Political Columnist, The State
Political Columnist for The State in Colombia, South Carolina, he's covered state politics for over 40 years
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Lee Bandy
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FROM Lee Bandy
To the Point
South Carolina Governor Turns up in Argentina South Carolina's Republican Governor made national headlines when he refused to accept federal stimulus money. Now Mark Sanford is famous for being absent without leave. Last Thursday, he disappeared without telling anyone where he was going — not Lieutenant Governor Andre Bauer, not his staff, not even his wife. Today he had an explanation. Lee Bandy, who's covered South Carolina politics for 40 years, is now retired from The State newspaper.
To the Point
Comebacks in New Hampshire and the Road Ahead You don't have to be a political junkie to know that Hillary Clinton and John McCain are the comeback kids of yesterday's New Hampshire primaries —even though Mc Cain points out that he's hardly a kid. Barack Obama said Iowa proved white Americans would vote for a black man. Gloria Steinem said it proved gender is harder to overcome than race. Yesterday's results in New Hampshire have prevented a lot of story lines from becoming conventional wisdom. Is Hillary Clinton the front-runner after all? Can John McCain compete against major money in big states? Will religion emerge as an underlying issue? What's up between now and Tsunami Tuesday?
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Will YouTube and Web 2.0 Change American Politics? CNN hyped last night's Democratic presidential debate at The Citadel in South Carolina as "revolutionary" because real people got to ask questions on video. Some students of politics and the media said the event would do for interactive Web 2.0 what the Kennedy-Nixon debates did for TV. Others called it just a tiny step forward, because CNN got to decide which questions the candidates had to respond to. Some 3000 thousand people submitted amateur videos that tackled everything from serious policy questions to sophomoric humor, including a question on global warming that came from an animated snowman. Did the format make for entertaining TV? Were the candidates more authentic? Did it finally come down to politics as usual?
To the Point
Democratic Presidential Candidates Debate in South Carolina Last night, on the campus of a historically black institution, South Carolina State University , all the Democratic candidates met for the first time. Results of the debate in this very Republican state, whose primary will be held fourth in next year's election process, could be a bell weather, especially for the voting patterns of African American Democrats. Each of the eight candidates got 11 minutes in total during an hour and a half of one-minute answers to questions on complex issues. For the most part, they were nice to each other, tough on President Bush and really angry about the war in Iraq. Are Clinton , Obama and Edwards still the top three? Did any "second tier" candidates distinguish themselves? We hear from across the Democratic political spectrum.
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Trump's 'America First' goes missing abroad In the Middle East, President Trump is changing some policies of the Obama Administration—and reversing his own campaign attacks on Islam as a religion that "hates us." We hear about his visit to Saudi Arabia and what's at stake for the rest of his foreign excursion.
To the Point
Ex-FBI Director Comey tells his side of the story Today, former FBI Director James Comey came close to calling the President who fired him a liar. The White House denied the claim and called it insulting, but Republican Senators did not challenge Comey’s truthfulness. Many questions remain: did the President try to obstruct a federal investigation? Later, we’ll go behind the “velvet rope” for a look at 5-Star health care for the richest Americans.
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Human Rights in the era of Donald Trump President Trump’s UN Ambassador, Nikki Haley, said today the US might pull out of the United Nations’ Human Rights Council. Serious violators of human rights are members of the Council itself–and a US resignation could make things worse. Later on today’s show, now that he’s into his second term, comedian turned US Senator Al Franken is telling jokes again.