(Yes indeed it is in my district! KSH).
Perhaps it is fitting that inclement weather could play a role in deciding the outcome of Tuesday’s special U.S. House election in South Carolina’s 1st District. After all, the race has been turbulent and unpredictable from the get-go.
Forecasts called for intermittent showers and thunderstorms around Charleston as voters head to the polls, adding a wrinkle to both sides’ turnout models, which were already steeped in guesswork.
The high-profile battle between former Republican Gov. Mark Sanford and Democrat Elizabeth Colbert Busch has seen everything from an embarrassing accusation of trespassing from Sanford’s ex-wife to rare, out-of-character appearances by Colbert Busch’s brother Stephen Colbert, the satirist best known for lampooning members of Congress rather than helping them raise money.
A wiser man that me said in 1861 that “South Carolina is too small to form a republic, but too large to be an insane asylum.”
One good thing is that as of tonight it will be over, it is incredible how much is spent of mailers, phone calls, etc.
This has nothing whatever to do with Sanford’s past indiscretion. If politics were about past indiscretion people would not call Ted Kennedy “The Lion of the Senate” or call Bill Clonton anything at all. South Carolina is conservative and very much anti-Obamacare. I was in Charleston on business two weeks ago and Sanford was running an ad, a video of Cobert Busch, promising union bosses entree into Boeing. That doesnt fly in SC. Then the head of the State Democratic Party racially maligned our governor last weekend based on her Indian heritage and “apologized” by saying he wasnt racially biased but she should be at home helping her male relatives with accounting, where she belongs, and then Eric Holder sent US DOJ employees to watch the polls in Charleston becasue the president is obsessed with taking back the House, and can’t afford to lose any seats that are up for grabs. Unfortunately the margin of victory is too large for DOJ to challenge. The stars aligned against CB thanks in large part to the geniuses in the Democratic Party. We can only hope they do as well in 2014.
#3, congratulations apparently are in order. Perhaps the former governor will invite his fellow South Carolinians to join him on his Appalachian Trail treks.
Apparently a mug shot of Colbert Busch from a messy divorce surfaced, which didn’t help her already sagging campaign. If I were in the district I’d have probably held my nose and voted for Sanford. He would be far, far more likely to vote for national policy I agree with than would CB. Sanford’s use of a cardboard Nancy Pelosi to debate was effective, it seems. Sanford will bear watching, but that’s what elections every two years are for. If he fouls up ethically before elections next year, perhaps a less flawed candidate will run and win.