South Carolina

Seen in the New York Times, in a story discussing how Mainers and South Carolinians may have to get passports soon if the feds don’t blink on Real ID:

“There is no wiggle room in South Carolina law in terms of asking for an extension,” Joel Sawyer, the spokesman, said. “If Washington wants a more secure form of ID, then Washington ought to be able to pay for it.”

So do any Republicans at the federal level still remember the Contract With America? You know, that pledge that was signed back in 1994 by Congressional Republicans which included a provision of “no unfunded mandates”?

Seen at CNN, the South Carolina Dem primary results:

With 86% of the precincts in:

• Obama — 229,775 (54%)
• Clinton — 114,636 (27%)
• Edwards — 79,538 (19%)
• Kucinich — 462 (0%)

So, presumably, this is it for Edwards?

Seen at Bloomberg News:

“Politics in South Carolina has been, from the very beginning, since colonial times, kind of a blood sport,” said Trey Walker, who served as the state’s Republican Party executive director from 1993 to 1999 and is now a consultant for McCain.

That comes from an article reporting on recent “dirty tricks” that are coming to the surface ahead of the South Carolina primaries, including push-polling and calls making false claims about certain candidates (activities that ought to be banned, if a Constitutional method of effecting such a ban were possible).

A few thoughts:

• Conventional wisdom is that Thompson won the debate.  I’m not sure that I’d go quite that far, and I’d have to wonder how much of that assessment is Fox-generated hype.  Notwithstanding my reservations, however, he did come across as a straight-talking, good ol’ boy who should be doing far better than his recent polling would indicate.
   
• If Romney weren’t well-financed and if he didn’t have extensive ground operations in place, I’d say, “put a fork in him, he’s done”.  He’s coming across as either a candidate in search of a message, or a politician who’s trying to be all things to all people.  He seems to be having problems carving a viable niche in the spectrum of messages, with the more popular messages having been claimed by other candidates.
   
  If Romney could credibly communicate the idea that he’d be effective at cleaning up waste and advancing a reasonably conservative message in the face of a hostile Congress, allowing him to build upon his resume of Massachusetts governor and Salt Lake City Olympic reformer, he might have a shot.  However, that shot is waning as Giuliani solidifies on the “I’m most likely to shift the purple states red” message.
   
• I can’t decide whether Ron Paul was just his usual nutty self, or if Fox carefully worked to make him seem extra-nutty.   I’m leaning towards the latter, given how the questions he faced were more in the “one of these things is not like another / one of these things is not the same” vein, from which he struggled to shift to answering policy questions handed to others, and given how giddy the commentators were over Paul’s low reaction numbers from their viewer’s panel…but Paul comes across as  a nut on his own, even without Fox’s assistance.
   
  If Fox News were as fair and balanced as it claims, they’d have a reasonable sounding Paul supporter on to explain why Paul’s message is appealing to his supporters (sometimes in spite of Paul’s quirks).
   
  Sadly, the notion that a nontrivial portion of the American electorate craves a small-government, pro-individual-liberties candidate so much that they’d tolerate quirks in their candidate, seems to finally be getting lost in Paul’s nuttiness.
   
• I have to give props to Huckabee for deflecting criticism and the spotlighting of the unconservativeness / un-neoconness of his positions while still coming across as a nice, likeable guy.
   
• If anyone won the debate, I’d have to name McCain.  He might not have won the battle of the soundbites (a title that Thompson did earn), but he seems to be solidifying his framing as a Republican partisans might not like, but who is viewed as most electable by partisans.

Seen in the Myrtle Beach Sun News:

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, U.S. Sen. John McCain of Arizona, U.S. Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former U.S. Sen. Fred Thompson of Tennessee have all accepted their invitations, said Rob Godfrey, spokesman for the state Republican Party.

“The stakes couldn’t be higher this election, and we couldn’t be more excited to extend a warm South Carolina welcome to six White House hopefuls who are seeking the Republican nomination,” said Katon Dawson, chairman of the state GOP.

To be invited, candidates must have placed in the top 5 positions in the New Hampshire poll — McCain, Romney, Huckabee, Giuliani and Paul — or be polling at least 5 percent nationally, such as Thompson.

It’s nice to see objective criteria being consistently held to for tonight’s debate.  However, I’m sufficiently leery of Fox News’ sensationalism, “fairness” and “balance” to wonder if this is either a decision forced upon FNC by the South Carolina GOP, or if it’s Fox’s decision to bring Paul on to grill him about his newsletter under the guise of “debate”.

Well, my wished-for moratorium on polling data releases isn’t in effect, so in case you’re wondering (as I was) what the polls show for the next states, here’s what I see in Real Clear Politics averages:

GOP Michigan (primary date 15 January, polling data 30 November through 19 December):

• Romney: 19.8%
• Huckabee: 18.8%
• McCain: 13.0%
• Giuliani: 12.5%
• Thompson: 6.5%
• Paul: 4.3%

Dems Michigan (15 January, delegates stripped, candidates boycotting, Obama not even on ballot)

GOP Nevada (19 January, polling data 16 November through 6 December):

• Giuliani: 23.7%
• Romney: 23.7%
• Huckabee: 15.3%
• Thompson: 9.7%
• McCain: 7.3%
• Paul: 5.0%

Dems Nevada (19 January, polling data 16 November through 6 December):

• Clinton: 41.3%
• Obama: 21.3%
• Edwards: 11.7%
• Richardson: 5.7%

GOP South Carolina (19 January, polling data 4 January through 7 January):

• Huckabee: 32.3%
• McCain: 19.7%
• Romney: 16.0%
• Thompson: 9.0%
• Giuliani: 9.0%
• Paul: 5.0%

Dems South Carolina (26 January, polling data 4 January through 7 January):

• Obama: 44.0%
• Clinton: 31.0%
• Edwards: 15.0%

GOP Florida (29 January, polling data 12 December through 7 January):

• Giuliani: 26.5%
• Huckabee: 21.3%
• Romney: 16.5%
• McCain: 14.3%
• Thompson: 8.5%
• Paul: 3.7%

Dems Florida (29 January, polling data 12 December through 7 January; delegates stripped, candidates boycotting):

• Clinton: 46.0%
• Obama: 26.3%
• Edwards 13.3%

Of course, we saw last night just how meaningful polling data can be. 

Seriously, I’m disappointed by how stale some of those numbers are.  If you make some guesses of how Iowa and New Hampshire might influence some of the older results… well, January is shaping up to be potentially mighty interesting.

Seen at CNN:

Two prominent supporters of Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign in South Carolina called state Democratic Party officials urging them to oppose putting comedian Stephen Colbert’s name on the primary ballot, according to party officials and Obama supporters with knowledge of the calls.

The Obama campaign folks involved say that they were just trying to feel out the powers-that-be for what their likely decision would be in allowing Colbert on the ballot.

Although the campaign workers were presumably understandably concerned about Colbert “stealing” Obama voters, due to the presumed overlap in supporters, I think that seeking to keep Colbert off the ballot may have been a strategic error.

After all, having Colbert on the ballot would likely have increased turnout in South Carolina. I’d bet that most of the folks who would have voted for Colbert are folks who won’t turn out for the conventional slate of candidates.

I’d also bet that a non-trivial portion of Colbert-inspired voters would have opted to vote for a real candidate…and that would most likely have benefited Obama.

Throw in the bad press….and this definitely seems like bad strategery to me.

Well, the entertainment level of the upcoming primary season just dropped a couple of notches.  From Reuters, via the New York Times:

Colbert, who has admitted he does not want to be president but just wanted to run for it in his native state of South Carolina, had filed for the Democratic ticket earlier on Thursday and paid the $2,500 filing fee.

Hours later, the party’s executive council voted 13-3 against allowing him on the ballot for the January 26 primary contest, party spokeswoman Keiana Page told Reuters. The eight other major Democratic candidates were accepted, she said.

It was already known that Colbert was deciding not to get a spot on the GOP ballot, due to the $35,000 filing fee required for that primary, and the need to avoid federal election laws that kick in at $5,000 of spending.

I can understand South Carolina’s decision to keep the ballot to “real” candidates (although, that leads one to wonder why Gravel and Kucinich will appear)…but it’s somewhat disappointing to see them passing up the opportunity for a lot of interest to be generated about Colbert.

I wonder if we’ll start hearing Colbert pushing himself as a write-in candidate in South Carolina.