Just when I'm beginning to think that none of the stupid political nonsense in this country can surprise me any more, here comes something new.

From Gawker...

South Carolina: Your politicians stink. Mark "All Over Your Appalachian Trail" Sanford's right-hand man, Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer, refuses to apologize for a comment comparing poor people to "stray animals," arguing we should not "feed" them lest "they breed."

Here's what Bauer said in front of a crowd of people in Greenville:

In government, we are too often giving a handout instead of a hand up. [...] My grandmother was not a highly educated woman, but she told me as a small child to quit feeding stray animals You know why? Because they breed.

You're facilitating the problem if you give an animal or a person ample food supply. They will reproduce, especially ones that don't think too much further than that. And so what you've got to do is you've got to curtail that type of behavior. They don't know any better.

The State—a newspaper that is either really good, or just has a good beat, since South Carolina politicians have neither self-control nor discursive filters—reports that Bauer refuses to apologize. Though his words were rough, he says, the message was true. Which is weird, because even if you forgive him for comparing poor people to flea-bag alley cats that "don't know any better" than to blindly rub their genitals together until flea-bag babies spring from their loins—if you actually follow his argument to its logical conclusion? It's that we should starve poor people until their reproductive organs cease to function, which is not only totally messed up, but isn't even efficient.

"This is out of love and compassion," Bauer said. "If I have to take a hit, then fine. ... I will take short-term pain for long-term gain."

Bauer's "stray animals" rant came on the same day that South Carolina reported a jobless rate of 12.6 percent. Some South Carolinians find this coincidence distressing