Dave Weigel’s been in South Carolina since last week, covering the election Democrats never really expected to win:
UPDATE, 8:23 p.m.: Well, it’s basically over. Beaufort County, the Sanford soft spot, went for him by a 6-point margin—2,152 votes. Charleston County is tied, when Colbert Busch needs to be winning it.
So, basically: Mark Sanford (R) defeats Elizabeth Colbert Busch (D), 54-45 percent.
UPDATE, 7:43 p.m.: Having stopped very briefly into the Elizabeth Colbert Busch party, and finding a classy selection of mostly-white Democrats enjoying a soft jazz band, I drove over to Sanford’s party at Liberty Tavern in Mt. Pleasant. By that time, we’d received results from two counties: Four precincts in Berkeley (Sanford by 7 points so far) and all of Colleton (Sanford 70-29 over ECB.).
But about Colleton and its sole precinct here, Edisto Beach. In 2012, it went for Mitt Romney by a landslide, 496-160 votes. Sanford has won it 272-114. Instead of netting the usual Republican 336-vote margin, it went for Sanford by 158…
I hope that, for once, the Democratic Party takes these results as a reason to fight harder next time, rather than collapsing into a puddle of self-recrimination. I especially hope Colbert-Busch comes back for another race, because the voters liked her and her message:
MT. PLEASANT, S.C.—Elizabeth Colbert Busch votes in safe Republican turf, and that would be fine on its own if the press didn’t want to cover this. The head election official at her precinct walked over to me as I joined a throng covering the candidate and informed me, unsmiling-ly, that I needed to check in with him. He made a fitful effort to break up reporters who were standing in the way of voters—”OK, let’s go!” After the candidate left, and after departing cameramen stumbled over a VOTE HERE sign, the election official snapped at ECB handlers for not following “the system we keep here.” They’d walked in the wrong way.
I noticed this because it was the only rough reception ECB got. Leaving the polls, female voters unanimously told me that they had voted for her. (Other reporters found some older women who’d stuck with Sanford.) Sharron Bohn, a laid-off government employee, said she was for Colbert Busch ever since her name was floated, and it had nothing to do with Sanford’s scandal.
“I don’t agree with what he did with his personal life, but I don’t really care,” she shrugged. “It’s his politics that worry me—frugality out the wazoo. I’ve had enough of this politicians who smile at us as they tell us about all the programs they’re cutting and defunding.“..
kc
I’m so disappointed in my state.
kc
OT, but I apologize for my total reading comprehension fail on the Elizabeth Smart thread earlier.
trollhattan
[sigh] There appears to be no Republican misstep big enough to kill a political career. Sanford and Vitter can be poster children.
Hal
Oh South Carolina, never change. It will be interesting to see Sanford and his jump off at official state functions.
AliceBlue
Sigh. I was oh-so-slightly hopeful.
pseudonymous in nc
Having seen the radical crazies in Raleigh, Lesser Carolina decided to up its game.
But yeah, that district is pretty much carved out for the GOP. It’ll be interesting to see what Jenny does next.
Just Some Fuckhead
I hope Elizabeth Colbert-Busch takes some time off to reflect on how special this opportunity was. Maybe hike the Appalachian Trail or visit South America or just watch a football game with her kids.
Hill Dweller
Unless PPP completely shit the bed with their polling, it looks like her support absolutely collapsed in the last ten days.
raven
@Hill Dweller: Who knows what those sleazy cocksucking south carolina christians pulled.
cmorenc
If the voters in SC-1 liked Colbert-Bush and her message, it wasn’t nearly so much that a 9-point majority preferred voting for an ex-Governor who resigned in disgrace over cheating with his wife “on the Appalachian Trail” to Argentina, violated restraining orders by trespassing at his ex-wife’s house, and made a transparently sleazy-cheesy move in asking his estranged ex to be his campaign manager. Hard fact is, a majority don’t prefer her policies or personality if they’d rather vote for a lying, cheating asshole jerk who will nevertheless likely vote the GOP party line.
Michele C
Can we maim the assholes who paid for those push polls?
Hill Dweller
@raven: There was a really vile push poll from Sanford supporters last week. I suppose that could have an effect on the mouth-breathers, but it doesn’t explain the entirety of her collapse.
raven
@Hill Dweller: I don’t think she ever stood a chance.
David Koch
IOKIYAR
Hill Dweller
@raven: I didn’t either, which is why I found the inclusion of several wingnut talking points in her stump speech so disappointing.
raven
@Hill Dweller: Ah, I see what you’re saying. I didn’t pay that much attention to the whole charade.
Spaghetti Lee
Win some, lose some, I guess. It’s impressive that she came so close.
kc
@Hill Dweller:
Oh yeah. The abortion push poll.
Republicans suck.
Comrade Jake
So SC has this clown and the YOU LIE! jackass
? Heckofa state.
kc
@Comrade Jake:
We also gave you Jim DeMint and Lindsay Graham.
The nation should shun us.
kc
Oh, and everyone who was saying how much better Charleston is than the rest of SC?
Y’all were wrong.
mikefromArlington
Y’all need to start walkin around the district with “God loves a cheater” shirts w/ his face plastered on it. Maybe buy a billboard next election round. Shame god fearin’ folk into not being able to pull the trigger for the guy
David Koch
PPush polling works in SC
Lee Atwater actually invented push polling, first using it in SC in 1978 to defeat a Democratic congressman using anti-Semitic tripe.
Shrub crushed McCain after he had won New Hampshire by 19 pts, smearing him as someone who had a black baby out of wedlock in an affair with a call-girl and as a NVA collaborator.
In 2008 Mittens was sunk when Reverend Huckabee sent out Xmas cards on Romney stationary wishing voters happy holidays and extorting the virtue of mormon polygamy.
Last year, a badly wounded Gingrich was able crushed Mittens by 20 pts by running a relentless negative campaign.
And now ECB gets smeared as a baby killer.
SC is just fertile for this stuff.
Mike in NC
@pseudonymous in nc: Read where a lot of old white guys were bothered that poor Mark Sanford had been married to a “strong, controlling woman” (in other words, an uppity bitch).
ChrisNYC
I’m sort of looking forward to the crap Sanford will stir. He’s a real asshole, has a promising lack of self control, that inveterate weirdness, loves the limelight and feels abandoned by the GOP. You just KNOW that he wants to be a Senator. He looks in the mirror and says, “Mark, you are Senator material.” Remember those stories from when he was governor about everyone hating him? I think he might be useful.
Mike in NC
@Hill Dweller: The RNCC shunned Sanford but the money still flowed in like a firehose.
dance around in your bones
I’m watching him now (left coast) crediting “God’s Grace and angels” for his win.
Just kill me now. What a fucking phony.
eta: I loved the part where he demanded his cooking pot to stand on to reach the crowds.
Shrillhouse
Predictable and pathetic.
Beth
@mikefromArlington: You would be amazed at how many folks at church showed me how they were going to hold their nose with one hand and vote for Sanford with the other. They have no shame.
beltane
@ChrisNYC: Maybe he’ll run for Lindsay’s seat using his womanizing as an asset.
@David Koch: I don’t want to put down a whole state as stupid, but it does seem that there are more stupid people per capita in SC than in some other states.
dewzke
My dog how awful the voters think in SC-1. Well the voters that made it to the polls. Blech. Really? Really? what a….Dang, I’m out. Sanford supports my right to be right to be an ass or some such bs? How could any sentient being vote for that thing.
PeakVT
Tribalism über alles.
Corner Stone
Ms. Colbert-Busch isn’t much of a Democrat.
Not really surprised or disappointed by this outcome.
Hill Dweller
@Mike in NC: The RNC/RNCC/RNSC are amateur hour. That party is run by the wingnut billionaires and their outside groups.
Ksmiami
@Beth: hence why more sane people are shunning religion. Fools and hypocrites.
Comrade Jake
That jackass DeMint was on NPR this morning spewing bile about the Heritage Foundation’s immigration opus. I felt like drop kicking my radio alarm clock.
RaflW
@Corner Stone:
Could be. But considering it’s S.C, having a D vote in the US House from time to time would have been helpful.
I think running in an R +11 district is always ballsy. And Dems should never let even R +11 races go without a decent candidate. Get the pols talking, make them defend their outlandish GOP fantasy policies. And, once in a while, win.
RaflW
@Comrade Jake:
In stead, drop an angry e-mail to NRP and, more importantly, to your local affiliate. Look, the right has made great headway flipping out over everything. Crabbing here is good, we need to know what shizzle NPR is up to.
But the network and the affiliates need to know that we know that Heritage is a hack shop and is not due the courtesy of a hand-job.
Spaghetti Lee
I’m not a campaign strategist, but I’ve never been quite sure about the tactic of, after a loss, raging about how the voters are all idiots and suckers. Even if they never see it, it can’t be good for personal optimism.
She got 45% of the vote. That’s one out of two. There’s sane people everywhere, even in ‘deep red’ districts. Engage them. Don’t write off whole states as lost causes.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Corner Stone:
Maybe, but Sanford isn’t much of a Republican and South Carolina isn’t much of a state. So, there’s that.
hilts
To paraphrase Phil Ochs: “South Carolina find yourself another country to be part of” — you dumb ass, cock-sucking, scumbag motherfuckers
OzoneR
@RaflW: Lets not forget she ran in a R+11 as pro-marriage equality, pro-choice, against cuts to SS and Medicare, in the district where the Civil War started.
If this is too conservative for a R+11, I’m not sure what would be considered progressive.
PsiFighter37
@Spaghetti Lee: It wasn’t close. Sure, it wasn’t the 18-point margin that Romney put up against Obama, but losing my 9-10% (or wherever the finals come out) is not my definition of a close race.
Sounds like Colbert-Busch peaked too early, and the famed SC GOP smear machine came alive late. Seems like the GOTV operation on our side was shit, and they didn’t come to play dirty (which seems to be a prerequisite for this state).
When shit like this happens, what is the real expectation that Vince Shaheen can honestly knock off Nikki Haley next year?
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
I’m not sure how Democrats could have really fought harder. Hell, Sanford’s ex-wife ran against him. This was white male privilege.
Mike in NC
@beltane:
No doubt you’ve heard of the Bermuda Triangle? I refer to Horry County, SC (Myrtle Beach and inland redneck enclaves) as the Crackpot Quadrangle.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Spaghetti Lee:
Thank you Kyle Broflovski.
But this is South Carolina we’re talking about, not one of the normal states.
Michele C
@Spaghetti Lee: dang, that makes sense. For some reason, I am gun shy, as they say, of anything tha sounds sensible.
OzoneR
@PsiFighter37:
It’s not a federal race, it’s a state race.
mdblanche
@hilts: They tried that and we stopped them. It seemed like a good idea at the time.
Hill Dweller
@Spaghetti Lee:
FWIW, I’ve been to SC several times, including the “good” parts of the state, and I can say without equivocation it is full of knuckle-draggin’ mouth breathers.
? Martin
@Belafon (formerly anonevent):
I’m not usually one to jump on the ‘run left’ bandwagon, but I think in this case it was needed. Unlike a general election, special elections have terrible turnouts. You win them not by running to the center and taking a few of the other guys votes from them, you win by turning your supporters out – you run hard to your base. It’s the same formula as primary elections.
Colbert-Busch didn’t do that. I think she should have. The GOP wasn’t exactly thrilled to vote for Sanford anyway. Their turnout was going to be weak.
OzoneR
@? Martin:
how didnt see? She ran pretty far left for South Carolina
sphouch
So, the message is, if you’re a philandering governor who uses taxpayer money to disappear to Argentina to carry on your affairs whilst having your handlers convey the message that you’re hiking the Appalachian Trail, you’re still a better choice in South Carolina than a woman? Those Values Voters must have shown up in droves.
JD Rhoades
@trollhattan:
The only thing a Rethuglican can do that will kill his political career is try to reach a sane compromise with Democrats. Because the Rethuglican Party isn’t really a party at all. They’re a tribe.
mai naem
I’m not surprised. The way the last polls were coming out, Sanford had caught up. I just feel bad for the Colberts who come across as just a very decent family. I was listening to Michael Steele this AM on talk radio(don’t ask why!) and he was talking about how people just see it as a divorced man blah blah blah. Seriously? This isn’t some private citizen’s divorce. This guy was a freaking governor who went off to Argentina on the public dime(initially anyway) and didn’t tell his staff where he went. He’s running for Congress and trespasses onto his ex’s property and, oh, yeah, he’s a deadbeat dad. I can’t be bothered to look it up but I’d love to see what Michael Steele said about Clinton and Weinerman. BTW, Steele started the show talking about Benghazi and compared it to the Bush WMDs.
gnomedad
If you were reminded that Mark Sanford is a lying, cheating, post-abandoning douchebag, would that affect your vote?
Quicksand
You heard it here firstish:
https://balloon-juice.com/2013/04/17/sanford-and-son/#comment-4370590
Corner Stone
@RaflW: R+18
Southern Beale
In other news ….
A North Berkeley couple who officials said had stockpiled weapons and discussed “eventual war with the government” was arrested last week by the Berkeley Police Department.
Last Tuesday, just after 11:30 p.m., police received a report that someone had fired a bullet through the walls of a neighbor’s apartment in the 1700 block of Highland Place, according to court documents. Police responded and found two people, later identified as Jeremy Adrian and his girlfriend, Masayo Shinohara, on the second floor landing.
The couple had with them a case an officer identified as one commonly used for the storage and transportation of weapons, according to police, along with a black rolling duffel bag. Police detained Adrian and Shinohara in handcuffs. According to an officer at the scene, Adrian admitted that he had fired a gun into the next-door unit.
According to Adrian’s attorney, Elena Condes, who represented her client Friday at his arraignment hearing, Adrian had removed the ammunition clip from his gun but had not realized there was still a bullet in the chamber. Condes told Alameda County Superior Court Judge Paul Delucchi on Friday that Adrian had accidentally fired the weapon, then immediately went over to his neighbor’s apartment to apologize and “make sure everybody was OK.”
? Martin
@OzoneR:
No, George Bush was pretty far left for South Carolina. I think ECB needed to run well to Obama’s left. She needed to be Elizabeth Warren in South Carolina. She needed to be the Democrat that kc above would get excited about. She didn’t run that campaign.
Yatsuno
South Carolina deserves what it gets, and it deserves to get it good and hard.
Southern Beale
OOPS hit the send on that one too soon. But seriously, et tu, Berkeley??? In other news ….
Jesus. Well at least in Berkeley the gun loonz come over to apologize before trying to skip town.
Corner Stone
@sphouch: Hell, using taxpayer cash to go fuck some hottie is about 90% of the way to nirvana for an idiot R voter. The only thing better would be if the hottie was a same sex male.
David Koch
Congratulations to the party of “family values”. Well done.
Corner Stone
@? Martin: Fuck no she didn’t. She ran a +5 or +8 R campaign hoping to get her district excited about her.
They all figured why fucking bother? We can get the ex-Gov for free.
Corner Stone
@mai naem: She ran a Republican campaign in a Republican district. She got what we all expected.
Hill Dweller
@? Martin: That’s what I was saying in the thread below.
Democratic policies are popular. Progressive policies are even more popular. For example, the House progressives’ sequester replacement proposal polled higher than any other package…if the respondents weren’t told who authored the proposal.
The Dems have the policy advantage, but they’re too busy trying to be Republican-lite, which suppresses the base but doesn’t lead to more votes from the other party. It also validates some of the wingnut talking points.
Ignore the hacks in the Village and stand up for progressive policies. It is ultimately a winning strategy.
Mike in NC
@PsiFighter37: True fact: most of the low information voters who elected Nikki Haley as SC governor thought she was American-Indian, not Indian-American.
mdblanche
@Southern Beale: Far right and far left overlap?
Comrade Jake
I go down to SC every once in awhile to do some work with Michelin. People who work there are fairly progressive. You start asking them about state politics and suddenly everyone’s face disappears into their hands.
ChrisNYC
@? Martin: Because SC red voters would certainly sit on their hands rather than get to the polls to beat an evil commie lefty who wants to punish job creators and nationalize healthcare.
? Martin
@ChrisNYC: But ECB was going to be the evil commie lefty no matter what. Suppressing votes is a losing strategy. Turnout is everything. Get the left excited enough to show up. And with Sanford there were going to be more than a few Republicans willing to sit home and take whatever result came along simply because they disliked Sanford.
jl
@Comrade Jake:
I wish I knew more about South Carolina.
I saw some election stats that said Obama got one of the highest proportion of white votes in SC than in any state in the South. I hope I remember that correctly.
Mentioned it here and one commenter said South Carolina has caught the northern Virginia and NC disease: some high tech knowledge industrial base, with better than average educated natives and substantial immigration from more progressive states. Not sure whether that is true.
Edit: but as a native Californian, I don’t believe her little brother’s BS about SC peaches. Most of them are made into baby food. Baby food, Mandrake, for innocent little children!
Edit2: if SC peaches are like GA peaches, they are a nice presumptuous regional niche peach, but the best? Ha!
Mike in NC
@Corner Stone: Like Harry Truman famously once said, “Give the voters the choice between a Republican and a Republican, they’ll choose the Republican every time.” Things haven’t changed in 60 years.
FlipYrWhig
@? Martin: Are there enough liberal firebrands in coastal South Carolina to make this strategy viable?
Seems like there’s a simpler answer anyway. White people in South Carolina like Republicans, even Republican douchenozzles, will vote for them, and aren’t reachable with campaign strategies, even the most clever ones actually or hypothetically possible.
MomSense
Ugh.
FlipYrWhig
@? Martin: we are talking about South Carolina, right?
jl
@MomSense:
” Ugh.”
Thanks. That was my reaction too. But I got distracted and forgot to type that.
Comrade Jake
OT: Charles Ramsey interview with Anderson Cooper:
http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/07/us/ohio-cleveland-ramsey/index.html?c=homepage-t
It’s another gem folks!
Mike in NC
@jl: You were misinformed about SC.
ChrisNYC
@? Martin: But she wasn’t a commie leftist, nor was she made out to be one. She got 45%. It feels like you’re assuming that there is a “left” to get out. It has, what PVI R+11, that district? Maybe there are non voters who you’re counting on to come into the process (but that seems a reach normally and especially in a special election held in May and on a short schedule). The voters in that district who actually vote are majority GOP. She has to steal some or she can’t win.
Violet
Said it before, but Sanford reminds me of Jerry Sandusky. Same dead eyes and thin mouth.
jl
@Mike in NC:
But your name is ‘Mike in NC’… so, you might have some interest.
I’ll admit that Obama getting the second or third the highest percentage of the white vote in the South is low bar, but I am pretty sure I remember the stats correctly.
And I cannot imagine any commenter on Balloon-Juice could possibly misinform me.
FlipYrWhig
@Mike in NC: yeah. That sounds like hella wishful thinking. It’s like going to Athens or Austin and concluding that the whole state must be arty and cool.
? Martin
@FlipYrWhig:
Unquestionably.
SC-1 had a 75% turnout rate in 2012. Obama got 40% of votes in the district. So, ECB has a base of 30% of the voters in the district.
Turnout tonight was 31%. So, over half of Obama’s voters in 2012 didn’t show up today. That was her window of victory – getting those voters to show up. And most of those voters were black – so I don’t think that running left was going to alienate anyone.
Mike in NC
The pattern throughout the south is the Republican national blueprint: destroy all labor unions, make people desperate enough to take a shitty job at minimum wage (or less), with next to zero benefits and time off, etc. I was fucking appalled at having to practically beg for a job where I was paid 50% less and expected to work twice as hard as I experienced in the DC area for 20 years.
kc
@Corner Stone:
Dude, no.
trollhattan
@Southern Beale:
Ugh. While I can’t claim there are no poor people in Berkeley there are darn few who can afford to live there. Evidently, some who can afford it are also gun fondlers. Maybe they were starting up the SLA again?
? Martin
@ChrisNYC:
NO NO NO NO NO! A thousand fucking times NO!
Turnout is never 100%. In special elections 40% is HUGE. Oftentimes it’s 20%. The issue in special elections (like primaries) isn’t how to woo the other guys voters. It’s how to get your voters to give more of a fuck and vote. In her case it was easy – most of the GOP didn’t give a fuck about Sanford. Hell, even the RNC didn’t give a fuck, and they’re PAID to give a fuck.
When turnout is the game, you run hard to the base. You excite them. You act like a teatard. You take the most extreme positions your party holds. That’s what gets people to show up.
Spaghetti Lee
@? Martin:
In Sanford’s case, I don’t know how much ‘acting’ was required.
I don’t automatically hate people who (how to put this) have a stronger religious fervor than me, but stuff like Sanford’s very-public “God has forgiven me, and my win is proof!” makes me retch. We should all be so lucky, eh Mark?
OzoneR
@? Martin:
Early in the campaign, ECB criticized Obama’s SS proposal. She also spoke about how there was no need to alter it, or cut Medicare.
Plus there was gay marriage and abortion which she openly supported it.
Again, I ask, in what way did she NOT run left?
OzoneR
@? Martin:
Wait, how do you know those voters were to the left of ECB? Maybe they were turned off by her support for gay marriage. Blacks in the south are very socially conservative. We don’t know why they didn’t show up, but I think you’re wrong to assume they didn’t because she didn’t run far enough left.
You want her to run to the left of Obama, but these people voted for Obama, didn’t they? Was his 2012 campaign more left than ECB?
JoyfulA
@Mike in NC: Boeing was offering electricians $10/hour for their new SC plant. I’ve been wondering whether that’s why the new plane has electrical problems.
Mike in NC
@? Martin: I’ve been voting for 40 years, and no matter where I’ve lived, people WILL NOT BOTHER to vote in non-presidential elections. That’s why this country is fucked.
ChrisNYC
@? Martin: I agree with it getting people to show up. I just don’t see why you think it gets only DEMS to show up. Particularly here where there was SO much media attention. I’d bet that if ECB had run on the I heart President Obama platform or the single payer platform or the put the bankers in jail platform or the let’s go back to Eisenhower tax rates platform, the GOPers would have started to care quite a bit about their dear Mark.
The Other Bob
@? Martin:
I agree. I think her last minute anti-ACA BS and other rightwing crap did not help. Haven’t we learned that no one votes for a fake R when they can vote for a real one? She just killed her base is all she did.
Corner Stone
@kc: Ok genius. Then you explain it all to us.
Don’t just tell me fucking no, dude, no.
Let’s hear it local clownshoe.
Death Panel Truck
@Mike in NC: What Truman actually said was “Given a choice between a fake Republican and a real one, the public will choose the real Republican every time.”
Corner Stone
ECB ran in a hard R district and lost by a swap of only about 5% or so.
Maybe she should’ve considered not being an R-Lite.
Steeplejack
@Southern Beale:
This is a stunning level of incompetence, and one all too common in these gun accidents. You almost should be able to know the “still one in the chamber” thing just from watching cop shows and action movies.
TR
I can’t believe how simple minded Democratic voters will continue to be.
The following has nothing to do with what Democrats receive.
How easy is it to use Sanford’s Big Govt.Paycheck,Big Govt.Healthcare & Big Govt. Retirement against him & the Rep/Con/Tea voters since they don’t like Socialist Redistribution supported by Big Govt. Tax Dollars. At every opportunity throw his “Socialism” up to his voters. Wonder if this strategy could work against every Rep/Con/Tea in the country?
I’m sure this is still to complicated for Democrats.
Kay
I didn’t think she ran a great campaign, but it sucks running in these districts which is why no one wants to do it.
In my opinion, it’s not that she (and others) run too far “Right” it’s that they all sound the same.
Public-private partnerships, job-killing deficits, wholly unneccesary union-bashing, it’s just biolerplate southern Democrat.
If they’d take a risk and run more populist, they would stand out. She would be a poor populist though because it’s completely inauthentic, but that’s the only way for a Democrat to compete.
lojasmo
@Hill Dweller:
The PPP poll was taken a couple days after the breaking of the tresspassing story and some other shit.
lojasmo
@Corner Stone:
Given that the republican won, I’m not surprised by your lack of disappointment.
celticdragonchick
@JoyfulA:
Jesus Christ.
I worked on commercial aircraft from 1997 to 2005, and as an apprentice mechanic in a 3rd party repair station I started at $12 an hour. As a full mechanic without my A&P I was making $15.50, and when I contracted out I was usually making around $25.
I never heard of anyone in production making $10 an hour in aviation. Damn.
Ted & Hellen
To me, the mistake here was the Dems making it all about “character,” “family, values,” and all the other usual REPUBLICAN BLUE NOSE bullshit tropes.
Who gives a fuck what he did in his personal life?
Gotta love the Juicers here who are outraged about the governor’s affair, yet have nothing to say about Bush Junior walking free.
ricky
@? Martin:
Name one campaign that ever won with that strategy.
But thanks for assuming the Democratic base reponds to candidates who “act like a teatard.”
ricky
@Corner Stone:
Yes. As those excellent PPP polls showed, once she lost her momentum and the R’s quit feeling disappointed and began reappearing in polls as likely voters, a hard swing to the left would have made those disappointed lefties in SC come out in droves.
She should have asked you to be her campaign manager. If only more listened.
Loviatar, Firebagger
I asked this yesterday
The Democrats got Obamacare (a Republican healthcare plan) and the Republicans got the statehouses and the House Of Representatives for the next 10 years.
Was it worth it?
West of the Rockies
@trollhattan: Well, here’s my take… I think that being so closely allied with fundamentalist Christianity, Republicans are big on being born again, on rising up from their sins (all it takes is a little public demonstration of contriteness and a smug statement about knowing “our father” has forgiven us!) and moving on with things.
On the other hand, when a liberal politician sins, well, that is unforgivable and this person must be confined to the flames of perdition! Godless bastards!
Makes me wanna barf.
ricky
@Loviatar, Firebagger:
I dunno. Did anyone answer your question yesterday?
Another Halocene Human
@kc: Well, anyone could go to Charleston, SC, and find that out for themselves, but then again, why would you?
Charlestonites like to brag about the dining and the views, but you can get those things in scads of places without the side of hard-core racism.
Pass.
Another Halocene Human
@? Martin: She ran center from what I can tell. She beat Obama’s numbers. Turnout was an issue that speaks to a lack of ground organization because it is a district where there are lots of Dem voters but the Dems aren’t competitive.
Why not do something about that ground organization? Oh yeah, OFA did, and they focused on Texas which has a lot of easy pickup Hispanic American natives who aren’t registered, making it possible to built momentum that will draw resources to continue the fight.
But the same could be done in many Southeastern congressional districts if anyone cared to. So far only NAACP and AFL-CIO seem to care. They are getting my money, btw.