By Phillip Shoopman || Last year, the voters in the Upstate and across the country spoke loudly that they wanted real reform and real conservative solutions to the spending habits and inefficient government practices both in Washington and in Columbia. The 2010 election was a revolution for a change in Washington to fix a system [...]
SC Legislative Schedule – 2/15/2011
South Carolina’s “do-nothing” legislative branch returns to Columbia on Tuesday for its sixth week of “action.”
What has it accomplished thus far?
Not a whole helluva lot. In fact, the 2011 session of the S.C. General Assembly is shaping up to be one of the least productive years in recent memory – which is saying something. That’s [...]
Down To Business
Last week was all about pomp and circumstance … this week S.C. lawmakers must confront reality.
The debate over an estimated $1 billion budget shortfall begins in earnest on Tuesday, with six separate S.C. House subcommittees holding preliminary budget hearings.
Ironically, the first state agency to meet with lawmakers will be the office of newly-inaugurated Gov. Nikki [...]
Haley Flip-Flops On Budget
A day after S.C. Gov. Mark Sanford submitted his final executive budget, S.C. Gov.-elect Nikki Haley flip-flopped and said she would submit a spending plan of her own after all …
Last September, in an attempt to build relations with fiscally-liberal legislative leaders, Haley said she would not submit an executive budget. Not surprisingly, fiscal conservatives [...]
Turning Off The Spigot
One of the best ways to avoid so-called budgetary “shortfalls” is to limit government to a set of clearly-defined core responsibilities – and then make sure that it never grows beyond a level that is absolutely necessary to perform these core responsibilities.
In South Carolina, our state lawmakers have failed to do either of these things [...]
