South DaCola

Editorial Cartoonist from South Dakota

Elections

Daugaard Democrats Elections Susan Wismer

Phase One complete: Huether for Governor 2018

l3wis 9Comments

Last night state Democrats hurdled step one in getting Huether elected to the governor’s office in 2018 by choosing Wismer to run against Daugaard. The ONLY way Wismer even has a snowball chance in Hell of beating an incumbent Republican would be if they could directly link him to the EB-5 scandal, which will be tough since there has been a complete media lockout on the subject.

Lowe’s loss wasn’t entirely a grand scheme by the Democratic party. Lowe admitted last night that he did very little advertising and NO direct mail. That is unfortunate, because he truly could have beat her if he would have just stuck with traditional political advertising, like Wismer did do. It worked for her.

What is even more frustrating is that the Dems have yet to say if they have a candidate for Secretary of State. As I have said in the past, this would have been their prime opportunity to go after that seat, especially with all of the scandals with Gant, and Shantel Krebs telling a petitioner last year that the petition and referendum process in South Dakota should be ‘Unconstitutional’. The last kind of person we want as election overseer. Speaking with a prominent Democrat recently, he said that the Dems have NO candidate for SOS and plan on putting their full support behind the governor candidate. Imagine that, putting all of their eggs in one basket.

I have never regretted leaving the Democratic party and becoming an Indy, and I don’t forsee myself ever returning. It just seems like SD Dems are always planning for the next election instead of the one at hand, and they proved this last night by securing Huether’s race for governor in 2018. As MMM would say, “Good Job.”

Bob Litz County Commission Elections Minnehaha County Sioux Falls

Still issues with voting

l3wis 6Comments

As I have pointed out several times after the municipal election and the run up to it, there were many issues with voting.

Besides the musical polling places every time there is an election, there are still problems with registration.

Last Friday someone told me that him and his wife recently moved into a new home and checked their voter registration to make sure it would be current. They are supposed to be registered in District 11, but were told they were in District 9 and voting at MariCar. This person pointed the problem out to Bob Litz and nothing was really done about it except they were told to still vote in District 9.

Last night they checked online, and they were still listed in District 9. So they went to vote at 7:30am this morning.  Fortunately, all the precinct workers knew him because his name (and his wife’s) was not listed on the voting roster!

They called the Auditor’s office to confirm that he was registered, but couldn’t explain the omission.  He had to fill out an Emergency Voting Card in order to vote.  He told me he felt sorry for the precinct workers as all the power – except lights – was shut off in there … no AC and the clock was stuck on 11:10.  He shared his story at public input this morning at the county commission meeting. (The video is not up yet, but I hear the CC was not to happy).

My conclusion all along after the municipal election fiasco is that heads need to roll on these mishaps, saying an election went ‘smoothly’ when it was an absolute disaster is just sugar coating the problem. We’ll see how things go tonight. Let’s just say, if Bosworth wins the Republican Senate ticket spot, we know something isn’t working correctly in the auditor’s office.

Elections

Primary endorsements and predictions

l3wis 1Comments

ENDORSEMENTS

(Note, Independents like myself CANNOT vote for Republicans in the primary, but we CAN vote for Democrats)

Senate Republican Race, Stace Nelson. While I disagree almost entirely with Stace’s entire platform, he is truly the ONLY Republican in the race that is genuine, I also think that a race between him and Weiland would be very interesting, I also think it would be very honest.

Rounds needs to go back to selling insurance or whatever the heck he does. His dealings with the EB-5 scandal and the Mette case coverup should be enough to tell Rounds to take a hike.

Governor Republican Race, Neither interest me. If you dislike Denny as much as I do, vote the Hubbel Craft.

Governor Democrat Race, Joe Lowe!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Wismer has not campaigned at all and is extremely wishy washy. I think she was dug up to be the loser against Denny in November. The Democrats NEED to win the governorship this Fall, and they can do this with Lowe. And if the State Party Dems had any sense at all, after Lowe wins the primary, they would put there full resources behind him.

Circuit Judge, John Pekas. John has proven to be an effective and knowledgeable attorney and county commissioner. He is one of the few Republicans I have voted for. While Hinrichs does have experience as a current judge, I often think that we need a fresh look at the judicial system.

PREDICTIONS

Senate;

Rounds 40%

Nelson 26%

Rhoden 20%

Bosworth 12%

Ravnsbourg 2%

Governor;

Dauguard 90%

Hubbel 10%

Lowe 65%

Wismer 35%

Judge;

Hinrichs 55%

Pekas 30%

Feinstein 15%

 

Elections Secretary of State

What does Christianity and Abortion have to do with fair elections?

l3wis 9Comments

Miller1

What is scary about this is that Pat currently serves under Gantless as our deputy Secretary of State. I sometimes wonder where these people come up with their campaign slogans. As deputy, shouldn’t she know what the job of a SOS is? It has nothing to do with religion, God or abortion. It scares the Sh*t out of me that an ideologue like this is running our elections. How would she treat a petition challenge by a liberal Democrat Atheist who was pro-choice? It seems a Republican SOS only duty is to make sure that the opposition party doesn’t get a fair election in our state. What is even more dreadful is that the people of SD continue to vote these kind of people in office (Her challenger, Krebs, isn’t much better).

Yet the Democrats can’t dig up one single person to challenge these yahoos.

The job of SOS is simple, very simple. You must be fair and unbias. That’s it. No one cares what church you go to or whether you like kittens and rainbows. We want to know if you can do the job fairly.

Pat, as a principled voter, your postcard scares me. I will pray for you.

 

 

 

Democrats Elections Joe Lowe for Governor Mayor Hubris Mayor Subprime Mike Huether Mike Huether

A conspiracy, conspiracy, conspiracy theory

l3wis 3Comments

Janklow_and_Lowe

If Joe can work with this guy, he can work with anyone.

Okay, obviously some of the things I am going to say are going to be pretty crazy, and let’s face it, I really don’t think the Democratic Party in SD is this smart to cook up such a plan. But who knows?

It’s been bothering me for a while WHY the Dems wanted to put up two candidates for governor, especially since Mr. Lowe was well on his way in his campaign before the established members of the party dug a NO name (to the common voter) out of nowhere, Susan Wismer.

Don’t get me wrong, Wismer has a great resume (personally I think she should be running for SOS)* But Joe Lowe is clearly far ahead of Wismer in the polls, he has experience in virtually all levels of government, he is a former state employee, he answers questions honestly and the edge he has over Denny is that he KNOWS him, Denny was his former boss. Lowe also used to be a part of the SD GOP.

So what is my theory?

Last night when Huether was being interviewed by Brian Allen of KSFY, Allen asked Mike if he was running for governor, he avoided the question but didn’t rule it out.

So I ask, are the Dems trying to put up a sure LOSER (Wismer) against Denny so that Huether has the opportunity to slide in 2018? No question it would be much easier for a Democrat to win in 4 years since there will be no incumbents.

What disappoints me about this scenario is that Joe Lowe is an amazing candidate, and very capable of winning (especially if he can get some traction on EB-5 and the Mette case/ foster kids from CHS). Not only that, if Lowe does win, I think he would be a great Governor who would be ready to do the job on day one and his experience with the GOP would make him very prepared to work with Republicans. In other words, Joe wouldn’t be a one term governor.

It also doesn’t hurt that indy candidate Mike Myers will really stir things up with the debates and the conversation leading up to the election.

*My theory gets stronger when you consider the fact that the Dems haven’t put anybody up for the SOS position, even when they have someone as qualified as Wismer. Plus with all the scandals with Gant and him dropping out, you would think the Dems would be ready to pounce on this position in state government.

Nope, seems once again the SD Dems are prepping for the next election instead of the current one, but I certainly wouldn’t accuse them of being ‘visionary’.

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