 in the 2000 survey, advanced six
spots in 2009 to an overall ranking of 15; Ronald Reagan moved from 11 to 10;
George H.W. Bush went from 20 to 18, and Jimmy Carter’s ranking declined from 22
to 25.  

As in 2000, C-SPAN was guided in this effort by
a team of academic advisors: Dr. Douglas Brinkley, Professor of History at Rice University; Dr. Edna Greene Medford, Associate Professor of History, Howard
University; and Richard
Norton Smith, Scholar in
Residence at George Mason University. The team approved the ten criteria, which
were the same used in C-SPAN’s 2000 Survey, reviewed the list of invited
participants, and supervised the reporting of the results.  Harvey C. Mansfield, William R. Kenan, Jr., Professor of Government at
Harvard, also consulted on the names of invited historians with an
overall goal of geographic, demographic, and ideological diversity.

“Bill Clinton and Ulysses S. Grant aren't often
mentioned in the same sentence – until now.  Participants in the latest C-SPAN
survey of presidential historians have boosted each man significantly higher
than in the original survey conducted in 2000. All of which goes to show two
things: the fluidity with which presidential reputations are judged, and the
difficulty of assessing any president who has only just recently left office,”
said Richard Norton Smith. 

“As much as is possible,
we created a poll that was non-partisan, judicious and fair minded, and it’s
fitting that for the 200th birthday of Abraham Lincoln that he remains at the
top of these presidential rankings,” noted Dr. Douglas Brinkley.

“How we rank our presidents is, to a large
extent, influenced by our own times. Today’s concerns shape our views of the
past, be it in the area of foreign policy, managing the economy, or human
rights.  The survey results also reinforce the idea that history is less about
agreed-upon facts than about perceptions of who we are as a nation and how our
leaders have either enhanced or tarnished that image we have of ourselves.
Lincoln continues to rank at the top in all categories because he is perceived
to embody the nation’s avowed core values: integrity, moderation, persistence in
the pursuit of honorable goals, respect for human rights, compassion; those who
collect near the bottom are perceived as having failed to uphold those values,”
concluded Dr. Edna Medford.

Full rankings for each of the 42 presidents are
available at
www.c-span.org/presidentialsurvey <http://www.c-span.org/presidentialsurvey>

Methodology

C-SPAN’s academic advisors
devised a survey in which participants used a one ("not effective") to ten
("very effective") scale to rate each president on ten qualities of presidential
leadership: "Public Persuasion," "Crisis Leadership," "Economic Management,"
"Moral Authority," "International Relations," "Administrative Skills,"
"Relations with Congress," "Vision/Setting An Agenda," “Pursued Equal Justice
for All,” and “Performance Within the Context of His Times."

Surveys were distributed to 147
historians and other professional observers of the presidency, drawn from a
database of C-SPAN's programming, augmented by suggestions from the academic
advisors.  Sixty-five agreed to participate.  Participants were guaranteed that
individual survey results remain confidential.  Survey responses were tabulated
by averaging all responses in a given category for each president.  Each of the
ten categories was given equal weighting in the total scores.  Overseeing the
2000 and 2009 tabulations were C-SPAN CFO Robert Kennedy and Dr. Robert
Browning, a political scientist who serves as director of the C-SPAN
archives.

Note that presidents might do well in one category, not so well in another. For instance, Bill Clinton made the top ten on "Public Persuasion," but was sixth from the bottom on "Moral Authority." Which makes sense.

I was going to construct my own Nick Hornby-style Top Five List, but I found it hard to argue with the one that the historians came up with:

  1. Abraham Lincoln
  2. George Washington
  3. Franklin D. Roosevelt
  4. Theodore Roosevelt
  5. Harry Truman

I hated that my favorite Founder John Adams didn't make the Top Ten — he came in 17th — but it's hard to argue with. His greatest contributions to the nation came long before he was president, and however much I like him, he was not that successful a president (probably the greatest thing he did as president was surrender power peacefully to Jefferson). Sort of like the fact that I LIKED Jimmy Carter, but can't say he did that great a job, accomplishment-wise.

Sheriff Lott back in the day

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This previous post got me to thinking that some of you might be interested in traveling down memory lane a bit with regard to Sheriff Leon Lott, since he's recently become nationally famous.

As y'all know, I feel a certain kinship for the sheriff (whom we endorsed in the last election). We call each other "twin" because we were both born on the same day in the same year in South Carolina. Also, he has been named "Toughest Cop"
twice, and if there were such a thing as a "Toughest Editorial Geek" contest, y'all know I would have won it at least twice by now. (He's also won the Miss Vista Queen drag pageant, but there I can draw no parallels to myself. It seems we are not identical twins.)

As for the controversy in which he is currently engaged, I'm not as stirred up as a lot of folks one way or the other. I sort of go back and forth on it. I think the law should be enforced equitably — but I also wonder how many people who were not white and famous have been prosecuted when they weren't at the very least caught holding. I most emphatically do NOT agree with the folks who see this as evidence that the War on Drugs is stupid or useless or whatever. I think it's a good thing this stuff is illegal. But I also doubt that this particular case is really worth the resources devoted to it thus far.

Anyway, wherever you stand on all of this, I thought I'd provide this reminder that Leon has never been shy about going after people who break our drug laws. He's devoted a career to it, done it with a great deal of dash, panache and personal courage, and has often been controversial.

Here is a profile Clif LeBlanc wrote for The State when Leon was on the way to unseating his ex-boss as sheriff. I pulled and scanned some photos from our pre-electronic files by way of illustration.

THE STATE
LEON LOTT: UP FROM 'MIAMI VICE'
Published on: 10/30/1996
Section: FRONT
Edition: FINAL
Page: A1
By CLIF LeBLANC, Staff Writer
Illustration: PHOTO: color & bw

Editor's note: This is the second of two articles examining the candidates for Richland County sheriff.

Leon Lott lives to catch the bad guys. He revels in the nitty-gritty and the glitz of being a cop. He may like it a little too much.

The 43-year-old Democratic challenger in Tuesday's election for Richland County sheriff believes in working hard and getting his hands dirty.

The way he went about busting pushers and users earned him a reputation and awards. But his boss, the incumbent sheriff, said it cost Lott the job he loves.

The long hours he put in as a narcotics detective for nine years also claimed his marriage and hurt his relationships with his daughters.

Nearly four years after reaching the depths of his personal and professional life, Lott feels he is a better officer who has grown enough to become the forward-looking "sheriff for the 21st century."

Dirty Harry and Sonny Crockett were personas Lott once wore with relish during high-flying days when he drove seized Porsches, sported an 18-carat Rolex, worked choice undercover cases with federal agents in Florida and postured for cameras.

Now he blames the Hollywood image on the media, though his best friend admits Lott enjoyed playing the role to his advantage. Lott still wears the $2,650 watch.

Citizens or celluloid? Lott has been chief of the tiny St. Matthews Police Department for three years. That has helped him appreciate real-life role models.

"I see myself as a combination of Frank Powell, Chief Austin as far as PR, and Sheriff Wells as far
as being involved in investigations."

Powell is the former five-term sheriff of Richland County who hired Lott in 1973 and has come to epitomize, for Lott, the lawman unswayed by political influence.

Chief Charles P. Austin is known for his ability to sell the community policing philosophy that has brought him and the city of Columbia success.

Union County Sheriff Howard Wells won national recognition for his handling of the Susan Smith case.

But Lott's critics don't buy that he is anything but the hot-dog narc who fashioned himself after make-believe cops and tried to live by rules that work only on the screen.

"He actually thinks he's Don Johnson. He actually thinks this is 'Miami Vice,' " said GOP opponent Allen Sloan, refering to the freewheeling fictional narcotics officer from the TV police drama that ended in 1989.

"That still exists today," Sloan said of Lott. "All the rules apply, except to Leon."

Two law enforcement officials who worked years with Lott in Richland County share a similar concern.

"He has an ends-justify-the-means mentality," one said, requesting anonymity because he would have to collaborate with Lott if he wins the election. "That's frightening in any law enforcement officer and especially in the top person."

Lott says he is a college-educated professional who can breathe new life into a tradition-bound agency.

"I never considered myself a hot dog," Lott said, wearing a tie and chatting from an easy chair in his modest living room. "The Sonny Crockett thing … I think I fed off what the news media created. I turned it around and tried to use it to our advantage."

Lott's best friend, Jon Fins, said the brash label comes from people who don't know him.

"To me, Leon is a guy in sweats who works out real hard to stay in shape, grabs a sandwich at McDonald's and goes right back to work," said Fins, co-owner of an Assembly Street pawn shop where Lott bought his Rolex.

Fierce or fair? Lott's detractors say his zeal often overrides good judgment.

Just before Christmas 1987, for example, his aggresiveness got the best of him, said Jim Anders, then-5th Circuit solicitor and now a strong supporter of Sloan.

Anders produced a blistering order from a federal judge over the seizure of a new, black BMW convertible during a drug bust.

Judge Clyde Hamilton ordered the car returned to its owner and blasted the U.S. Attorney's office, the FBI and then-Capt. Lott of the sheriff's office. The judge cited "many irregularities" and "questionable motivations" for taking the BMW.

"Captain Lott's testimony raised the possibility that he had sought forfeiture … for an improper purpose, specifically to serve as his private vehicle," the judge's ruling said. It appeared, Hamilton said, that Lott wanted to drive the care to the FBI Academy in Quantico, Va.

Lott was scheduled to leave for coveted training at the prestigious academy in about the time the BMW was seized.

The car had only the remains of a marijuana joint, Anders said, adding he refused to seize the car because state law required a minimum of 10 pounds of pot before government could move to confiscate a vehicle used in the drug business.

"That's the kind of reckless behavior that I'm concerned about," Anders said. "It's less character than ability. A smart police officer doesn't get himself involved in cases like that."

Lott's explanation? "That's not pointing any finger at me. It's pointing fingers at the Richland County Sheriff's Department, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the U.S. Attorney's office. They made the decisions to move forward. I didn't force them to do that."

But Lott initiated the seizure and pressured the young woman who owned the car to voluntarily turn it over for forfeiture.

Caught in middle? Lott's most publicized criticism as a narcotics agent occurred in 1991. A circuit court judge threatened him with contempt for changing agreements with drug suspects, for ignoring a court order to arrest a father- and-son drug-dealing team from Miami and especially for not adequately supervising drug peddlers who were out on bond so they could help police make cases.

Enrique and Fabian Valencia were busted at Owens Field in February 1990 with 11 pounds of cocaine. In exchange for reduced sentences laid out in written agreements, they pledged to help Lott lure bigger dealers into South Carolina.

Judge Carol Connor stung Lott for his actions, but didn't punish the pushers because they met their terms.

Anders said he doesn't remember the agreement and Sloan publicly backed Lott when the deal made news in March 1991.

Lott produced his records of the case, which show that Anders' chief narcotics prosecutor signed the agreement. A Feb. 19, 1991, memo from Lott to then-5th Circuit Solicitor Dick Harpootlian, who disavowed the deal after suceeding Anders, indicates that Sloan "had been advised of the situation."

Lott maintains he was caught in the middle between officials who made an agreement in writing and a new prosecutor and judge who took a different view after the fact.

"If I did violate it," Lott said of Connor's order. "It was with the approval of the sheriff."

Harpootlian was so concerned about Lott's judgment at the time that he announced he would review all his drug deals and recommended to Sloan that Lott be taken out of narcotics enforcement.

Sloan moved him to what Lott calls a do-nothing administrative position, where he stayed until he was fired in December 1992.

The demotion and dismissal was the bleakest time in Lott's life. His marriage fell apart during that time and he had to try to explain to his three daughters why he was out of the profession he loved.

It took Lott six months to land the chief's job with the seven-member St. Matthews department.

Harpootlian and Lott have made peace and the prosecutor-turned-defense-lawyer is backing Lott's campaign.

"I think Leon had a life-changing experience," Harpootlian said. "He lost his wife. He lost his job. He's somebody who realizes he's screwed up. He's matured. The guy's real talented. He gets up every morning wanting to be a cop."

Lott doesn't agree with all of that. "I don't think I made immature or bad decisions," he said.

But asked if he would OK the BMW and Valencia decisions if he were sheriff, Lott responded, "I would approve."

Lott conceded that he has changed and plans to continue his professional growth. "I guess age matures you. I feel like I'm a more rounded law enforcement officer now."

But controversy has followed Lott to St. Matthews.

Before the June primary, Lott ran afoul of the federal Hatch Act, which limits political activity by employees whose agencies get money from Washington. Federal officials said Lott should not run for office because as chief of the Calhoun County town he administered nearly $59,000 in federal grants.

The dispute was settled this month after Lott agreed to drop the title of chief and sever any ties to supervision of the grants. But Lott remains chief in every other way after the town named him police "administrator."

Lott has built his campaign on the theme of higher standards. He said he will be fairer, he has the energy to be an administrator as well as a street cop, and he has fresher ideas.

He promises a network of 24-hour, full-service substations, a lower crime rate and all without a tax increase

The making of a cop. Lott fell into a career in law enforcement. More accurately, he threw himself into the job.

It was a boring summer evening just before his senior year at Aiken High School. Lott and some friends decided to egg cars from an overpass on I-20, which was under construction.

"I think the first car we egged stopped. We had egged the chief investigator for the sheriff's department," Lott recalled. "Me, being a (baseball) player … I had been the only one to hit the car."

The teen-agers tried to get away, but the detective pulled them over. He didn't rough them up or charge them, but he did behave professionally as he called their parents.

"It made such an impression on me … it just grabbed a hold of me," Lott said. The job appealed to his sense of rooting for the underdog (crime victims), to his interest in untangling things that are puzzling and to his restlessness with monotony.

The work also served as an outlet for his competitiveness.

Lott is media savvy and at ease before cameras, having appeared dozens of times in local newspapers and TV as well as nationally on "America's Most Wanted." But that self-assured image clashes with the quiet, reserved teen-ager Lott said he was.

He finds it odd that he's called a hot dog now when that was the kind of athlete he disliked in high school. "I thought actions spoke louder than words," Lott said.

The words have been loud and harsh in the Sloan-Lott race.

"There's been a lot of talk that this is about revenge," Lott said. "It's not. When he fired me … he gave me a chance to go out and show – prove to myself – that I could be more than just a narcotics officer. I got my revenge by being successful, by showing I could be a chief.

"I want to come back to Richland County, personally, so I can see my kids everyday and, professionally, because I can do a better job."

In case you're wondering, here's a key to the five photos on this post:

  1. Top: The original cutline from August 1986 said, "Columbia's version of 'Miami Vice'…Narcotic investigator Lt. Leon Lott shows off his sports car, a Porsche 944"
  2. Mug shot: The notation on the back of the print, dated May 24, 1984, says "Richland Sheriff's investigator Lt. Leon Lott (chief narcotics deputy)"
  3. On a bust: The July 2, 1986, cutline said, "Leon Lott before entering trailer of suspected grower."
  4. In coat and tie: Dated Nov. 11, 1988, the cutline says "Capt. Leon Lott displays some seized equipment."
  5. Below: Photo taken by me during the sheriff's endorsement interview in May 2008.

Bad blood between Leon, Harpo?

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Looking for something else, I happened to run into this old story from 1991. It's from Leon Lott's Miami Vice days as head of the narcotics squad of the sheriff's department. As many of you will remember, back then Leon had a rep as a bit of a cowboy (in addition to Sonny Crockett, Dirty Harry was invoked) who liked to kick down doors and drive hot, confiscated cars.

But what I had forgotten was that Dick Harpootlian — who was quoted in today's story being critical of Leon on behalf of his client, busted in connection with the Michael Phelps investigation — had such a beef with Leon back then, when Dick was the solicitor. Interesting back story. Don't miss the classic quote at the end from Leon: "I love narcotics." (OK, so maybe that's a little out of context.):

          THE STATE

NARCOTICS CHIEF SAYS
POLITICS COST HIM JOB
Published on: 03/09/1991
Section: METRO/REGION
Edition: FINAL
Page: 1B
By TWILA DECKER and JOHN ALLARD, Staff Writers
Illustration: Photo, bw

Caption: Lott to be reassigned

Richland County's vice Capt. Leon Lott, often compared to "Miami Vice" character Sonny Crockett, will be transferred out of the job he loves after criticism by 5th Circuit Solicitor Dick Harpootlian.

Harpootlian asked a circuit judge last week to void a deal made by Lott a year ago that dismissed charges against a father-and-son drug-dealing team, Fabian and Enrique Valencia, in exchange for information about drug deals in South Carolina.

Harpootlian said the deal, which hasn't resulted in any arrests in this state, never should have been made. Judge Carol Connor is still considering whether she'll void the agreement.

"I think the conduct of Capt. Lott in the Valencia case . . . gave rise to serious questions about his judgment," Harpootlian said. "He let two of the county's biggest drug dealers go free."

Surprisingly, Sheriff Allen Sloan, who had strained relations with Lott last year and threatened to move him to the burglary division, has come to Lott's defense and says the move has nothing to do with the Valencia case.

"That deal was sanctioned by (former 5th Circuit) Solicitor Jim Anders," Sloan said. "Leon thought it was a good idea, and he still thinks it was a good deal. I back the boy 100 percent."

Sloan said Lott has expressed enthusiasm about his new responsibilities as captain of administration and believes that it's time to move on after nine years of heading the narcotics division.

But a somber Lott, who said he had no choice but to accept the new job because he has three children and a wife to support, gave a different account of the move late Thursday night.

Lott said Harpootlian gave Sloan an ultimatum: Get rid of Lott or there would be "major problems" between the Sheriff's Department and the solicitor's office.

Harpootlian denies pressuring Sloan.

"It's unfortunate that Leon views everything in this sinister way," Harpootlian said. "That might be the way it works in the world of narcotics, but this is the world of professionals.

"It's the sheriff's prerogative to organize his office in a way that's going to be most conducive to a good working relationship."

Sloan said Lott will be in charge of training, the DARE program, drug testing of applicants and officers and recruiting and hiring. He also will be in charge of seeking grants.

Deputy Chief Fred Riddle, who, unlike Lott, dresses conservatively in a suit and tie each day, will have the narcotics division added to his responsibilities.

"This will assure a daily account of everything they do," Sloan said. "But I am not in the least bit discouraged or unpleased with Leon's performance."

Riddle, who will be Lott's supervisor, will continue to be in charge of investigations and administration.

Lott also was criticized by Harpootlian and several defense lawyers for failing to monitor his drug agents' deals, spending $18,000 on a Mustang chase car and requiring his officers to meet quotas.

"This constant pressure to meet quotas means quantity takes precedence over quality, which means you arrest someone in whatever way you can," said Leigh Leventis, a Columbia attorney.

"Unless you have assets to turn over or agree to work for them as a snitch, they say you're going to prison. The system has allowed all kinds of abuses," Leventis said.

But Lott denies enforcing a quota, saying the number of arrests varies from month to month. He also said in a recent interview that he keeps close watch on his 26 narcotics agents to make sure they're following the law.

"I control narcotics with an iron fist over my guys. I try to be aware of everything that goes on. They have high intensity to work and perform," Lott said. "We're out there working our butts off to do something about the drug problem."

Lott, who was voted South Carolina Law Enforcement Association officer of the year in 1989, said work has been the focus of his life.

"I love narcotics. I don't know what I would do if I was transferred," Lott said last month.

Happy birthday, Abe and Chuck

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So, if you were invited to simultaneous birthday parties today, for Abraham Lincoln and Charles Darwin, and the actual honorees would be there alive and participating in the celebration, which one would you go to?

Me, I'd pick Lincoln. They say he was a lot of fun at parties. Also, I look up to him and what he did more.
Nothing against Darwin, but I suspect that if he hadn't worked out natural selection, someone else would have. But if Lincoln hadn't been president, the union would have fallen apart — nobody else would have been as single-mindedly stubborn about holding it together. I mean, why do you think so many of my fellow South Carolinians are still ticked at him? And even though all of my ancestors that I know about fought for the opposite outcome (five great-great grandaddies that I know about), this Southern boy is glad that the U.S. of A. is still around. So it all worked out well in the end.

All of which reminds me that I need to get back to reading Obama's favorite, desert-island-must-have book, Team of Rivals. I've let myself get sidetracked with re-reading O'Brian, and reading Moby Dick for the first time, so I need to buckle down and get back to Goodwin.

As for Darwin, I thought I'd share this interesting piece that I saw in The New Republic, headlined "Charles Darwin, Conservative?"

Basically, it examines the great irony of modern politics, which is that conservatives tend to snub Darwin, even though his idea of order arising from nature without a guiding plan fits THEIR ideas about how society can produce civilization without guiding government.

Meanwhile, liberals who honor Darwin act as though they don't believe in that principle one bit, since they think you need a strong guiding hand of government to have order.

George Will made much the same point in his column that we ran Sunday, but I think the point is made more clearly in the TNR piece.

By the way, I side with the modern-day liberals on this point: I don't think you can have order without
government. Take away the guiding hand, and you get Somalia — warring militias running around firing AK-47s at everybody. But you know already that I thought that. I'm a rule-of-law guy.

As for the thing that everybody fights about over Darwin… Well, I'm a Catholic, and I hear the pope made peace with Darwin awhile back.

You know what I think about evolution, and natural selection? I think that is just exactly the way God would create the world. I don't see Him doing it like Cecil B. DeMille, six days and abracadabra, here's the world. I think He'd do it the slow, majestic, complicated way. Evolution seems just His style, to me. But what do I know?

(Now watch this: The controversial part of this post won't be the Darwin stuff; it'll be that I said nice things about Lincoln.)

Not that ‘Morning in America’ hubris again…

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Just got this e-mail a little while ago from a reader (I guess it was a reader, anyway):

The headlines today said that McCain claims Obama "must" consult with the GOP on stimulus talks. That's not true, any more than saying that Ronald Reagan was required to allow Dems much input in his 1981 plans. On election eve 1980, even old democrats like me realized that the public had said no to government spending, said no to government meddling and no to more regulations. I believed the public was wrong, but also understood that Reagan's mandate was to proceed as he'd promised.
 
Thirty years later, Americans' have decided that we need government, government to stop us from dying from eating peanut butter, government to stop bankers from stealing from us, and government to provide jobs until the economy picks up. That's Obama's mandate, and to do anything else would be to back off from his promises. McCain is wrong. He and his party lost. Obama wants to be nice and extend an olive branch to the losers, but it is not necessary that he does so. What's necessary is he goes forward with his plans.

To which I felt compelled to answer as follows (slightly edited, as I read back over it):

Interesting you should mention 1981. I'm still ticked off that Democrats back then took just the attitude that you're calling for. Tip O'Neill and the rest said, well, Reagan won the election, so let's give him anything that he wants. This, after four years of that same Democratic Congress not giving Jimmy Carter ANYthing he wanted.

I'm still mad about it. I'm still mad about how the whole world just rolled over for Reagan. Much of the media was full of that "Morning in America" hoopla, and I felt like …. well, have you ever been the only person in the room who was not drunk or stoned, and everybody around you thought everything was just SO funny, and you just thought they were all very irritating? Not much fun, huh? Well, that was me in the Reagan era.

I don't feel that way this time. I sort of thought Reagan's win in 1980 was the end of the world — not because I was anti-Republican, but because I had liked Jimmy Carter so much (I don't like him as much as I did then, but I really liked him then). I don't feel that way at all about Obama. Out of all the people running for president last year, McCain and Obama were my first and second choices. So while I'm sorry McCain didn't win, I'm glad Obama didn't lose. I'm highly ambivalent on that score.

But one reason I DO like Obama so much — and liked him so much more than Hillary — is that he IS about post-partisanship. (That's one of the main things I liked about McCain, too.) He's nothing like Reagan; he's far less the ideological warrior. And if he doesn't work with McCain (something which, to his credit, he's already demonstrated a willingness to do), then he's not the guy that a LOT of people voted for. I would expect exactly the same from McCain — a willingness to work across the aisle — had he been elected.

And I have little patience for Democrats who act the way the Reaganites did in the early 80s — We won, so we'll do what we damn' well please. Unfortunately, I do hear that from some. Like "Morning in America" revisited. And I didn't like that triumphalist bull the first time, not one bit.

And if you don't care about bipartisanship, think about this: There's a good chance this stimulus will fail. There's a good chance ANY stimulus would fail. So how would you feel about it if, once the stimulus fails, the GOP recaptures Congress, and then goes around telling Obama and the world that "We won, so we don't have to listen to you?"

Far better that we have a stimulus plan that both parties buy into. It's a little late for that, but it WOULD have been far better. It's never good to have one of the two major parties politically invested in the nation failing…

(I'll add one more thought: I would not say that Obama "must" work with McCain et al. I'm just saying that to the extent that he can, he should. This is not to say that if you've tried to bring the GOP along and they've just refused and you truly believe your plan is the right one, you don't go ahead — just as I thought it was right for us to go ahead into Iraq without France, Germany and Russia on board. But I am saying that if you can possibly swing it, bipartisan is WAY better for the country.)

Reaganism, boiled down to its essence

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Being a word guy, I got a kick out of this first paragraph of a letter we ran on our Sunday page:

Government is the problem. Stop it.

Although those two sentences actually make more sense, something about them reminded me of Stephen Colbert's "I Am America (And So Can You!)"

The temptation was strong to edit the letter so that it stopped there. It would have been perfect, a statement of Reaganism boiled down to its minimalist essence. If Reagan were the coal, this would be the diamond.

But I left the letter alone. Here it is:

Government printing too much money

Government is the problem. Stop it.

It
is printing unprecedented amounts of money. Continuing will lead to
hyper-inflation. Remember the Weimer Republic hyper-inflation, when a
wheelbarrow full of money was needed for a loaf of bread?

It's
simple supply and demand. When the government effectively prints so
many dollars, the value of the dollar will eventually go down,
drastically.

For now, call all members of Congress and urge them to kill the “stimulus” (incredible pork-barrel, not stimulus) bill.

In the longer form, however, the message lacked purity. It gave you things to argue with; you could say, "Hmmm. I seem to recall the Weimar Republic had certain other problems that contributed to the devaluation of the currency, something more than the act itself of printing too much money." Nevertheless, I do love a good historical analogy. My favorite with regard to Weimar inflation is this: The night of the Beer Hall Putsch, until it was time to make their move, one of Hitler's aides bought three beers so the two of them and one other follower could blend in. The beers cost three billion marks. But you know, if I wanted to talk about runaway inflation, I'd probably cite something more immediate: Zimbabwe has to print new denominations every week, because prices double every day. (Then again, though, Zimbabwe has bigger problems that contribute to having to print the money, not vice versa.)

But that first paragraph was very enjoyable, esthetically speaking. It was like haiku or something…

Amen to letter debunking Reagan tax ‘reform’

48 Replies

Just now remembered that I meant to say a big "Amen!" to the third of these letters that ran on Thursday:

Reagan tax policies began economic slide

I think that if I read one more letter praising Ronald Reagan’s tax policies I will be sick.

I
was in the tax business when his 1986 tax reform act was passed. This
act was revenue-neutral. The cut in the top brackets was accomplished
by cutting numerous deductions that the middle class enjoyed. My own
taxes increased more than $2,500.

The idea, of course, was that
those in the top brackets would create jobs and products. The problem
was the middle class had less money to purchase the products.

From
that point on, the discrepancy in accumulated wealth between the middle
and upper classes began to widen, and the government deficit began to
increase.

If you want real tax reform, I have a suggestion: Allow
those who take the standard deduction also to take their charitable
deductions. This would result in churches and other charities being
able to meet the increasing demands they are facing in this current
economy.

WILLIAM R. GEDDINGS JR.
West Columbia

The first year that tax "reform" took effect was my first year at The State. I had taken a big pay cut to come here from Wichita (I SO wanted to be close to all of y'all and I really, REALLY wanted to get the heck out of Kansas). I mean a big one, like 25 percent. Add to that the fact that I was the first (or at least, the only) editor ever hired from out of state (in our daily meetings, pretty much everyone was a USC grad except for the guy who was ostracized for having gone to Clemson), and there simply did not exist a procedure for compensating such new hires for their moving expenses. My boss fiddled the books (legally, acting within he rightful prerogatives) to give me an extra $1,000 in my first paycheck to help me out with that. I went with the cheapest deal with the movers I could get — we did all the packing, in our own boxes — and we drove a lot of stuff ourselves crammed into our two vehicles like the Clampetts heading for California. With needing to stop for the kids, it took us four days to get here. And the move still cost me $1,500 out of my own pocket, which cleaned out our savings account.

We rented because we couldn't afford to buy, and we kept putting food on the table by my wife taking in other kids to care for them along with our four (our fifth was born here the following year).

And THAT year, thanks to Ronald Reagan's tax "reform," was the first time I EVER had to pay more than had been deducted from my paycheck. In fact, I think it still stands as the ONLY time, but I'm not positive; I'd need to check.

So needless to say, I didn't think much of what the Gipper had done for me. Maybe somebody benefited — Gordon Gekko or somebody — but it was pretty painful for me and mine, hitting me in probably the worst year of my adult life for such an unexpected expense.

Not that we should make tax policy based on how it affects yours truly. I'll leave such arguments as that to my libertarian friends. I'm just saying Mr. Geddings' letter struck a chord with me.