Bad News For Tourism States July 2, 2008
Posted by fitsnews in : SC Politics , 10 comments
AND HOW SOUTH CAROLINA’S LAWMAKERS HAVE MADE OUR STATE’S SITUATION WORSE
FITSNews - July 2, 2008 - With national reports showing that travel this July 4th holiday is down, you’d think that states which rely on tourism to keep their economies up and running (like South Carolina) would be doing everything they could to lure more potential visitors.
Of course, that sort of common sense doesn’t penetrate the thick skulls of our boneheaded lawmakers, who decided to put our state’s tourism marketers into the field this year with one arm tied behind their backs.
Despite restoring a portion of destination-specific marketing dollars to South Carolina’s Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism, the agency is still working with $11 million less in this year’s budget than it had last year.
Evidently, lawmakers felt that money was better spent on their pet project slush fund.
“(Reduced revenue) means serious changes,” PRT spokesman Marion Edmunds told FITSNews today. “We are having to scale back on the advertising of our product.” (more…)
What Is This Doing On A U.S. Senator’s Website?
Posted by fitsnews in : SC Politics , 3 commentsPALMETTO SCOOP FINDS GAY SATIRE LINK ON JIM DEMINT’S WEBSITE DISCLAIMER
FITSNews - July 2, 2008 - A homosexual satire video can be accessed from the website disclaimer of U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint, which might be explainable if the video’s producers weren’t also employed by his political consultant, Warren Tompkins.
From the Palmetto Scoop:
The link can be found on the site’s disclaimer, where it reads “Website by Under The Power Lines” — the company that developed DeMint’s site and apparently these videos as well. When visitors click on “Under the Power Lines,” they are taken to TheCoveShorts’ YouTube page, featuring the above video.
Readers may remember that this same group was responsible for the Phoney Fred Wesbite launched during the height of the Republican presidential primary battle.
Yeah … we remember. Nice work by the Scoop … and it’ll be interesting to see how long it takes for these ass clowns to shut down the links on DeMint’s page. Last time they got caught with their pants down, they just disappeared from the Internet for a couple of months.
UPDATE - By the way, Under the Power Lines creative director Lauren Parsons is kinda hot. You gotta love a girl that “felt a tingle in her heart” the first time she wrote some Internet code. Rrrrrawww!!!
Rawl Tapped To Lead S.C. Chamber July 1, 2008
Posted by fitsnews in : SC Politics , 3 comments
POTENTIALLY POSITIVE SHIFT AT THE TOP OF POWERFUL STATE BUSINESS ORGANIZATION
FITSNews - July 1, 2008 - One of South Carolina’s most influential organizations has a new leader today, as State House veteran and former Chief Operating Officer Otis Rawl has assumed the reins over at the S.C. Chamber of Commerce.
We’ve been among the Chamber’s most vocal critics in recent years, owing to the increasingly leftist lean of the organization under outgoing President Hunter Howard. Frankly, we believe the fact that the Chamber has been co-opted by the status quo forces in the S.C. Legislature has neutered its effectiveness as a pro-business lobby.
Whether on taxes, spending or education reform, the Chamber has more often than not geared its efforts toward protecting bureaucrats instead of businesses, entrenched institutions instead of entrepreneurship and “pork as usual” instead of prosperity.
Rawl, however, could be a ray of hope. He’s certainly not afraid to rattle lawmakers’ cages when the need arises, and our experience with him leads us to believe that he will be far more receptive to legitimate pro-business interests than his predecessor ever was. Time will tell, but we view this as a positive development for the chamber, and hopefully a sign that it will soon begin to advance the sort of sound fiscal policy needed to improve our state’s abysmal competitive position.
So Long, Shot June 30, 2008
Posted by fitsnews in : SC Politics, The Press , 3 comments
THE NET’S GOOD OLD BOY DEFENDERS SAY GOODBYE
FITSNews - June 30, 2008 - The internet wing of consultant Warren Tompkins incumbent protection and lobbyist enrichment business (a.k.a. Shot Politics) is shutting down, according to a post on their website. After three years and literally hundreds of articles, “The Shot” closed its doors with a music video and a quote from the song they selected for their farewell, “Closing Time” by Minneapolis-based Semisonic.
Which means for once there was actually something worth watching on their website …
In all seriousness, though, we’re sad to see them go. As much as we disagreed with their big government, ambulance chaser world view, they certainly kept Sic Willie’s ego well-fed and occasionally provided us with some competition.
Anyway, check out Palmetto Scoop and SCHotline to see some other reactions to the news, and remember that one less disagreeing voice remains one less voice, which is never a good thing in an arena where more people need to be raising theirs to the rooftops …
The S.C. Senate’s New Theme Song
Posted by fitsnews in : SC Politics , 3 commentsTHEY GOT 99 PROBLEMS BUT …
FITSNews - June 30, 2008 - It goes without saying that Sic Willie and the FITS gals are all for more women in politics. Seriously people, South Carolina ranks last-in-the-nation in the percentage of female elected officials in its legislature, another embarrassing national gutter ball and quite frankly part of the reason we have such an ineffective legislature.
But here’s the thing - we need female leaders, not female followers of our state’s failed status quo if South Carolina is ever going to reverse its track record of failure. And we also need more women who are willing to run on actual ideas, not the fact that they have vaginas.
That’s why we’re thoroughly unimpressed with the candidacy of Democrat Mandy Powers Norrell, who seems to be basing her entire campaign for the State Senate on the fact that she doesn’t have a penis.
Well, to be fair, she’s also for spending kabillions of additional taxpayer dollars on all of the same failed solutions that have kept our state at the bottom of all the national rankings for decades.
Seriously, where are all the good conservative women in this state? Why are the only women on the ballot this November “pink right down to their underwear?”
B.S. Spending
Posted by fitsnews in : SC Politics , 10 comments
LAWMAKERS SLIP THEIR PORK IN RIGHT AFTER THE ELECTIONS
FITSNews - June 30, 2008 - Ever since we blew the lid on South Carolina’s utterly ridiculous “competitive grants program” last year, the scrutiny faced by this legislative slush fund went through the roof. Simply put, it has been one of the few scandals over at the State House that the mainstream media has actually seized upon. Yeah, color us shocked on that one, too.
Anyway, given all the attention, don’t think for a minute that it was an accident when the program’s top two slush-buddies - House Ways & Means Chairman Dan “Egg-tooth” Cooper and Senate Finance Chairman Hugh Leatherman - selected Friday June 27, 2008 as the day they would release the latest batch of bullshit spending.
Think about it, people. They posted this trash less than 48 hours after the last votes were cast in the 2008 Republican primary season … (more…)
The ACLU Is Coming To Town June 28, 2008
Posted by fitsnews in : SC Politics, US Politics , 4 comments
STILL THINK SOUTH CAROLINA IS THE REDDEST STATE IN THE NATION?
FITSNews - June 28, 2008 - We don’t have anything against the American Civil Liberties Union, mind you, but the fact that one of the nation’s leading liberal activist groups is opening an office in South Carolina should serve notice that our state’s reddish tinge is beginning to get a tad purpler.
That’s assuming, of course, that the Democratic avalanche in the 2008 S.C. presidential primary (Dems turned out 525,000 voters compared to the GOP’s 446,000) didn’t sufficiently drive that message home.
Republicans are in big trouble, people … like, everywhere. But then again they deserve to be, so we don’t really feel sorry for them. Particularly not South Carolina Republicans, who might as well be Democrats the way they spend our money.
Anyway, several SCGOP leaders have already privately fretted to FITSNews that their party will lose several seats in the 2008 general election, and while the “Republican” majority isn’t yet imperiled, it sure as hell deserves to be.
