Benevolus

Illuminating important issues in public policy.

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

Actually, @icecastles22 your characterization of my position is completely wrong.

If Darline Graham, or anyone else, has a passion to serve in elective office at any level, they should pursue that passion in the normal course of elections.

The present circumstances are anything but normal. We have a person, largely unknown to South Carolina voters until nine days ago, with no evidence of having prior interest in elective office, and no history of publicly advocating or commenting on any of the myriad issues of the day dealt with by US Senators. A normal election cycle gives voters, media, and opponents time to vet candidates to fully assess the best qualified candidate in the field.

Now, look at the calendar we are farcing. Early voting starts in 15 days. Candidates need to rapidly build a campaign organization, raise funds, create and book media and mailings, all while traveling the state to meet with voters. That is a huge task experienced officeholders. Imagine also having to learn and develop positions on all of the important issues… in just 15 days!

And that is just to win the nomination. Then, while the Democrat opponent has preparing for her general election campaign since June 12, whichever GOP candidate emerges from this accelerated process on August 11 or 25 will have just 10 weeks to build, run, and win a general election campaign.

Now contrast Darline’s preparedness doing that with any of @RepRussellFrySC / @RalphNorman / @MarkSanford . They already know the relevant policy issues and where they stand on them. They all have a record serving in both Columbia and Washington that the public can see and judge them by. And they all have the experience that enables them to rapidly mount an effective campaign.

South Carolina voters deserve the best chance at electing a proven conservative to US Senate, and good candidates have offered themselves. Darline’s entry into the race nearly guarantees a runoff will be necessary, shortening an already compressed calendar by two more weeks. She has until noon on July 28 to withdraw from the race. She should do so.

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

I'm sorry, Senator, but I will not be supporting you. Not because of something you've done, but because I have no idea who you are or what you stand for. In Russell Fry, Ralph Norman, and Mark Sanford, we have three well qualified conservatives with proven records. In you, we have? And face it, your late brother's legislative legacy is not something conservative South Carolinians were pleased with. I always voted for him in the general elections, but opposed him in the primaries. His advocacy for US engagement in every global conflict is a problem for me. And while that may or may not be your position, the people of South Carolina have no idea what you stand for. Serving as an interim Senator was fine. It honored Lindsey's service and allowed an open primary with no thumb on the scale for an open seat. But abusing that interim appointment to run for a full term against (at least) three well qualified conservatives is a no-go for me.

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

@scvic_travels @DarlineGrahamSC Honoring someone's legacy is not what Senate appointments are for. Not all that different than Blagojevich selling Obama's Illinois senator seat. But since the term is short and it paved the way for an open primary, I was okay with it. Not this!

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

@GrammyMandyB @DarlineGrahamSC Nope. He had an affair and tried to cover it up. If that is the deciding issue for you, I understand. But the guy who strolled into the General Assembly with a pig under each arm has pretty good conservative cred to me. As do Russell Fry and Ralph Norman.

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

@RiseOfAlberta Trade you for Minnesota.

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

@DoW_CIO @DOWResponse The @DoW_CIO needs to learn to speak in English to have any hope of persuading the public of anything. Get this person a translator ASAP.

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

@TGowdySC I know you’ve not been enamored with Washington, but this is the moment your country really needs you. Please run to be our next US Senator.

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

Brilliant! Three magnificent sentences from @pmarca that perfectly describe the proper role of government in industry.

[Marc Andreessen 🇺🇸 @pmarca]

If, when you say regulation, you mean the dead and clammy hand of the commissar—the gentleman who has never in his life built a single thing, drafting rules to govern a thing he cannot define, to be enforced by men who cannot read them; if you mean the form in triplicate, the impact assessment upon the impact assessment, the compliance officer who breeds, in the warm dark of the org chart, further compliance officers unto the third and fourth generation; if you mean the moat—the deep cold moat that the giant digs around his own castle and christens, with a perfectly straight face, public safety—the drawbridge he hauls up behind himself the very instant he is across, lest any hungrier and hungrier man should follow; if you mean the precautionary principle, which, had it governed our grandfathers, would have banned the wheel pending further study of the hill, and left us yet shivering and raw in the mouth of the cave, blessing its excellent ventilation; if you mean the European disease—that magnificent open-air museum of a continent, which produces in our time precisely two things in great abundance, and they are regulation, and the eloquent and well-footnoted regret of cultivated men explaining at length why they have produced nothing else; if you mean the license required to think, the permission slip for honest arithmetic, the king’s wax stamp pressed upon the forehead of every new idea before it may draw its first breath; if you mean the agency dispatched, with trumpets, to slay a single dragon, which arrives at the cave, surveys the accommodations, and moves in—and spends the ensuing century laying eggs and devouring the very villagers it was sworn to defend; if you mean the startup that perishes not of the market’s honest verdict but of the filing fee, the genius decamping by the next tide to a freer and warmer shore; if you mean the law that arrives, faithful as the swallows, exactly one whole epoch too late—helmeted, plumed, and magnificently armed—to regulate the stagecoach—then certainly, my friends, I am against it.

But—but, my friends—if, when you say regulation, you mean instead the humble steel guardrail upon the mountain road at midnight, the very thing you curse on the easy days and bless on your knees the one night the fog comes down; if you mean the brakes—for it is the brakes, and not the engine alone, that permit a sane man to drive fast and yet arrive alive—and the buttress, without which no cathedral was ever flung so high, but only in spite of which, but because of which; if you mean the meat inspector, who is the single homely reason a man may eat a sausage in this republic without first composing his last will and testament; if you mean the firebreak cut clean through the forest before the dry season of the burning, the smallpox cordon, the buoy that marks the channel, the rule of the road that lets ten thousand strangers hurtle past one another in the dark at fearful speed and arrive, by its quiet grace, every one of them home; if you mean the honest scale and the true weight, the reason a pound is a pound and a dollar a dollar from Natchez to Nome; if you mean the firm and decent wall between the counterfeit voice and the widow’s bank account, between the deepfaked candidate and the ballot box on the eve of the vote, between the loosed and loveless machine and the schoolyard it neither knows nor pities; if you mean the simple plank of law that says the strong shall not, in the gray dawn, feed the weak quietly into the furnace and sell the rising smoke as progress; if you mean, in the end, the one slender thread of trust without which no citizen will ever dare to use the marvelous thing at all—for where there is no rule there is no trust, and where there is no trust there is no commerce, and a miracle that no man dares to touch is no miracle, but only a handsome and expensive ghost—then certainly I am for it.

This is my stand. I will not retreat from it. I will not compromise one inch of it.

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

If we were to trade all of our national media people for the European soccer fans posting about the wonder that is USA, how much extra cash would we need to kick in to make the deal?

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

@Scobleizer @wholemars @40trillz Hey Robert, maybe rephrase that second sentence?

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

@MHTruthUltra @beinlibertarian Right facts. Wrong lesson. The lesson here is prevent bad actors from having nuclear weapons, and don’t elect Democrats like Barack and Hillary.

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

@countyhwy “Standin on a corner in Winslow, Arizona”

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

@propublica So, is @propublica suggesting arresting 1300 violent alien criminals was not worth the effort?

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

Republicans should be in airports carrying signs saying "Call Chuck Schumer [phone] and tell Democrats to stop blocking DHS funding."

[Matt Van Swol @mattvanswol]

🚨#BREAKING: COMPLETE INSANITY in the Atlanta Airport as the official website has now suspended ALL POSSIBLE ESTIMATES of current wait times for TSA security as travelers have had to wait sometimes as long as...

...6+ HOURS IN LINE!!!!

HOW LONG MUST THIS GO ON?!!!!!!!!!

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

@HustleBitch_ Saw that car at the 1964 World's Fair in New York. One of the longest lines of any exhibit.

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

@RepMcGovern One of those expenditures is for something the Constitution says is within the purview of the federal government.

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

@Gutfeldfox According to Grok, the 21 members of the California parole board serve three year terms. Gavin has been governor since 2019. That means every current member of the parole board was either originally appointed or reappointed by Gavin Newsom.

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

@bennyjohnson We’ve seen this movie before. She won’t be able to recall anything..

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

While Lisa Cook's shopped judge deliberates, read what the Federal Reserve Bank of Philly said in 2023 about the costs of owner-occupancy fraud. https://t.co/RhArsyMHRY

[Benevolus @HeyBenevolus]

@billybinion Theater? You mean like the pre-dawn Mar-a-Lago raid and the pre-dawn arrest of Roger Stone?