McMaster's re-hire should be re-considered

September 9, 2003

We’ve all made at least one bone-headed blunder in our lives, personally and professionally. And some of us have received more second chances than we likely deserve. Foolish mistakes should not condemn a talented person to a life on the dole or being forced to opt for another profession than the one for which he has trained.

We believe in second chances. The world revolves on them. And Tommy Windsor, recently rehired by Attorney General Henry McMaster, should get one — but not on the taxpayers’ payroll in the same job he left under a cloud.

Six years ago, Mr. Windsor, then a special investigator in the attorney general’s office, resigned after he "mistakenly" sent an e-mail message to a newspaper columnist that contained slurs against gays, minorities and people on welfare — and went to everyone in the columnist’s computer address book.

Mr. Windsor has apologized for his gaffe. He refers to the e-mail as "an immature joke" (he was 25 at the time, surely old enough to know better) and said he would never do it again. Well, good for him. He also notes he has "suffered" for his "sense of humor."

There is nothing humorous about racial slurs. Neither should "jokes" about another person’s private life provoke chuckles of glee. Then there is the lack of laughter that should accompany an anecdote on the discouraging life of someone on welfare, despite their best efforts to improve their lot.

Not everyone on welfare is there because they don’t want to work. Some are elderly residents who were at one time working members of society. Others are the working poor who receive assistance because they still can’t make ends meet with a minimum-wage job that carries no benefits. Still others are there temporarily because they are among the thousands who have lost their jobs and have not been able to find another.

South Carolinians — some of whom are (gasp!) gay and minorities — should not have to pay the salary of a man who would make a joke, however "harmless" he believed it to be, about one’s skin color or private life. For whatever reason, Mr. Windsor made the comments. He as good as made them in public in sending them across the Internet. And he made them from a state-owned computer and apparently during the regular work day.

Yet, he will "never do anything like that again," he told reporters, and he "avoids" people who would tell gay-bashing or racist jokes.

It’s good that he has learned from the experience. And in all likelihood, he wouldn’t do anything like this again. Mr. McMaster discounts suspicion that Mr. Windsor’s relationship within the Republican Party played any role in the re-hiring. Of the 70 applicants, Mr. Windsor was the "best," he said.

But surely among the other 69 applicants there was at least one who was equally qualified professionally — and who would not have the baggage of having publicly expressed a derogatory view against so many of the population that he would be charged with serving.

More than a third of our state’s population is made up of minorities. There are gays in South Carolina, although most don’t advertise the fact precisely because of such attitudes as that exhibited so publicly by Mr. Windsor. And there are surely plenty of people who are tired of all the jokes about welfare recipients, since poverty crosses age, gender and racial lines and is unfortunately prevalent in our state and most others these days.

Mr. Windsor has admitted he made a mistake. So alright, give him a second chance to prove it was an aberration, not his standard way of thinking. Perhaps with this in his background he will make an even better investigator.

But not in the Attorney General’s office.

If Mr. McMaster believes so strongly in Mr. Windsor’s worth to state government, he surely has enough influence to find him a more appropriate position.

Copyright 2003, Anderson Independent Mail. All Rights Reserved.