More Unemployment Finger Pointing

Failure of “5-year plan” style economics plagues South Carolina. Lawmakers look to “pass the buck.”

It appears that several high profile members of the SC General Assembly are struggling with severe confusion over the causes of unemployment in South Carolina.

In addition to relating the depressing news that South Carolina has one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation, this article from The Charleston Post and Courier website confirms that more than one legislator is indeed completely detached from any semblance of reality.

This from the article-

“[SC Senators] Cooper and Leatherman say Gov. Mark Sanford is to blame for the state’s high unemployment rate. “After observing the actual results over the past several years, it has become painfully clear to me that this administration simply does not care about creating jobs for our people, and I think that’s obvious to everyone,” Sen. Leatherman said.”

What should be most obvious to everyone is that legislators like Hugh Leatherman and Dan Cooper are infinitely more engaged in hoarding tax dollars in slush funds than running a streamlined and transparent government.

Orangeburg Brain Trust Ponders Fuel Costs

In response to increasing fuel costs, Orangeburg Representative Jerry Govan is bending the full weight of his intellect toward lessening the impact of high fuel costs on South Carolinians. The result of this world- shaking endeavor? A four day school week.

This from the Orangeburg Times and Democrat-

“It’s worth discussing,” said state Rep. Jerry Govan, D-Orangeburg, who plans to introduce legislation calling for a statewide four-day work week.
In addition, he is currently researching the possibility of a four-day school week. He says such a move would save the state more than $10 million per year to operate school buses alone.

What a surprise. There go our hopes of Govan suggesting that Orangeburg school districts undergo an audit to determine what redundancies and waste can be culled out to free up money for necessities… like fuel for buses.

Waste Not, Want Not

The Spartanburg Herald Journal rightly takes the SC General Assembly to task in a blistering editorial titled “Failure to set priorities.” Completely disregarding projected shortfalls in the state budget, legislators have staunchly refused to touch the millions of tax dollars they have stored away for personal pork barrel projects.

From the article

“A committee voted last week to give $10 million to a collection of lawmakers’ pet projects despite the fact that the state budget is in trouble and lawmakers know they may have to come back to Columbia later this year to deal with shortfalls.

The committee spent $10 million of the $18 million in the Competitive Grants Program, which actually involves no competition. The program simply allocates money to the favored local projects of lawmakers.”