HorryCounty.com

Rankin Senate Issues Hurt Horry County Residents By Dennis Mitchell A recent article by a Columbia news outlet claimed senators are looking to change SC Senate rules in order to remove Horry County Sen. Luke Rankin from his chairmanship of the Senate Judiciary Committee.   The desire to remove Rankin from the committee chairmanship apparently results from his opposition, during the last session, to the SC Justice Act, which proposed to amend liability law to make each defendant in a personal injury lawsuit liable only for their percentage of liability that led to the injury or loss. The passage of the act was important to small business owners, especially those in the hospitality industry.   Twenty four state senators, a majority in that chamber, signed on as co-sponsors of the legislation. However, the bill was stalled in the Judiciary Committee for over a year and, when it did finally get to the floor for debate, a powerful Democratic senator was successful in tabling the am...

  Malfeasance - Job Creation In a world where job creation is the holy grail of economic policy, our valiant government has heroically stepped in to ensure that everyone has a job—even if that job is creating more jobs. Yes, the government has mastered the art of job inception, making the movie "Inception" look like child’s play. The idea is simple: hire a person to find people who need jobs, and then hire more people to manage the people who are finding people who need jobs. It’s job creation, government-style! It’s like a never-ending Russian nesting doll of employment. Only in America, can folks get excited about a jobs report that says over 200,000 jobs were created.   That sounds like good news, but when you realize most of the jobs created were government jobs, one starts to realize that this ain't such a good thing after all.   Many economists would agree with me that a new government job does not add anything to America's GDP.   Look, America is something lik...

  Malfeasance - Don't Go Uncle Joe In the aftermath of the latest Biden-Trump debate, it seems the Democrats are facing a conundrum that even the most advanced Sudoku puzzle couldn't solve: should Uncle Joe stay or should he go? The call for Biden to step down is echoing louder than a cicada convention in August, and it's coming not just from Republicans but from his own party faithful who are starting to wonder if they accidentally voted for a talking head instead of a candidate. The media, meanwhile, is frothing at the mouth like a pack of Chihuahuas who've just discovered the neighbor's garbage cans. Every pundit with a pulse is dissecting Biden's debate performance like it's a Zapruder film, trying to figure out if he blinked too much or if his hair plugs were malfunctioning. They're calling for him to step aside faster than a contestant on "The Bachelor" who just realized they're not there for the right reasons. But let's be real h...

  Royal Prerogative and American Democracy By Dennis Mitchell This week we celebrate the 4th of July and its meaning as the day in 1776 on which the 13 colonies in North America declared their independence from Great Britain. It is the 248th anniversary of this bold action. It can also be celebrated as the day on which government of laws replaced government by the whims of a monarch was introduced to the western world. It is ironic that it occurs just several days after the Supreme Court of the United States declared the American president, whoever it may be, is immune from prosecution for criminal acts within the scope of the president’s official duties. The Court did not specify what official duties it was referring to, leaving that decision to a lower court over which it may rule in the future. In doing so, it can be argued that the Supreme Court reintroduced the concept of royal prerogative into the American system of government. Royal prerogative is defined as a body of author...

 

  Time to Stop Routine Patrol of Beaches  by Full Size Vehicles By Dennis Mitchell Last week’s tragedy in which a Horry County Beach Safety truck struck and killed a local beachgoer has prompted state representative William Bailey to call for restrictions on full size public safety vehicles patrolling on local beaches in non-emergency situations. Bailey said he plans to pre-file such a bill before the next legislative session begins in January 2025. Bailey’s proposed bill makes so much sense, people must wonder why it has not been proposed until now.   With the severely crowded beaches which are experienced on the Grand Strand during the summer tourist season, vehicles such as ATV’s should be the common patrol type vehicle. These provide excellent range of vision, quick maneuverability and considerably smaller room to operate than full size trucks. In the event of emergency situations, officers on these types of vehicles could clear an area for operation if full size vehi...

 

  Malfeasance - Reassessment Hey folks, I've got unwelcome visitors coming to my house this year.   If you live in Horry County, they're coming to see you, too.   Who could it be now?   Why, it's the tax assessors, armed with a clipboard and a gleam in their eye. Yes, it's that magical time again when we get to reassess the value of our homes and brace ourselves for the inevitable sticker shock when the tax bill arrives. It's like a twisted game of Monopoly, except instead of passing Go and collecting $200, we're passing the buck straight to the county coffers. Now, I'm no mathematician, but even I can tell you that when property values skyrocket faster than a bottle rocket on the Fourth of July, so do our tax bills. It's as if our humble abodes have suddenly transformed into beachfront mansions overnight. Last time I checked, my backyard wasn't equipped with a private yacht dock, but who am I to argue with the whims of the tax gods? And let's no...

  Federal Government to Reclassify Marijuana By Dennis Mitchell A bill to allow the sale of medical marijuana in South Carolina failed again in the SC House this year. Opposition to the bill is strongest in the law enforcement communities, objected to by, among others, Chief Mark Keel of SLED and the S. C. Sheriff’s Association. The federal government recently announced it would reclassify marijuana from its current status as a Class 1 substance to a Class 3 substance, putting it on the level of medical drugs such as cough syrup with codeine. This change by the federal government could give renewed push to legalizing medical marijuana in South Carolina. The bill that failed in the General Assembly this year is reported to be one of the strictest on the uses of marijuana for medical purposes. Smoking of the product, for example, would not be allowed. However, providing relief through topical use and liquid dosages could go a long way toward bringing relief to cancer patients, those ...

  Polecat of the Week goes to the proposed Surf Park in Myrtle Beach which just requested its third one-year extension from the city to buy the land. It's tough competing against all that free surf on the oceanfront.

 

  Malfeasance - Illegal Aliens Are Really Voters Recently, the greatest president in our lifetime, Joe Biden let the cat out of the bag. Can you believe that Biden accidentally referred to "illegal aliens" as voters during an interview on a Spanish radio show.   Yikes.   (The New York Post called this a "freudian slip".)   Biden also went on to say the following, “One of the reasons [why] we’re growing so much is we have a significant influx of immigrants coming into our country, [which is] the only reason our economy’s so good."   So, immigrants are the only reason that we have a good economy?   Who says we have a good economy? That's just plain stupid, but I've come to expect nothing but stupid comments from Biden and his administration. For the record, the previous president, Donald Trump, who says mean things and hurts the feeling of overly sensitive people, had a better immigration policy and tried to get the Census takers to only count actual citi...

  Horry County Road Funding By Dennis Mitchell Horry County Council passed first reading last week of an ordinance to establish road projects, funded by a one-cent local option sales tax, for up to the next 25 years. This is the most ambitious consideration of future road projects ever discussed by council. If approved, this initiative would replace the more common seven-year project lists such as RIDE II and RIDE III. The final approval for institution of the one-cent local option tax will be voted on in a binding referendum question on the November 2024 general election. Therein lies the first big question the voters must answer – do they wish to approve a list of road projects in November which will restrict new projects over up to 25 years? The local option tax is projected to raise approximately $5 billion over 25 years. This amount could be bonded against to speed up construction of the projects rather than the pay as you go system used with the last two RIDE plans. However, ...

  Protests Then and Now By Dennis Mitchell There is some irony in the fact that last Saturday was the 54th anniversary of the Kent State University shootings and we now have the biggest protests on college campuses since those Vietnam protest days. There is also irony in the fact that many of those condemning the student protests of today the loudest are of the baby boom generation which was the protesters against the Vietnam War. Now, the baby boom generation is interesting. The first generation to come of age after the invention of the birth control pill, it forged the sexual revolution. It was also the generation that made drug experimentation almost a right of passage. By the time this generation hit 50, it had done a 180-degree turn into virtual opposition to many sexual choices and freedoms and was the strongest for wanting a war on drugs. Some would call those changes maturity, but maybe hypocrisy is a better word. I heard an interview with a man who was a student at Kent St...

  The South Carolina Senate wins the Polecat of the Week Award for failing to help small business by tabling the Tort Reform bill in the Chamber.

 

Malfeasance - Don't Shoot The Dog Well, slap my holster and call me Trigger, did you hear the latest yeehaw from Governor Noem? Seems like ol' Krist went and shot herself in the foot—metaphorically speaking, that is. Now, I ain't no stranger to a little target practice, but golly, when you're a politician, you gotta be as careful as a cat in a room full of rocking chairs. Now, I reckon ol' Krist thought she was just sharing a good ol' hunting yarn, but bless her heart, she ended up stepping in a whole heap of doggy doo. I mean, come on now, shooting a dog? For most people, mostly city dwellers, that's like trying to fry bacon in a toaster—just ain't gonna end well no matter how you slice it. And to top it off, she's supposed to be the big Second Amendment advocate, but looks like she's got a little too trigger-happy for her own good. The good Governor of South Dakota did what used to be the normal thing to do, but we ain't living in normal ti...

  Judicial Reform in South Carolina By Dennis Mitchell The Article of Rights, Section 8 - Separation of Powers, of the South Carolina Constitution states, “In the government of this State, the legislative, executive and judicial powers of the government shall be forever separate and distinct from each other, and no persons or persons exercising the functions of one of the said departments shall assume or discharge the duties of any other.” Separation of Powers is the basis of American Democracy, established by the Founding Fathers in the U. S. Constitution and copied by the states throughout the nation. In South Carolina, the letter of the law is followed with no person in one body exercising the functions of another. However, the method of selecting judges in the state, almost entirely in the hands of the legislature, has increasingly brought the question of undue influence by lawyers/legislators over the members of the judiciary. For that reason, judicial reform, changing the way...

  Polecat of the Week honors go to members of the SC House who oppose the medical marijuana bill. Medical marijuana is helping veterans, in those states where they can obtain it, to relieve pain from service-related injuries and PTSD, while SC veterans are being ignored by this group.