From where I sit, there’s been a lot of good news tonight. The voters of South Carolina have spoken, and they have urged Andre Bauer to do something anatomically difficult.
But the night ends on a note that is . . . complicating for Republicans, from where I sit. A short while ago, I wrote a piece laying out the argument that Sharron Angle was a supremely flawed candidate to take on Harry Reid in Nevada. At this late hour, the AP has declared Sharron Angle the winner of the Nevada Senate primary, and she may win by quite a healthy margin.
I wrote:
Sharron Angle has her fans; she’s been endorsed by Mark Levin, Erick Erickson of RedState, and the Club for Growth. Ultimately, this is a choice for Nevada Republicans; if they conclude that Angle’s no-holds-barred conservatism is what they want to represent them, they’re free to make that choice. But they shouldn’t be surprised to see 70-year-old Harry Reid doing cartwheels shortly thereafter. The Senate majority leader has spent more than $8 million so far in this campaign, with little effect on his lousy poll numbers, but he could spend large chunks of his remaining $9 million or so on television advertising painting Angle as a beer-banning, felon-massaging, tax-hiking FEC scofflaw. Will that be enough to save Harry Reid in a state with high unemployment, the state hardest hit by the housing crash? Perhaps not, but he clearly prefers his odds against Angle to those against the other options.
Well, my preferences are clear; I prefer a Republican who backed some odd ideas in prison reform and who suggested she merely tolerated legal alcohol in an off-the-cuff comment over a Democratic incumbent who represents a great deal of what’s wrong with Washington. Then again, it’s easy for me to say; I don’t live in Nevada.