By Denise Ross

Well, not quite. But Rep. Brian Dreyer, R-Rapid City, normally the picture of podium composure and maker of substantive comments, had difficulty walking away from Saturday’s crackerbarrel in Rapid City as his foot was in his mouth.

Well into a multi-layered discussion about legislative committee procedures, the size of hearing rooms, term limits and night committee meetings, freshmen legislator Dreyer tried to defend the current protocol - which does not make regular practice of nighttime committee hearings.

In trying to agree with Sen. Mac McCracken, R-Rapid City, who had spoken before him, Dreyer might have achieved the technically difficult rhetorical maneuver of deference wrapped in an insult.

McCracken, who has 8 years under his belt and chairs the Senate Commerce Committee, said:

It’s up to the committee chairs to stay on schedule.

Dreyer then said:

You can train any chimp to run a committee.

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By Denise Ross

The Legislature’s appropriations committees should begin their review of the governor’s proposed budget right after the governor’s annual budget address in early December, Rep. Jeff Haverly has proposed.

Haverly said that even when the appropriations committees meet twice as often as other legislative committees, they struggle to adequately sift through the state’s $3.3B budget in 35 or 40 work days.

And to serve adequately as an equal branch of government - and the branch charged with controlling the purse strings - Haverly said a change is in order.

The governor has all year to spend your money and then propose it to us.

(Photo by David Larson)

Haverly at Saturday’s crackerbarrel in Rapid City.

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By Denise Ross

Yes, Republicans have super-delegates, too, although they don’t like to call them that. They prefer the descriptor “automatic.” Nonetheless, SD GOP Chairman Karl Adam agreed with me that, at this point, that’s merely a semantics question.

Anyway, a reader e-mailed me asking about this, so I tracked down some details. Here’s the scoop for South Dakota. We have 3 Republican super-auto-delegates, compared to 7 on the Dem side.

The lucky GOP 3 are, by virtue of their posts within the party, Adam himself, of Pierre, national committeeman Ron Schmidt of Rapid City and national committee woman Mary Jean Jensen of Lemmon.

Let’s all pause for a moment to reflect on the irony that Mike Rounds and John Thune are not super-delegates, but Ron Schmidt is.

OK.

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By Denise Ross

Catholic Bishop of the Rapid City Diocese Blase Cupich sent a letter to his parishoners explaining that he has decided to allow the anti-abortion activists seeking to put an abortion ban on the 2008 South Dakota ballot to gather signatures at Catholic churches this weekend.

The letter, above, and a related bulletin, below, encourage Catholics to look favorably on the proposed abortion ban, which has exceptions for rape, incest and health of the mother. [Full text on the jump.]

The letter says:

Given the fact that this proposed law is a serious attempt to limit the number of lives lost through abortion, I am convinced that we, your pastors, must do all that we can to provide you with the opportunity to know more about his effort and to participate in it. 

The bulletin says:

The ultimate and prefered goal is to defend the right to life for all the unborn against the violence of abortion. However, a gradualist approach is also a responsible and justifiable way of proceeding.

To read the full text click “Read more.”

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By Denise Ross

Here’s a critique of the NYT’s McCain story that reflects my own view. Debra Saunders nails the story’s most glaring weakness:

Either new information will come forward to corroborate this weak story - based solely on the speculation - as opposed to actual knowledge - of two sources (who refused to be named and, for all we know, may have an ax to grind) …

The story purported to be about McCain’s ethics and dealings with D.C. lobbyists, in a failed attempt to gloss gossip with a patina of gravitas.

The story doesn’t quote two independent, yet anonymous, sources who said they knew of an affair. It quotes two unnamed people who said they were worried something might be happening or might be about to happen and so they had a talk with McCain. And I guess that talk is the news peg?

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By Denise Ross

I’m just now forcing myself to sit down and read the infamous McCain story in the New York Times.

This is simply one thought, not all of my thoughts.

Besides that the bulk of the story is a rehash of old news - which is OK if you bill it as that and don’t try to dress it up in a short skirt - I contend they buried the lead.  

Here is the first item, well into the article, that got my reporter antennae really wiggling.

Like other presidential candidates, he has relied on lobbyists to run his campaigns. Since a cash crunch last summer, several of them — including his campaign manager, Rick Davis, who represented companies before Mr. McCain’s Senate panel — have been working without pay, a gift that could be worth tens of thousands of dollars.

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By Denise Ross

Rapid City engineering consultant Cheryl Chapman was elected vice chairwoman of the SD Democratic Party on Saturday, and, by extenstion, is our state’s newest super delegate to the party’s national convention in August.

Normally, this would be “ho hum,” as Cheryl said, but this year, watch out! All Democratic super delegates have giant targets painted on them.

Cheryl ran unopposed for the post and was chosen by the state party’s central committee for the job at a meeting in Oacoma.

And while “Oacoma” bears a striking resemblance to “Obama,” Chapman isn’t backing either Barack or Hillary. She’s hoping the next round of primary voting on March 4 significantly fades that new target she has.  She stopped short of saying she has adopted the posture of Sen. Tim Johnson, who said he will vote for whomever wins South Dakota’s June 3 primary.

She tells Hoghouse Blog:

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By Denise Ross

Tom Daschle’s second book is on sale at Amazon and via the Center for American Progress, where Daschle is distinguished senior fellow and which appears to be handling publicity for the book.

The book, Critical: What We Can Do About the Health Care Crisis, is not just another analytic critique of what’s wrong with the American health care system and it’s spawn of financial woes for some, riches for others. Daschle offers a bold prescription to get us up off our collective sick bed.

There’s no “Look Inside” feature on this book at Amazon at the moment. Here’s what Publisher’s Weekly had to say:

Skeptics say we can’t afford to cover everyone; the truth is that we can’t afford not to because U.S. economic competitiveness is being impeded by the large uninsured population and fast-rising health costs. Daschle’s book delineates the weaknesses of previous attempts at national health coverage, outlines the complex economic factors and medical issues affecting coverage and sets forth plans for change.

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By Denise Ross

More specifically, he expresses his disdain for his role - anyone’s role - as a super-delegate. Today, Johnson told the Rapid City Weekly News:

I don’t think there is any reason for super-delegates to exist.

Johnson said that, despite having publicly endorsed Barack Obama, he will cast his vote at the Democratic National Convention in August for whomever South Dakota Democrats favor in the June 3 primary.

He said he would cast a vote for Hillary Clinton if she wins the state’s primary and he is advising other super delegates to follow the wishes of voters in their states.

I’ve heard of this new movement for super-delegates to follow the winds of their constitutents. I haven’t seen any super-delegate besides Johnson back it so whole-heartedly. Is he the first?

Can Stephanie Herseth Sandlin now come out with this same posture? Should she?

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By Denise Ross

Open government is a hot topic this year.

I am a self-identified open government advocate, but at Saturday’s crackerbarrel in Rapid City, two lawmakers described two open government bills as a conflict between common sense and the battle cry of open government. I cannot argue with them.

Rep. Mark Kirkeby, R-Rapid City, noted that under current state law, a majority of the local school board, city council or county commission cannot legally show their faces at the crackerbarrel meetings.

They could not attend a forum such as this.

Senate Bill 199 seeks to change that, so that members of the school board, for example, could attend crackerbarrels without the worry of violating the state’s open meeting’s law. Technically, they could do so now if they followed all the rules of publishing an agenda ahead of time.

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