This is what we saw in an Associated Press release Sunday morning under the headline:

“Georgia Ports Authority wants to deepen Savannah River channel”

“The Georgia Ports Authority wants to deepen the Savannah River channel to accommodate larger container ships”, is the way the article began.

“Today, more than 50 percent of container ships calling on Savannah are what we call ‘tidally constrained’, meaning they can’t carry full loads at all tides,” said the authority’s executive director. “They either have to come in light-loaded or sail with a full tide”, he added.

Unless the channel is deepened to 48 feet, he went on to say, major international carriers would be discouraged from continuing to grow their operations in Savannah.

The port director credits the state with investing in the infrastructure necessary for the ports to accommodate double-digit growth year-after-year, but the Savannah Harbor Expansion Project is needed to keep it up because the size of container ships is increasing, he said.

According to the American Association of Port Authorities, shipping companies can save as much as $ 4.5 million per voyage by carrying a bit more than double their load, but larger ships need more water to navigate the river channel safely and can’t be bound by tides as they are now in Savannah.

“We’re definitely playing in the big leagues now,” the port director said. “But we have to get this deepening project done. It’s critical if we want to stay in the big leagues.”

[Is that “ego and the corporate fanning of feathers”, or what?]

Read again what that port director and the AAPA said:

• The port director “credits the state with investing in the infrastructure necessary … etc.”
• The AAPA assures us that “… shipping companies can save as much as $ 4.5 million per voyage … etc.
• And again from the port director, “We’re definitely playing in the big leagues now … etc.”

But shouldn’t it be obvious by now that the “state” just happens to be the taxpaying consumers? And isn’t the AAPA making it obvious that the shipping companies … and not the “state” … are the beneficiaries of the infrastructure investments and dredging projects even though the “state” gets stuck with tab?

And just who is it that’s “definitely in the big leagues now”? The “state”? … or the egos “fanning their corporate feathers”? Take a guess.