The Opinion Blog

Brainpower could shape more useful MB airport plan

In an editorial today, the newspaper notes that something positive could come of the legislative proposal to place control of Myrtle Beach International Airport under a quasi-independent governing body:

Last week, the newspaper's editorial board panned proposed legislation to wrest ownership of the county's airports from Horry County government and transfer it to a 10-member state-run commission. The chief concern was that too little time remains in this year's General Assembly session for legislators to fix the bill's flaws and craft a plan that Horry County could support. Change can't happen without the county's cooperation.

Now one of the legislation's sponsors, S.C. Sen. Luke Rankin, R-Myrtle Beach, plans to give folks with an interest in local airports a chance to comment, before the session ends, on his airport-commission proposal. (S.C. Rep. Alan Clemmons, R-Myrtle Beach, has introduced an identical bill in the House.) A Senate Transportation subcommittee will convene this week in Columbia to hear testimony into the legislation.

Mid-May national debt check-up

Friends: We last checked in on our national debt April 23, when the total stood at $9,341,483,600,140.48. As of today, it stands at $9,352,287,132,675.25. In a little over three weeks, in short, the debt has risen about $10.8 billion. That this increase doesn't seem so bad is a powerful indicator of how jaded I, at least, have become about unsecured federal spending.

You can find more information about the federal debt at http://www.treasurydirect.gov/NP/BPDLogin?application=np

Cheers (if that's the word), dc

Weekend cartoon extra #3

By Jimmy Margulies, The Record (Hackensack, N.J.)

Click below to view the #1 & #2 cartoons.

WEEKEND OPEN FORUM: What's on your mind?

Post comments below on any issue you want. The only limitations: the ground rules listed at the left and your own imagination. I'll reply when appropriate. Have fun. dc

(If you wish your comment to be considered for publication in the newspaper, copy it into an e-mail and send it to opinions@thesunnews.com. Please add your address and phone number to the e-mail so we can contact you for verification. The size limit for letters is 150 words.)

We owe our national politicians bigger salaries

Ripped from the wires ... Leonard Pitts Jr. explains why George W. Bush and members of Congress should receive fat pay raises.

By Leonard Pitts Jr.

I think George W. Bush deserves a raise.

You're waiting for the punchline, I know. You're figuring with a setup like that, about a president whose popularity lives down where moles and earthworms do, the payoff's got to be a doozy.

Sorry, but there is no punchline because that wasn't a setup. I think the president should get a raise. Congress, too. And yes, I know Congress' approval ratings are similarly subterranean.

But see, the argument I'm making has nothing to do with this individual president or Congress. It is, rather, about us, about what we want and deserve in our leadership. Here's the short version:

You get what you pay for.

Calif. joins Mass. (for now) on same-sex marriage

Ripped from the wires ... In an editorial today, the San Jose Mercury News cheers the California Supreme Court's voiding Thursday of that state's same-sex marriage ban, on the ground it is unconstitutional. The newspaper also worries that a ballot initiative now in the works could overturn the ruling:

The California Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that marrying someone of your own choosing is a fundamental civil right that applies to all. Californians have cause to celebrate this landmark decision.

The legalizing of same-sex marriage is a historic advancement of equality that should not be reversed.

Opponents, who are on the verge of putting a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage on the ballot in November, should read the majority's well-reasoned opinion. The jurists based their decision not on personal, moral or religious beliefs, but on the obligation to protect individual rights.

Six weeks of pain may mean victory for Barack

Ripped from the wires ... Author and pollster Douglas Schoen explains why the controversies and losses of the past six weeks have actually been good for Barack Obama:

By Douglas E. Schoen

Conventional wisdom suggests that these last two months have been bad news for Illinois Sen. Barack Obama. He hasn't been able to close the door on Democratic rival Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, who swept West Virginia on Tuesday. He's been dogged by controversies over his words and associates. Meanwhile, Republican Arizona Sen. John McCain has been getting a jump-start on the fall campaign.

Although those things may be true, so is this: The last six weeks have been a great benefit to Obama and may emerge as the most important period of his quest for the presidency.

FRIDAY OPEN FORUM: What's on your mind?

Post comments below on any issue you want. The only limitations: the ground rules listed at the left and your own imagination. I'll reply when appropriate. Have fun. dc

(If you wish your comment to be considered for publication in the newspaper, copy it into an e-mail and send it to opinions@thesunnews.com. Please add your address and phone number to the e-mail so we can contact you for verification. The size limit for letters is 150 words.)

Needed: An S.C. immigration bill that actually works

Friends: Here's an advance look at the newspaper's editorial for Friday. I'd be interested in reading your thoughts, if you have any. Thanks, dc.

A slim majority of S.C. senators are taking a drubbing this week because -- horrors! -- they wish to pass an immigration-reform law that regulators and prosecutors can actually enforce. The S.C. House and Gov. Mark Sanford seem more interested in passing a bill that "gets tough'' on employers who use foreign labor, with insufficient regard for whether the measure stands up in court.

The pressure on senators to "do something, fast," is intense. Some residents apparently want the heads of employers who hire illegals to be mounted on spikes along public roads. Sanford and the House leadership, meanwhile, are conducting an intense public-relations campaign that ridicules the Senate for refusing to pass an employer-crackdown bill that the House adopted last week.

Uh oh: McCain joins global warming cult

Ripped from the wires ... Cal Thomas takes issue with John McCain's recent declaration that humans are influencing climate change and must help fix the problem:

By CAL THOMAS

In an effort to win over those "moderates'' who believe that global warming is about to destroy the planet, Republican presidential candidate John McCain spoke Monday at a Portland, Ore., training facility for Vestas Wind Technology. He claimed, "The facts of global warming demand our urgent attention, especially in Washington.''

There certainly is more "hot air'' on this and a lot of other subjects in Washington, but that isn't what he meant. The era of big government is so not over, as Bill Clinton claimed it was in 1996. It is just beginning and increasingly the political contests seem to be about who will manage its growth, not who will reduce its size, cost and reach.

Our economic woes have their sweet side

Ripped from the wires ... Normally, I would not go back to Froma Harrop so soon after posting her other piece, but when she's right, she's right. Here, she discusses the positive aspects of our economic slowdown.

By FROMA HARROP

The morning after overdoing it, some of us take pleasure in the cleansing process. The carrot juice goes down smoothly, and a simple walk feels virtuous. One vows to exert more self-control and give yoga another try.

The current economic downturn creates its own kind of a hangover and also a potential learning experience. For many consumers, it has tolled closing time on too much borrowing, too much spending, too much sweet talk about real estate. The game is over. But while the dawn may seem cruel, it sheds light on certain truths that had been suppressed. Enrolling one's finances into a 12-step program is a healthy thing to do.

THURSDAY OPEN FORUM: What's on your mind?

Post comments below on any issue you want. The only limitations: the ground rules listed at the left and your own imagination. I'll reply when appropriate. Have fun. dc

(If you wish your comment to be considered for publication in the newspaper, copy it into an e-mail and send it to opinions@thesunnews.com. Please add your address and phone number to the e-mail so we can contact you for verification. The size limit for letters is 150 words.)

MB airport authority bill comes months too late

Today's editorial takes issue with the proposal by S.C. Sen. Luke Rankin and S.C. Rep. Alan Clemmons to transfet Horry County's airports to a state-run commission:

Let Rankin-Clemmons airport plan go nowhere

A question for S.C. Sen. Luke Rankin and S.C. Rep. Alan Clemmons, who this week filed identical bills to give control of the Myrtle Beach International Airport to an unelected entity called the Grand Strand Airport District: Why didn't you guys pitch this legislation at the beginning of this year's legislative session?

By waiting until now to pitch an alternative airport governance plan, Rankin, R-Myrtle Beach, and Clemmons, R-Myrtle Beach, virtually guarantee that nothing productive can happen. Horry County's other three senators were right this week to greet the proposal with the same enthusiasm they'd show a plate of undercooked fish.

Rove offers Obama triumphalists some good advice

Ripped from the wires ... Columnist Froma Harrop tells "Obamites" why bagging on the apparently defeated Hillary Clinton is not smart.

Bu FROMA HARROP

Many in the Obama camp, having outfoxed the apparently not-so-formidable Clinton machine, can't seem to get the hang of winning gracefully. They feel a need to drive a stake in Hillary Clinton's reputation, then dance. If they were smart, they'd heap praise on Clinton and let her finish out the race, however she chooses to do so.

That's sage advice, even though offered by Republican mastermind-turned-pundit Karl Rove. Treat Clinton shabbily, he says, and many of her supporters "will remember it by November.''

WEDNESDAY OPEN FORUM: What's on your mind?

Post comments below on any issue you want. The only limitations: the ground rules listed at the left and your own imagination. I'll reply when appropriate. Have fun. dc

(If you wish your comment to be considered for publication in the newspaper, copy it into an e-mail and send it to opinions@thesunnews.com. Please add your address and phone number to the e-mail so we can contact you for verification. The size limit for letters is 150 words.)