This had social media buzzing this morning:
Columbia, SC – The South Carolina Club for Growth, a network of fiscal conservatives, made history today by endorsing its first statewide Democratic candidate – Ginny Deerin – who is running for Secretary of State.
“We are endorsing Ginny Deerin for three reasons,” said SC Club for Growth Chairman Dave Ellison. “First, her plan to cut the budget, cut the fees and cut regulations in the Secretary of State’s office compellingly aligns with our commitment to fiscal conservatism.”
“Second, her opponent – the 12-year incumbent – has allowed the Secretary of State’s office to become a bloated bureaucracy that wastes taxpayers’ money and makes doing business in our state more cumbersome for South Carolina companies and charities.”
“Third, Ginny Deerin wants to make our state government more efficient, not only by cutting the budget, fees and regulations in the Secretary of State’s office but also by making the Secretary of State an appointed office, rather than an elected one.”…
The SC Club for Growth, up to now, was best known as Mark Sanford’s most reliable cheerleaders. While he was governor, the organization seemed to exist primarily for that purpose. It has from the start been the champion of the kind of airy, theoretical, ivory-tower, Ayn Randian libertarianism that Sanford represented (as opposed to the more populist, down-home, nitty-gritty, anti-intellectual Tea Party libertarianism that Nikki Haley represents).
So yeah, this is kind of a milestone. While the Club certainly has not loved all Republicans in the past — just as Mark Sanford never did (and the Club went after the ones he really didn’t like) — but this is the first time it has been sufficiently down on a Republican as to endorse a Democrat instead. So I guess that makes Mark Hammond a bit of a record-breaker, too.
Not sure what kind of an impact, if any, it will have — partly because I’m not sure how many of those folks who will vote for anyone or anything with an “R” after its name have even heard of the Club for Growth.
But it’s interesting…
By the way, my first instinct when I saw the news was to be a wise guy about it:
Did she want them to? “@WinthropPoll: SC Club for Growth endorses first statewide Democratic Candidate: http://t.co/NOjPGvK6ys”
— Brad Warthen (@BradWarthen) September 18, 2014
But I see that she’s posted some of the social media buzz about the nod on her website. And well she might: If not for this, you might have gotten to Election Day and beyond without ever having heard of her. So even if it’s just because of the novelty of the thing, this helps.
Related Posts
SCCFG OKS DINO OVER RINO
Channeling one of the Bobs from “Office Space”: What would you say the Secretary of State actually does here?
I already told you: I deal with the god damn customers so the engineers don’t have to. I have people skills; I am good at dealing with people. Can’t you understand that? What the hell is WRONG with you people?
Speaking as a former corporate lawyer, the Secretary of State deals with all those people who aren’t humans.
I worked as an IT consultant for the Secretary of State office back in the early 90’s for about six months. I built a system for tracking corporate filings, notary publics, etc. Jim Miles was in the position then. That experience helped to solidify my view of the inefficiency of government. One of Miles’ staff (Michael Graham) went on to semi-fame as a conservative talk show host. The first time I met him, he was ranting about the “jerks” who came into the office looking for assistance. Another, Walter Whetsell, went on to become a semi-famous political consultant in SC. Another young intern was a Rush Limbaugh fan boy who is likely executing low level dirty political espionage these days. None of them really cared about the function of the office… it seemed to be a place to stash political operatives and have the government pay their salaries. As far as I could tell, there was only one person on the staff who actually ran the office… and it was mainly a group of what I would call “less than enthused” clerks. Initiative and energy were in very short supply.