Gov. Mark Sanford 's first State of the State speech created a mild stir at a Columbia restaurant and sports bar Wednesday night.

Damon's, a Congaree Vista eatery, has a bank of large television screens on the wall and speakers at individual tables so folks can hear the event they are watching without disturbing other customers.

But in this case, the restaurant chose to blare Sanford's speech over the restaurant's loudspeaker system while people were dining.

When people wanting to watch -- and hear -- basketball games complained to the staff, they were told that the restaurant would not turn down Sanford's speech.

That caused some people to turn their table speakers up louder in an attempt to hear over the speech -- resulting in a verbal duel between the new governor and ESPN basketball analyst Dick Vitale.

A restaurant executive said Damon's had been asked by "government officials" to air the speech, noting that a table full of people -- legislative lobbyists, it turns out -- near the front were watching it.

Wouldn't be the first time a group of lobbyists bullied someone into getting what they wanted.

THEIR TAKE-HOME PAY WON'T TAKE THEM...

Gov. Mark Sanford last week took a major step, albeit backward, in fulfilling a campaign promise of raising income levels in South Carolina.

While in Congress, Sanford earned a reputation of being tight-fisted and a tough boss. His economies on pay scales, at least, seem to have trickled down from Washington.

In recent days, he got rid of the Governor's Mansion director, booting Ryan Zimmerman out of an $80,000-a-year post. His next step occurred in assembling his communications team.

Sanford hired Chris Drummond, former news director at WCSC-TV and WCBD-TV in Charleston, as his communications director at a salary of $70,000. Will Folks, Sanford's campaign spokesman, became the governor's press secretary, earning $42,500 a year.

Those salaries don't rival the pay given to the top flacks in the previous two gubernatorial administrations. Former Democratic Gov. Jim Hodges paid his communications director $96,000 and another spokesman $65,900.

Former Gov. David Beasley, a Republican, paid his communications director $91,800 while his press secretary earned $67,600.

But Drummond and Folks should take heart in the fact that in 20 years, if the income tax is eliminated as their new boss hopes, their take-home pay might reach that of their predecessors.

GOV...GOV WILL BRING US TOGETHER

A naive -- dare we say mischievous? -- member of the Sanford inaugural team seated U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., next to Tucker Eskew, deputy assistant to the president, at the Jan. 15 event.

Two years ago the two were almost literally at each other's throats. McCain, of course, had a rotten time of it in South Carolina during the 2000 Republican primary when he faced off against then-candidate George W. Bush.

Bush counted on South Carolina native Eskew then as a campaign spokesman and brought him to Washington after the election. Eskew attended the inaugural as the White House's representative.

The Buzz hears that McCain and Eskew chatted amicably, but avoided any mention of Campaign 2000.

We would have paid handsomely to have witnessed a spirited debate on interracial dating at Bob Jones University.