By Elliott Brack, republished with permission | It’s fun to read books by Doris Kearns Goodwin. Here’s why: the author writes intelligently, figuring that the readers know basic facts about the overall book subject. So, she cuts to the quick, giving you new insights and facts about the stories you already know. You don’t waste time hearing her version of what you already knew.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | America’s culture wars are wearing us out. There’s too much distrust, frustration and pent-up anger. Some want to make America great again, but that sends red flags to others who see the sentiment as dog whistles for a more divided society. Others wonder when America wasn’t great.
Perhaps we can all agree on one thing: America is more polarized and divided than ever in recent memory. And maybe. Just maybe, we can use that which divides to unite us.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | There’s been a lot of huffing, puffing and bantam-roostering of late by Gov. Henry McMaster and Republican legislative leaders about when schools should reopen.
Turn the cluck off, folks. We need to do what’s right and safe, not anything related to the politics of the moment.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | British thinker and science writer Matt Ridley has a reminder for anyone looking for a quick fix for coronavirus: Innovation takes time.
In what may be the most impactful and important non-fiction book of the year, Ridley’s “How Innovation Works” says we’ll eventually figure out how to deal with the deadly virus, but it won’t happen overnight.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | The horrible surge in coronavirus cases being experienced in South Carolina has one root cause: a liberal impatience by conservatives who reopened the state too early. As a result, too many people have the disease. Too many will die as exhausted medical workers are at their breaking point.
If there’s ever a textbook example that policy matters, it’s in South Carolina’s immature response to dealing with the silent terror of the pandemic. And now, officials trying to play catch up with mask ordinances and other measures that should have been in place long ago.
Just compare what happened in South Carolina, where Gov. Henry McMaster lightly shut down businesses for a few short weeks to states like New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, where governors locked things down tightly for much longer. Those places have flattened the curve — albeit with big economic hits. But the virus there is now manageable — as long as people are careful. Here, it’s out of control.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | You wouldn’t walk barefoot and bare-chested into a shop, especially if it had a sign on a door that said, “No shoes. No shirt. No service.” To do so would be gross and rude.
So why in the world are people getting all bent out of shape when “No mask” becomes the same kind of societal no-no? At a time when more than 1,000 people in our state are picking up coronavirus every day, not wearing a mask in public is about as smart as walking barefoot on sun-baked pavement on a 100-degree day.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | The curious thing about laws is they can be repealed.
When South Carolina legislators meet this week to talk about money, they need to add repealing the Heritage Act to the agenda. Twenty years ago, the act passed as the fulcrum of a compromise to remove the Confederate battle flag from the Statehouse dome. Now, its time has come. It needs to be shelved itself, gone like prohibition and old laws on fugitive slaves, sodomy, investment banking and miscegenation.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | If you want to understand the stark difference between business and government, look to NASCAR.
Just two days after Bubba Wallace, the racing sport’s only black driver, said it was time to remove the Confederate flag from NASCAR’s events and properties, the sport’s operating company did so. Two days. To get rid of the painful symbol of the South that’s been a visible feature at racing events for generations.
By Brian Elmore, special to Statehouse Report | For every George Floyd and Tamir Rice, Breonna Taylor and Walter Scott, thousands of African-Americans and people of color die silently each year due to a lack of access to health care.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | Now is not the time for the state’s black legislators to be timid. Now is the time to demand much more than has been on the table in a long time.
For the generations from slavery through Jim Crow and into modern times, South Carolina’s African American population has been beaten down, physically, mentally and emotionally.
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.
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