Just Say No to South Carolina AG's Shamelessly Punitive Prudery

The recent multiple scandals exposing sexual hypocrisy on the part of South Carolina's politicians seem to have done nothing to diminish their repressive impulses. The latest example involves an assistant deputy attorney general named Roland Corning who was found by a police officer spending his lunch break in his car with a stripper. The officer himself acknowledged that no illegal activity was occurring; as far as I can tell from the news story, the man isn't married, so it's not even a case of infidelity. Nor is it hypocrisy on Corning's part, at least in his present life as a prosecutor (he was previously a state legislator), since he worked on securities cases. Nonetheless, he was fired the same day by Attorney General Henry McMaster. The AP story willingly repeats a number of details that may have added fuel to the puritanical fires, and which you can read there if you're so inclined. The bottom line, however, is that nothing illegal, non-consensual, or even unsafe appears to have been going on, yet Corning has lost his job over it. I've sent McMaster an email expressing my disgust at his action, and also written him a letter. The contact information as it appears on his website is: The Honorable [sic] Henry McMaster P.O. Box 11549 Columbia, SC 29211 Email: info@scattorneygeneral.com My thanks to my friend John Kirkland for forwarding the link to this story to his facebook page.