By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | With all of the confusion after the Iowa Democratic presidential caucuses and creeping nastiness seeming to shape the party’s New Hampshire primary, look for South Carolina to come to the rescue to former Vice President Joe Biden’s campaign.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., said something a couple of weeks back that’s been circling through my brain:
“Look, I have this firm belief that if America hasn’t broken your heart, you don’t love her enough.”
My heart is breaking as our nation is being torn apart in ways never imagined by founding fathers and leaders of the country for 200 years.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | There’s a backlog of untested rape kits in South Carolina because there’s more evidence coming in than authorized labs have the capacity to process.
One estimate is there are 1,800 evidence parcels that are waiting to be processed before cases can move forward. As of Dec. 31, the State Law Enforcement Division’s forensics lab had 1,333 untested rape kits waiting for processing, according to spokesman Tommy Crosby. Another 148 are being processed now.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | The math is easy. With about about $2 billion in new or surplus tax revenues for the state’s coming fiscal year, there’s more than enough money for the General Assembly to do something it should have long done: Make 4-year-old kindergarten available for all of South Carolina’s poor children.
By Fred Palm, contributing editor | The S.C. Department of Transportation (SCDOT) proposes to widen Interstate 526 and redo the Interstate 26 intersection. This will be a massive redo of a major travel vector. The cost: at least $1.1 billion. The I-526 Corridor Analysis shows minor shifts in congestion or capacity improvement. The SCDOT website is open to the end of January for our comments.
SCDOT builds highways and wants us to focus on the four alternative highway routes. We are putting down our future regional investments and growth. Highway investment drives other future investments. Businesses use interstate distribution of their goods that grows our economy. Build it and they will come or follow. In a similar vein, railroad spines drove our country’s western development.
Transportation, flooding and economic factors drive the following decisions: Where homes get put; where business expands; and how long the commute follows. These are supporting, opposing, or conflicting factors.
* CLICK into the story to find how too take part in the SCDOT virtual public meeting and share your voice.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | Looking back at the past decade, it’s pretty easy to see what the S.C. General Assembly didn’t do — fix education, fix the tax structure, fix health care and on and on.
But state lawmakers did get some things done in what may become known as the legislature’s Decade of the Nibble. That’s because each area they focused on was more of what a posh restaurant would call an “amuse bouche” than an entree.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | The harsh crescendo of Washington bullheadedness seems to be trickling down into politics across South Carolina.
The impeachment of President Donald Trump may be exacerbating divides in the electorate while also motivating partisans to do more in new ways. Others say the whole thing is a nothingburger.
By Fred Palm, contributing editor | The S.C. Department of Transportation (SCDOT) wants to widen Interstate 526 to six lanes in Charleston and Berkeley counties recognizing that congestion is regional and the correct response is more highway.
Maybe.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is making its way into the commercial, medical and educational spheres. Traffic management involves dynamic conditions involving both complex and repetitive decisions to control traffic signals to get us through an intersection.
Congestion detection and prediction is a math problem that we can do — and so can trained machines. In fact, the Federal Highway Administration advocates more use of these “Adaptive Traffic Management Systems.”
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | The 2020 legislative season will be upon us before we know it. If it is typical, campaign-year bluster will fill rooms as lawmakers clamor for the spotlight to get pet projects passed. Hot-button, controversial issues will suck oxygen out of the Statehouse and waste valuable time.
Let’s pray for an atypical legislative year — one in which officials get real things accomplished. Rather than waste time on meaningless bills, legislators need to get these five things right, once and for all …
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | OK, boomlets. Stand down. The older folks aren’t all that bad.
Millennials and iGen kids who now gleefully deprecate and mock baby boomers these days need to face the reality that the very lifestyle that keeps them connected, in tune, entertained, online and hip to what’s happening is due to … wait for it … baby boomers.
We Can Do Better, South Carolina! (2019) by editor and publisher Andy Brack offers incisive commentaries on the American South, politics, the common good and interesting South Carolina leaders. Available exclusively for Kindle for $7.99. A paperback version will be ready soon. Learn more.
Charleston Currents is brought to you free of charge thanks to the generosity of our underwriters:
Charleston City Paper, an alt-weekly seen by more than 100,000 people, offers the latest on news, views, arts, dining and music. Sign up for newsletters that will keep you up-to-date all week.
Statehouse Report is a renowned statewide policy and politics forecast published every Friday that informs South Carolina’s opinion leaders with key insights and news.
Like us on Facebook
Follow us on Twitter
Use our feed
Send us your comments
Recent Comments