Category Archives: Midlands

And to keep our honor clean

The allegation that a bunch of gangbangers that included four U.S. Marines were planning a rumble at an Irmo High School football game — not knowing that there was no game scheduled — is sufficiently bizarre to spawn bad jokes:

Asked why they thought they would find a game if they invaded Irmo, the Marines said, "President Bush promised us it was based on solid intel."

Hey, I told you it was a bad joke. Chalk it up to my trying too hard to throw a bone to you anti-war types out there.

Here’s another excuse: Though I gave it a shot, there’s just nothing funny about this situation. It’s appalling to think that a corporal and two lance corporals could have made it through boot camp and advanced training, be assigned to a unit, get promoted and still have enough loyalty left to something as worthless as the Crips to soil the honor of the Corps in such a manner.

Allegedly. For the moment, they are innocent. I hope they turn out actually to be so in the end. I know that not everybody who goes through Parris Island is a choir boy, but boots usually learn enough pride and discipline not to be thrown into the brig for something this stupid.

Did they just want to fight that badly? Were they disappointed at being wing wipers instead of serving in a rifle company? I just hope it was the cops who got the bad intel on this one.

Mayor Bob on smoking bans

Columbia Mayor Bob Coble had sent me four e-mails (all of which I just read, since I just got back from vacation) responding to our lead editorial of July 30, which essentially said we’d love to see smoking eliminated from local bars and restaurants, but we didn’t think state law would allow a municipality to take such action.

FYI I am attaching the Attorney General’s Opinion
that holds that the State
has preempted cities from banning smoking in public buildings. The opinion
says that because the State Clean Indoor Act is statewide, it preempts
local governments from a smoking ban by "implication." I think the legal
issue is unclear enough that it should be decided by the Court in
a declaratory judgment action. The Clean Indoor Air Act does not
address smoking bans by cities but regulates where smoking is prohibited. If
the  State Legislature had specifically addressed smoking in restaurants
I would feel differently. Thanks

So the mayor is apparently forging ahead. Here’s a followup message:

FYI The Smoke Free
Columbia folks have sent me two ordinances. The first is a model ordinance (with
Columbia filled in) and the second is the ordinance that Sullivan’s Island
adopted (or is in the process). They are very similar. Thanks,
Bob

Well, I wish him luck, but it’s still our position that the Legislature intended to prevent localities from taking this common-sense step. Either way, state law needs to be changed. On this and other matters that naturally fit within the realm of local ordinance, the state should leave communities alone to decide their own rules, as expressed by the governments closest to the people.

Mayor Bob on smoking

Still catching up on that e-mail. I got this one from Mayor Bob Sunday, regarding my column of that date. I guess Tony Blair showed it to him or something:

To: <[email protected]>
Subject: No Smoking
Date: Sunday, July 16, 2006 11:46 AM

    Brad, I am in the UK on an economic development mission but read your editorial (or column). I believe that Columbia City Council could address the issue of a no smoking ordinance as early as August. I believe the Surgeon Generals report will be critical. While I have not talked with all of City Council I am very pleased with the level of support at this point. I addition to the health issue, I think it is also an economic development issue. People are going to want to invest and live in cities that have no smoking (I believe).
    Thanks
Sent Wirelessly while away from the City of Columbia with my International Blackberry.

Smoking column

Good news: We get to smoke for free.
Bad news: We have no choice

By Brad Warthen
Editorial Page Editor

WHY IS it called "secondhand smoke"? What’’s "secondhand" about it? When I find myself gagging on it, and look around for the source, it’’s always coming straight from the cigarette. The smoker’’s not using the smoke first before sharing it with me. Most of the time, he’’s not puffing on the thing at all. He’’s just sitting there, letting the tendrils of carcinogenic particulates pollute the room.Smoking

Let’’s give smokers this much credit –— when they do take a pull on their coffin nails, they usually refrain from blowing it right in our faces.

So there’’s nothing secondhand about it. Those of us who "don’’t smoke" are getting the full, genuine, original article, fresh and straight off the rack. Face it, folks –— we’’re smoking. The good news is, we’re not even having to pay for it. The bad news is, we don’’t have any say in the matter.

Now, the term "passive smoke" makes some sense. When you consider that most people are "nonsmokers," but all of them at some time or other have to breathe the stuff anyway, it becomes clear that most who smoke aren’’t doing it on purpose.

Fortunately, the majority has in recent years become a lot less docile. As a result, fewer and fewer of us are forced to work long hours in smoke-saturated factories, stores and offices— the way I was when I first came to work at this newspaper, a fact that cost me thousands in medical bills (even with insurance).

Notice how often I’’m slipping into the first-person here. This makes me uncomfortable, which is why you’’ve probably never read an entire column from me on the subject of smoking, even though it has been for many years my bane. I’’m suspicious of other people who advocate things that would directly benefit them or some group they belong to, so I avoid it myself. When I wrote a column that dealt with my rather extreme food allergies, I spent much of the piece trying to rationalize my self-absorption.

But the subject of public smoking has been brought to the fore, and the time has come to speak out. There’’s a new surgeon general’’s report. The University of South Carolina has moved virtually to ban it. On the state and local levels, there are moves afoot to eliminate smoking from bars and restaurants –— the last broad refuges of the gray haze.

It’’s time to speak up. In fact, I wonder why the majority was so diffident for so long. I guess it was that classic American attitude, "Live and let others fill our air with deadly fumes." An anecdote:

A restaurant in Greenville. Our waiter came up and asked in a whisper whether we’’d mind if a gentleman who smokes were seated next to us. You see, he explained, the petitioner was in a wheelchair, and that was the only table available that would be accessible to him. Granted, this was the nonsmoking section, but if we could accommodate him….

Uh, well, gee. A guy in a wheelchair. Poor fella. It’s not like I can’’t smell the smoke from across the room anyway ("nonsmoking areas" are a joke). I started thinking aloud: "I suppose… I mean… if there is no alternative… I’’m allergic to it and all, but if you have to…."

At this point, the waiter began to back off, and said –— with a tone of deferential reproach that must have taken him years to perfect –— "That’s all right. I’’ll just ask the other gentleman to wait for another table."

Gosh. I felt like a heel. I pictured a hungry, forlorn, Dickensian cripple, waiting for some kind soul to let him have a bit of nourishment. Tiny Tim grown up, being dealt another cruel blow by life. As the waiter started to back away from our table, I was about to relent… when suddenly, a rather obvious point hit me: "Or," I said, "he could just not smoke."

Why did he have to smoke if he sat in the section full of people who had specifically asked not to breathe smoke while dining? Easy answer: He didn’’t. Nor did he need to spit, curse, pick his nose or break wind.

OK, I got off-message. It’s about public health, not offensiveness. As the surgeon general reported, even brief exposure to tobacco smoke "has immediate adverse effects" on the body. (I knew that before, since smoke causes my bronchial tubes to start closing the instant they make contact. I’’m lucky that way. I don’’t have to wait 30 years to get sick.)

Smoke_pipeBut you know what? Even if it were only a matter of being offensive, even if it were nothing more than putting a bad, hazy smell into the air, there would be no excuse for one person imposing it upon even one other person.

We’’re not talking about one person’’s interests being set against another’s. It’s not in anybody’’s interests for anybody to smoke –— unless you make money off that human weakness.

Take that guy in Greenville. He was already in a wheelchair! I’m supposed to waive the rules so that he can make himself sicker, and us with him? What madness.

It’’s not even in the interests of many bars or restaurants –— although, if nonsmoking establishments become the norm, I can foresee a time in which there would be a niche market for smoking dens.

And I’’d prefer for the market to sort that out. I am no libertarian, yet even I hesitate to pass laws to ban smoking in public places. But the market has not addressed the matter to the extent you would expect. Why?

Richland County Councilman Joe McEachern says a restaurateur recently told him, "Joe, I’ve got some great customers who are smoking; I can’t personally put up a sign that says ‘’no smoking.’’" But if there were a law, his business would benefit because the demand for clean-air dining is greater than he can meet now: "I can’’t get enough room for nonsmoking."

OK, so if most people don’’t smoke, and it’’s to everybody’’s benefit to clear the air, why can’’t we work something out?

Maybe this is why: I still feel kind of bad about the guy in the wheelchair. But I shouldn’’t.

Go give blood. NOW!

Iraq_blood
T
he South Carolina region of the American Red Cross is experiencing a severe blood shortage. That means we are all experiencing such a shortage.

Not giving enough blood to keep safe amounts on hand is par for the course around here. If anybody can explain why South Carolinians in the Midlands and Lowcountry (Greenville’s in a separate region) won’t chip in and give on a regular basis, I’d like to hear it. To me, it remains a mystery.

I know why I used to not give — I was scared. But I got over it, because I came to understand how bad the need was. And if I can get over it, you can. I’ve never been as afraid of anything as I was of giving blood. Just typing this paragraph mentioning giving blood would have made me feel faint. I’m still afraid every time I give, but I do it anyway. It’s good to face your fears.

People give in Iraq, and under considerably less comfortable conditions than we have at the local Red Cross (see above, in the Shiite slum of Sadr City in Baghdad). Why do they do that? Because they understand the need. Well, we have a need, too. We should respond to it. You can make an appointment online, or call 1-800-GIVELIFE or, in Columbia, 251-6138.

The Red Cross has extended its hours today, tomorrow and Friday in light of this emergency. Make an appointment and go. Or just go. I’m about to call them myself.

Runoff predictions, other info

Campbell_nun
W
ell, the polls have closed now in South Carolina, and if the weather back home has been anything like the way it’s been where I am, the turnout was probably pretty low today for runoffs.

So here is a recap of some of the info I provided on primary day, plus some new stuff, starting with … my runoff predictions (which you can compare to my predictions from a couple of weeks ago, if you’d like):

  • Treasurer: T-Rav. Duh.
  • Lieutenant governor: Mike Campbell. I don’t expect him to run away with it, though.
  • House District 96: Kit Spires. I don’t think Ken Clark can overcome the deficit from two weeks ago so quickly, not with turnout like this. If I were he I’d run as a write-in for the fall. He’s such a better representative than Mr. Spires could ever hope to be, and that is so obvious to anyone to whom he gets to present his case, that I cannot believe that any electorate would not choose him if he gets his message out well enough.
  • Richland County Council District 1: William Malinowski.
  • Lexington County Council District 7: This one is a tougher call, but I’m going to go with our endorsee John Carrigg over once-and-would-be-again councilman Art Guerry.

I think that’s all the ones we wrote about in the last couple of weeks. Let me know if I left somebody out.

Here are some more links you might find informative or conducive to dialogue as you contemplate returns:

My bad. Sorry, Mr. Holcombe

Well, I screwed up ETV last night — once. I was reading off results from a laptop that Andy Gobeil had put in front of me (in response to my constant off-air griping that I didn’t have up-to-date info to speak from), and I got one thing wrong.

I said William Malinowski was the new councilman from Richland County Council District 1. Actually, while he got the plurality of votes, he and Jim Holcombe will be in a runoff.

Mea culpa.

I’m still trying to get the hang of this TV thing — you have to keep talking to avoid "dead air," but you don’t get to edit yourself.

Besides that, though, how do y’all think I did? Should I keep my day job?

Looks like Joe’s still a little sore

I think Joe Azar is still a little sore at me. The good news — for somebody — is that least one reader out there agrees completely with Katon.

Here’s what Joe sent out to his e-mail list last night:

jsa-Unbelievable! Brad Warthen has really stepped over the line with Republicans andAzar_mug72 Democrats alike. I missed his comment because I don’t read his columns in much depth (as they do not have much depth). But Brad insulted the Democrats more than the Republicans by telling them not to waste their votes in their own primary but to vote in the GOP primary. He called the Dems dead and useless in his Bradley Warthen sort of way. Unbelievable! What arrogance! Management should strongly reconsider who they have writing for them. Here is the link to his article:  http://blogs.thestate.com/bradwarthensblog/2006/06/steakvssizzle_c.html. The comment is third paragraph from the end. Read Katon Dawson’s letter (below) first and it all makes sense. Every Democrat should be incensed, as well as Republicans, and all voters. What kind of person would tell voters they are in a loser party and should abandon it for another? We need at least a two party system but Warthen is all for killing one party. Imagine if most Democrats did as he said? What would become of their party? I am sure Bradley has some lame excuse (does not his majesty always have some convoluted rational?) for his sick suggestion, and it would be appropriate to frame it at the bottom of the cat box, commode, or urinal.

Though he has come after me, and everyone can understand why I would have reason to dislike him, I just cannot believe he is either so pompous, arrogant, unintelligent, or uncaring, to have said what he did. Maybe he is drunk with his own personal power and is trying to manipulate the vote to prove his power. Maybe he is mad at someone in the Dem’s administration, or, more likely, one of the Dem candidates for governor and intends to show them his power to get back at them. Whatever it is, vote your conscience and party of your choice, especially this election. Always do, regardless of the polls or pompous editors like Brad. Never let the media prejudice your vote. And don’t bother writing Brad, nor his blog. It only gives him more power and proves to
management people are reading. Just ignore, don’t read his dribble, and do not blog or write him. (Why  bother anyhow as he is always right.) That will do more good over time to get him transferred down to the stock room or Environmental Engineering!

You know, before this gets out of hand, somebody needs to tell both Joe and Katon that the usual word is "drivel." Although it is related to that other word.

Candidate Web Sites

I have most of the major candidates’ Web addresses in the rail to the left of this post, but here are those and a few more, in a handy-dandy single post:

Governor
Mark Sanford


Oscar Lovelace

Tommy Moore

Frank Willis

Dennis Aughtry

Superintendent of Education
Bob Staton


Karen Floyd


Kerry Wood

Mike Ryan


Elizabeth Moffly

S.C. Treasurer

Greg Ryberg

Thomas Ravenel


Rick Quinn


Jeff Willis

Lieutenant Governor

Mike Campbell


Andre Bauer

Henry Jordan

Agriculture Commissioner


Hugh Weathers

William Bell

Secretary of State

Bill McKown

Mark Hammond

2nd Congressional District

David White

Michael Ray Ellisor

Fragments from interview marathon

Highlights and sidelights
from a week of interviews

By Brad Warthen
Editorial Page Editor
SOME NUGGETS from interviews this past week with candidates in the June 13 primaries:00hart_3

Monday, 8:30 a.m. Surprise: Rep. Joe E. Brown, the retired school administrator who has represented S.C. House District 73 for 20 years, seems to have viable Democratic opposition. Energetic young lawyer Chris Hart calls the incumbent “a true Southern gentleman” who has “become complacent. He’s become ineffective.” Some think that’s why former Speaker David Wilkins found him the one Democrat nonthreatening enough to be a committee chair. Mr. Hart says “every legislator should have to articulate a vision.” Mr. Brown is a quiet man. We’ll see what he has to say in his interview May 22.

00bingham2:30 p.m. Rep. Kenny Bingham, who speaks proudly and often of his service on the Lexington 2 school board, spent a good bit of his interview explaining why he was among the minority who spoke up and voted for the latest attempt to provide subsidies for private schools. He said he didn’t think it would have impact; public schools shouldn’t fear the competition because “they got all the dang money in the world, more than any private school.” He thinks the whole issue is a waste of time, but “when you continue to say ‘no, I’m not going to do it,’” you find you don’t have a “place at the table.”

00mizzell_15:30 p.m. Tony Mizzell, Richland County Council Democrat, belabored a horticultural metaphor in explaining why he wants another term. He’s “planted a lot of seeds” and watered and weeded and so forth, “and things are just starting to grow.” He worked the analogy every which way save one: fertilizer. I wondered at that. Other politicians like to lay on lots of fertilizer.

Tuesday, 1:30 p.m. “This will be a positive 00statoncampaign,” said Columbia businessman Bob Staton, seeking the GOP nomination for S.C. schools superintendent. “I think we’ve beat up public education so much in election cycles” that the electorate is sold on the idea that it’s just bad, and not going to get any better. “If you believe you can do something, you’re going to come a lot closer” to getting it done. “You don’t build up by tearing down.”

2:30 p.m. Oscar Lovelace, quixotic challenger for the GOP nod for governor, is00lovelace more eloquent than the incumbent and knows it: “I just believe strongly that the governor is missing some critical leadership skills” — communication, cooperation and common sense. “Our governor has never been CEO of anything before we made him CEO of South Carolina,” said the family doctor who has built a practice with 38 employees and 15,000 patients. “Our governor has never attended a public school in South Carolina…. I can speak from the bully pulpit. Mark Sanford can’t, because he hasn’t had the real-world experiences.”

00jackson4:30 p.m. Norman Jackson, challenging Mr. Mizzell, was a longtime member of the Richland County planning commission, and has a structural criticism: “I would not want to see more than two members from any one special interest on a commission,” he says. With “two developers, two real estate developers and a lawyer who deals with real estate,” he counts five. “They do a good enough job,” he admits. “I’m just saying….”

00willisWednesday, 10 a.m. “I love the detail,” said Jeff Willis, who describes himself as the only one of four Republicans seeking to be state treasurer with financial experience. “We need a more active, engaged treasurer,” he says, but he thinks the treasurer should continue to be an elective post, and he would keep the unconstitutional Budget and Control Board as is. “If I can do one-tenth what Grady Patterson has done, it would be an honor and a privilege.”
00quinn
12:30 p.m. Rick Quinn, the former House majority leader seeking the same nomination, disagrees. He would ditch the Budget and Control Board and implement a “paradigm change” in the treasurer’s role. “We’ve had Grady so long that people don’t expect the treasurer to weigh in” on critical fiscal issues, such as tax reform. He would.

2 p.m. Two hours with Gov. Mark Sanford covered more than I 00sanfordcan summarize here. The most interesting thing was his emerging advocacy of state funding for education (see editorial above). That came at the very end of the interview, and an aide dragged him away before he could get much into it. More on that later.

5 p.m.
Mike Ryan is the only Republican who works in public00ryan education seeking to be education superintendent. After 20 years in the Army (82nd Airborne), he retired as a major. He’s the assistant principal of Wando High School and, unlike many in public education and some in this race, believes in the Education Accountability Act. His is a “no-excuse mentality. Here’s the mission, and how do we get it done?” He corrects those who say we’re just “teaching to the test” with PACT. “We’re teaching to standards, which are on the test.” And in part thanks to those standards, “I honestly believe we’re ready to turn the corner.”

00bushThursday, 11:30 a.m. Retiree Keith Bush wants to be the Republican to take on Billy Derrick, Lexington County Council’s sole Democrat. Mr. Bush says he’s “a great supporter of user fees,” and he isn’t kidding. No checking out books for free at the public library if he had his way. And that’s just the start. “How are colleges funded? Tuition. How are private schools funded? Tuition. How are public schools funded? Taxes.” That makes no sense to him.

00carrigg12:30 p.m. Some interviews range beyond local issues. “For years I’ve driven a Suburban,” said Lexington County Councilman John Carrigg. “The other day I went out and bought a little Saturn Vue.” He gets about twice the 14 miles per gallon that was the best he could do before. “We citizens have a responsibility to stop driving those trucks around.”

Governor makes right call

All hail Governor Sanford for doing the right thing for the right reasons, even though it’s likely to cost him in GOP-vote-rich Lexington County (my home, I always add). His veto message on the subject isn’t posted yet, but when it is, I’ll change this to link to it.

This was a bit of a nail-biter, as the governor could have interpreted "the right thing" two ways. Given his extreme libertarianism (you can tell an extreme libertarian by the fact that they even believe the market works with regard to health care), he doesn’t really believe in the state Certificate of Need process. But as long as it’s the law, he will not allow narrow interests to overturn it.

Now, to the override attempt. I was talking with Rep. James Smith this morning, and he says he expects a vote tomorrow. He’d rather have it today, but he said Speaker Bobby Harrell wants to give it a day.

"There should be no reason that this should not be sustained," he said. After all, the wrong side never had a 2/3 vote in their favor.

But he’s worried because some lawmakers who voted the right way the first time are — scuttlebutt has it — trying to hold up the state Hospital Association (which opposed Lexington Medical’s attempt to subvert the process through legislative fiat) for a little something in return for continuing to vote their "principles."

There will be a lot of phone-calling and button-holing today.

Galivants Ferry I

06stump_016Mayor Bob needs to have a lo-o-ong talk with Mayor Frank.

Honestly, I don’t get the trolley thing. What it has to do with running for governor, I don’t know. But I know it didn’t work that great in Columbia, and I doubt it would work any better in Florence.

Anyway, I was struck by the fact that Mr. Willis had invested so much in signage. Unusual signage. Even innovative signage — although I have to say that the first thing I thought of when I saw this display was, "Jim Hodges. School bus. Breakfast-table issues." … and other stuff Mr. Hodges did when he was minority leader in the House, and later as gubernatorial candidate and then governor.

So it was kinda different, and kinda the same. And for a Democrat, the overall message thus conveyed was — forgive me — rather pedestrian.

Or perhaps I should say, "hackneyed."

Or perhaps I should go on to the next item.

Markets and health care

Well, regulars knew that at least one person would have something to say about my last post. It was Lee, of course. Lee comments on everything, usually multiple times. This would make for a lively forum if not for the fact that all of us know what Lee is going to say before he says it. He’s going to give you the standard radical libertarian line, regardless of the subject.

You see, the Lexington Medical Center folks are counting on reactions such as Lee‘s. That’s what they were counting on from the Legislature — ""Aw, gee, who are we to say no to somebody who wants to set up an open-heart center?"

Libertarians think the market works the same way with health care as with selling soda pop.
There are a lot of folks in America who think like Lee. That’s why we pay more in this country for health care than folks in other developed countries do, and we get worse health outcomes.

The fact that a surgical team has to do hundreds of such procedures to be good at it is meaningless to Lee. He’d rather see every hospital in the state take on open-heart if they want to (and since it is a big money-maker, they’ll want to), so that NOBODY can get a bypass from a facility that knows what it’s doing, and we’ll all have to pay for all that duplicative investment.

He actually thinks that the average person is a hard-nosed, discriminating consumer of health care. He thinks that if the average person is told by his physician that a bypass might keep him alive, he’s going to ask how much it costs, and then comparison-shop.

Har-de-har.

Folks, do you realize that one of the arguments LMC has been making in favor of opening this cash cow is that patients are NOT informed? It’s actually one of their better points.

In discussion with some docs who support the proposal, I’ve pointed out that I live almost right behind LMC, and have to pass it to go to any other hospital. So if I cut myself and need some stitches, I go to LMC. Or if I need major abdominal surgery, as I did in 1993, I go to LMC. But if I think I’m having a heart attack, I’m going to Providence (and would even when LMC gets its way on the heart center). And if I have cancer, I’m going to consult the folks who practice at Richland.

I said those things to a Lexington doc just a few days ago, and his response was, "Well, yeah, that’s because you’re an informed patient." His point was that most people aren’t. They’ll just stop at the first emergency room they get to. Good point — except that if you follow that logic to its natural conclusion, every hospital with an ER should be allowed to do open-heart, whether they ever get the chance to get good at it or not.

So much for the invisible hand.

Did I tell ya, or did I tell ya?

Over the last month or two, I’ve broken the rules I’ve made against answering e-mails at length to respond to a Lexington County physician who has been extremely upset about our stance against Lexington Medical Center getting permission to start an open-heart-surgery facility.

What got to him the most was the fact that we got exponentially more down on it when the Lexington advocates — not satisfied to let their appeal of DHEC’s decision run its course — got their delegation to push to change the law under which they had been refused, so as to specifically allow LMC to have its way. He couldn’t see what a rank maneuver this was, or how many principles of sound government (and sound health regulation) this violated.

Anyway, the first thing I thought of when I read our lead story this morning was, "Well, somebody‘s going to be happy today."

As soon as I got to the office, I sent him this e-mail:

Dr. Black:

Didn’t I try to tell you that you had nothing to worry, much less get upset, about? From the moment this issue stepped out of the realm of merit and into the realm of raw politics, you were destined to get your way.

The reason we have regulation by people who are relatively insulated from politics is that they can look at things objectively. Politicians, particularly South Carolina legislators, can’t say "no" to anybody — particularly not to angry people from the most Republican county in the state.

So you can relax now. We won’t give up on this, even though the result is pretty much assured now. It’s not our job to write about what WILL happen, but to write about what SHOULD happen, no matter how unpopular the stand may be among our friends and neighbors. It’s not that much fun sometimes, but it’s what we do.

Have a good day,
Brad Warthen

If y’all show ANY interest in this issue, I’ll post some or all of my correspondence with him. It might be interesting; I don’t know. That’s up to y’all.

Eating smokeless

A little extra data with regard to my post yesterday wondering why we have smoke-free restaurants but not bars or nightclubs.

Here is an official list of such restaurants, helpfully compiled by those evil "statists" (to hear some of my respondents tell it, as they go off on diatribes having nothing to do with the subject at hand) at DHEC.

One day it would be nice to see such a list of places where one could have a brew and hear live music, and still breathe. Anyone? Anyone?

Columbia election column

Fisher has given Coble the
kind of race Columbia needed

By Brad Warthen
Editorial Page Editor
WHEN KEVIN Fisher had left after energetically making his case in an endorsement interview, I said this to fellow editor Warren Bolton: “You see why I wanted him to run?”
    He nodded.
    A few minutes later, we decided to recommend the board endorse Mayor Bob Coble again.
Sound contradictory? Well, it makes sense to me. I’ll explain.
    A week before the filing deadline, I used this space to urge Mr. Fisher to challenge the mayor. After a lunch during which he had passionately expressed one point of disagreement after another with the mayor, I thought it was high time such criticism was actually aired before the voters.
    Bob Coble has some of the world’s most passive-aggressive critics. They gripe and snipe, but not one who had a chance of unseating him had tried in 16 years.
    I knew Mr. Fisher could make up for that.
    After I wrote that column, a lot of people thought I was backing Mr. Fisher. Then I wrote another column in which I said Columbia voters had a clear choice before them: Mr. Fisher, who tries hard to convince everyone he’s right; or Mr. Coble, who is happy to be seen as self-effacing but effective. That muddied the waters. Some thought at that point that I was declaring for the incumbent, but that wasn’t my intent.
    Mr. Fisher is a very effective critic of the present administration. There’s a lot he doesn’t like, and he expresses eloquently why you shouldn’t like it either. He writes a whale of a good op-ed piece; I hope he keeps them coming.
    But he’s too much like me. I’m a professional critic, and sometimes I write a marginally readable piece lambasting this or that. But I haven’t seen any groundswell of people out there demanding that I run for mayor.
    And I think I understand why. When I look at Columbia’s city council, and imagine myself trying to get that bunch of independently elected prima donnas (no offense) to do what I know good and well they ought to do… well, I reflect that I’ve picked the right line of work — one in which it’s more important to be right than to be effective. I’ll just keep on being a voice crying in the wilderness.
    Mr. Fisher should, too. He’s good at it.
    So why did I want him to run? This city is in the middle of rapid, dramatic, multidirectional change, and it would be a travesty not to have a full, lively debate about its course. I didn’t think the city could afford another mayoral election like the ones it has had the last 16 years.
    The mayor needed challenging. He’s far from perfect. Mr. Fisher is right in many ways. He has a point when he says that “Mayor Bob” is perhaps too affable and, as a result, often isn’t forceful enough to overcome the limitations of his office in this form of government.
    Mr. Fisher is plenty forceful. But he is not affable enough to get things done. There’s a delicate balance involved in working with six council members who are each as powerful as you. Mr. Coble doesn’t always strike that balance, but often does. Mr. Fisher seldom would.
    A lot of good things have happened in the last few years in Columbia, and while the mayor isn’t always the loudest voice in the room, he pushes as hard as anyone. The Vista booms; Main Street is revitalized; old enmities are set aside; strategic partnerships envision a dynamic future for the city, and make it happen.
    Mayor Coble doesn’t shout, but he testifies convincingly to his effectiveness in the past, present and future. Mr. Fisher is great at pointing out the mayor’s failings. But he doesn’t make the case for himself nearly as well.
    In the end, the mayor has risen to his first real challenge, and has defended well his claim to four more years.
    While I’m all for saying who should be elected, I stay clear of predicting who will win. But I will say this: On Tuesday, more people will turn out to vote in Columbia than in a decade of mayoral elections. Whether they favor Mr. Fisher or the mayor, they know that this time, their votes are likely to make a difference.
    If that happens, the winner will be the city of Columbia.

John Wrisley on Joe Azar

Seeking a better ending to today’s column, I called longtime radio personality John Wrisley based on a bum tip that he was an Azar supporter. Apparently I wasn’t the only one who thought he was a possibility.

“Joe called me just the other night” and asked for help, Mr. Wrisley said. “And I said, I can’t do that, Joe.” Why?

“Because I really can’t take him seriously," he said. “I’m not even sure he takes it seriously.”

It’s not that he prefers one of the other candidates. Mr. Wrisley said he’s not happy with the choices before him. “Most of all, I’m not happy with Mayor Bob.”

“He is a likeable guy. I just feel like the city has bitten off more than it can chew.”

As for Mr. Azar, Mr. Wrisley told him, “You’re not ever going to get anywhere with the empty rhetoric — ‘vision,’ and ‘we need to be leaders instead of followers.”

He said he’s served on a lot of committees with Joe over the years, and "He’s filled with ideas. He really likes to talk," but he’s short on action. Mr. Wrisley said at one meeting, he interrupted a long harangue from Mr. Azar to suggest that the committee adopt his proposal, and delegate him to get it done. The affirmative vote was unanimous. But noting got done.

“I don’t see him as the sort of person who will stick his nose into the nitty-gritty to do what it takes to get what needs to be done… done,” he said. “I don’t see him as the executive that he wants to be.”

“He’s kind of full of himself,” Mr. Wrisley said of Mr. Azar. “And that’s fine. We need people like that.” If that’s true, Mr. Azar certainly meets the need.

Finally, since he knew him so well, I asked if he could recommend anyone else who was supporting Joe. "No," he said. Not in his circle of acquaintances. But he added, "I like this guy. I think he’s got a nice business going…. He should not get distracted."

Joe Azar on ‘The State,’ and me

As I noted in today’s column, I was dissatisfied with what I got out of our endorsement meeting, so I went looking for his Web site, and found some other pertinent material. The Web site itself wasn’t all that helpful; it doesn’t seem to have been maintained. But the candidate has a preferred form of semi-mass communication: He has a long e-mail list, and it’s not unusual for him to send out his thoughts three or four times a day (perhaps we have the makings of a blogger). I’m on the list. Here’s what he had to say in reaction to my Sunday column:

Political season is upon us and here comes The State and Brad. One moment he praises Fisher, the next he cuts him. Of course, he ignores me as he usually does, but still gives credit to ideas I have advanced over the years. He just can’t seem to bring himself to put my name on them. Unfortunately, Fisher has gotten set up by Brad. Just read the two articles below and it is quite  apparent. I have listed the web addresses if you also want to see comments from readers.

It appears Brad is setting us up to endorse Coble. He is trying to be a king maker and affect the cityelections (and he does not even live in the city). Fortunately, The State editorials are not well read,  and Brad has lost his credibility with many. I say these both as I hear very little whenever there is an editorial such as this. In past years I would get much comment. Now, when I ask friends what they thought of an editorial, they look at me funny. I get so little feedback on State editorials that I have quit using them as a source of discussion. I dare say we get quite a lot of feedback and distribution via this email, enough that it would make The State’s editorial staff jealous. There is more to come as this is a close race, and I am willing to bet Coble does not go back in.

Classic Azar. Anyway, I should probably clear something up. I’m not about to say whom I think we will endorse at this point, but I will point out one thing, for those who have leaped to the same conclusion as Mr. Azar: As I explained on this blog, I’m the kind of guy who, forced to choose, will prefer being right — as I see the right — to being effective at something other than the right.

I can see how someone who assumes that it is always best to be effective could read my previous column and assume I’m raising Mr. Coble above Mr. Azar. But given the way I am, there is insufficient reason for anyone to be positive about that.

My column on Joe Azar

Our interview with Joe Azar, veteran candidate
By BRAD WARTHEN
EDITORIAL PAGE EDITOR
APPARENTLY, it’s going to be my fault if Joe Azar loses — again — to Bob Coble in next month’s election for mayor of Columbia.
    He didn’t tell me this himself. I learned that when I Googled him.
    The first thing that came up for Joe Azar was a story posted by City Paper, a local publication I didn’t know existed until I read something in The State about its editor quitting. Long story.
March06_099_1    Anyway, the piece was based on an interview with Mr. Azar in a local bar around midnight. (It said he doesn’t drink, but does shoot pool.) The story related Mr. Azar’s own “personal and strangely intriguing theory” as to why Kevin Fisher got into the race:
    “Azar believes The State knew that if he ran against Bob Coble alone he would have a good chance of winning. For that reason, The State threw in Kevin Fisher as a spoiler, he says.”
    I urged Mr. Fisher to run solely to stop the Azar juggernaut? Why would I do that? Mr. Azar explained: “There’s always been a cozy relationship between The State… especially the editorial… and city elected officials.”
    So how — and I’m just asking — do you explain our having endorsed Tameika Isaac
and Daniel Rickenmann
over council fixtures Franny Heizer and Jim Papadea?
    Oh, never mind. Apparently, his is a nice, neat explanation that helps Mr. Azar feel good about the fact that we never endorse him. I’m all for that.
    Joe Azar is a genial guy. He goes around with a huge, passive-aggressive chip on his shoulder, but he’s genial. He always greets me with a big smile. When he met with Associate Editor Warren Bolton and me last week, he suggested having lunch after the election is over. Fine by me.
    But I can’t imagine endorsing him. I think this mystifies him. I’m sorry about that; it’s unpleasant for me as well as for him. It makes our biennial or quadrennial formal meetings rather awkward.
    And when I don’t write about him — something I prefer not to do, in keeping with the old saw, “If you don’t have anything good to say…” —  it puzzles readers. One wrote on my blog Sunday, in response to my column contrasting Messrs. Coble and Fisher: “We have three candidates for mayor, not just two. Why was Mr. Azar only given one sentence?”
    I’ll try to explain. Maybe I owe Mr. Azar that, seeing as how I’m spoiling his big shot. I’ll tell you what a meeting with him is like. That may help. He only came in to meet with us after complaining to Warren that he saw little point in it. Fine. Nothing special about that. Bob Coble had asked Warren if there was any point in his coming in, seeing as how I was backing Kevin Fisher. (Why am I always the last to know these things?)
    But when Mayor Bob came in, he acted like a guy who was really serious about seeking office.
Joe Azar did not.
    First, he spent a long time talking about how useless it was to come in, and how mean we always were, and how he knew the fix was in for Mayor Coble (which will shock my “main man” Kevin Fisher). “I wonder why you invite me; you can write the editorial without me,” etc.
    But eventually, he talked about being mayor. He said he would do things that would set him apart. “I’d love to… live in a project for two weeks.” He said the other candidates would “never have stopped a young man who may be wearing gang colors, (and) engage them in dialogue. Before you can involve them, you’ve got to invite them. Say ‘I would like to involve you in a board or commission. But first you’ve got to clean yourself up, talk well…’”
    He’s gregarious, and seems truly interested in helping people, on a retail level. He sees himself as a street-level guy. He holds out his hands and tells us how he gets calluses crawling under houses, showing “my guys” how to install the audio and video equipment he sells out of his Five Points store.
    He says he would set up a “place for the homeless in the floodplain” where they could grow food to feed themselves and “have a little farmer’s market.” He would call for “a work-study program” for youth. A weightlifter, he would “emphasize more health and fitness.” He said he had had Marvin Chernoff’s idea for an arts festival “for years.” He would recycle computers. He would do a better job of hiring and retaining city employees. He would have a summer activities program, with a community band and amateur sports. “Gentrification is a serious problem,” he said. “And I wish I had time to talk about that.”
    Sound breathless? He was. Late in the interview, I had noted the time and asked whether he had other points. He pulled out a document. Refusing to give me a copy, he read all of the above proposals aloud, at high speed, with an occasional gripe about being pressed for time. Our fault, you see.
    I just took notes as fast as I could, and resolved to check his Web site later. (But there’s nothing like that list on the site.)
    After an hour, he rose, and amid the smiles and handshakes, told us how upset he’d be when our endorsement came out. He said he would want to punch the walls, but instead, he would “put a picture of you and Warren at the bottom of the urinal.”
    Or maybe he would put Warren in the urinal, and me in the toilet. Or maybe just put our faces on a dart board at a favorite bar.
    “That would be classier,” I observed. Nah, he decided, he’d stick with the first idea: the urinal.

What’s “ABC Columbia?”

I just left the room where the boob tube resides because local TV news was on, and my wife had the remote. I can’t bear local TV news. Never could, but it does seem to get worse as time passes.

Anyway, before I left the room, I noticed that the station I had labeled as WOLO when I set up our tube years ago is now identifying itself — repeatedly, to the point of being really monotonous about  it — as "ABC Columbia."

What’s that all about? What did I miss? Whatever it is, it sounds really generic, as though the station itself has no sense of identity.

Oh, yeah. Now I remember reading about this. Wow. As bad as local TV news can be, it’s even worse when you know it’s not even local.

But wait — it seems they came back. Whatever. In any case, back to my original question: Why is it "ABC Columbia?" Their Web site doesn’t explain. In fact, it doesn’t even use that term.

Wikipedia mentions it, but doesn’t explain. It’s implied that this is another bright idea of this Bahakel guy, or rather of the company that bears his name. They seem to have a lot of such "bright ideas."

Anyway, I think I’ll go back and see if something else is on.