Category Archives: South Carolina

The blessing of a potential candidate

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By BRAD WARTHEN
Editorial Page Editor
On a brilliant, warm February afternoon, I was holed up in a darkened booth in an Irish-themed pub talking local politics. Not exactly James Joyce’s “Ivy Day in the Committee Room,” but a reasonable Columbia facsimile.
    Jack Van Loan was holding court at his “office” in a booth at Delaney’s in Five Points — files and organizer on the table before him next to his coffee, his briefcase opened on a nearby bench. From such locations Jack makes and takes his multiple calls getting ready for the big St. Patrick’s Day event March 14, and talks Five Points politics.
    Last year, he was blessing Belinda Gergel for the 3rd district City Council contest that she eventually won. This time, he was pushing someone for mayor.
    It was Steve Benjamin, whom I’ve known for years; we endorsed him for state attorney general in 2002. But Jack wanted to “introduce” him as his candidate for mayor, and I wanted to hear what Jack — a force in the Five Points Association since 1991 — had to say about him.
    Jack says the necessary ingredient in leadership is courage — something he knows about, having been imprisoned at the “Hanoi Hilton” with John McCain. He says Steve Benjamin’s got it. “He’s not a Goldwater conservative,” which would be more to Jack’s liking. But “This is my guy.” If he runs.
    Mr. Benjamin says he’ll decide whether to take on Mayor Bob Coble “in the next couple of months.” No later, because he will need the full year running up to the April 2010 election. Jack agrees: “A year’s nothing.”
    What this would mean is that Bob Coble would face something other than the “usual suspects” opposition that has tended to characterize his re-elections. Last election, Kevin Fisher mounted the most serious race in a while, but that was weak compared to what Steve Benjamin would do. He wouldn’t just be a focal point for the discontented. He has the name, connections and credibility to challenge the mayor in the very heart of his political support.
    And now, confidence in Columbia’s leadership is at a low ebb. City finances are an inexcusable mess; the police department is reeling from a string of problems. The city manager has quit, after the council couldn’t get its act together to evaluate him. The seven elected political leaders seem incapable of summoning the will to cope with anything, from homelessness to closing a deal to provide more parking spaces in Five Points (a very sore point for Jack).
    “I have a great relationship with Bob Coble,” says Mr. Benjamin. “On my worst day, he’s been a great acquaintance.” Further, he says he doesn’t doubt the mayor’s dedication to the city.
    So, as he says the mayor himself asked him, why consider running against his friend Bob? While he still hasn’t made up his mind, “reasons become clearer every day — every morning after I read your paper.”
    If he runs, the campaign will be positive, and “aspirational.” He wants to grow old here. He wants his children to raise their children here.
    To hear his wife or law partners tell it, he’s already involved in “too many things:” Among them, he’s chairman-elect of the Greater Columbia Chamber of Commerce, and vice chairman of the Columbia City Center Partnership. I don’t find it unusual to run into him twice in the same day, at unrelated community events.
    “I think we lack a clear and cohesive vision about where this city needs to go,” he says. More than that, he understands that the city lacks the means for translating any such vision into effective action.
    In other words, he advocates replacing Columbia’s unaccountable, failed council-manager government with a strong-mayor system. A full-time mayor with responsibility for, rather than politically diffused detachment from, the day-to-day executive functions of the government is necessary “for a city trying to make the next leap — from good to great,” he says. “Some say it’s a third rail,” but “it’s hard to look somebody in the eye and say I want to run the city, and then say you don’t really want to run the city.” Under the current setup, not a lot of people would want the job — at least, not a lot of people a reasonable person would want to want the job.
    He mentions several important issues the city has yet to cope with — transportation, clean air and water. But it is on homelessness that he draws a sharp contrast. He says the proposal of the Midlands Housing Alliance to establish a multi-purpose center to fight homelessness at the Salvation Army site “is sound, is 95 percent of the way towards being funded, looks like a certainty and certainly fills a void.” As a former resident of the Elmwood neighborhood, he understands concerns, but believes “some strong, good neighborhood agreements” could reassure folks such a center would not be a detriment.
    Mr. Benjamin is a veteran of the last failed effort to establish such a center, which was undermined by the City Council. That experience “put us on notice that if something’s going to happen, it may have to happen in spite of elected city leadership.” Various stakeholders, from business leaders to service providers, came together in the Housing Alliance to provide that missing direction, and now Mr. Benjamin says the city should step up and do its part, which would include providing operating funds.
    “I don’t get the impression that the city leadership thinks it’s a problem,” says Jack Van Loan. Referring to Cathy Novinger of the Housing Alliance, he adds, “That gal would have made a damned fine general officer in the Air Force. She can make a decision without stuttering.”
    It’s a quality that the former fighter pilot values, and one he suggests that he sees in Steve Benjamin.
And while it’s far too soon to say wh
o should win, if Mr. Benjamin gets into the race, Columbia will have its clearest chance in a long while to pick a new direction.

For links and more, please go to thestate.com/bradsblog/.

WashTimes picks on SC schoolgirl

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More than one friend has brought to my attention this piece from Salon, taking up the cudgels for a schoolgirl here in South Carolina:

Friday February 27, 2009 06:11 EST

Criticizing Ty'Sheoma Bethea

I
thought it would come from Michelle Malkin or Rush Limbaugh, but Malkin
is too busy planning her anti-tax tea parties while Rush gets ready for
his close-up at the Conservative Political Action Committee this weekend (which is a collection of nuts so nutty even Sarah Palin stayed away).

No, it was the conservative Washington Times that cast the first stone at Ty'Sheoma Bethea,
the Dillon, S.C., teenager who wrote to Congress seeking stimulus funds
for her shamefully dilapidated school. Obama used her statement, "We
are not quitters," as the coda of his speech Tuesday night, but now the
Moon-owned paper tells us what's wrong with Bethea, in an editorial
with the condescending headline, 'Yes, Ty'Sheoma, there is a Santa
Claus."

Obama "presented" Bethea "as a plucky girl from a
hopeless school who took it on herself to write the president and
Congress asking for much needed help," the Times began, ominously.
Wait, she's not a plucky girl from a hopeless school? The editorial
depicts her instead as a player in Obama's "mere political theater"
because the president has been using her school, J.V. Martin, as a
"political prop" since he first visited in 2005. Wow. Dastardly.  I'm
getting the picture: Obama, that slick Democrat opportunist, has
repeatedly visited one of the poorest schools in South Carolina, a
state that voted for John McCain.  You just know he leaves with his
pockets stuffed with cash every time he makes the trip.

It gets worse….

And you can read the rest of Joan Walsh's piece here.

You know, I long ago got cynical about these regular folks that presidents of both parties put on display
during their prime-time speeches. I'm actually capable of understanding that public policy affects real people without such smarmy concrete evidence. Such faux-populist gimmicks are the rhetorical equivalent of those insipid man-on-the-street interviews that local TV news shows do, the ones that make me want to scream, "I don't care what this person who has obviously never thought about this issue before thinks! Either tell me something I don't know, or go away!" Such things tend to strike me as manipulative, phony and insulting.

So I'm not here to imbue this little girl with some sort of oracular power or something. But come on, people — picking on a little kid who just wants to go to a decent school? This is where ideology gets you. You get so wrapped up in your political points you want to make, you forget that there's a real person there, even when she's staring you in the face.

Earlier this week, I called a guy in Latta who had rung my phone (according to caller ID) at least 10 times that day, refusing to leave a message. (As I've probably told you, ever since my department ceased to have a person to answer phones, I have to let the machine get it and get back to people when I can, if I'm to have any hope of getting the paper out each day.) But I called back on the chance that he was disabled or something, or there was a problem with my voice mail.

There was no phone problem. He just wanted me to be the latest of several people at the paper he had berated for saying J.V. Martin school was built in 1896, when PARTS of it were built much later. Some of it, I seem to recall him saying, in 1984. Does this seem like a huge distinction to you? It didn't to me, either, but it was VERY important to him. He wasn't saying it wasn't a substandard facility, mind you; he just had that one objection, and he maintained it was the height of irresponsibility on the part of the newspaper not to point out that distinction.

Anyway, the situation is what it is. J.V. Martin is a facility that stands out in a part of the state not exactly known for stellar school facilities, as you've read many times before in our paper, seen in Bud Ferillo's "Corridor of Shame," and read in Kathleen Parker's column last week. You know, that wild-eyed liberal Kathleen.

Is that Dillon County's worst educational problem? Probably not. There's the bizarre governing setup for local schools there, whereby the high school football coach, by virtue of being the only resident member of the county legislative delegation, decides who will be on the school board. The caller and I discussed that, and he thought it was worse that a certain other party — the son of the late South of The Border founder Alan Schafer — has too much influence. I don't know anything about that, but the Coach Hayes thing has always been weird and Byzantine enough for me.

South Carolina should be able to do better than J.V. Martin, and if it can't, that's an argument for getting some federal help, as much as I dislike federal involvement in school matters. All this kid did was ask for something better, and a newspaper derides her as an emblem of "irresponsibility." That's a hell of a thing.

Sunday preview: Ivy Day in the Committee Room (5 Points version)

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    Old Jack raked the cinders together with a piece of cardboard and spread them judiciously over the whitening dome of coals. When the dome was thinly covered his face lapsed into darkness but, as he set himself to fan the fire again, his crouching shadow ascended the opposite wall and his face slowly re-emerged into light….

        — from "Ivy Day in the Committee Room," by James Joyce

In the middle of a brilliant, unusually warm February afternoon (Thursday), I was holed up in an Irish-themed pub talking local politics. Jack Van Loan was holding court at his "office" in a booth at Delaney's pub in Five Points. And when I say office, I mean "office," with his files and organizers on the table before him next to his coffee, and his briefcase opened on a bench close at hand. From such locations Jack makes and takes his multiple calls getting ready for the big St. Paddy's Day event (March 14) and talks Five Points politics.

Last year, he was pushing Belinda Gergel for the 3rd district council contest that she eventually won. Today, he was conveying his blessing upon another (potential) candidate — this one for mayor.

The candidate, or potential candidate, sat in the dark with the bright light coming in the window behind him so that I was talking to a silhouette — a little like the effect when you talk to Joe Riley in his office down there at the Four Corners of the Law, with that huge cathedral-like array of windows behind him, and the fluid light of the Holy City radiating all about him. This was a little more prosaic than that, but then this wasn't the mayor yet, just a potential candidate.

Who was the candidate? Well, that's him in the very bad phone picture above, with Jack at his right. Shouldn't be hard to figure out. The thing about this candidate was, I needed no introduction. We've endorsed him for statewide office in the past. But my friend Jack wanted to introduce him as his candidate for mayor in next April's election, and I wanted to hear what Jack — a force in the influential Five Points Association since 1991 — had to say about him. It wasn't exactly Joyce's "Ivy Day in the Committee Room" and we didn't talk about Parnell, but by Columbia standards it would do.

Anyway, the rest of the story will be in my Sunday column, so tune in.

Much ado about photo ID

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The photo ID bill that caused such a flap in the House yesterday is one of those classic issues that partisans make a HUGE deal over, and which seems to me entirely undeserving of the fuss.

The way I see it is this:

  • It's ridiculous for Democrats to act like this is some kind of insupportable burden on voting, even to the point of walking out to dramatize their profound concern. Why shouldn't you have to make the kind of basic demonstration of your identity that you have to make for pretty much any other kind of transaction?
  • It's ridiculous for Republicans to insist that we have to have this safeguard, absent any sort of widespread abuse here in South Carolina in recent elections. Where's the problem necessitating this big confrontation with the Democrats? I don't see it.

Some of you defend parties by telling me that they legitimately reflect different philosophies and value systems. Well, when you scratch the surface and get at the values that inform these two overwrought partisan reactions, it doesn't make me feel any better either way. In fact, it reminds me why I can't subscribe to either party's world view.

Democrats believe at their core that it should be EASIER to vote. I look around me at the kinds of decisions that are sometimes made by voters in this country, and it seems to me sometimes that far too many people who are ALREADY voting take the responsibility too lightly. Look at exit polls. (Or forget the exit polls, just try going up to people on the street and asking them a few pointed questions about public affairs.) Look at what people actually know about candidates and their positions and the issues, and look at the reasons why they say they vote certain ways, and it can sometimes be alarming. Hey, I love this self-government thing, but it's not perfect, and one of the imperfections is that some folks don't take their electoral responsibility seriously enough. So why would I want to see the people who are so apathetic that they don't vote NOW coming out and voting? Yet that seems to be what many Democrats are advocating, and it disturbs me.

And beneath all that sanctimony from Republicans about the integrity of the voting process is, I'm sorry to say, something that looks very much like what Democrats are describing, although Democrats do so imperfectly and in overly cartoonish terms. There's a bit of bourgeois disdain in the GOP position on these things. There is a tendency among Republicans to think of themselves as the solid, hard-working citizens who play by the rules, and to be disdainful of those who don't have their advantages — which Republicans don't SEE as advantages at all, but merely their due as a result of being so righteous and hard-working and all. There's a tendency to see the disadvantaged as being to blame for their plight, as being too lazy or immoral or whatever to participate fully. The idea is that they wouldn't have these problems if they would just TRY. What I'm trying to describe here is the thing that is making sincere Republicans' blood pressure rise even as they're reading these words. It's a tendency to attach moral weight to middle-class status. Republicans seem to believe as an article of faith that there are all these shiftless, marginal people out there — relatives of Cadillac-driving welfare queens of the Reagan era, no doubt — wanting to commit voter fraud, and they've got to stop it, and if you don't want to stop it too then you don't believe in having integrity in the process.

So basically, I'm unimpressed by the holier-than-thou posturing from either side. And I get very tired at all the drama over something that NEITHER side can demonstrate is all that big a deal. Democrats can't demonstrate that this is a great injustice, and Republicans can't demonstrate that it's needed. And yet we have to put up with all this drama.

McCain to go to bat for McMaster (as well he should)

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The Hill reports that John McCain is going to be raising funds for Attorney General Henry McMaster's (yet undeclared) bid for governor in 2010:

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) is hitting the fundraising circuit to return the favor to a local Republican who proved a key supporter in the 2008 primaries.

McCain and many of his top advisers will throw a fundraising reception on behalf of Henry McMaster, the South Carolina attorney general who backed McCain during his run for president in 2008.

The event's host committee includes McCain loyalists like one-time senior advisors Charlie Black, former campaign manager Rick Davis and former Republican National Committee deputy chairman Frank Donatelli. McCain will make an appearance, a spokeswoman confirmed.

And well he should, because Henry was right with him through thick and thin in his most recent presidential bid. He and Bobby Harrell, all the way, even when people were counting McCain as out of the GOP race. Note the video from above (this is the slightly more extended version of my most-viewed video of all time, at 59,850 views), in which Henry warmed up the crowd for McCain one night in the Vista in 2007 (the night of the first S.C. presidential candidate debate, as I recall).

GOP dark horse steps forward

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This just came to my attention, and in keeping with my efforts to begin chronicling the 2010 gubernatorial election (because the sooner we can get a new governor, the better), I share it with you:

{BC-SC-Governor-Nelsen, 2nd Ld-Writethru,0320}
{Furman professor plans GOP bid for SC governor}
{Eds: UPDATES with quotes, details from Nelsen, Bauer. ADDS byline.}
{By JIM DAVENPORT}=
{Associated Press Writer}=
   COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) – A Furman University political science professor announced plans Thursday to be the first GOP candidate to formally enter the 2010 race for South Carolina governor.
   Brent Nelsen says he'll file paperwork Friday to set up his Nelsen for Governor Committee and launch a series of economic summits around the state that aim to come up with plans to increase employment and spur economic development.
   Nelsen has never run for political office and said he wants to put into practice some of the things he has taught. He wouldn't say how much he expects to raise in the next six months to wage a credible campaign in a primary that most expect will cost millions to win.
   "I'm going to have enough money in the next six months to make a run for this," Nelsen said. "I'm not going to put a dollar figure on it."
   Republican Gov. Mark Sanford is limited to two terms and leaves office in 2011. His tenure has been marked by high jobless rates – at 9.5 percent in December, South Carolina had the nation's third worst unemployment rate.
   Other GOP candidates flush with campaign cash and with better-recognized names in state politics have said they're interested but not yet ready to announce plans. Attorney General Henry McMaster is interested but isn't expected to enter the race before spring. Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer said Thursday he's probably running, but is too busy for now to announce his intentions. U.S. Rep. Gresham Barrett has begun lining up advisers for a possible bid.
   Democrat state Sen. Vincent Sheheen of Camden already has filed 2010 campaign forms so he can begin raising money, making him the only other candidate formally in the race for governor. Other Democrats considering bids include House Minority Leader Harry Ott of St. Matthews and state Sen. Robert Ford of Charleston.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that Prof. Nelson isn't quite as viable a candidate as the subject of my Sunday column, Vincent Sheheen. Nor, and this is more to the point, as viable as the most active GOP candidate-to-be, Attorney General Henry McMaster. But I pass on this report nonetheless, so that you might make of it what you will.

For more on Dr. Nelson, I refer you to this piece he wrote for us recently, which appeared on our Saturday Online Extra on Jan. 17:

S.C. GOP must reform itself
By BRENT F. NELSON
GUEST COLUMNIST
The S.C. Republican Party is in trouble. If the party fails to seek new ideas and reach out to new voters, its dominance of state politics will end. It’s time to start a new debate within the party.
    Ironically, Republicans still look strong. The party holds eight of the nine elected state offices. Republicans control the state House and Senate by comfortable margins and have both U.S. senators and four of six U.S. representatives. Just as important, South Carolina remained “McCain red” in a presidential election that saw big gains for Democrats almost everywhere.
    But scratch the surface, and significant cracks appear in the GOP’s foundation. The most obvious problem is the dysfunctional relationship between the Republican governor and the Republican Legislature. To be fair, Columbia’s broken politics stems from a state constitution that hamstrings the governor, denying him the power to implement a coherent policy. But Gov. Mark Sanford has been unable — or unwilling — to employ the customary gubernatorial tools to shepherd his proposals through the Legislature. That Legislature is indeed overly protective of its anachronistic privileges, but he often uses that resistance as a pretext for political posturing of his own, rather than engaging opponents in a search for common ground. The party has gotten away with this petty bickering, but the state now faces the third-highest unemployment rate in the country, declining competitiveness and poor educational performance. Someday voters will notice.
    And Republicans face a cascade of worrying electoral trends. Only 54 percent of South Carolinians picked John McCain for president, down 10 points from Ronald Reagan’s vote in 1984. McCain’s showing is no anomaly but another point marking a rather steady decline for Republican candidates (not counting the three-way elections of 1992 and 1996). In the 2008 contest, the Republican vote dropped in 43 of 46 counties. Declines averaged 3.6 percent but were even greater (4.4 percent) in the 11 largest counties.
    The worst news comes from important demographic categories. In 2004 George Bush won every age group in South Carolina, including 18-29 year olds; John McCain managed to win only those 45 and older. Fifteen percent of African-American voters voted for Bush in 2004; only 4 percent chose McCain. Hispanic voters are too few in South Carolina to analyze, but Hispanics increased their share of the electorate from 1 percent in 2004 to 3 percent in 2008. Nationally Obama won 61 percent of the Hispanic vote, and South Carolina was probably no different.
    Is all lost for S.C. Republicans? Absolutely not — but the party must adjust to the new realities. Republicans must reach beyond white, married, religious voters — a shrinking base. To avoid becoming the next red state gone blue, Republicans must attract more young people, minorities and not-so-religious whites. Accomplishing this without losing the GOP’s conservative base will be tricky, but not impossible.
    Here are three suggestions.

— First, the party must stress what it is for rather than what it is against. It is no longer enough to be against government, taxes, gun control, abortion, gay marriage and immigration. Uncommitted voters want to know the alternative. Republicans should focus on establishing the conditions necessary to “human flourishing.”
Strong government should establish clear boundaries for behavior and then stand back and allow responsible citizens to act freely. Public officials must identify the social causes of poverty and low educational achievement and work with churches and neighborhood organizations to strengthen families and their communities.
We need politicians who can find compassionate ways to balance the need for employers to gain access to hard-working labor, citizens to feel comfortable in their neighborhoods and immigrants to realize the American dream. Governments cannot make humans flourish, but they can make the necessary room for this to happen. That is a conservative vision.
— Second, Republicans must reconnect with young adults, Hispanics and African-Americans. Many in these groups are social conservatives who fail to see in Republicans a concern for the economic and cultural issues important to minorities. Republicans must convince these voters that the party is committed to
the flourishing of all South Carolinians.
— Finally, the party must stop fighting and start solving problems. Education, enterprise and environment might be three places to start. The state must dramatically narrow the education gap between the richest and the poorest; it must regain its globally competitive position; and it must manage responsibly the natural beauty of this state.

    If S.C. Republicans focus on human flourishing and government that works, new supporters will help reverse the party’s decline.

Dr. Nelson chairs the political science department at Furman University. He is a lifelong Republican.

Palmetto Health comes out swinging

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Well, you're not going to be surprised to know that Palmetto Health is not a BIT pleased that Providence Hospital and Lexington Medical Center have cut a deal on open-heart and left it out. Palmetto Health issued this statement at 4:37 this afternoon, after the other two parties made their big announcement:

IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Feb. 25, 2009

Statement by Charles D. Beaman, Jr., CEO, Palmetto Health

I have great respect for the dedicated professionals associated with Lexington Medical Center and Providence Hospital. However, I am surprised and very disappointed that the leaders of those hospitals excluded Palmetto Health when they negotiated a private agreement regarding health care delivery for the Midlands of South Carolina.

Palmetto Health is the largest provider of health care in the area.  We have been urging collaboration and cooperation from the beginning.

Frankly, I am at a loss to understand why a private agreement regarding health care delivery would be negotiated and announced that excludes the region’s largest hospital system.  Our goal is to provide the best, most efficient services to the families of central South Carolina.  It is simply not possible to develop a regional health care delivery plan that excludes Palmetto Health.  

Here are just a few of the questions left unresolved by the private agreement negotiated by only two of the region’s hospitals:

  • Will Lexington Medical Center agree to support Palmetto Health’s plan to build Parkridge Hospital in the Irmo area?  That plan was approved by state officials in August of 2007.  The community involved is eager to have a hospital in their area.  But progress has been blocked for nearly two years by legal maneuvers.
  • Will we have sufficient trauma coverage for our region? If open heart surgery must be provided in a hospital that has one of the busiest ERs in the area, why not consider providing trauma services in that same ER?
  • Will we have adequate behavioral health services for our region?  Right now Palmetto Health is the only inpatient provider for unfunded patients.  As the state continues to cut services for inpatients and outpatients, our regional hospitals need to work together.
  • Where are the oversight and the spirit of cooperation to provide care for the uninsured and underinsured who are showing up in growing numbers at the region’s only safety-net hospital – Palmetto Health Richland?  Is open heart surgery the only service worth sharing?

At Palmetto Health, we remain willing to cooperate and collaborate with other hospital systems to create a true regional health care delivery plan.  And we urge our colleagues in the health care delivery system to focus on the full range of services needed in these difficult economic times. 

In the mean time, our friends in Lexington County can rest assured we will continue to support them in their specialized heart care needs.  Just last week, a patient from Lexington County had his heart blockage removed within 19 minutes of his arrival at Palmetto Health Heart Hospital after being transported there by Lexington County EMS.  We remain ready and able to accommodate patients needing our care.

# # # # #

In those four bulleted items, Chuck Beaman sets out the biggest beefs that Palmetto Health has long held in terms of getting the short end of the stick on Midlands health care — it treats the most indigent patients, and it maintains the expensive trauma services that the other hospitals don't have to provide because IT does. That's why it was so important to Palmetto Richland to develop it's expanded open-heart program, because it brings in revenue it needs to offset those expenses.

That question, "Is open heart surgery the only service worth sharing?" is about as loaded as a question gets. Lexington has argued all along that it needed open heart because it was getting such a disproportionate share of acute cardiac cases coming into its ER. In that case, the other hospitals have said, why don't you beef up ER — which would COST money, rather than bringing it in the way open-heart does. Now, Providence isn't saying that, and is getting $15 million, and Palmetto Health is feeling very isolated and neglected.

Note that the release doesn't promise to keep opposing Lexington's CON request on open-heart, but says it will be happy to continue serving those patients at the Richland campus, which one of course reads as meaning the same thing.

Bottom line: Two of the combatants have made peace. But the war's not over.

The war is over — between Providence and Lexington Medical

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Just to briefly mention what I've been up to on this Ash Wednesday, we had a meeting this morning with representatives of Providence Hospital and Lexington Medical Center. They had come to jointly announce a major breakthrough — they've stopped fighting over whether LexMed should be allowed to do open-heart surgery.

As you know, Lexington has tried everything it could think of in recent years — regulatory, legal and political — to get around the fact that DHEC has said (in a shocking, rare instance of DHEC saying "no" to anyone) that they can't do bypasses. Providence and Palmetto Health have been on the opposite side of the table, arguing that a third such program would be duplicative and damage the quality of overall care in the Midlands by reducing the number of procedures they do below the level considered necessary for maintaining proficiency.

We have agreed with Providence and Palmetto Health on this. In fact, we also opposed Palmetto Health expanding its heart program several years back, on the same grounds, but DHEC approved it. We have maintained that yet a third such program would be insupportable.

But now two of these three parties have decided to stop spending millions fighting each other, and after months of negotiations have agreed on the following:

  • Providence and Lexington Medical will ask DHEC to "de-certify" one of Providence's four open-heart surgical suites.
  • The two will then ask DHEC to certify ONE such unit at Lexington Medical.
  • Lexington will drop its challenge to certificates for expansion for Providence Northeast.
  • Lexington will pay Providence, in three installments, a total of $15 million to compensate it for the lost revenues from de-certifying a unit.

So what's missing? Well, Palmetto Health. What we have here is a classic 1984 sort of situation: Eastasia and Eurasia have always been at war with Oceania. But now Eurasia and Oceania are friends. Does that mean they are now at war with Eastasia — I mean, Palmetto Health? Well, no — at least not at this moment. But Palmetto Health is not a part of the peace agreement, and it's hard to see how the overall battle over this issue is over until it is. We'll see in the coming days.

All of that is not to take away from what a huge breakthrough this is. This has been a very, VERY bitter battle that has distorted local politics as well as spending all that money on lawyers and such. As one who lives right behind Lexington Medical, I can tell you I've caught a lot of heat over this emotional issue, as has the newspaper. It's been tough to get people to look beyond the feelings to the larger issue. (One way I've tried to do that personally has been by pointing out that if I were having a heart attack, I'd have to be transported right past Lexington, only a mile from my house, to Providence — but that I believe that situation is best for the community overall, in terms of better outcomes for more patients in the Midlands.)

Now, suddenly, it's over? Well, this part of it is. And I find myself torn between on the one hand celebrating the end of a really destructive conflict, and wondering why it's suddenly OK for an experienced open-heart team to be replaced by a startup? Mind you, I'm sure Lexington Medical will do as a good a job as anyone could starting such a program. It's an excellent hospital, and takes tremendous pride in doing everything it does well. Still, all things being equal, would we not be better off with the established team at Providence doing that portion of the region's procedures?

The thing is, politically and financially and in other ways, all things were NOT equal, and continued conflict had its cost. So I can see why Providence has agreed to this even as I have reservations. Lexington Medical is giving ground, too, by the way, aside from giving up money — it still has objections to the wisdom and advisability of the Providence Northeast expansion. But it's dropping those concerns in the interests of agreement.

By the way, as a brief primer on the importance of money in all these considerations: When Providence started doing open-heart decades ago, it wasn't a money-maker. The Sisters of Charity did it because somebody in South Carolina needed to. Later, open-heart surgery became very lucrative. And while I fully believe that all parties believed they were also doing what was best for their patients, the money has played a big role at each step in these battles. Palmetto Richland, with the largest share of indigent care and an extremely expensive trauma unit, needed to expand into heart surgery to have something that brought in revenues. Lexington didn't want to be left out of that. And Providence, which has struggled financially in recent years after an ill-advised partnership with a for-profit corporation (which the good sisters mortgaged their convent to get out of), could ill afford to give up the revenues.

That's the simplistic, "it's all about money" explanation. There are other factors at work as well. One of them is that the treatment of heart disease is increasingly moving beyond open-heart, often to less invasive therapies. That's one reason why Providence was unwilling to give up part of a pie that was diminishing in overall size. But it also seems to be a reason why it is willing to give it up now — open-heart isn't the future the way it once was, so Providence sees no point in continuing a wasteful fight over a portion of the diminishing number of such procedures to be done in the future.

Meanwhile, if I heard it right today, Lexington is NOT giving up its objections to a certificate involving the main Providence campus. So all is not sweetness and light, with all conflicts behind us in this community.

But no doubt about it, this is a major step by these two very important local institutions. It's huge. But it's SO huge, and complicated, that much remains to be sorted out.

Governator vs. Sanford

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Just in case you missed this little interaction between our own governor and the one out in Collie-forn-nee-ah, I bring it to your attention:

Schwarzenegger and Crist are at odds with South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, the chairman of the Republican Governors Association. Sanford called the package a huge mistake and warned that the nation will hit a tipping point by stacking up trillions and trillions in debt.

In an appearance Sunday on ABC's "This Week with George Stephanopoulos," Schwarzenegger took a shot at Sanford.

"Well, Governor Sanford says that he does not want to take the money, the federal stimulus package money. And I want to say to him: I'll take it," Schwarzenegger said. "I'm more than happy to take his money or any other governor in this country that doesn't want to take this money, I take it, because we in California can need it."

After leaving the meeting at the White House Monday, Sanford shot back.

"It's a difference of opinion that makes the world go round," Sanford told reporters.

Caller strikes blow for George Washington and other white folks

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Just thought I'd share this voicemail from over the weekend, of a type that I get from time to time. I like to share the joy when I can.

It's from a reader who wanted to see more about George Washington's birthday in the paper. I thought at first maybe this was someone who had missed the point that this year was Lincoln's 200th, and thought Washington should have gotten as much play as Honest Abe. But no; that wasn't the caller's problem.

Here's the audio, and here's my transcription of the money part of the message, in case you can't hear it:

…On Martin Luther King's birthday, y'all had pages and pages and pages of stuff, for weeks and weeks and weeks. I think it's a 'sgrace… your paper is not for our state; it's for the black people; it's not for the white people; you're a racist paper; that's why nobody takes you anymore. Goodbye.

Well, that’s a big releef

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At 11:02 a.m. today, I received a release from Jim Clyburn's office with the following headline on it:

CLYBURN CALLS
JINDAL’S BLUFF, HIGHLIGHTS HYPOCRACY

Then, at 11:33, I got the corrected version, which makes me feel so much better:

CLYBURN CALLS
JINDAL’S BLUFF, HIGHLIGHTS HYPOCRICY

Still awaiting the next correction; I'll let you know when I see it…

Historic Isadore Lourie speech

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

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

Remarks

By the

Honorable Isadore E. Lourie

On the Occasion of the Installation
of the

Richland County Legislative
Delegation

November 13, 1970

House Chamber, The State House,
Columbia, South Carolina

 

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

 

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

 

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

 

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

 

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

 

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

 

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

 

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

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

Leon Lott at Rotary: THREE standing ovations

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Well, I saw something I've never seen before at my Rotary Club, to the best of my memory (and fellow Rotarians, correct me if I'm wrong): Our main speaker got THREE standing ovations — before he started speaking, in the middle of his remarks, and when he finished. I've seen some war heroes and others get TWO before, but the club is generally fairly sparing with the standing Os, and the three today can be taken as a deliberate and spontaneous statement by the members of the state's largest Rotary.

The speaker was Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott.

And far from this being a generic, institutional, I'm-your-sheriff-and-here's-what-I-do-for-a-living sort of speech out of the can, the entire thing was a spirited, sometimes humorous, ultimately deadly serious rebuttal to the criticism that the Sheriff has received over the last three weeks over the Michael Phelps affair.

First the humorous — excuse the crude phone photo above. I didn't have my real camera with me. Fortunately, thestate.com videographer Andy Haworth was there, and he's going to give me a link once he gets what he has posted. Anyway, my crude shot above was taken after the sheriff had warmed up for his speech by a) donning a flak vest; b) saying "I've got my own damn' medals" and hanging them around his neck, then c) having quoted Newsweek as describing him as "blond and photogenic," putting on an Ellie Mae Clampett-style wig.

The sheriff then went on to explain that "I didn't have a choice" whether to investigate the Phelps photo that had been seen around the world, explaining that he didn't care about the picture itself per se, but he did care about what kids in Richland County saw when they looked at it. So he did what he saw as his duty, and carried the case as far as he reasonably could — without doing anything out of the ordinary — before closing it for lack of further evidence.

Then, in the spirit of late night television (where he has been the butt of a certain amount of jocularity), he offered his responses to the Top Ten criticisms he's heard in the last three weeks:

  1. It's "only marijuana," and everybody does it or has done it at some time. He singled me out at that point to say he doesn't normally read blogs, but he read what I wrote last week about someone close to me whose downward slide in life began with youthful dope smoking, and he said he had similar experiences in his life. "I've seen people die from the use of majijuana. You know, maybe that's why it's illegal." He mentioned a close friend in high school, a football hero, who he said is dead because of marijuana. "Don't give me that BS that it doesn't hurt anybody because it does; I've seen it."
  2. Marijuana "shouldn't be illegal." The sheriff explained that that wasn't his department — he enforces the law; he doesn't make it. Pointing to state Sen. Joel Lourie out in the audience, he proposed that those who would like the law changed to take it up with him and other lawmakers.
  3. His investigation was "a waste of taxpayer's money." He said a total of 16 man-hours were spent on the case out of his entire department for the three weeks, for a grand-total expenditure — based on the involved deputies' pay rates — of $322.48. He defended the modest outlay, saying "That's our job."
  4. That he was only pursuing the case "to make a name." Well, he said, "I have a name," and he's had it since his parents gave it to him 55 years ago, and he's satisfied with it. He explained the sequence of events this way: Three weeks ago, after the photo of Phelps with a bong created a worldwide sensation, a reporter asked him, "Sheriff, are you going to do anything about it?" He said he would investigate, and that was the LAST statement he made to any sort of media about the subject until his press conference closing the case a week ago. "I could have been on Leno" or any other of many media opportunities that were offered to him during the period, but which he turned down. In reply to an accusation that he was just trying to get his Warholian "15 minutes," he said, "I could have had 35 hours" of fame if he had wanted it. "When we were through with (the investigation) and I got through quail hunting," he had a press conference "and that was it."
  5. "I was running for re-election — Dadgummit," he thought he just got through doing that (which he did, having been re-elected in November).
  6. "I didn't have nothing better to do." Oh, yeah, the sheriff said — he is SO bored as sheriff. And here he got pretty passionate. Yeah, he said, he's got other things to do, and he's doing them. He referred in particular to the Denny Terrace attacks — the brutal beating death of Linda Derrick and the beating and stabbing of Carolyn Webb. The suspect, Elbert Wallace, is one the sheriff has described as a "crackhead," and who Solicitor Barney Giese said "really did terrorize a community for a long period of time." Mrs. Derrick's sister Susan Porth said "My precious sister’s life was taken so this man could get high." The sheriff said today, "That's why that lady's dead, because of drugs," making the point that the suspect didn't start smoking crack. His point in bringing this up was to say that he's doing his job on these more important cases, and that's what he has homicide investigators for. But he also has a narcotics unit, and it is also doing its job. And that unit did its job in the Phelps case. By the way, the sheriff noted, nobody got arrested in the case for being in the famous bong picture. Rather, "We arrested 8 people who were stupid enough to have drugs on them at the… time when we went to… talk with them." That's what they were charged with.
  7. "I'm running for governor." He thought that was pretty bizarre. He wondered what he'd do if he were elected governor — "I'd be like the dog that caught the car." Again, he pointed to Joel Lourie if you wanted to talk to a potential gubernatorial candidate (but as readers of The State and this blog know, Vincent Sheheen is running instead of either Joel or James Smith).
  8. "It was only a college dope party." Lott said cops had been to this house twice previously because of thefts associated with the fact that thieves knew there were drugs on the premises. "This was a drug house that was a menace to the neighborhood."
  9. Quoting a letter he received, "Michael Phelps is a true American hero, and you are a true American ass." He said it was from "another disgusted taxpayer" — in Michigan. The sheriff went on to repeat what he had said earlier about his national fan mail: "I don't care what a dope smoker in California thinks about me."
  10. Finally, "Why?" Why the investigation, that is. "How could I not? How could I just ignore it?" He said it was his job to take those medals from around the neck of the guy in the photo and investigate, and he did, and that was that, and "I can go to bed at night knowing I've done my job."

It was right after he finished with his top ten that the sheriff got his second standing ovation.

In response to a question, he went on to talk about the fact that "Mexico is in a war right now," with a lot of people getting killed, because of the U.S. market for drugs — that is to say, a market driven by demand from "Michael Phelps and college kids" and others in this country. "Every time we light up a joint here," we in this country are contributing to that violence.

Anyway, the support for the sheriff in that room was pretty solid. Good for Leon.

Looking ahead to 2010: Are we hopeful yet?

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By BRAD WARTHEN
Editorial Page Editor

Since
the current occupant has sort of put the whole
being-governor-of-South-Carolina thing behind him — nowadays you have
to track national media to know what he’s up to — let’s follow his
lead, and look forward to the time when he no longer holds the office
even technically.

    In the spirit of getting us to that point as
quickly as possible, I spoke last week with the one declared candidate
for the 2010 gubernatorial election, Sen. Vincent Sheheen.

    If you
don’t know the 37-year-old Camden attorney, you might know his daddy,
former Higher Education Commissioner Fred, or his uncle, former House
Speaker Bob. He is like them in his dedication to public service, yet
very different. His uncle was the last Democrat to run the House, while
the nephew has been shaped by having to get things done in a world run
by Republicans. It’s made him a consensus-builder, and he thinks that
has prepared him well for this moment.

    Not only does he think he
has a good chance of gaining the Democratic nomination among those who
have been mentioned — and his close allies who might have drawn from
the same base of support, Rep. James Smith and Sen. Joel Lourie, are
not running — but, “at this point in the state’s history, I have a good
chance in the general election,” whoever the GOP nominee is. Why?
“Because people are not satisfied.”

    He can identify with that: “I’ve reached this point out of frustration and hope.”

    “We
have been stuck in a rut for a long time,” he said, and “I am not
seeing things changing at all. And that’s very frustrating.” He senses
a similar frustration in the electorate. He thinks voters realize that
“if we keep… not doing anything, then we’re not going to improve.”

    So what does he want to do?

  • “Get
    real again about job creation and economic development.” He says the
    state needs a governor who will treat that as a priority, playing an
    active part in recruiting business, and working to see that the whole
    state, including the rural parts, benefits.
  • “Pulling
    South Carolina’s governmental structure into at least the 20th century,
    and maybe the 21st century.” Some of what he wants to do is what the
    current governor has said he wanted to do. But the plan that Mr.
    Sheheen has put forward (parts of which he explains on the facing page)
    actually has some traction — enough so that Mark Sanford mentioned it
    favorably in his State of the State address this year. Sen. Sheheen
    believes the time has come to move restructuring past the starting
    line, and he thinks he can do it: “I’m not knocking anybody; I’m just
    saying it’s time to have somebody who can build consensus.”
  • “Change
    the way we spend our money.” As he rightly describes the process, “We
    budget in the dark.” He wants to see a programmatic budget, followed by
    the legislative oversight that has been missing, to make sure the
    spending does what it’s intended to do.
  • Combine
    conservation with economic development. He thinks we need to move
    beyond setting aside just to conserve, but convert what is conserved to
    benefit “the humans in a community.” He points to the ways the Camden
    battlefield     has been used to promote tourism.
  • Change
    the way we fund education. Make funding equitable, based on pupils, not
    districts, so that “a similarly situated student will have the same
    opportunities … regardless of where they live.”

    When I ask
whether there’s anything else, he confesses: “I’m a geek. I could keep
going, but … I’ve got to think of something that’s politically
catchy. I’m supposed to do that.”

    At which point he proves his
geekhood by mentioning comprehensive tax reform, which he’s been
advocating “since my first day in the House.”

    But while that
issue might not make voters’ hearts beat faster, he speaks again of
what he sees as “a growing consensus that we need to do something.”

    And
he thinks the high-profile, counterproductive “contention between the
current governor and the Legislature” has created an opportunity for
someone who wants to move beyond that.

    But how would a Democrat
fare in that task in a State House run by Republicans? Quite well, he
says. He calls Republican Carroll Campbell “one of the most effective
governors,” a fact he attributes in part to the “constructive friction”
between him and the Democratic Legislature that his Uncle Bob helped
lead.

    Ironically, Vincent Sheheen seems to be suggesting that his
party has become enough of an outsider in the halls of state power that
a consensus-minded Democrat could be less threatening to, and more
successful in working with, the GOP leadership. “Someone who is not
jockeying for position within their own party could actually help to
bring together some of the different factions.”

    As a
representative of “swing counties” — Chesterfield, Lancaster and
Kershaw — he sees himself as having the ability to be that Democrat.

    Thus
far — perhaps because he’s the only declared candidate in either party
— he wears the burden of this campaign lightly. At one point he asks
me, “Am I making you hopeful?” — then chuckles when I decline to answer.

    But
I will say this to you, the reader: He’s talking about the right
issues, and he’s talking about them the right way. That’s a start.
Here’s hoping that the candidates yet to declare, in both parties, do
the same. Then perhaps we can have a gubernatorial choice, for once,
between good and better.

For links and more, please go to thestate.com/bradsblog/.

Sunday preview: A look at gubernatorial field for 2010 (all one of it)

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For once, I am ahead of the game. I have now interviewed ALL of the declared candidates for governor in 2010, and have written about them in my Sunday column.

Of course, there's only one so far: Sen. Vincent Sheheen, Democrat from Camden.

I don't know who will be the next candidate to declare, but I'll tell you who's running the hardest among the undeclared: Attorney General Henry McMaster, Republican. Hardly a day goes by that I don't get a release about him speaking to this or that Republican group in some nook or cranny of the state. In fact, I got this one just yesterday about his appearing on Sen. Sheheen's home turf:

COLUMBIA – Attorney General Henry McMaster will be honored for his service to Kershaw County at a BBQ dinner and rally this Friday, Feb. 20th at 6:00 pm.  The rally will take place at: KCMC Health Resource Center, 124 Battleship Rd, Camden.  The public is invited to attend.  There will be a media availability immediately following the rally.

In fact, looking at the old clock on the wall, it looks like I'm missing that as I type this. And that would have been a good one for me to go to, had it not been on a Friday. I look forward to seeing Henry and/or Vincent and whoever else out there stumping soon, because we can't get to 2010 soon enough as far as I'm concerned. I'm tired of reading AP stories describing network news interviews with Mark Sanford promoting his (shudder) national ambitions, just so I can find out what our governor's up to.

One of the things my Sunday column talks about is the candidate's views on government restructuring. On the same day, we'll have a column co-authored by him and Anton Gunn on the same subject (continuing a string of me writing columns related to op-eds that day, such as last week's on Mark Sanford, and the recent one on DHEC). As further background material on that subject, here's a post from a little over a year ago from when Vincent came to talk about his restructuring plan (yes, I actually wrote about something other than the presidential primaries in January 2008), and here's video that goes with that.

And just to show you the subject's been on him mind a while, here's a 2007 post that's sort of related.

Of course, he hasn't been thinking about restructuring as long as I have; at least I hope not (even though he does claim to be something of a "geek."). He was in college when we did the "Power Failure" series.Yes, ladies and gentlemen, we have here a gubernatorial candidate who was born in the year I graduated from high school. I still remember vividly our editorial board interview with the first gubernatorial candidate I'd ever interviewed who was younger than I was — David Beasley in 1994. Since then, every governor we've had has been younger than I am.

And now this. These kids today…

Well, that would be a radical departure

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Headline from the Greenville News site:

I also enjoyed this quote from the AP story (which we also ran, under a more realistic headline), which in Mark Sanford's book is a major admission:

"Throw enough money at any problem and you're going to help some folks."

Watch now — Lee's going to start calling him a socialist…

One more thing… you notice how, if you want to know what Mark Sanford is doing or saying, you have to go to Washington or tune in to national media? He's never been very interested in South Carolina, much less in governing it, but he's definitely gone to new extremes in recent weeks.

Did you see the Gossett column?

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Just by way of completing a loop…

Remember my column of Jan. 25, in which I wrote, in part:

    While I was writing that column, I heard from my colleague Cindi Scoppe
that Manufacturers Alliance chief Lewis Gossett was sending us an op-ed
clarifying his position after The State’s Sammy Fretwell had reported
that he and S.C. Chamber of Commerce president Otis Rawl were
supporting legislative efforts to put DHEC in the governor’s Cabinet.
   
Not having received that op-ed (and we still hadn’t received it a week
later, when this page was composed), I just wrote around the business
leaders, and focused on another Fretwell story that reported that the chairman of the DHEC board, Bo Aughtry, was supportive of the Cabinet idea.
“It is worthy of serious consideration because I believe it would take
some of the political influence out of decisions that really should not
be political,” he had told Sammy.

That ran something like 10 days after I'd heard that we were going to get that "clarifying" op-ed.

Well, it ran on Monday, in case you missed it. Here's a link.

By way of full disclosure, I want to tell you that it didn't take Mr. Gossett quite as long as it looks to get back to us. Cindi (who handles local op-eds these days) says in answer to my asking her today that she received it on Feb. 5. It was the right length for a Monday slot (it was short, and we usually run a short op-ed on Mondays), and she wasn't able to get it edited to her satisfaction in time to run it on Monday, Feb. 9 (content for that page had to be ready on the morning of Feb. 6). So it ran on the following Monday, Feb. 16.

Just so you know.

Anyway, Mr. Gossett had three main points in his piece:

  1. First, he wanted to complain that in their stories about DHEC Sammy and John down in the newsroom had reported only part of what he had said on the subject. (Of course, anyone can say that at any time unless we just publish transcripts of interviews, but you get what he means — that in his opinion, important points were left out.)
  2. Then, he wanted to say that while "I generally prefer the Cabinet form of government if any restructuring is necessary," he doesn't think it's necessary in this case.
  3. Finally, he wanted to say that DHEC is really as tough on manufacturers as it needs to be.

Actually, you know what? Never mind my summary of what he said (even though summarizing what people say is kinda what I do professionally); he might claim I left out the important parts. Just go read it.

You might also want to read the Bo Aughtry piece ALSO saying his support of restructuring was not accurately represented. And then you might fully understand what I said at the outset of my Jan. 25 column:

JUST
IN CASE you were wondering, or knew and had forgotten, this is the way
the political culture pushes back against change in South Carolina: Not
with a bang, but with an “Aw, never mind.”
    Remember last week’s column,
in which I offered, as a rare sign of hope, the gathering consensus
that the state Department of Health and Environmental Control should be
made more accountable by placing it directly under the elected chief
executive? Well, ever since then, there’s been some backtracking.

Valerie’s story on Sanford, stimulus

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Somehow I missed, until a release from Jim Clyburn's office, the story that our own Valerie Bauerlein co-wrote in The Wall Street Journal Saturday about Mark Sanford and the stimulus.

Headlined "GOP Governor Sees Danger in States Accepting Stimulus Money," it mostly said what we already knew here in Columbia about the governor's posturing for his national fan club at the expense of South Carolina. But a small detail in the story jumped out at me. It didn't tell me anything new, but it grabbed me nonetheless:

    When the fate of the stimulus bill was still uncertain last week, Mr. Sanford traveled to Washington on Feb. 4 to ask Republican senators to fight it. Most Washington Republicans, in the House as well as the Senate, lined up against the initiative, drawing a sharp distinction with Democrats — though three moderate Republicans joined with all 58 Democrats to propel the recovery package out of the Senate.
    Other Republican governors have been more favorable toward the plan. Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, for example, broke with party leaders by stumping for the proposal with Mr. Obama in Fort Myers on Monday.

Did it hit you, too? I'm talking about this part: "Mr. Sanford traveled to Washington on Feb. 4 to ask Republican senators to fight it…"

We're talking about a guy who, even if you go by HIS account, hasn't been able to find a minute since 2003 to meet with the Employment Security Commission of his own state (he can threaten to fire them, but he can't sit down and talk with them). We're talking about a guy who is notorious for not working with lawmakers of his own party, who meet one floor above his office — even though he CAN find time to carry piglets up there so they can poop all over the nice new carpet.

This same guy finds time to run up to Washington and lobby Republicans up THERE to do what they were going to do anyway, so he can posture for the WSJ as though he had something to do with it.

Meanwhile, back home, he's forcing all sorts of people to go to all kinds of lengths to prepare to work around him because of his sorta, kinda threat to be an obstacle (as Valerie puts it, he's being "coy" about it) to stimulus funds coming to South Carolina, which is ALSO all about him and his posturing.

Of course Valerie reminds us at the end of just how influential Mark Sanford is with Republicans:

But even in Republican-led South Carolina, Mr. Sanford may have difficulty holding the line. Leaders of the GOP-controlled state legislature concede Mr. Sanford's point, but would want to at least accept the $480 million for roads, bridges and other infrastructure the state is eligible for.

Of course they would. That's because they care about South Carolina more than they care about ideological posturing.

Not only is dope illegal, it should be

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Note Cindi's column today about Sheriff Lott and Michael Phelps.

Originally (in a somewhat condensed form), it was going to be an editorial — that is, an expression of the consensus of the editorial board as a whole. Trouble is, we didn't reach consensus.

We were all in agreement that the sheriff was right to drop the case, and inadvisable to have taken it as far as he did. We agreed that the law should be applied equally, but that there was no case here, and discretion would dictate that the sheriff's department's resources would have been better spend elsewhere.

We also agreed that had Phelps been caught in the act, and in possession — say, if the cops had raided the party — he should have been prosecuted. The law is the law.

But then, we had a disagreement. Warren and I wanted to say that not only is the law the law, but it should be the law. We agree with Cindi that we don't need to have nonviolent offenders in our prisons — they need treatment and probation, not jail time. But Warren and I believe marijuana possession should still be a crime; Cindi isn't convinced of that. She's not sure what she thinks, but she is inclined to believe it should be regulated more the way alcohol is.

We didn't get deeply into WHY we thought what we did. We were too busy scrambling to rethink tomorrow's page, turning the piece into a column (as you should know, signed columns reflect the opinion of the writer; unsigned editorials the board view) and making other changes on deadline.

But I'll tell you one reason I think the way I do. And it's the classic case of personal experience shaping one's views, so be aware. You've probably read about how heavy use of marijuana can mess with the development of an adolescent brain. Well, I've seen that up close. Someone very close to me started smoking dope heavily when he was about 12. Over the next decade you could tell that something had gone wrong with a bright and engaging kid. For one thing, he didn't grow up. Up until the time he died at age 30, he still talked like a kid. He was very credulous, having trouble telling between what was likely to be true and what was not. He lost connection with the truth. He turned to petty dishonesty in pursuit of drugs (eventually going well past marijuana, of course). He never kept any job for long. He did several stretches in jail (for trying to pass forged prescriptions, not for anything violent). Eventually, his habits led to his early death.

Note that I'm not saying m.j. was a "gateway drug" for him. I'm saying that cannabis itself did something to him at a critical point in the development of his brain and personality that caused him to fail to be the adult he would otherwise have been.

So do I think that cannabis is worse than alcohol? No, I don't think so. Each is worse in different ways. But society made the decision a while back that it was NOT going to ban alcohol; it's too ingrained in our culture. So we do what we can with regulating it, taxing it (and by the way, in SC we tax it MUCH more heavily than we do tobacco, in case you were wondering) and keeping it out of the hands of kids. We do NOT have to make the same concessions for loco weed; the case just isn't nearly as strong. Maybe if Jesus had turned the water into Panama Red, dope would have the same central role in our culture that wine does. But he didn't. His very first miracle was to affirm the central role of alcohol in a sacramental celebration. And I cite that not to make a religious or theological point, but a cultural one. Humans stopped being hunter-gatherers so they could grown barley to make beer, or so I'm convinced. We just can't root it out.

Anyway, I'm meandering now. What do y'all think? Not all at once, now…