South Carolina is in a political pickle

Alvin Greene will not be elected to the U.S. Senate from South Carolina. Why? Because the political world has wised up to this guy. He is utterly, completely clueless about governing.

But here’s the problem: Greene is the Democratic Party nominee in the race for the high office is seeking. He will run against Republican U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint.

He won the Democratic primary the other day, shocking everyone who was watching this race, although apparently not very closely. Greene is an unemployed veteran, yet he plunked down $10,400 while filing to run for the Senate. Where did he get the dough? He isn’t saying and apparently no one in the Palmetto State sought to inquire about him weeks ago.

Oh, but there’s more. Greene has a felony obscenity charge hanging over him. A female college student has alleged that Greene showed her some dirty pictures online and sought to enter her dorm room.

My question is this: Where was the vaunted statewide media during this campaign?

Greene didn’t campaign. He didn’t spend a nickel on his campaign. He held no rallies. He had no town meetings. He did zero meet-and-greets with voters. He published zero campaign literature. Yet he won his party primary! His post-primary interviews have been exercises in futility for the questioners. Greene’s answers to policy questions make Sarah “Barracuda” Palin sound like a Rhodes scholar.

How does this happen? And why didn’t the media in South Carolina — or anyone whose job is to examine these races — see this coming?

U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn, a South Carolina Democrat, says Greene is a Republican “plant.” He’s called for an investigation into his candidacy. He says his campaign is smeared with “elephant dung.”

A lot of folks have egg on their face on this one. S.C. Republicans long have had a reputation for playing dirty, and often with each other. If they’ve crossed the party line into messing with Democratic politics, then the state political machine has a whole other set of problems.

The late U.S. Sen. Lloyd Bentsen used to say that “politics in Texas is a contact sport.” Ah, and we thought Texas politics was tough.

Silly us.