His eyes are focused on the future — the far, far future…
The campaigns just keep getting started earlier and earlier. But I think this is a first for me:
COLUMBIA, S.C. — Republican state Rep. Tommy Pope said Tuesday he plans to run for governor in 2018, calling the job an opportunity to advocate for statewide needs such as improving roads and bridges.
The 51-year-old York representative and former prosecutor said he made the decision after praying about it with his wife, adding that a formal announcement is likely two years away.
State leaders “need to focus on something larger than ourselves. The governor’s office gives the opportunity to lead in that direction on issues that are important to everybody, like state infrastructure,” he said. “We need to come up with a way to fund it, and we need to come up with a means of fairly distributing it.”
Pope’s comments come five months before voters decide who will be governor for the next four years. He is running for a third term in the House in November….
I really don’t remember when I’ve heard a prospective candidate state his intentions so definitely before the election before the one he intends to run in. It may not be the first time it’s happened, it’s just a first in my memory.
I mean, the guy just lapped the electoral cycle.
That said, I like that he’s talking about leading on infrastructure. Although I’m a little disappointed when he says, further down in the story, that “he stopped short of advocating for a gas tax increase statewide.”
If you’re getting such a long running start like this, it seems it would be because you were bursting to share some great new idea that no one else has had the brains and/or guts to put forth. Perhaps he’ll get back to us when he has one. No rush; there’s plenty of time…
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The plan sounded good until he was too chicken to step up and propose raising the tax to fund roads ( his hometown voters have overwhelmingly approved raising taxes for over a decade now to fun road improvements in York- and you can tell by driving up there)
Another too weak to lead candidate it appears. Sounds perfect for South Carolina.
My gut reaction, as I indicated above, is to agree with you.
Now I’ll take a step back and defend him… I think what he’s doing is trying to avoid getting written off four years ahead of the election. He’s getting the conversation started… we HAVE to do something about infrastructure… without saying anything at the outset that would immediately alienate so much of the electorate.
Reading between the lines, I get the sense that this is a guy who would go for the tax increase, but only when he’s built some consensus for it, and it’s politically feasible.
It’s a matter of timing. Lincoln (not to say this guy is Lincoln or anything) didn’t take difficult stands until he sensed the country was just barely ready. For that reason, abolitionists gave him hell because he wouldn’t leap out from the start and espouse their position. He was too busy trying to keep the country together, which was a prerequisite to eliminating (or even reducing or containing) slavery. He had an uncanny ability to pick just the right moment — to issue the Emancipation Proclamation, to push the 13th Amendment. He still faced fearsome odds when he proposed those things, but it was just barely politically possible at that moment…
On second thought- I think you are right.
He wants to do it- but knows he has to get a lot of folks to go along with him first.
Hopefully we don’t have a major bridge collapse before it happens.