North Carolina’s biggest newspaper has weighed-in on the saga involving the state’s Republican governor, a fired grocery store cook and now a Democratic mayor.
The verdict: Everybody ended up looking kind of bad.
An editorial published Wednesday by the Charlotte Observer acknowledged that Drew Swope “acted inappropriately” when he made a snarky remark to Gov. Pat McCrory (R) at Reid’s Fine Foods in Charlotte. The confrontation cost Swope his job at the high-end grocery store and he accepted the consequences.
After the firing drew some publicity, Charlotte Mayor Pat Cannon stepped in and offered to help Swope find a job — an action that the Observer panned as “a blatant and useless political ploy.”
“He did not offer to individually help the tens of thousands of other unemployed Charlotteans find a job,” the editorial board wrote.
But the harshest judgment, by far, was reserved for McCrory.
The editorial board wrote that the incident “reinforced his image as thin-skinned” and that a savvier politician would have played it differently.
Imagine how a sharp political adviser would have had the governor parlay the confrontation into a positive. Instead of coming across as petty, McCrory could have ignored Swope’s comment, or even embraced the opportunity for dialogue. He could have been forgiving and charitable – and be seen as the grown up in the room. Instead, he accidentally made national news again.