“Government reform genius”
I wish…but never claimed to be one. The insinuation made by the Treasurer’s office was that someone who started and ran a restaurant company wasn’t qualified to comment on government policy. That “pay your taxes and keep your mouth shut” mentality sure strikes me as elitist and anti-democratic.

Activity based budgets
Yep, busted. I think borrowing successful ideas from the other 49 states is something we should do more of in South Carolina. We admitted at the time to following the blueprint laid out in the book “The Price of Government: Getting the Results we need in an Age of Permanent Fiscal Crisis.”

The state of Washington – under Democratic Governor (now Commerce Secretary) Gary Locke – did a good job pioneering this approach. However, it was still no easy chore to break agency actions into over 1200 activities, figure out the true cost for each, and assemble and lead a team of over 50 government employees, activists and citizens in prioritizing them. We also made it happen without the benefit of hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on consultants like they did in Washington.

GEAR Commission
Our bipartisan commission worked for six months to come up with 61 specific recommendations for improving the Budget and Control Board. A ten member legislative body listened to over twenty hours of testimony on our suggestions and eventually endorsed a majority of them. The Budget and Control Board has already implemented all or part of many of them. Our state has already saved tens of millions as a result and we have discovered that many of the savings were actually more than we estimated. There are still hundreds of millions in additional savings that I think still should be enacted once the political will is finally there to face our state’s worsening pension crisis.

And yep, two of our nine members didn’t sign the final report – both of them were legislative appointees who were former administrators at the Budget and Control Board. One was a very helpful, participating member who didn’t feel he could sign off on some of the proposed changes to the retirement system. The other wouldn’t do a bit of work, return any phone calls, answer any emails, or attend any meeting.

No counter plans?
You may not like all or any of them but there are plenty. Feel free to start with the hundreds of pages of specific recommendations in the Executive Budget and the GEAR report.

Average ribs?
I may have sold the business but still take pride in Sticky Fingers serving great food. If you want to give them another try, please let me know how to send you a coupon for a free order on me.

Finally
The reason I wrote the original oped was that our state and country are confronting tens of trillions in political promises that politicians have made but not funded. I unfortunately think we are witnessing the greatest generational theft in the world’s history.

My point was that we needed serious discussions about how to pay these bills and at least owe it to our kids to try and stop them from worsening. While calling someone an “ass clown” is certainly more clever than sending out a press release ripping on their former profession, I don’t think either do much to help solve the problem.

The year I worked in the Reagan White House didn’t qualify me to open a restaurant at age 23 but fortunately I didn’t listen to naysayers then either.

Great Goobers, sic(k) willie.
You guys are full of cr@p.

I know it pisses off the “go along to get along” State Republican Party but I for one think it’s necessary. Keep up the good work!