Winter 2011

Top 10 Quotes

We don't publish this Ten Top 10 every year, but there were enough great quotes in the last four editions of Southern Business & Development and on www.RandleReport.com to warrant the category Top 10 Quotes in this year's Ten Top 10s edition.

"Before and after President Obama signed the landmark health care reform bill into law on March 22, 2010, opponents howled that its price tag -- $938 billion over 10 years -- will ultimately bankrupt the country. But compared to defense spending, the cost of the new health care bill is chump change. For example, if spending by the Pentagon increases at the rate it has since 2006, the price tag for defense will be the same as health care -- $938 billion -- but for one year, not 10."

-- Mike Randle, editor and publisher of SB&D in his Winter 2010 cover story titled, "What if Peace Breaks Out?"

"The South, as a region, plays a considerable role in DoD's basing, housing, logistics and operations. This will continue. If peace breaks out, our armed forces will need to 'reset,' meaning replace assets lost in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars through combat and the strain of today's wars. Restocking will keep the DoD procurement folks busy as well as business and industry."

-- Dave Dickson, Executive Director of the Richmond-based Virginia National Defense Industrial Authority in the same story, "What if Peace Breaks Out?"

"In fact, we have not seen a surge in major projects coming from an individual industry sector like this in the South since the automotive industry went nutty-nut with dozens of big projects in 2002 and 2003."

-- Mike Randle, editor and publisher of SB&D in the Spring 2010 cover story titled "The Race to Green in the Wake of the Spill." Randle was referring to the large number of projects in the South coming from clean tech industries like solar, zero emission automobiles, wind, biofuels, recycling and other environmentally friendly sectors. This summer SB&D will publish a bonus issue titled "The American South: The Center of the Clean Tech Revolution." 

"Now my concern is that every day that we delay trying to find a price for carbon is a day that China uses to dominate the green economy."

-- S.C. Sen. Lindsay Graham in the same cover story titled "The Race to Green in the Wake of the Spill."

"What happened to manufacturing? In two words, higher productivity. As productivity rises, employment falls because fewer people are needed. In this, manufacturing is following the same trend as agriculture. A century ago, almost 30 percent of adult Americans worked on a farm. Nowadays, fewer than five percent do. That doesn't mean the U.S. failed at agriculture. Quite the opposite."

-- Former U.S. Sec. of Labor Robert B. Reich in the annual "Made in the South" edition in the summer of 2010.

"In other words, the mad rush to China for U.S. manufacturers is over. And like GM and others, manufacturers in the U.S. will emerge from this recession much leaner than ever before, which means productivity and profits will soar."

-- Mike Randle in the summer 2010 "Made in the South" feature

"There's only one Deep South state that doesn't have a single county with an unemployment rate of over 12% and that state is Arkansas. In fact, Arkansas only has two counties with an unemployment rate that tops 10 percent. In comparison, Georgia has 29 rural counties with an unemployment rate 12% or higher and that leads the South."

-- Mike Randle in the annual Small Town South edition in the fall of 2010.

"Whatever view one holds, if you 'follow the money,' it is clear that Clean Tech is the next big wave of economic development, and the South stands to benefit."
-- Dennis Cuneo, Managing Partner of the Washington, D.C. office of Fisher & Phillips LLP in the Fall 2010 edition and featured on www.RandleReport.com. Cuneo was formerly Senior V.P. of Toyota Motor NA.

"I never understood why it took nearly a week for him (former President George W. Bush) to agree to my original request for federal troops. The delay, we now understand from his book, came from the President’s fixation on the implications of invoking the Insurrection Act, fueled by the media’s exaggeration of violence in New Orleans."

-- Former Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco responding to Bush's book "Decision Points" that was published last year where he explained how he could have responded better to the situation in Louisiana right after Hurricane Katrina hit the state in 2005. Blanco is a guest writer on www.RandleReport.com.

"Enterprise Florida is no longer an economic development agency. It’s a think tank."  

-- An unnamed veteran Florida economic development practitioner (for obvious reasons) in this edition's cover story titled "Will Rick Scott Save or Sink Florida?"