After the departure of former Mike Huckabee campaign director Chip Saltsman, and after some significant horsetrading on the floor of the Capital Hilton, Michael Steele became the new chairman of the Republican National Committee today.

The vote, 91 out of 168 ballots, came on the sixth round of voting. SCGOP chairman Katon Dawson made it to the final round, but went into the sixth ballot trailing by 10 votes and could not make up the difference.

RNC Chairman Mike Duncan, after seeing his support slip, was the first to pull out of the race, followed by former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell. Michigan Republican Party Chairman Saul Anuzis, who was in the lower level of voting on each ballot, pulled out after the fifth round.

The first two rounds of voting were basically similar, with Steele performing better than some observers believed. The GOPAC director and former Maryland lieutenant governor had been under pressure in the past few weeks because of the perception among some in the party that he was too moderate. Duncan held his own, garnering 52 votes and first place in the first round, and tying with Steele at 48 in the second round.

While the third ballot was cast and counted, Wonkette founder Ana Marie Cox tweeted from the event that the rumor was Duncan would lose his support in the third round, though that conventional wisdom was countered by a GOP insider. Republican Internet strategist and blogger Patrick Ruffini, a little after 1 p.m., tweeted that the race was effectively down from five men to three.

Indeed, Duncan did remain in, but he lost four more votes and Steele jumped into first place with 51. Dawson picked up five, but remained in third behind Duncan. Anuzis, holding tight at 24 votes, became the topic of speculation as The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder tweeted that the Michigan GOP chairman could make a deal with Steele. Cox, though, tweeted that such a move wouldn’t happen because it made too much sense. Again, she relayed a remark made at the event that Duncan was done.

Before the fourth ballot, Duncan stepped up to the podium and withdrew his name from consideration. With Steele and Dawson about halfway to the Promised Land, and Steele with a 17-vote lead, Duncan’s 44 votes were set up to be a potential game-changer. As the votes were being cast, the race largely came down to Steele and Dawson, with Anuzis and Blackwell bringing up the rear.

Dawson was the big winner after the fourth round, gaining 28 votes and leaping past Steele, holding a 62-60 advantage. S.C. politcal consultant and staffer to Rep. Gresham Barrett, B.J. Boling, tweeted that Duncan would be voting for Dawson. Cox surmised that if Blackwell dropped out, which looked increasingly possible after not picking up any votes, his social conservative backers would go to Dawson and effectively decide the race.

“Anuzis [who holds 31 votes] can stop the all-white country club guy from winning if he really wants to,” Cox tweeted. “Not that I’m encouraging him.”

As of the 3 p.m. reconvening of the meeting, Blackwell stepped out of the race. Blackwell tossed his support to Steele, influenced, he said, by the Good Book. If Steele pulled his total number of votes, then he would be sitting pretty at 75, just 10 shy of the winning total. Boling did not believe it would make a difference, and that followers of Blackwell would still move into the Dawson camp.

The move to Dawson didn’t happen, but the move to Steele did. He pulled 19 more votes on the fifth ballot, pulling within just six votes of taking the chairmanship. Dawson came in second with 69, and Anuzis, pulling just 20, went in front of the committee shortly after the vote to drop out of the race. He did not publicly pick either Steele or Dawson, which leaves the door open for his supporters. But, Dawson still needed 16 of the 20 to win on the sixth round of voting.

Cox tweeted that Anuzis told RNC members that he was never interested in making a deal for the chairmanship, but that it was unlikely that his supporters would back Dawson in the final vote. S.C. consultant Wesley Donehue was of the same mind, tweeting that there was “No doubt at all that Anuzis voters will go to Steele.”

And, they did, with Steele picking up 12 of the Anuzis backers.

Enjoying significant support among his native South Carolinians, Dawson was rumored as far back as fall 2007 to be running for RNC chair, but only officially kicked off his effort in late summer of last year.

Recently-elected RNC committeeman Glenn McCall put Dawson’s name in nomination, saying, “The Lord has put great mentors into my life, and Katon is no exception. I know his heart — he’s a great man, and he has turned our party around with a lot of hard work. I feel that the things we need from a chairman, that inspire voters…we can raise funds, but if we don’t have inspired voters, it’s all for naught. Katon has done those things, so the things that we need in a new chairman of the party, someone that can inspire voters, someone that can rebuild the grassroots operation — like Katon has done in South Carolina — someone that can work very hard, which you do every day, to protect our Republican brand, hold our elected officials accountable, and he does that with a very simple statement at how he’s brought coalitions together in South Carolina. Some of you may think that its really easy, because it’s South Carolina, but it’s not. We have coalitions in every state, all across the country. In South Carolina, Katon has been able to bring those coalitions together….”

McCall continued, “If you look at his record, and that’s what it is all about, we’re not like the Democrats, we’re about experience and accomplishments, and that’s what we need in our next chairman. Out of all the candidates, great candidates, he’s the only one that has the experience to actually, and the accomplishments — proven accomplishments, to move our party forward.”

As the vote drew closer, Dawson was under increasing heat for not only his 12-year membership in the all-white, elite Forest Lake Country Club, but also his comments at a West Forum event at USC in 2003 in which he said he was inspired to get involved in politics because of the desegregation of A.C. Flora High School. Additionally, some were pointing to his participation with the Camellia Ball, one of a number of exclusive, and usually all-white, debutante balls in the Columbia area.

Dawson counted on the support of black RNC members like McCall and N.C. committeewoman Ada Fisher to blunt the accusation that he was racially insensitive. However, it did not stop Democrats, and Republicans supporting other candidates, from spreading these stories across the Internet.

In the coming days, it will be determined whether having to defend his background harmed Dawson enough to where he could not take the win.

Patterson Hood, lead singer of the Drive-By Truckers, has sung about the “duality of the Southern thing.” Though that phrase was used in a different context (like, how a person could respect and honor both Robert E. Lee and Martin Luther King) it can be applied to the strange dichotomy of the Southern business climate.

Like its fellow states in the Old Confederacy, South Carolina has for years attempted to keep regulations minimal and taxes low in order to attract business. However, it has also been a very litigious state, and Sen. Larry Martin introduced a bill on Thursday to bring that in line with the Palmetto State’s other business-friendly practices.

“If South Carolina is going to be competitive with our neighboring states in keeping and attracting jobs and investment, it is important that we take a common sense approach to our civil justice rules,” Martin said in a statement. “That’s what this tort reform bill is designed to do, to bring about a greater sense of equity to the tort system and to encourage investment in South Carolina.”

Wolfe Reports’ home state of Alabama developed a well-deserved reputation for outrageous punitive damages awards, and to counter some juries overreaching on an award, the bill would cap such damages to $250,000 for small businesses and limit non-economic damages to $350,000.

Twelve other cosponsors have signed on to the bill, and it was referred to the Judiciary Committee.

The State Ports Authority. Most South Carolinians would be hard-pressed to know that it existed, much less what it does or its role in the battles between members of the General Assembly and Gov. Mark Sanford.

Still, the Port of Charleston has been integral to South Carolina’s economy since the state was a British colony, so whatever happens on the coast becomes a top state priority.

A new bill, introduced by Sen. Larry Grooms, seeks to reorganize SPA to push Charleston from the fourth largest port on the East Coast back to No. 1, and bring in some accountability standards.

“The port is too important to the economic vitality of our state to be used as a political tool,” Sen. Glenn McConnell, a cosponsor of the bill, said in a statement. “We’ve got to take the politics out of the port’s operations and demand that it be run like a business. Job creation comes with long term planning, not political trade winds.”

Among changes to the SPA would be establishing a 20-year strategic plan, which would be reviewed by the General Assembly, the establishment of a screening process for potential board members and the stipulation that cause has to be shown for the removal of a board member.

The changes to how the board is organized is considered by some political observers to reappropriate some of the power that the governor currently exerts over the SPA.

“We think this ports bill is the opposite of accountability,” Sanford spokesman Joel Sawyer said. “By taking away the governor’s only tool for effecting change on the board, it further insulates the board and the agency from answering to the public. We think Rep. [Jimmy] Merrill’s bill would be a much better way to ensure accountability on the board.”

On Tuesday, Sen. Ronnie Cromer, along with 17 cosponsors, introduced a concurrent resolution to request that President Barack Obama reverse his decision to close down the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay. Part of the reason was so that the detainees would not pose a threat to the United States, and part of it was to discourage moving detainees to the Navy brig in Charleston.

“Closing the detention center at Guantanamo Bay is the wrong move for our country, it is better to have enemy combatants housed outside of the continental United States,” Cromer, who served 30 years in the S.C. Army National Guard, said in a statement. “We have been very blessed over the last seven years, in that we have not had another terrorist attack in our country, but moving current detainees into the United States is just inviting trouble. And, I am certainly opposed to using the Charleston Naval Base as an alternative location. I hope Washington will hear this message. We must proceed with extreme caution, when it comes to this matter of national security.”

The resolution was favorably reported out of committee on a 16-0 vote, with four Democratic senators not voting (Sens. Robert Ford and Glenn Reese voted in the affirmative).

While the resolution has no power, it was on track to pass until Sen. Phil Leventis threw a wrench into the works. The senator from Sumter got involved and the resolution will not be taken up until he takes his name off the bill or it gets debated on the contested calendar.

Leventis, who served in the U.S. Air Force from 1969 to 1974, and following that, the S.C. Air National Guard for 25 years, maintains that the government’s actions, including alleged torture and use of black box prisons, have undermined basic American principles. While he said he does not want the detainees in Charleston, he said that the Senate at least needs to debate the resolution so that there is a public discussion of the message South Carolina is sending to DC.

If there is anything that gets, for lack of a better classification, DeMint Republicans more worked up than the latest federal stimulus plan, it’s the Employee Free Choice Act.

The bill, working its way through Congress, would make the act of union organizing dramatically simpler. According to opponents of the act, it would eliminate the vote for union representation by secret ballot. However, the act specifies that employees would still have the option of selecting a secret ballot, but companies would no longer have the chance to request that method.

Either way you cut it, Senate Majority Leader Harvey Peeler and Majority Whip Danny Verdin introduced a bill earlier this week in the upper chamber to compliment Rep. Eric Bedingfield’s bill in the House to create a constitutional amendment that would ensure the right to a secret ballot vote in South Carolina.

“The fundamental right to a secret ballot vote is essential to a free nation. Our senators will not let liberal Washington insiders take that right from South Carolina’s workers,“ Peeler said in a statement. “We’ve seen what happens when unions control the economy. It’s called Detroit. And we’ve seen what happens when unions fail. Congress bails them out on the backs of hardworking taxpayers. South Carolina must continue to be a right-to-work state and we must protect our workers’ right during this tough economic crisis.”

In a representation of how this issue is taking off this year, Fox News Channel interviewed Bedingfield on Wednesday for a segment about his proposal.

TUESDAY
Rep. Grady Brown announced to the House that he was the next Grandmaster Flash. OK, maybe not, but he is spinning records on a weekly basis.

“Every Tuesday night, my son and I, we DJ at a place called Rust,” he said. “R-U-S-T. It’s in the Vista, right behind the Motor Supply [Company]. From 7 until 11 o’clock, if you like to shag, like a little R&B, we’d love to have you there.”

Rep. John King asked for the privilege of the floor be granted to the South Pointe High School football team. That led Speaker of the House Bobby Harrell to inquire about a certain highly-regarded safety.

“Mr. King, does this mean that I get to see that outstanding five-star recruit for Carolina,” he asked.

Former Speaker of the House and Ambassador to Canada David Wilkins made a cameo, briefly causing a stir in the back of the House chamber, and taking a few minutes to visit with Harrell before taking a seat behind the current Speaker and observing the rest of the day’s session.

Reaction to President Barack Obama’s decision to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay received almost instant reaction, considering that the brig at the Charleston Navy Base could be used as a new home for some detainees.

“Closing the detention center at Guantanamo Bay is the wrong move for our country, it is better to have enemy combatants housed outside of the continental United States,” Sen. Ronnie Cromer said in a statement. “We have been very blessed over the last seven years, in that we have not had another terrorist attack in our country, but moving current detainees into the United States is just inviting trouble.”

One of the top priorities of Senate Republicans this session, spending caps, passed unanimously out of the Judiciary Committee and was sent to the full Senate. Sen. Glenn McConnell, the bill’s chief sponsor, said that the plan will make sure the state does not get into another tough fiscal fix like what is occurring this year.

Concurring, Majority Leader Harvey Peeler said, “Sen. McConnell’s plan caps spending and forces legislators to use every single tax dollar wisely. There’s no doubt that we are facing tough economic problems, but thoughtful senators like Glenn McConnell are moving past the problems and pushing conservative solutions.“

WEDNESDAY
Sen. McConnell wants senators and others to use their inside voices. Anyone that has watched the Senate, or the House, knows that at some times the din gets a little loud.

“Very quickly, what I wanted to talk with you about is where we seem to be starting out this year. And, that is, this chamber — I’m as guilty as anyone else — and that is the thing I was going to address. It is just getting so noisy in here, you cannot hear anything being read on these bills across this desk,“ he said. “We have rules now that require us to take votes on this uncontested call of the calendar, and it’s going to start picking up. We’re starting to get, in my opinion, myself included, into a bad habit here of too much loud talk going on, on this floor. Too much staff bringing too much business in here to connect with senators on this floor, and it just is getting to the point, if you’ve got to have these conversations, we need to be mindful to take them outside as much as we can.“

Sen. Lee Bright suffered a family tragedy, and Sen. Larry Grooms informed the chamber to the sad news.

Grooms said that Bright’s child, which was to “be born shortly after we adjourned this session, is not going to be born. His wife, they found news today, while at a routine visit to the doctor, that the baby’s heart was no longer beating. It was a time, thought to be of great joy to his family as he had his two little girls there to watch the first ultrasound to see their new sibling. His wife’s in the hospital right now. We hope for a quick recovery.“

Wolfe Reports joins the Senate in extending to the Bright family our condolences.

MEETINGS:
HOUSE:
Room 511 — 9 a.m. — Ways and Means Legislative, Executive, and Local Government Subcommittee
Room 515-A — 9 a.m. — Judiciary Criminal Laws Subcommittee
Room 516 — 9 a.m. — Judiciary Election Laws Subcommittee
Room 209, Gressette — 9 a.m. — Joint Driver’s License Reinstatement Fee Study Committee
Room 201 — 1 p.m. — Leg. Black Caucus Intern Program

SENATE:
Room 105 — 8:30 a.m. — N.E.S.A. Delegation
Room 209 — 9 a.m. — Joint Driver’s License Reinstatement Fee Study Committee
Room 105 — 10 a.m. — Education Funding Study Committee
Room 406 — 10 a.m. — Judiciary Subcommittee on S-132 and S-198
Room 207 — 10:15 a.m. — Judiciary Subcommittee on S-184
Room 209 — Upon adjournment — Judiciary Subcommittee on S-155, S-245 and S-272

RECEPTIONS:
ALL MEMBERS
8 a.m. — Breakfast by S.C. Association of Christian Schools at Room 112, Blatt Building

As Cory Boyd might say, it’s back like cooked crack. If it is the beginning of a legislative session, then LCI is handling another attempt at reforming South Carolina’s payday lending industry.

Rep. Harry Cato had the responsibility of introducing the bill to LCI’s Banking and Consumer Affairs Subcommittee, and also to the numerous legislators and other onlookers that created an overflow crowd at the Blatt Building on Tuesday.

For people looking for something new in the debate, they were sorely disappointed, except for perhaps the fact that the bill, to regulate closer but not ban payday loans, looks to have the initial support to move quickly through the Legislature.

Rep. Bakari Sellers, a cosponsor of the bill, still lamented that it didn’t address the cycle of debt he said some payday lending customers get trapped in. Rep. Anton Gunn, who dealt with the issue when he was at S.C. Fair Share, said, “Year after year, we’ve tried to wrestle this pig, and it’s squealed so loud nothing got done.”

Rep. Rita Allison, speaking on behalf of the Spartanburg delegation, reminded her fellow legislators that Advance America, one of the nation’s largest payday lending firms, is headquartered in South Carolina and employs a large number of people.

Interestingly, for an issue that was relentlessly debated last year, comments from legislators and the public lasted over two hours. The State, however, considered the deliberations speedy.

A House subcommittee wasted little time Tuesday in passing the state’s newest edition of payday lending reform, giving easy approval to a heavily-backed bill that raises to $600 the amount a lender may loan to individual clients, while avoiding a cap on the interest rate they can charge.

Also, payday lending lobbyists were out in force. Lobbyist extraordinaire Dwight Drake snagged Sellers in the hallway outside the committee meeting, arguing with him over minutiae in the state’s current regulations on the industry.

Proving that the bill is getting plenty of attention, former Sen. Tommy Moore, who is now a lobbyist for the payday lending trade organization Community Financial Services Association, was around, too, seen hanging out with Drake, Sen. John Land and Sen. Nikki Setzler later in the evening.

On Speaker of the House Bobby Harrell’s weekly program on Tuesday, Rep. Alan Clemmons and Rep. Bakari Sellers debated numerous issues with voting and elections in South Carolina, such as voter fraud, a voter ID bill, fusion voting and possible changes to the state’s open primary system.

As could be expected, the Republican and the Democrat were cordial, agreed on some things and disagreed on most others.

“With voting, it’s a right, but it’s also a responsibility,” Clemmons said. “We have a responsibility to ensure that every single person has their vote, but that every single person has no more than their vote. That’s important to us. And, I think that we, as a General Assembly, are willing to step up to the plate to protect the integrity of that vote. Just a couple years back, we saw a situation that is somewhat illustrative of the kind of thing that can happen in South Carolina.”

The representative from Myrtle Beach recalled an incident in which a person, paid to register voters, went through a phone book to fill out the registrations. Questions were raised when the mayor of Florence’s name appeared among the new registrations.

Though he recognized the threat of fraud, Sellers was concerned in making sure legit voters were not harmed.

“I think fraud is a major issue, but, I think there’s an issue in South Carolina that is just as important, and runs parallel to fraud, and that is the way we sometimes systematically disenfranchise voters in South Carolina,” Sellers said.

He added that it is just as important to make sure everyone who is eligible to vote is allowed to vote.

That led the discussion to voter ID laws. There are efforts already underway in the General Assembly to reform the state’s rules on voter ID.

“It’s very easy for me to take Bobby Harrell’s voter registration card to Bobby Harrell’s precinct and present it and vote as if I were Bobby Harrell,” Clemmons said. “That’s not right. We need to take steps to remedy that.”

Clemmons suggested a good idea would be putting a picture on voter registration cards, and maintained that the state should not put up unreasonable barriers to voting. In a stroke of bipartisanship, Sellers agreed, saying such a proposal would likely receive support from both sides of the aisle.

Fusion voting, by which a candidate would appear on the ballot as many times as different parties nominated them, also is getting a look in the Legislature this session. Clemmons called the multiple listings akin to getting multiple bites at the apple. Harrell suggested that a candidate could be listed once, but along with that, there could be printed each party that nominated that candidate.

“We passed a bill very similar to that, last year, out of the House, but it was never considered in the Senate,” Clemmons said.

While Sellers agreed that the issue should be looked at, he didn’t see a problem with the way the system currently operates.

“I think there is no fraud, there is no disillusionment, there is nothing wrong with having your name on the ballot more than one time, under different parties,” he said.

Following the rhythm of the debate, when it came to who should vote in primaries, Clemmons favored closing primaries to registered party members and independents, while Sellers wanted to keep the process open to everyone.

While it may seem like SCGOP chairman Katon Dawson has most of the Palmetto State’s Republicans in his camp, one man has gone to work for the opposition.

Jim Dyke, a political communications consultant from Charleston, is serving as former Maryland Lt. Gov. (and GOPAC chairman) Michael Steele‘s spokesman for his campaign for RNC chair. Dyke has a long history in Republican politics, recently serving as Rudy Giuliani’s senior communications adviser, and a communications adviser to former Sen. Bill Frist and to former President George W. Bush during, putting it mildly, the Harriet Miers Supreme Court nomination debacle.

The native Arkansan is also helping put together U.S. Rep. Gresham Barrett‘s anticipated 2010 run for governor.

Could that mean possible problems between the consultant, or Barrett, and the Dawson team? Doesn’t look that way.

“Michael Steele is fortunate to have someone like Jim Dyke in his corner,” state Republican Party spokesman Rob Godfrey said. “The great thing about this race is that Katon, Michael Steele and Jim Dyke share a common goal — rebuilding the Republican Party. Regardless of the outcome of Friday’s vote, they will continue to share this goal and hopefully work together toward achieving it.”