Monday, April 20, 2009

Making sense

More of this, please:

Gov. Sanford’s philosophical belief that we should send South Carolina’s money to other states while our citizens continue to struggle is in essence telling our citizens who have no bread to just eat cake instead.

... While Gov. Sanford has made it clear that he adamantly opposes taking this education and law enforcement stimulus money, he has at the same time already accepted all the other funds that he can out of the remaining 90 percent of the $8 billion in stimulus money and tax cuts coming to our state.

It makes no sense for the governor to cherry-pick the funds he will accept — such as the $50 million to make buildings more energy-efficient that he requested the other week — and oppose money for teachers and law enforcement officers on so-called “philosophical” grounds. This is inconsistent with any kind of viewpoint and goes against what most people would consider to be common sense.

Would it interest you to know that this came from the (Republican) Speaker of the House in South Carolina?

To quote DougJ over at Balloon Juice:

It’s tempting to say it’s surprising that someone so lucid and practical would be Speaker of the House of a government as dysfunctional as South Carolina’s appears to be. But there are pragmatic people everywhere, thank God. The problem with the Republican party isn’t that all of its elected officials are loons (they’re not), it’s that they’re letting the inmates, er, I mean philosophers, run the asylum.

How long until Bobby Harrell has to apologize to Rush Limbaugh?

4 comments:

Kia said...

I have nothing of substance to add but wanted to share my disgust at the situation in general and at the Governor's wife in particular.

I'm a huge tennis fan and yesterday watched the televised conclusion of a women's tournament on Daniel's Island in Charleston.

Jenny Sanford was there in all her unctuous glory. Quoting from the bible, but not any inconvenient passages like the meek inheriting the earth, or the eye of the needle, the camel, the rich man or heaven...

We all know that life is staus quo for a precious few in this country, but seeing her yesterday, given her husband's tragic decisions, made my stomach turn.

blackink said...

Aw, see, I missed that. Those folks should be ashamed of themselves but Jenny Sanford can't help who she's married to.

Like, I imagine that Laura Bush is probably a delightful woman. But her husband wrought tremendous damage on the rest of us and it's sort of hard to move on from there.

But to address your larger point, indeed. Some people are interested in preserving the status quo, even to the detriment of millions of others. It must be a tough thing to swallow if you happen to be unfortunate enough to be unemployed and a resident of South Carolina.

Kia said...

Last I checked the Sanford's marriage was not arranged : ) She and Laura get tarred with the same brush as their mates as far as I'm concerned.

I'm sure most of that well heeled crowd helped to elect Sanford but as someone who envisions my senior years with a straw hat and high ball watching these same tourneys, I'm not mad at the rich of SC across the board. But Jenny gets a special disdain because as Chris Rock pointed out you can't marry a crack head if you're all about going to church! : )

blackink said...

Haha. True dat. But you know how it goes, Sanford might be a complete asshole at the statehouse and a sweetheart at home.