Attention Kmart shoppers... The runoff campaign is almost over, the store will be closing shortly, and you will need to go to the voting booth by 700PM tomorrow. Yes, at long last, this ugliness that has been the 7th District runoff will graciously come to an end. Thank God, because we can't take much more of this! Not so much the campaign stops, though they are a tad repetitive by now... We just can't take anymore of the distortive ads and Facebook rants back and forth from both sides. Personally, we hear a lot of people say they will vote for whoever wins in November, but we have a hard time believing that from some of the things we've read from some.
Thankfully, this is our last post before we vote, then go on Bill Pickle's radio show to talk about this and hopefully a lot of other things in the morning. In a tight race like this, having the appearance that your campaign is gaining momentum is important, so both are unloading all the shells from thier shotguns. The last thing you want is to lose by a point or two, and wished you had done something you passed on.
Tom Rice definitely did that today, as he crossed the district on a bus tour with an All-Star list of his biggest endorsers: Governor Nikki Haley, former Governor Jim Edwards, and ex Pee Dee congressmen Ed Young and John Napier. In a race where the Pee Dee is the wide open spot for undecided or second choice voters, Rice made a clear play for upping his credibility in an area where Andre Bauer clearly has better name recognition. The time for policy stands is long over - the last days are all emotion and getting out the vote - and Rice and Haley even more so made pleas for their vote tomorrow.
Judging by the latest Rice ad, and Haley's specific words, there is a clear tack of the Rice campaign: Andre Bauer cannot be trusted. Haley admitted that she felt Bauer has abandoned the reform movement, and there is a bit of bad blood leftover from 2010. That tends to dampen the message, but she did have an effect train of thought that others hadn't used. She felt Bauer gave in on accepting Stimulus funds, and he gave up his values for the ease of compromise. She asked 'what will he compromise on in DC? Will Obamacare not be so bad? What about increasing the debt limit?' Yeah, a bit towards the extreme, but it was probably the best speech we had ever seen her give.
Is Andre Bauer untrustworthy? Of course not... We're at the very last minute of this race -the time when the biggest bullshit bombs get tossed. We hate runoffs, because the guy that you had no problems with two weeks ago is suddenly the biggest threat to our very safety and freedoms if he/she gets elected. Our best advice during these races is to wear ear plugs to avoid the distortive messages, and just enjoy the event itself, which is what we always do...
Overall, it was Rice's biggest event of the campaign in Florence. I'd estimate there were 125-150 attendees at Locals, where we took the time to read the menu, thus allowing us to save about $3 over our last lunch there.. Like Andre Bauer's event last week with Mike Huckabee, getting a big name to stop by for you definitely gets the people out. I tried to get a pic of Haley, but I was too far, and my camera phone gets fuzzy if you move at all. I might need to start bringing the Kodak with me again..Here's a few of the pics that actually came out well...
Darlington County young guns Matthew Blewitt and District 62 candidate Ronald Page stopped by, and stayed late... Page noticed the same the same error from Napier that I did, when Napier said Rice would 'bring the district to new depths' ... Oops, guess he meant heights!
And on the other end of the spectrum, we have Old Farts Ron McGill and Mal Weatherly... It was great to see Mal for the first time in years. On the other hand, I speak with Ron more than my entire immediate family combined! That's because he makes more sense than they do...
That pretty much concludes our coverage of the 2012 Runoff. It's been interesting to say the least. At it's worst, it's been ugly and threateningly divisive... Why so much this time? It's been 80 years since we had seven congressional districts, and 20 years since Republicans have felt they actually had a congressman. Rarely do we get this jacked up on a DC race, but we finally feel this is OUR seat, and when it gets that way, people involved will get emotional. We don't. Why? Because we are alien cyborgs sent to Planet Earth to observe and report this strange human activity called politics. Other cyborgs drew the straws to watch strip clubs and Football - and we're still unhappy about that. All we have left is to predict how it all will turn out tomorrow. No science will be involved - just an educated guess with a little gut feeling.
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3 comments:
Mike- any last mintute indication of how this thing ends up. Found any polling? What are your people saying? TJ
where was grimes? he seems to have fallen off the planet since the district convention. saw him at the state convention at it was noticed by many tht he was there and then gone.
Tj, I put the post up late last night. Like i said, no polling to back it up, just a semi-educated guess. I was on Bill's show, and he had it very close to mine,so it could be on. We'll see..
Hamilton, Tom has been very busy with work, but he's also had to take a step back with this District race. There are lots of people with a vested interest in this race, and they might disagree with who wins. Hopefully, it'll end tomorrow...
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