What Is Going On in South Carolina?

The Atlantic ^ | June 12, 2010 | Chris Good

[Jet Jaguar]

Alvin Greene has been accused of being a plant, and, honestly, it's an accusation that may not be too far from reality. After winning the state's Democratic Senate primary with over 100,000 votes, becoming the challenger for Republican Jim DeMint, the 32-year-old unemployed veteran has given interviews and appeared on TV. When asked about his campaign, he does not give answers that indicate he ran a real one.

James Clyburn, the House Democratic whip and nine-term congressman from South Carolina, has suggested someone propped Greene up to defeat Vic Rawl, a member of the Charleston County Council and a former four-term state legislator, calling for an investigation into the election. The South Carolina Law Enforcement Division has obliged; according to the South Carolina Democratic Party, an investigation has been opened.

This interview with Keith Olbermann is difficult to watch. In it, Greene insists he's always been a Democrat and that his 58% victory was not a fluke.

This interview with The Root, similarly, is a strange read. Greene seems well intentioned, wanting to be elected because of the state's high unemployment race, and insisting that he campaigned hard across the state.

There is precedent of "planted" candidates in South Carolina: in 2007, Ken Silverstein wrote in Harper's about Rod Shealy, a South Carolina political strategist who has actually done with someone else what is being suggested was done with Greene:

[apocalypto]

John McCain was sure to lose, and the majority of those who voted for him in the primaries had to know this. He might have won fair and square,as you claim, but their plan was for him to lose. One had to be stupid or delusional to believe he could win. Any one of the other candidates had a better chance of winning against Hussein Obama. McCain is loony tunes. He and creepy Cindy were like an elderly version of Boris and Natasha.

[arrogantsob]

While McCain was not my favorite candidate I respect the man. It is false that the “majority of those who voted for him in the primaries” “had to know” he was sure to lose.