Moon walking with Walter; governor should go

By GRAHAM OSTEEN
Editor-At-Large
graham@theitem.com

Why hasn't South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford resigned yet?

Our state has a huge and growing unemployment rate and an endless list of complicated work to do. At the very least, the remaining 18 months of his term will require constant attention to mounting problems, strong organization, creative planning and consensus building on a level he is incapable of achieving. Ever. His own staff is starting to jump ship and the calls for investigations are mounting.

You can't lead a state – and he never really has – when you're trying to juggle a girlfriend in another country; a slow, steady drip of details about spending public money on personal trips; a painfully and publicly victimized family (his wife and four sons can't be enjoying family dinners these days); and an increasingly hostile state legislature filled with people who need to be listening more carefully to their constituents.

Are you listening?

Then please hear this: I'm one of your constituents, and I think you should ask the governor to resign for the good of the state and his family, deal with his personal life in private, and let Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer and the South Carolina Legislature focus on everything but what's next with the Sanford soap opera.

There will be a gubernatorial election in 2010, so let the chips fall. Whatever you may think of Bauer, one thing is certain: He cares about this state and seems to work hard at being accessible and listening to people. His public missteps – speeding, crashing a plane – pale in comparison to Sanford's worldwide mess, and he's made responsiveness to the needs of senior citizens an effective and personal mission of his office.

The voters will ultimately decide who the next governor will be anyway, so what's wrong with some fresh, focused energy during a time of crisis? What could it hurt?

Dealing with anything from a “management standpoint” in the most challenging economic environment in modern history is hard enough, and Sanford's effectiveness is gone. Forever. Never coming back.

We the people of this state deserve better, especially with so much uncertainty in the world.



I watched the Apollo 11 moon walk 40 years ago this month at our family's house in Murrells Inlet.

There was always a large group of Sumterites down there on summer family vacations at the inlet, Garden City, Litchfield, Pawleys, etc., and we had a big old black and white television with an antenna. I don't remember exactly how many people came over to watch it on our porch that night, but the guests included Jay and Christine Hammond, then of Sumter, and all of their children. Debbie Hammond and I reconnected recently and have had fun remembering what an amazing time that was for all of us.

I sometimes worry that kids today aren't having nearly as much fun as we did because there's too much information in the world – which can lead to an early loss of innocence and a numbing sense of doom – and they don't play outdoors enough. But that's another topic for another day.

One side item: Debbie's younger brother Brian is one of the owners of the new Firehouse Subs restaurant here in Sumter.



All this talk about walking on the moon brings me to my Walter Cronkite story.

Walter – God rest his soul – was introduced to my wife by my mother in Washington about 20-something years ago. If that sounds odd, then you don't know much about Southern women.

We were at an American Society of Newspaper Editors meeting when Walter came walking by the hotel coffee shop early one morning. My mother – a former United Airlines stewardess known to invite complete strangers to dinner – said, “Walter honey, I want you to meet my daughter-in-law.”

True story.

Walter never had a chance to figure out that he didn't know her, my wife or me, but we ended up having a nice conversation about newspapers.

That's how Walter rolled, and that's the way it is.

Graham Osteen is co-president of Osteen Publishing Co. and Editor-At-Large of The Item. Contact him at The Item, 20 North Magnolia St., Sumter, S.C., 29150; graham@theitem.com, or call (803) 774-1352.