Ohio Gov. Bob Taft pleaded guilty to breaking state ethics laws.
Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco is blamed for failing to act as her
state’s biggest city turned into a toxic pond.
These are Gov. Mark Sanford’s peers?
So says Time magazine.
The glossy newsweekly has declared Sanford to be one of the three
worst governors in the country. Taft and Blanco are the others.
What did Sanford do to tick off Time?
Tim Padgett wrote the two-paragraph piece in the magazine’s
latest issue. In it, he says Sanford’s “conspicuous frugality”
helped get him elected governor in 2002. But, Padgett writes, a
“growing chorus of critics, including leaders of his own GOP” fear
his thrift has hurt the state.
Padgett does not name any critics, even though, he says, they are
growing in number. He also cites the credit-rating agency Standard
& Poor’s decision to lower the state’s credit rating, plus
S.C.’s high unemployment rate and low per capita income.
“Even GOP bosses charge that he is worse at economic development
than at grandstanding,” Padgett writes, again without naming these
bosses.
The top GOP boss in South Carolina is Katon Dawson, who said he’d
rather be called what he is, chairman of the S.C. Republican Party,
than a “GOP boss.” But Dawson said Padgett never called him, nor did
anyone else at Time.
Efforts Monday to reach Padgett or anyone else at Time were
unsuccessful.
Sanford said he isn’t sure if the first family subscribes to the
magazine, but he won’t cancel it if he does.
“I have read The New York Times, I will still read The New York
Times. I have read Time. I will still read Time. They may be
left-leaning, but it’s good to check in with what the left is
thinking.”
If the troika of Sanford, Blanco and Taft is the nation’s worst,
who are the best governors?
According to Time, in no obvious order, they are Republicans Mike
Huckabee of Arkansas and Kenny Guinn of Nevada, and Democrats Janet
Napolitano of Arizona, Mark Warner of Virginia and Kathleen Sebelius
of Kansas.
Sanford sees a common thread among the five — tax increases. All
five proposed major tax increases, although Napolitano’s failed to
pass.
Sure, Sanford said, they are “Republicans and Democrats, but the
common theme was fairly large tax increases.”
Paul Asmer, 38, of Columbia, said he thought the Time article was
“over the top.”
Asmer, co-owner of Medcorp., which supplies ultrasound machines
to hospitals, calls himself “on the fence” when it comes to being a
Republican or Democrat.
But, he said, he found Time’s piece unfair.
“Who are they to judge what’s going on in South Carolina?” Asmer
said. “I thought he was good for South Carolina.”
Raymond Mars, 56, was even more direct.
“It was crap; it was obscene,” said the chief regional
coordinator for the S.C. Center for Grassroots and Community
Alternatives, which supports Sanford’s tuition tax credit plan.
“That’s our governor, and we’ve got to support him somehow.”
Writing tickets in Five Points, parking enforcement officer Dixie
Miller took the opposite view.
“I agree with it,” Miller said of the ranking. “There was
something about him I didn’t like. It seems to me all he worries
about is the rich people.”
Not all national publications dislike Sanford. An Aug. 23
editorial in The Wall Street Journal praised Sanford’s plan to
change Medicaid. The conservative publication The National Review,
on April 25, praised Sanford in general, calling him “one of the
best new governors.”
Yet, Time magazine says Sanford is worse even than Illinois
Democratic Gov. Rod Blagojevich, whose office has received so many
subpoenas from the U.S. Attorney that he’s stopped talking about
it.
Sanford is also, apparently, ranked worse than Republican Ernie
Fletcher of Kentucky, where 13 members of his administration have
received 82 indictments.
One thing is certain: Sanford can expect to hear about this
ranking again, especially during next year’s election.
“The voters, next year, will be demanding change, and the days of
Mark Sanford’s embarrassing legacy are numbered,” said Senate
Minority Leader John Land, D-Clarendon.
Reach Gould Sheinin at (803) 771-8658 or asheinin@thestate.com.
