Jonathan Ellis of the Sioux Falls Argus Leader refers to Republican senate candidate Mike Rounds as “road kill” who is attracting buzzards. In an brutal assessment of the former two-term governor’s campaign, Mr. Ellis says that it was more appropriate for a run for sheriff than a run for the upper chamber of Congress. He didn’t raise serious money and he didn’t take his opposition seriously.
The political world outside of South Dakota learned some stunning news last week: Mike Rounds, the guy everybody assumed would be the next senator from South Dakota, actually has been running a campaign more suited for sheriff of Mayberry County than U.S. Senate…
…Rounds failed to raise the resources necessary to defend himself in the cutthroat world of U.S. Senate campaigns, where millions of dollars can be beamed into a race with the flip of a switch. Rounds woke up last week to find $3 million of hostile money sitting outside his comfy campaign headquarters in Pierre. And there’s nothing he can do about it…
…Rounds reassembled a campaign team from his days as governor. The team was adequate for a governor’s race. The problem is, nobody outside of South Dakota cares who is governor of the state. Senate races are fought on an entirely different level — the difference between high school football and pro football. GOP leaders were concerned that Rounds and his team didn’t grasp this reality. As it turns out, justifiably so.
The whole column reads like a political obituary, but Ellis does acknowledge that Rounds could still pull out a victory. It’s just that he’s lost all his momentum and the NRSC has been forced to launch a salvage mission.
What’s still unclear is if the DSCC is primarily concerned with electing their candidate, Rick Weiland, or with electing independent candidate, Larry Pressler. Either way, they hope that Mike Rounds is truly roadkill because that will save them a senate seat that they had every reason to believe was lost.
So, SD voters have a choice among 1) a far rightwinger, former SD House Rep, former GOP who is running as an IND and to repeal the ACA, 2) a GOP, former two-term governor, who is either incompetent or a crook, an anti-abortionist, and running on ??? 3) an IND, former GOP and three-term Senator (lost re-election to the retiring Johnson), DC resident, who will only serve one-term (until he’s 77 years old), is to the left of many Democrats on various social/political issues, but a PetePeterson guy on Social Security, 4) Weiland:
Note: SD voters repealed the SD leg/Rounds, draconian, anti-abortion law.
In November, do the “conservatives” come home and vote for the guy running on ??? (but a “I’m with Mitch” backbencher), stick with a one-termer liberal that would stick it to the people on Social Security, or Weiland? Looks to me as if, Reid’s going for a Weiland win because one issue on which he disagrees with Obama is cutting Social Security.
It looks like Pressler isn’t such a hot character himself:
http://www.buzzfeed.com/andrewkaczynski/sd-senate-candidate-sat-on-board-of-company-while-it-defraud
At a minimum, easily duped. So that makes it a nut, a GOP dope, an IND dope, and a decent DEM. The DEM should get the “vote of every thinking person,” and in a four-way race, that could be enough to win.
Ah, I see that you have not been in SD.
However, one thing that is not taken into account is the Indian vote, which is 90% D. If we get the Indians out to vote, we can pull out a win for Weiland.
The issue is that the two counties have very deliberately made it hard to vote. In some cases, the Indians in Rosebud and Pine Ridge must travel several hours (3 or more) to get to the polling place. This is not a misprint. There is a concerted effort starting TODAY, Native American Day in SD, to get the Indians to the polls for early voting.
The right of Native Americans to vote is, if anything, stronger than anyone else’s. You say there is a concerted effort starting today. What can we do to help?
Even MSNBC has begun to notice:
Should have added that Pressler fits in well with the Simpson/Bowles crowd, but that is a subset of the PetePeterson gang.
It’s all about GOTV.
Period.
Guess I should have posted Weiland’s video in this diary:
His latest has more content (gasp — he’s running far to the left of all the other 2014 DEM Senate candidates in freaking SD), but the music’s not as good as the first one.