A long political journey

Abraham Lincoln once said, “I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended on to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the facts.”

Well, despite the recent improvement, our economy is still in danger, and could easily slide back into recession, particularly if our South Carolina congressional delegation continues to pander to the people on issues like “debt ceilings” and refuses to raise any new revenues to pay for the deficits and debt that they have created.

Now what I really want to share is my long political journey. I grew up in Melrose, Mass., an upper-middle-class bedroom suburb nine miles north of Boston. The Withingtons and Bates were all Republicans. On my mother’s side, the Heffernans, Cullens and Powers were all staunch Democrats. I was for JFK as a senior in high school. In the 1770s, the Withingtons were radical revolutionaries, Sons of Liberty, and all that crazy stuff.

When I moved to Atlanta in 1970, I found the “good ol’ boy” Democrats solidly in charge of the government. Everything was “Pickrick” according to Lt. Gov. Lester Maddox. I decided to join young State Senator Paul Coverdell and his Young Republicans, and we helped 27-year-old George K. Larsen defeat an old 30-year incumbent Democrat. Our biggest victory was helping Mack Mattingly defeat Herman Talmadge in a stunning upset in 1980.

In 1999 I went to hear libertarian Harry Browne speak to a packed crowd of 400 at the Galleria in heavily Republican Cobb County. I went to some Libertarian meetings and was soon recruited to run for the Public Service Commission in the Libertarians’ struggle to maintain ballot access. We had to get 3 percent statewide. I ran a good campaign with help from Neal Boortz, produced a good one-minute radio ad and put out 500 signs all over Georgia. We got 133,904 votes (5.8 percent) in a heavily contested three-man race.

When I moved to Pawleys Island in 2001, the Republicans couldn’t find anyone to run to succeed and hold Tom Swatzel’s seat. I was again invited by Republican Party officials to run, and I did. I even stayed in when they finally convinced Jerry Oakley to run. I got almost 30 percent as a total unknown in the 2002 June primary.

I remained with the Republicans, and helped Jim DeMint make his great 2004 primary comeback from 25.6 percent, barely making the runoff against Beasley. Meanwhile, in mid-March of 2003, right before the invasion of Iraq, I strongly opposed it, and called it “madness,” You see, I had attended Marine Maj. Scott Ritter’s speech at Coastal in December of 2002. He said, “There’s nothing left over there. They destroyed almost all of it. But they’re going anyway.” President Ingliss pooh-poohed the speech.

In September of 2004, when Patricia Ferguson abruptly dropped out of the S.C. House 106 race as the Democrat, I thought somebody should run, because it was Nelson Hardwick’s first time. When Greg McCollum told me there wasn’t anybody, and besides they were printing the ballots the next week, I told him that I would do it if he could get me on the ballot. Because I was a Republican, the Republican party in Columbia permitted the switch of names on the ballot. I lost with 5,000 votes on a faulty ballot, which I appealed, and Nelson will tell you that I gave him a good test.

Finally, in 2010 I “tested the waters” with a four-month campaign on the Democratic side to unseat an aging Henry Brown. Henry dropped out in early January of 2011 after my TV ad blitz here and in Charleston in December. As strong Republicans like Stovall Witte, Clark Parker, Paul Thurmond and Tim Scott entered the race, I decided to let them have it, and I didn’t file.

And again, when I saw that Howard Barnard had not recruited anyone to succeed him in Council 5 in the Surfside Beach area, where I now lived, I got the OK from Republican Party officials Tom Herron and Robert Rabon, paid the $738.64 filing fee out of my own pocket, and did another three month campaign. I lost against two well-funded candidates, Paul Price and Bill McKown, but we debated, discussed the issues, put out our signs, shook a lot of hands, and I did OK.

Recently, in Mullins at the I-73 road show, Brad Dean kind of kidded me asking me what I was, “A Libertarian , a Republican or a Democrat?” Before I could give my answer, Brad had moved on. To Brad and everyone else, “I am an American.”

The writer, a candidate for the 7th Congressional District, lives in Myrtle Beach.