Enron Accounting At State Ports Authority? August 22, 2008
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DESPERATE TIMES APPARENTLY CALL FOR DESPERATE MEASURES
FITSNews - August 22, 2008 - We were more than a little bit surprised to see South Carolina’s Socialist Ports Authority claim to have taken in record revenues and earnings yesterday, particularly just two weeks after the Marxist-Leninists over there were blasted by legislative leaders for their woeful performance.
Even more surprisingly, SPA officials claim they won’t need taxpayer dollars to expand capacity in Charleston (something they should have done over a decade ago), a claim we take with a “harbor full of salt” considering that taxpayers are already shelling out over $160 million in the current state budget because of the SPA’s ass-backward, communist approach to managing our port terminals (i.e. refusing to enter into public-private partnerships).
Obviously, some of the dinosaurs over at the SPA are trying to save their skin in the wake of record declines in container traffic, but have they resorted to Ken Lay-style Enron accounting schemes to do it?
According to one SPA board member who spoke with FITSNews on the condition of anonymity, the answer to that question is “yes.” In fact, here’s what this official had to say when we asked whether or not the State Ports Authority was “cooking its books …” (more…)
Power: The Honorable Mentions
Posted by fitsnews in : SC Politics , 11 comments
THE FIRST INSTALLMENT OF OUR LONG-AWAITED LIST
FITSNews - August 22, 2008 - It ain’t “the list” itself … but as was the case last year, there are a lot of people who belong on the forthcoming “Palmetto Power 100″ whose names somehow ended up getting left out.
What can we say, people, our founding editor is a frequent “brain farter.” Not to mention a frequent regular farter, as well.
Anyway, get a jump start on “Palmetto Power 100 fever” by checking out our honorable (and a few dishonorable) mentions by clicking the “more” link at the end of this sentence … (more…)
The Angry Loon Is Back
Posted by fitsnews in : Good Stuff, SC Politics , add a comment
… AND MADDER THAN EVER
FITSNews - August 22, 2008 - We ordinarily make it a rule not to hand out free press to unruly loons, but in the case of our newest online anti-admirer, we are compelled to make a final solution … err, exception.
Wait … why the inappropriate Holocaust joke?
Well, after thoroughly “out-Goebbelsing” this latest status quo apologist a week ago, a deafening totalitarian silence was finally broken yesterday with some fresh venom directed at our own Sic Willie. While predictably ignoring all of the issues we raised, a clever implication was made that our founding editor has, um, how do we put this … a tiny penis. It would also appear that our website’s growing popularity and “slickness with the diction” has struck a bit of a nerve …
Anyway, from our new hater:
The only reason Folks’ blog is ranked so high is because 1) he’s been blogging since he got canned for pleading guilty to criminal domestic violence and 2) he’s still got enough frenemies in this festering industry called politics that feed him information …
So, yeah, Will, you’ve got a lot of hits. A monkey could get a lot of hits if it blogged consistently, on the same topic, for three years. That’s how blog readership works. A monkey would probably not throw as much of its own shit and wank off in public a little less, but you can’t have everything.
First of all, don’t knock wanking off in public or tossing your own feces ’till you’ve tried it. Both are actually quite liberating. Second, the last thing this world needs is someone leveling the “small penis” accusation at someone as demonstrably crazy as Sic. He’s liable to not only post a picture of it, but provide a list of all those who can vouch for its imposing dimensions.
Blog Warfare August 21, 2008
Posted by fitsnews in : SC Politics , 5 comments
IT’S FITS VERSUS THE SCOOP FOR S.C. BLOG SUPREMACY
FITSNews - August 21, 2008 - We’re a little leery of the science behind S.C. Blog Net News, which purports to rank South Carolina’s political websites according to their influence, but since they have us at No. 1 again this week we figured we’d show them a little love.
Of course, everybody knows FITSNews is No. 1 every week, with our bud McLovin over at the Palmetto Scoop providing us with our only real competition.
Having said that, as hopelessly inaccurate and straight-out-of-their-asses as SC BNN’s rankings most assuredly are, their site is worth checking out if only for the cool “blog influence tracking” feature, which lets you chart how your favorite website is faring versus its competition.
We charted ourselves versus the Scoop (above ), and all we can say is the result looks a lot like monkey DNA to us …
It’s Coming August 20, 2008
Posted by fitsnews in : SC Politics , 9 comments
PALMETTO POWER 100, V. 2.0 IS EN ROUTE
FITSNews - August 20, 2008 - So you think you’ve got juice?
Well, if you were on the inaugural FITSNews Palmetto Power 100 last year, you definitely do … but where will South Carolina’s most influential politicians and power brokers end up when the new list is released this weekend?
We’ve been hard at work all week preparing Version 2.0 of our list, but we wanted to give everybody one last chance to send us your thoughts before we wrapped up our work. Needless to say, as it stands now there are some major shakeups all the way through this year’s edition, with over 20 new additions and several changes (including one at the very top) … and no, once again Sic Willie didn’t make the cut.
Anyway, we’ll be rolling out this year’s list in at least two installments, if for no other reason that we’re complete and total teases, and we have absolutely no shame whatsoever in artificially inflating our hit count.
Of course, if you don’t want to wait for somebody to tell you who made the cut and who didn’t, allow us to draw your attention to the e-mail sign up box down the screen just a little bit (and to your right) … believe it or not, we finally figured out how to send e-mails, and you can sign up to get the Palmetto Power 100 and other FITS dispatches delivered straight to your inbox.
FITSNews Exclusive - Congressman Took Campaign Cash From Developer
Posted by fitsnews in : SC Politics , 14 comments
BAD, HENRY BROWN, BAD
FITSNews - August 20, 2008 - We were more than a little suspicious after reading Tony Bartelme’s story in the Charleston (S.C.) Post and Courier the other day about U.S. Rep. Henry Brown (old dude, above ).
Aside from the fact that Brown thinks we should subsidize flood insurance for rich people who want to build homes on pristine barrier islands, something about the Congressman’s professed ignorance of Leonard Long - a developer pushing to build those very homes on our own Kiawah Island - struck us as disingenuous …
Asked whether Long had approached him about the bill, Brown replied, “Who’s Leonard Long?”
Hmmmm … as it turns out, old Henry probably should’ve checked his list of financial contributors prior to experiencing this convenient senior moment, because Leonard Long (of Kiawah Resort Associates, in case you were wondering) gave Brown’s campaign a $1,000 contribution on June 2 of this year - less than three weeks before the Congressman introduced his controversial bill to force taxpayers to foot the bill for flood insurance.
That sure sounds like your typical Washington D.C. “pay-to-play” scam to us, despite Brown’s now highly-questionable claims that he has no “personal agenda” in the matter and “had no idea there was a developer” involved with the issue.
Brown is already in deep doo locally over the proposed bill, but we suspect the revelation that he took money from a guy with such a direct stake in his legislation - and then tried to play dumb about it - will end up putting him further on the defensive … as it should.
Smatterings
Posted by fitsnews in : Good Stuff, SC Politics, US Politics , add a commentRANDOM “NEW PORNOGRAPHY”
FITSNews - August 20, 2008 - It’s probably not natural to obsess over New Pornographers’ frontwoman Neko Case the way we do, but we’re sure government will pass a law at some point affording her the protection she deserves from our founding editor’s overactive imagination. In the meantime, we’re pleased to have her provide the accompaniment for today’s assorted random smatterings …
SCOOP STRETCH? - Our bud McLovin’ over at Palmetto Scoop claims that Barack Obama has already chosen Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine as his running mate … or at least somebody “in the Beltway” told him that. WTF? Until we get our text message from the Obamessiah himself, we’ll hold off on declaring this a done deal …
SPEAKING OF ELECTIONEERING - The Washington Post has a fun new web page that lets you project the outcome of the 2008 presidential election, one state at a time. Alright, it’s really not all that fun … certainly not as fun as presidential kung-fu …
SPEAKING OF FIGHTING - For those of you itching to see somebody get knocked out today, enjoy this clip.
MORE SCHOOL SUCKINESS - Our friends at The Voice have two solid posts up detailing how South Carolina is screwing over its special needs kids and graduating even fewer people than we thought we were … which we thought was damn near impossible.
MANDE’S STALKER UPDATE - Our non-friends over at Not Very Bright have taken a break from obsessing over our girl Mande’s every word to post this delightful picture of the S.C. Legislature’s vision for our state.
POLLY = REAL - We’ve gotten quite a bit of mail recently related to our newest contributor, Polly, who came back from the Beijing Olympics with gold medals in beauty, brains and bad-assness. To answer all the inquiries, yes, she’s real … and she’s fabulous!
