Category Archives: Leadership

Et tu, Chip? Not quite, but almost…

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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 comic stylings of Vincent Sheheen

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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…

Tucker Eskew remembers when governors governed

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Tucker Eskew at the Summit Club Tuesday.

Yesterday at the Summit Club, Tucker Eskew spoke to a luncheon meeting of the local chapter of the International Association of Business Communicators. (And OMG, I just committed one of the cardinal sins of Newswriting 101. I just wrote what is termed a “The Ladies Auxiliary met on Wednesday” lede! Which is to say, a lede that tells you a scheduled event occurred, but doesn’t tell you what happened, or why you should care. Well, so what? I don’t have an editor or anyone else to get on me about it. Perhaps you’ve noticed.)

The first thing that interested me about this was how many former staffers from The State were there — Michael Sponhour, Jan Easterling, Jeff Stensland, Preston McLaurin and others, all there to represent their various clients. It was Old Home Week. And I think I was a bit of a curiosity at the gathering, because it was the first time many of them had seen me NOT as an editor at the paper. But perhaps I’m just thinking of myself as the center of the universe again. My wife says I do that.

Anyway, the interesting thing was hearing Tucker ramble about his experiences with the politicos he’s worked for. Some of it was familiar ground — stuff I lived through as well, but experiencing it from a different vantage point — but other parts told me something new. In case you don’t know Tucker, here’s the promo the IABC put out before the event:

High-stakes strategist and high-visibility spokesman Tucker Eskew will share some stories and lessons from his time in the South Carolina State House, the White House, No. 10 Downing Street and his consulting firm, Vianovo. Tucker is a spokesman and strategist whose career began with Ronald Reagan, Lee Atwater and Carroll Campbell. It then continued with George W. Bush and Sarah Palin. Drawing on these experiences, Tucker will reflect on the statecraft and stagecraft he’s witnessed and practiced over 25 years as a communicator. Register now for this inside look into the politics of media and communications from a man who’s been there and done that.

Tucker has come a long way since he was that punk kid we had to joust with when I headed the governmental affairs staff (10 reporters, back in the day) at The State and he was Carroll Campbell’s press secretary. He’s been behind the scenes at a number of interesting moments in history, and I enjoyed hearing his stories about:

His biggest mistake ever. This one made me smile, because it had nothing to do with handling Sarah Palin or anything you might expect. It was when we caught him, the governor’s press secretary, parking in a handicapped space in front of the Capitol Newsstand on Sunday mornings to pick up the papers. As he noted, the item ran in the “Earsay” column, a feature I started as a place to put all those interesting tidbits that reporters always avidly told their colleagues when they got back to the newsroom, but seldom got around to writing for the paper.

The BMW announcement. Probably the high point of the Campbell administration. Tucker sort of lost his temper at the time with reporters who reported cautiously on the announcement rather than playing it as being as big as it would eventually be — reporting just the initial employment, for instance, instead of the likely (and the predictions were borne out over time) economic impact over the long run. Of course, the reporters were just being the kind of healthy skeptics they were trained to be, in keeping with the rule, “If your mother says she loves you, check it out.” I mean, you certainly don’t give her any points from promising to love you at some point in the misty future. I got the sense Tucker understands that now. But he also takes satisfaction in knowing that BMW was as big a BFD as he maintained at the time.

Then and now. The hardest part of his job in the days before the BMW announcement was keeping the lid on the deal until it could be completed. He said he learned to say “no comment” 150 ways. When it was all done and he met the head guy from BWM, the German said, “So you’re the man who says nothing so much.” He urged us to remember that “This was an era when newspapers were large, well-staffed and aggressive.” That was indeed a long time ago.

The 2000 South Carolina Presidential Primary. This is the one part of his speech I had a real beef with. At some point — I didn’t write down the exact quote — he said something about being proud of the Bush victory. McCain supporter that I was, I would have found such pride distinctly out of place. Tucker had been on the Bush team so long — Campbell had been instrumental in getting Bush pere elected in 1988 — that he could see it no other way, I suppose.

The Long Count in Florida. At the point at which the campaign should have been done, he was asked to pack his bags to spend two or three days in Palm Beach. A week later, his wife mailed him a full suitcase. This was shortly after they had had a baby, and as he and an expectant world stood on one side of a glass wall looking into a room where the chads were being counted and obsessed over, it struck him how like standing outside the hospital nursery the experience was. And all he could think was, “That was one ugly baby” he was looking at in Palm Beach.

September 11, 2001. He was working in the White House press office. As everyone was still reeling from the impact of the first three planes, Whit Ayres called to ask him if he was all right. Sure I am, he said. Ayres said that on TV it looked like his building (the Eisenhower Office Building) was on fire. That was an optical illusion caused by the angle from which a network camera located downtown was shooting the smoke rising from the Pentagon. At around that time, some staffers asked whether they were supposed to be evacuating the building. No sooner had he said “no” than alarms went off. Everyone had been trained to walk, not run, to the exits in an emergency. So they were particularly alarmed to see and hear Secret Service agents yelling at women — including nice, soft-spoken women from South Carolina — to “Take off your shoes and RUN!” That’s because the agents had heard there was another plane headed toward them. Later in the day, he would advocate for the president to come back to the House and be seen leading. And he would write some of the first words released publicly from the administration, by Karen Hughes.

The great missed opportunity. He spoke of how writers right after 9/11 were hailing “the end of irony and cynicism.” Of course, it was just a pause before intensifying, as the partisan bitterness from both sides later exceeded our worst imaginings.

London during the media blitz. It was decided that in the War on Terror, London was the world media center, particularly for the Arabic press. So Tucker was sent there to represent the administration in liaison with Tony Blair’s staff at No. 10. He said it was “the most corrosive, cynical media environment that I’d ever been exposed to.” And he had thought we were bad back in Columbia. At least we didn’t Photoshop pictures of his boss with blood dripping from his fangs. (Tucker urged us to read Tony Blair’s new book. I certainly will, since I just asked for and got it for my birthday.)

Sarah Palin on SNL — In 2008, he was sent from the McCain campaign to become one of the handlers of someone he had known nothing about — the surprise running mate. A high point of that experience was accompanying her backstage when she went on “Saturday Night Live” — something Tucker had urged her to do. He actually had fun for once. But there was work to do as well. He had a role in nixing some bits of the script, such as a line that rhymed “filth” with “MILF.” And the bit that had McCain being “hot for teacher.”

South Carolina’s national image. “We were a shiny piece of trash on the side of the road for awhile,” he said of our time in the “Daily Show” limelight, but he thinks our image is better now. Nevertheless, he knows that South Carolina business people and others who have to travel outside the state pick up on a distinct impression of South Carolina, and “it’s not a good impression.” Someone had asked him whether we just had too many “characters.” He suggested that “it’s not about the characters, but it is about character.” After all, Thurmond and Hollings managed to be characters without reflecting too badly on our state’s character. That is less the case today.

Back in the day, Tucker used to get on my nerves, mostly because he advocated so tenaciously for his boss, whom at the time I saw as more of a partisan warrior than a guy interested in governing. (This was due in part to the fact that he was building his party, and doing so quite successfully. I kept comparing him unfavorably to Lamar Alexander, whom I had covered in Tennessee. Alexander had worked with Democratic lawmakers as full partners and accomplished a lot as a result. Campbell had more of an in-your-face style, doing such things as holding press conferences to rub it in when a Democratic lawmaker switched parties.) Now, I look back on the Campbell administration as halcyon days, a time when a real governor got things done, a state of affairs we haven’t been so fortunate to experience since.

Time matures our perspective. And it’s certainly matured Tucker. My Democratic friends will no doubt see him as anathema because of the names with which he has been associated. But I see him as that brash kid who has grown into a Man of Respect among people who do communications from that side of the wall — the side I’m now on, by the way.

And why is it so easy for me to see him that way now? Because he harks back to a time when we had a governor more interested in governing than posturing. A couple of times he proudly quoted someone — I missed who — calling Campbell an “exemplar of governing conservatism,” with emphasis on the “governing.” Campbell believed in it.

Tucker is too professional to put it this way, but he was obviously appalled at having to work for someone as insubstantial as Sarah Palin — the exemplar of the sort of Republican politician that dominates the scene today. He was at pains to explain her appeal in positive terms, describing her as an unaffected person who causes crowds to think approvingly, “She doesn’t talk down to me.”

He was asked whether he was the one who said Ms. Palin had “gone rogue.” No. But he marveled at being charged with promoting a candidate who was so startling unprepared to run for such a high office. He spoke of the kinds of experience and knowledge that one took for granted in a candidate at that level, and said, “We had never worked with someone who had never done those things.” As far as seasoning experiences were concerned, “Almost none of that had ever transpired.” But he didn’t call her a rogue. “I didn’t say it, but I observed it and was charged with dealing with it.”

And deal with it he must, because, as he realized after a time on the campaign, “She doesn’t have a lot of people who have been around her a long time.”

It was interesting, in light of these observations, to think back on what he had said a few minutes before, in a different context, about how amazing it is to see Nikki Haley “rise, in relative terms, from nowhere…” He had meant it in a good way. But the comparison to Palin is rather unavoidable.

Asked what he thought of the state’s two U.S. senators, he diplomatically spoke of his respect for both, but emphasized that they are very different. DeMint is about the “principle,” and Graham “stands on principle, but still gets things done” — making him another “exemplar of governing conservatism.” With distinct understatement, he noted that “DeMint has made himself a lot of friends around the country, and probably some opponents within” the Senate — the place where one has to work with people to get anything one believes in done.

A longtime Republican operative in the audience asked whether President Reagan could even get elected in today’s political environment. She — Christy Cox, longtime aide to David Wilkins — seemed to doubt it. Tucker said he would hope Ronald “Morning in America” Reagan could “change the climate.”

But the point was made. The climate would indeed have to be changed for the Great Communicator to be successful today.

So that’s why I can appreciate Tucker better today. Once, I saw him as a sort of partisan guerrilla warrior, part of the problem. Now, he joins me in harking back to a time when those who called themselves conservatives ran for, and served as, governor because they believed in governing. And as I said earlier, that was a long time ago…

Pro-life snub of Sheheen misses huge opportunity

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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.

The counter-Haley insurgency within the GOP goes mainstream (but sotto voce)

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Republicans who are enamored of their gubernatorial nominee can dismiss Cyndi Mosteller (sister of close Sanford ally Chip Campsen) if they like. But they’ll have a bit of trouble shrugging off this missive from their own Speaker of the House:

PLEASE FORWARD THIS EMAIL TO ALL REPUBLICANS YOU KNOW.

Dear Friends,

This Election Year there are a lot of accusations flying around and very few facts backing them up.  Republicans need to make sure all voters are fully informed before they go to the polls this November and that is why we felt it was so important that we get the real facts out.

Recently, special interest groups in our state have tried to accuse State House Republicans of fighting against reforms that we not only support, but that we have actually voted on and passed.  They are even accusing Republican leadership of not supporting the very reforms that we have worked hard to get passed.

The SC House Republican Caucus is a conservative body that has a record of conservative reforms and a clear vision for our state’s future.  Over this series of emails, we will tell you the facts about that solid record and share with you our plans to build on that record.

Transparency

The House Republican Caucus supports more transparency in our state government.  A more open government makes for a more accountable government.  We believe the people should be able to see how their elected officials vote.

FACT:  In January 2009, we adopted a Rule in the House of Representatives that was authored by Representative Nikki Haley that put more of our votes on the record. Click here to see the House Rule.

FACT:  Just this past session, the House of Representatives unanimously passed Rep. Haley’s bill that would make the House Rule requiring more recorded votes a law.  Click here to see the bill we passed.

Even though it passed unanimously and would appear as though it was easy to pass, there were still hurdles we had to overcome to get us there. The House Republican Caucus and I, as the Speaker, worked very hard to get this important rule passed and to get the legislation through the House of Representatives.

Unfortunately, this bill never made it through the SC Senate.  Because of that, the House Republican Caucus has put Transparency at the top of our election agenda and plan to address this issue again in the next legislative session.

As I said at the beginning of this email, there will be a lot of untrue allegations made during this election season, but facts are facts.  The House Republican Caucus, and I as the Speaker, have not only supported more transparency in government, we have backed up the talk with action by passing a House Rule and a House Bill.  This is the kind of leadership you expect from Republicans, and I am proud to be able to tell you about it.

Bobby Harrell

Speaker,

South Carolina House of Representatives


PLEASE FORWARD THIS EMAIL TO ALL REPUBLICANS YOU KNOW.

A friend sent this to me, noting rightly that “you’re certainly not a Republican, but I thought I’d pass it on anyway.” I’m much obliged.

Whoa. Normally, when a Republican leader starts out a mailing, less than a month from a general election, with “This Election Year there are a lot of accusations flying around and very few facts backing them up,” he’s unloading on the Democratic nominee. Not this time, baby. Not the way I read it, anyway — because I’ve only heard one person try to paint the leadership as opposed to transparency.

Sure, in keeping with Reagan’s 11th Commandment, Bobby didn’t come right out and say “Nikki Haley is a liar!” But even your more comprehension-challenged Repubs ought to be able to understand this message. Right? Or are they thicker than I give them credit for being?

Or… is there something I’m missing?

I’d much rather hear talk of DeMint than of Palin

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A friend, obviously seeking to appall me, sent an e-mail saying, “Oh, you’ll enjoy this…” and linking to this blog post, which I quote in part:

And speaking of factions, and again I’m not a reporter, just a consumer of news, it sure seems to me that Jim DeMint is the current leader of the hard-core conservative faction of the Republican Party.  He’s far more consistent with his endorsements than any other conservative leader, and unlike Palin he can claim that he’s actually been doing something effective for the cause.  For the conservative/Tea Party faction, presumably the trick is to be as far to the right as possible without actually sounding crazy to those outside the faction (and thus perhaps drawing vetoes from more pragmatic conservatives, and possibly some GOP-aligned interest groups).  At least as I read the reporting, DeMint seems to be pretty good at keeping to that line, and he certainly must be more reliable both for that crowd and for more pragmatic types than Palin.

To know more, we need more solid reporting.  Hey, reporters!  We know activists hate TARP; is it a make or break issue for them?  What about other important groups within the GOP?  And, while of course Tea Partiers and conservatives generally are fond of the Sage of Wasilla, do leaders of those groups seem more likely to turn to her or to DeMint (or perhaps to another candidate) for leadership?  How much good will did DeMint buy with his endorsements and support in primary season 2010?

And yeah, I groaned, but was not shocked or surprised. After all, a guy makes a naked power play like the one DeMint’s made, and one should expect such talk.

And I’ll say this for him: Better DeMint than Palin.

Don’t get me wrong: I would think it horrible to contemplate either of them becoming POTUS. But at least my intelligence, my sense of propriety, is not nearly as offended by talk of DeMint as of Palin. Or for that matter, the absurd idea of Nikki Haley presuming to become governor of South Carolina when she has done nothing in public or private life to indicate any sort of suitability or qualifications for the job.

The thing is, Jim DeMint is a uomo di rispetto, a man of respect, in the Godfather sense. Sure, he might be doing some things that I

Al Lettieri as Virgil "The Turk" Sollozzo.

consider to be infamnia, and he might be trying to start a war among the Two Families that rule inside the Beltway, but he is a man to be taken seriously, a United States Senator who has demonstrated considerable political leadership skill. I respect him the way Don Corleone respected Sollozzo when he agreed to meet with him even though he wasn’t interested in his proposal, because drugs is a dirty business, as we all know — but I digress.

Contrast that to the utter lack of accomplishment that Sarah Palin embodies — she’s sort of to politics what Paris Hilton is to fame, or Reality TV is as a testament to a highly evolved species — and you can see why, though I don’t want either of them to become Leader of the Free World, I am less offended by loose talk about him than I am about her.

Talk about Sarah Palin as a presidential contender has become so routine that many have probably become inured to it, and now think nothing of it. But it is bizarre in the extreme. Like Alvin Greene — or Christine O’Donnell — being a major party nominee for the Senate.  Or like Nikki Haley.

Does no one but me notice this? Has Reality TV dumbed down American expectations to the point that we think it’s OK for anybody who’s shown up on the Boob Tube enough to presume to be presidential material?

Apparently so.

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

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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…

DeMint is now officially Too Big For His Britches

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Folks, this is really embarrassing. Throughout our history, U.S. senators have not exactly been known for modesty. Fritz Hollings, for instance, was no shrinking violet. Being one of only 100 in the country, with some pretty weighty constitutional responsibility, can go to one’s head. Add in the tradition going back to ancient Rome, and you have a formula for bombast.

But I have never heard or read of any one senator taking upon himself such a megalomaniacal presumption as what Jim DeMint has taken upon himself with this latest move:

U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., in an extraordinary move, has warned the other 99 U.S. senators that for the rest of the legislative session this year, all bills and nominations slated for unanimous passage must go through his office for review…

Normally, senatorial ego is limited by the understanding that there are 99 others just like you, which is the wellspring of senatorial courtesy. The notion that the world does not revolve around YOU is something that we start teaching our children as we’re trying to get them beyond the Terrible Twos. Most of us pick up on it by the time we reach the age of majority, at least to some extent.

But if Jim DeMint had ever been familiar with this concept, he has forgotten it.

Contrast this obnoxious cry of ego, if you will, to the quiet way that Lindsay Graham has worked behind the scenes to have a salutary effect on foreign policy since the election of Barack Obama. Despite the imperative of satisfying his left wing, I keep seeing Obama do things in Afghanistan and elsewhere that show a marked pragmatism, a reassuring wisdom. And apparently, Sen. Graham is one of the main reasons why:

A new book by The Washington Post’s Bob Woodward describes U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham as playing a central role in the formation and execution of President Barack Obama’s war policy in Afghanistan through his close ties to Vice President Joe Biden, Gen. David Petraeus and White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel.

The book by the former Watergate reporter, Obama’s Wars, contains vivid and previously undisclosed portrayals of Graham’s closed-door conversations and confrontations with Obama, Afghan President Hamid Karzai and other key figures.

Petraeus, the former commander of U.S. troops in Iraq who now holds the same post in Afghanistan, describes Graham as “a brilliant and skillful chess player” whom the general admires for his ability to navigate the power channels of Washington.

Talk about your polar opposites — the ball hog vs. the guy who just wants to make sure his team wins. And his team (and this might come as a shock to Jim Demint) is the United States of America, NOT the extreme right wing of the Republican Party, which Sen. DeMint seems to think is his country.

And what is Jim DeMint trying to accomplish in all this, aside from self-aggrandizement? Note this in The Washington Post:

Consider the case of Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina, the new Republican kingpin and enforcer on Capitol Hill. DeMint claims he was misquoted by Bloomberg Businessweek last week as saying that his goal for the next Senate is “complete gridlock.” But you’d never know it from the way he’s behaving during the Senate’s do-nothing, pre-election legislative session. DeMint makes no apologies for saying that there’s no place for bipartisan compromise or consensus or some “watered-down Republican philosophy,” as he put it. For DeMint, this is war. The only acceptable outcome is total victory, and any Republican who dares to disagree will be treated as a traitor during the next election cycle.

And of course, he’s trying to get in a position to accomplish all this by such moves as supporting such candidates as Christine “Witchy Woman” O’Donnell.

I’ve never been more proud of Lindsey Graham, or more embarrassed by Jim DeMint. This moment has been coming, but I never suspected it would go this far.

Nikki vs. Vincent, by the ounce

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As I occasionally have to clarify here, I’m about commentary, not reporting. You want reporting, go someplace else. I haven’t been a reporter in 30 years. You want an opinion writer who’s primarily a reporter, see Cindi Scoppe. She’s one of the best. (Her column today is a good example of that quality; I may post separately about that later.) Sure, I “cover” events from time to time, just so I can get my own first-hand impressions. But mainly what I do is make observations based upon the existing body of available information.

Now Corey Hutchins with The Free Times is a reporter. You’ll recall that he was the only media type to go out and track down Alvin Greene before the primary. Too bad more people didn’t read his report at the time.

Now, he has a facts-and-figures report comparing the legislative records of Nikki Haley and Vincent Sheheen. One way to characterize what he found is in this observation he posted on Facebook:

If one were to print out the list of legislative bills in the past five years primarily sponsored by the two lawmakers running for governor in S.C., Dem Sen. Sheheen’s would weigh 9.5 ounces and GOP Rep. Haley’s would clock in at 2.4 give or take a botched staple.

Of course, that doesn’t tell you much. Maybe Vincent is just wordy. You’ll get more to chew on reading his full report headlined, “Legislative Records: Sheheen More Active, Successful Than Haley,” with the subhed, “Since 2004, Sheheen Has Sponsored 96 Bills, Haley 13.”

An excerpt:

There are several ways to detail the disparity, but the easiest might be to look at the number of bills for which each candidate was listed as a primary sponsor and how far along each piece of legislation made it through the sausage maker.

Sheheen was elected to the state senate in 2004, the same year Haley was elected to the House. (Sheheen served in the House for four years before being elected to the Senate.) The difference in their legislative accomplishments since then is staggering.

According to state House and Senate records, during the 2005-2006 session, Sheheen sponsored 35 bills and was able to get eight of them passed. That same session, her first in office, Haley went zero for one.

The following session Sheheen went six for 30. Haley scored one out of seven.

During the latest legislative session that took place from 2009 to 2010, Gov. Mark Sanford signed two out of the 31 bills that Sheheen primarily sponsored. That year, the governor didn’t put pen to paper on any of the five bills backed by Haley.

Given these numbers, it would be hard to overstate the extent to which Sheheen — a Democrat in a Republican-dominated chamber —was able to navigate the legislative process in a more effective fashion than Haley. But from a philosophical standpoint — Haley being a candidate who wants government to do less — her rhetoric is at least somewhat consistent with her legislative record…

That’s a bit simplistic, a measure of Corey’s reportorial wish to be as fair to her as he can. What her record really underlines is the problem that I keep pointing to. In terms of accomplishing ANYTHING in dealing with the people who write the laws of the state (and in a Legislative State like ours, that thought could almost be framed as “accomplish anything, period”), Nikki Haley’s record indicates that, if anything, she’s been less successful even than Mark Sanford. Which is a very low standard indeed.

And remember, Sanford started out with a honeymoon, with a legislative leadership eager to work at long last with a governor of their own party. Those same leaders already know they don’t like Nikki.

Doug, of course, will turn that around into an attack on the legislative leaders themselves, which is satisfying to him but gets us nowhere. When you and I walk into the booth on Nov. 2, for the overwhelming majority of us, those leaders won’t be on the ballot (and the few of us who do live in their districts will find they don’t have viable opposition). What we get to pick is the governor. That’s how we get to affect the future course of our state.

Yeah, OK, I’ll help spread the truth

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Just got this from the Sheheen campaign under the headline, “Help Vincent Fight Back with the Truth:”

Dear Brad –

This week, the race for governor changed. Vincent Sheheen’s second week of television ads have introduced him to a statewide audience and voters are impressed.  We learned that Nikki Haley, who claims her skills as an accountant qualify her to be governor, had even more problems paying her taxes, this time for her business.  The onslaught of bad news has the Haley campaign on the defensive.

Having already misled the public on her record, her positions and her business acumen, Nikki Haley has now resorted to false attacks on Vincent Sheheen rather than answering tough questions about her positions and her business problems.

In the last week, she falsely accused Vincent of wanting to raise taxes to solve the budget crisis but she is the only candidate who wants higher taxes; Haley wants to raise our grocery tax.

She claimed: “Vince Sheheen will kill our state’s competitiveness” but the Sanford-Haley philosophy of the last eight years has already left our job recruitment efforts in dismal shape and more of the same won’t improve them.

She even blamed Vincent for the fiscal problems of Washington DC and border security in Arizona.  Vincent responded that maybe Nikki Haley was running for governor of the United States that the last thing we needed was another governor focused on national office and not our state.

Then she called him “slippery.”  Her tactics are desperate and an embarrassment.  We need your help to fight back with the truth.  Donate today so South Carolina can elect a governor we can trust.

Thanks,

Trav

Trav Robertson
Campaign Manager
Sheheen for Governor

OK, all that is true.

But here’s some more truth: Nikki’s not on the ropes. She’s not on the defensive, even thought she should be, since every supposed strength she’s touted (transparency, business acumen) has turned out to be a weakness. She’s on a roll.

Today, I heard two different accounts of the appearance of the two candidates before the Palmetto Business Forum yesterday. Both said Vincent was fine and said the right things, but was low key and seemed to lack the fire in the belly.

Nikki, they said, was ON. She was in the zone. She had obviously been superbly prepared by her handlers, and recited everything perfectly. My witnesses knew, as I know, that Nikki’s understanding of issues is at best skin deep, generally not going beyond a bumper-sticker message. But she delivers the bumper sticker well.

This is a continuation of what I saw at the Sarah Palin event a couple of months back. I saw something that is unmistakable to me after my decades of observing politics and politicians closely: A candidate who was peaking, who was confident, poised, energetic and on message. She was ladling out stuff that that Tea Party crowd was lapping up, and she’s still doing it. Knowing that the business community doesn’t trust her, she has worked hard at learning key things to say to win them over. And that, according to my witnesses, was what was on display last night.

It is extremely important to South Carolina that Vincent Sheheen win this election. He is THE reform candidate, and the governor our state needs. But unless something happens to change the game, he’s not going to. Win, that is. And the business community, and the rest of us, are going to suffer another four years of a governor who fundamentally does not understand or appreciate economic development, and can’t work with key players to help move our state forward.

And we can’t afford that. But right now, that’s where we’re headed.

It’s not Clapton, but Sheheen’s “Crossroads” is a good start on the fall campaign

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Above is the TV ad just released by the Sheheen campaign, entitled “Crossroads.”

I like it. It hits the right notes for going after the people who decide elections — us independents, and the Republicans who are smart enough not to want another four years of Sanford. And there are a lot of such Republicans, no matter what some Democrats might think. It’s good to see that Vincent is starting out trying (honestly and candidly, without a single note of artifice) to appeal to them, as well as to the sensible folk in the middle.

This is a good start on the fall campaign. But we need to see a lot more good stuff if he’s to avoid another defeat for South Carolina.

Oh, and just for fun, here’s the Cream electrified version of the Robert Johnson classic below:

Haley wants to drop one thing Sanford did right

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I’m with Mark Sanford on this one:

Last week, Republican gubernatorial candidate Nikki Haley said she would do away with detailed executive budgets, which were typically ignored due to the acrimony between Sanford and lawmakers. Instead, Haley said, she would set a small list of priorities and work with lawmakers during the process.
In a message sent to Sanford’s campaign e-mail list, the outgoing governor argued his successor should also draft a detailed budget.

“These Executive Budgets have been vital in creating a budget blue print that showed how we could fund core services of government without raising taxes,” Sanford wrote, encouraging recipients to read a Post and Courier editorial on the subject. “They were important in showing the savings that might come from restructuring and consolidating government.”

Sanford does not mention Haley, a political ally who shares many of Sanford’s positions, by name in the e-mail.

Even with our weak-governor system, the governor is the one elected official with the closest thing to a governmentwide perspective — and has the broadest responsibility to voters. He (or she) should at the very least propose a budget setting priorities for spending, which lawmakers are then free to ignore the way they have since Carroll Campbell started the practice a couple of decades back. Campbell was right to go ahead and ACT like a governor, at least in advocacy terms, by submitting a budget, rather than waiting around to actually be put in charge of the executive branch.

Nikki Haley is on the right track looking for ways to antagonize lawmakers less. (Although it’s a bit late for that. Unlike Sanford, who started with a honeymoon, she’s already alienated legislative leaders to such an extent that if elected she would start out in a hole with them, and she knows it, and knows we know it, which is why she’s talking about this.) But this is the wrong item to start with. An executive budget, theoretical as it is, is a useful tool.

And while Mark Sanford went out of his way to alienate lawmakers so that they would ignore his budget proposals, along with the rest of his agenda, he put a lot of work into his budgets. And while they had their flaws, they were worth considering.

So would be Nikki Haley’s, were she elected. And so would Vincent Sheheen’s, which is why I hope he would continue to submit them. We need governors to actually take an interest in governing.

It’s great that Nikki wants to signal that she’d be different from Sanford. But this is the wrong way to start.

Candidate seeks Anton Gunn nomination

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I don’t know who else might have also filed for this, and I don’t know what to think of this person, but since the release just came in, I thought I’d share it with you:

MIA BUTLER FILES FOR HOUSE DISTRICT 79
Local businesswoman seeks to fill seat vacated by Rep. Anton Gunn
COLUMBIA, SC – Mia Butler, a business owner and entrepreneur with two decades of public and private sector experience in South Carolina announced late today that she has officially filed to become a candidate for the District 79 vacancy left open by Democratic Representative Anton Gunn.

Butler said she wants to use her business experience to bring a strong voice for job-creation and economic development to the State House. She also vowed to continue the example set by Representative Gunn to bring rational and effective leadership, focused on bringing both sides together to help address South Carolina’s challenges. “As a strong business woman with government experience, I know what it takes to streamline a budget and resolve issues that individuals and small business owners are facing. I have demonstrated it in my business for 8 years. You can’t have success in business without working with people to address their problems, effectively and efficiently. We need a strong leader who is focused on getting things done,” said Butler.

“I have lived in this district for the last 13 years. I’m raising my family here and I’m seeing the changes that are happening in our community. We need a leader who understands those changes and can make an immediate impact at the State House. I have the experience and the commitment to stand up for what’s right for our district and our state. I want to be an independent voice for our district,” stated Butler.

As the Principal of the corporate communications firm, McLeod Butler Communications, Butler has been a tireless advocate for small businesses, public education, crime victims, public safety and higher education institutions over the last decade. Butler’s professional experience includes launching and directing a statewide program for former South Carolina Attorney General Charlie Condon, receiving a gubernatorial appointment to direct one of the largest programs within the South Carolina Governor’s Office of Executive Policies & Programs under former Governor Jim Hodges and serving on the Board of Directors of the South Carolina Chamber of Commerce, where she is an active member of the Chamber’s Small Business and Communications committees, as well as its Excellence in Education Council.

Business and political leaders praised Butler’s candidacy for the State House.  Former Governor Jim Hodges said, “Mia Butler was a key member of the leadership team in my administration.  She’s intelligent, hard working and has great ideas about job creation and educational improvement.  I strongly support her candidacy for the Democratic nomination in House District 79.”

“From improving education, to passing comprehensive tax reform and creating jobs, we face many challenges in South Carolina.” Butler said. “We can meet those challenges, but it will require a leader who can hit the ground running and advocate on behalf of small businesses to spur economic growth opportunities. I know I can bring that to the State House.”

“I believe that Mia Butler will be a great Representative for Kershaw and Richland counties. She has demonstrated her leadership skills in business and she has a clear vision for improving our state,” said Steve Benjamin, Mayor of Columbia. “Mia believes in the South Carolina values of faith, hard work, community involvement, and independence.”
Mia Butler is married to Tracy Garrick. They, along with sons, Brian “BJ” and Cameron Butler reside in Lake Carolina.

So if Hodges is supporting her, does that mean she’s anointed? I don’t know. Not necessarily. More as I do know…

Remember, the Democrat who replaces Rep. Gunn faces Sheri Few in November.

THAT’s what she means by transparency (or is it?)

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On a day when the state’s largest newspaper leads with a second-day story about Vincent Sheheen answering questions that he shouldn’t be asked, about GOP inside-the-Beltway shouting points (the headline, “Sheheen takes on the issues,” was baldly out of sync with the story, since those are NOT “the issues”), it was shockingly refreshing to see another medium report on the gubernatorial candidates talking about an ACTUAL gubernatorial issue — South Carolina’s economy.

Here’s an excerpt from the end of the Columbia Regional Business Report story:

[Nikki Haley] said South Carolina could build upon being a right-to-work state by being a “no corporate income tax” state.

[Vincent] Sheheen said South Carolina has one of the lowest corporate income tax rates in the nation.

“That proposal specifically will help very few businesses in South Carolina because the vast majority of businesses in South Carolina pay no corporate income tax,” he said. “If we are going to keep doing the same things we’ve been doing over the past eight years, we all as citizens of South Carolina better get used to very high unemployment rates.”

Sheheen spoke of a government that doesn’t divide, but unites. South Carolina needs to increase funding to its higher education system, invest in alternative energy initiatives and expand the port system, he said.

“If we are going to brag about our port, we have to be committed to improving our port,” Sheheen said. He supports a designated earmark in the federal budget for dredging at the ports. “That’s how we dredge ports in this country. I’m willing to go to bat for this state to get our port expanded.”

Haley spoke of reforming the property tax system, supporting school choice and enacting term limits for legislators. She also vowed to make government more transparent.

“You’ve got attorneys that turn around and serve on these committees that affect workers’ comp, work the system all the way, but when they get to the floor, they recuse themselves,” Haley said. “It’s not that they recuse themselves on the floor; they shouldn’t be able to serve on those committees. That’s a direct conflict of interest.”

Reading that, the scales fell from my eyes. I now understand — I think. I had been confused that Ms. Transparency was so reluctant to BE transparent when given the chance. But she never meant her. When she says, “Transparency,” she means, “Legislators who are lawyers should be transparent. In fact, they should shut up and not participate, because being a lawyer is a conflict, in ways that being paid $40,000 for nothing but one’s influence is not.”

At least, that’s what I gather from that passage. In Nikki’s defense, it’s highly likely that if I heard that quote in context I’d get a different impression. I’m sure Nikki has a more nuanced explanation of exactly what she means when she touts transparency. And I remain eager to hear it. Perhaps I will, and perhaps I’ll learn more about the candidates’ stances on economic development and education and the state budget and law and order and environmental protection and other relevant issues — if we can stop talking about abortion and immigration and … what was the other one? Oh, yeah , the federal health care bill that was a big national issue last year. (All of which is a long way of saying, “Talking about our feelings about Obama.”)

Maybe.

What Vincent Sheheen’s been up to lately

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Up until a couple of weeks back when he finally came out swinging on Nikki Haley’s painfully obvious hypocrisy on transparency (not to mention her inability and/or refusal to pay her taxes on time — and this from the candidate who wants to run the state the way she runs her business), I was getting worried because I wasn’t hearing anything from Vincent Sheheen.

Yeah, I knew he was busy with a reorganization, and rebuilding from a primary to a general campaign, and quite likely fund-raising (something he needs to do a LOT of, considering all the free national media Nikki gets). But still, the precious days were passing, and given how critically important it is that our state not be subjected to another four years like the past eight, and how hard a Democrat would have to work to change the electoral math, I was worried.

I feel better now that I’m seeing a lot more life out of his campaign, although I’m still not feeling as good about it as I’d like. He really, really needs to be doing something extraordinary to overcome the inertia that causes the SC electorate to remain in a state of stagnation.

Anyway, in light of all that, I was glad to get this form e-mail today from his campaign manager:

We wanted to bring you an update of all the wonderful things that your campaign has been doing the past couple weeks in our mission to transform South Carolina!

Almost every day, Vincent has hit the road taking his message of hard work and hope to our citizens.  From the Upstate to the Lowcountry, Vincent has been meeting with businesspeople, educators, the young, the old and just plain folks talking about his vision for South Carolina.

During the last two weeks, Vincent visited healthcare professionals from all over South Carolina to share his plans to grow opportunities for our workers in health care.  Nurses, medical technicians and physicians represent growing opportunities for our workforce.With our medical universities, technical colleges, dental school and growing population, South Carolina has the potential to grow its health care economy exponentially. Our state should be a destination for Americans looking for the best medical care.

Recently, Vincent visited the SC State Ports Authority in Charleston. Vincent has called on political leaders from both parties to join forces to ensure funding to deepen the Charleston Harbor to remain competitive with North Carolina and Georgia. As governor, Vincent will focus on increasing our ports’ volume to attract business and jobs to our state.

Vincent has also met with local builders and green energy advocates to discuss the continued opportunities our state has to jump start the housing market and grow new industries in the state. We can create jobs in South Carolina while reducing our energy costs and improving our vitally-important conservation efforts.

The message we hear loud and clear from all parts of South Carolina is the same – South Carolinians are ready once again for a leader we can be proud of! A governor who will be focused on job creation for all of South Carolina. We can do it!

Thanks for your continued support,

Trav

Trav Robertson
Sheheen for Governor

Of course, what an update like that implies is that the campaign itself is realizing that people have been wondering what Vincent’s been up to. And if they are realizing that, good — as long as they keep working harder to do something positive about it.

Democrats start clock ticking on Haley

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Today I got this from the S.C. Democratic Party:

Dems Challenge Nikki Haley:  Where Are Your Emails?
Sanford disciple says she’s “compiling” taxpayer-funded email for release; what’s she hiding?

COLUMBIA- It’s been three days since The State reported that Nikki Haley, Mark Sanford’s favorite to succeed him asGovernor, was “compiling” her taxpayer-funded email for public release, but she’s not moving fast enough for South Carolina Democrats.  This morning the SCDP re-launched HaleyinHiding.com, a website devoted to holding Mrs. Haley to her own promises of transparency.

“Mrs. Haley has been refusing to release her taxpayer-funded emails for months now, so naturally I’m happy to see her even giving lip service to a position that was the heart of her primary campaign,” said SCDP Chair Carol Fowler.  “Unfortunately, she’s tipping her hand by stalling and delaying.  Just as with her tax returns, it’s clear that there’s something in those emails that Mrs. Haley doesn’t want us to see.”

Sigh… I guess that’s the party’s role to play in this.

Nikki, end this silliness! Release the blasted e-mails already…

Is that the best Haley can do? Bring up Obama? Wow, that is truly lame…

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There wasn’t much new in The State‘s recap Sunday of how Vincent Sheheen is pretty much thrashing Nikki Haley on her signature issues (transparency and business savvy) — nothing much you couldn’t have read here the middle of last week.

But I was struck by the unbelievably lame response recorded from the Haley campaign:

For its part, Haley’s campaign has argued Sheheen, a state senator from Camden, is ducking questions about whether the Democrat supports recently approved national health insurance law and the Obama administration’s lawsuit challenging Arizona’s immigration law, two issues Sheheen could have to deal with if elected governor.

Really? That’s the best you can do? He’s totally crushing you on transparency, and making a mockery of your desire to run government the way you run your business, and that’s your response? You retreat to the current GOP playbook? That book only has one play these days, you know. It goes something like this:

When cornered, talk about Obama. Don’t worry that it has nothing to do with the office you’re running for. Just cry, “Obama! Obama! Obama! We hate Obama! Do you hate Obama? If you don’t, you’re not one of us, because we really, really hate him…” Yadda-yadda. Just keep going; don’t worry about repeating yourself or not making the slightest bit of logical sense, because your base will eat this up…

As for the last phrase in that excerpt from The State — “two issues Sheheen could have to deal with if elected governor” — it’s hard to imagine a more transparent case of news people bending over backwards to act like a source is saying something rational when he or she is not. Yeah, you stretch a point and sure, health care reform affects every state (just as it does business and many other aspects of life) and a governor will govern in an environment in which a lot of people insist that immigration is a huge state issue. But you could say that about almost any hot-button national issue, from Afghanistan to the BP oil spill — it still wouldn’t be central. Everyone, but everyone, knows that the Haley campaign putting out that response has absolutely ZERO to do with what faces the next governor, and everything to do with the fact that if it isn’t in the Sarah Palin songbook, they can’t sing it.

Anyway, we are left waiting for a substantive response actually bearing on the two things that are allegedly Nikki’s strong suits, and why we should believe anything she says about them. And Vincent didn’t pick these issues — Nikki did.

Way to go, Vincent. Can you catch up now, Nikki?

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I’m glad to see Vincent Sheheen took my advice. OK, so maybe he didn’t do it because I advised it; likely he figured it out for himself.

In any case, I was glad to see this release come in on my Blackberry today:

VINCENT SHEHEEN RELEASES SENATE EMAILS

“Sheheen calls on Haley for transparency and full disclosure.”

Camden, SC—-Today Vincent Sheheen, candidate for governor, released his legislative emails for the public to review. He released information from both the L Drive and the G Drive for his Senate office.
 
In releasing his emails, Vincent stated, “ In order to restore trust, honesty and integrity to our state, we as candidates must be transparent in our actions. Today, I have released my legislative emails and I challenge Representative Haley to do the same. Candidates must practice what we preach. It is about a true and open government.”

This keeps Vincent way out ahead of Nikki on the transparency front — you know, the issue that she chose to run on…

She’s probably starting to regret making a big deal of this issue. Today, her campaign released some tax records, although not for the full 10 years that Sheheen has released. And even though she picked the years she released, she has revealed a record of late filings and having to pay fines. From the AP story:

COLUMBIA, S.C. — South Carolina Republican gubernatorial nominee Nikki Haley has repeatedly paid late fees and penalties for not paying her income taxes on time.      Tax records released Wednesday by Haley’s campaign show she and her husband filed more than a year late on two occasions. They have not filed by the usual April 15 deadline since they began owing money five years ago.

No wonder she’s such an anti-tax zealot. She has so much trouble paying them.

The state Democratic Party is of course loving this; they’ve put out a release to chortle:

“Nikki Haley not only refused to release 10 years of tax returns to match Vincent Sheheen’s record of transparency, her attempt to save face has backfired,” said Fowler.  “At no point in the past five years has Ms. Haley paid her taxes on time, but she’s running for office citing her experience as an accountant and claiming to be a fiscal conservative.  If this is how she manages her own books, imagine what she has in store for South Carolina.  This reeks of the worst kind of hypocrisy.”

So now we’re all left waiting to see the rest of those tax records — and the e-mails, of course. There are shoes left to drop in this saga…

Mike Fitts’ piece on Sheheen and the Chamber

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The lead story in the latest print version of Columbia Regional Business Report was about the S.C. Chamber of Commerce’s historic decision to endorse a candidate in the governor’s race — specifically, Vincent Sheheen. I can’t link you to the full piece because for some reason it’s not online. But Mike Fitts shot me a copy of his piece to save me all that nasty typing as I give you this excerpt:

Chamber weighs in on governor’s race

Executive summary: Frustration with Gov. Mark Sanford has helped prod the S.C. Chamber of Commerce to give its first gubernatorial endorsement, to Vincent Sheheen.

By Mike Fitts
[email protected]

There was one overriding factor that prompted the S.C. Chamber of Commerce to make an endorsement for the governor’s race for the first time: the gridlock around the current occupant.

A large majority of the members of the chamber’s board, which is made up of more than 50 business executives from across the state, thought that it was time for the chamber to do its first endorsement in a statewide race. The view that Gov. Mark Sanford had failed to get things done for eight years was a major driver in that decision, said chamber CEO Otis Rawl. The business community “didn’t make much headway” with the governor’s office during his term, he said.

“Our board didn’t want that to happen again,” Rawl said…

Here are some things that interested me about the piece:

  • The fact that it was for the first time. That hadn’t fully registered on me. It seems to me a reflection of business leaders’ realization that sitting on the sidelines has led to stagnation in South Carolina’s political leadership. Rather than let another do-nothing governor get elected on the base of ideological slogans, they wanted to act to get some real leadership.
  • Although I’d read it before, I was struck again by the vapid immaturity of the Haley campaign’s response: Haley spokesman Rob Godfrey had said to the AP: “The state chamber is a big fan of bailouts and corporate welfare, so it’s no surprise that they would prefer a liberal like Vincent Sheheen over a conservative like Nikki Haley.” I wonder if Nikki opened her secret meetings with business people with those words. If she truly believed in transparency, if she really wanted to let those people know what her campaign stood for, she would have. A response like this confirms that the Chamber chose wisely.
  • A factor in the Chamber’s decision was that Sheheen, rather than resorting to ideological slogans, had more specifics about what he’d do to build our state’s economy: “Sheheen offered better answers on keeping the state’s ports successful, building up the state’s infrastructure and improving the state’s workforce, which is vital to keeping such employers and Boeing and BMW happy, Rawl said.”
  • Sheheen also made the case — and this should truly be the measure of this campaign — that unlike Haley, who has built her brief career on fighting against the Legislature, he could actually get his plans acted upon: “It’s OK to rail against the good ol’ boy system, Rawl said, but a governor has to be able to get legislation thru the General Assembly.”
  • Then there’s the execrable Act 388, which distorted our whole tax system — putting an excessive burden on businesses and renters, and shifting the load for supporting public schools onto the volatile, exemption-ridden sales tax — for the sake of the subset of homeowners who lived in high-growth areas. Vincent did what he could to stop it; Nikki voted for it.
  • The vote of confidence by the Chamber’s board was huge and dramatic. They didn’t even wait for the GOP runoff to be over before 75 percent of them voted to support Sheheen in the fall. As for the broader membership, there has been “scattered pushback” from some individual members, but nothing to make the Chamber leadership (which has not been given to taking such risks) sweat. Which is truly remarkable with such a broad, conservative membership as the Chamber’s.

Finally, the thing that got the Chamber to take this unprecedented step was the fact that this election is so pivotal, a fact that I started writing about before I left the paper (which is normally LONG before I would focus on something like this). South Carolina simply cannot continue to drift while our elected leaders play ideological footsie (when you go to that link, scroll down to “Sanford on Fox 46 times”) with national media. We have to get serious. That’s a conclusion that the Chamber has reached as well.

“Graham’s courageous stand for the republic”

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After I got done stewing about having screwed up on the Biden thing, I remembered that I owed Cindi Scoppe a phone call. Speaking to her reminded me that I meant to call your attention to The State‘s editorial yesterday, “Graham’s courageous stand for the republic.”

It was really, really good. So good that after I read it at breakfast yesterday, I e-mailed Cindi to say:

Excellent lede today. Did you write that, or did I?
It needs to be said loudly and often.

OK, so maybe that wouldn’t be a compliment to you, but I think Cindi saw it as such. You know, knowing my ego as she does.

But it really did say pretty much everything I would have said — of course, one of the great things about working with Cindi over the years was that she could do that. There was a time when I felt like I had to write any important edit about state government or politics to get the message just right, and the right tone and feel into it (to please me, anyway). But I realized shortly after I brought Cindi up from the newsroom that if I just spent a few minutes explaining to her what I wanted, in a few minutes she’d turn it around into an edit that was everything I had wanted, and just as good as if I’d written it — and several hours faster.

The great thing about this was that I didn’t have occasion to tell her what I wanted (you may have heard, I don’t word there any more), and yet I got it anyway. But more important than it being what I wanted, it’s what South Carolina needed to hear about Graham’s decision to vote for Elena Kagan’s nomination, and his cogent explanation of his reasoning.

An excerpt:

THROUGHOUT the first two centuries or so of our nation’s history, what Sen. Lindsay Graham did on Wednesday when he voted to confirm President Obama’s appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court would have been thoroughly unremarkable. What would have been remarkable would have been for a senator to do otherwise — to vote against confirming a nominee who did not have serious ethical, legal, mental or intellectual problems.

But as Sen. Graham told the Judiciary Committee, things are changing…. What matters today are individual agendas, and punishing anyone who doesn’t agree with their every opinion.

That’s a threat not just to the independence of the judiciary but to the republic itself…

As when he voted to confirm Mr. Obama’s first Supreme Court appointment a year ago, Sen. Graham said Wednesday that Ms. Kagan was not someone he would have appointed, but Mr. Obama won the election; the job of the Senate is merely to stop a president from appointing people who are objectively unfit to be judges.

Will Ms. Kagan join the liberal wing of the court? Probably. Just as President Bush’s appointments joined the conservative wing. We wish there weren’t such clearly defined wings…. But that’s a political preference we have; not a constitutional standard appropriate for senators to consider. As far as confirmation goes, there’s nothing wrong with Ms. Kagan. Just as there was nothing wrong with Sonia Sotomayor. Or with John Roberts. Or with Samuel Alito. And any senator who votes or voted against any of them was simply wrong.

But go read the whole thing. And share it with every South Carolinian you know.