 The special election for the 1st Congressional District isn’t South Carolina’s only political topic at the moment. Jason Grant Smith will be previewing “I Voted?,” his documentary on electronic voting machines, at three locations across the state beginning this weekend. Arranged by the South Carolina Democratic Women’s Council, the showing schedule is: - Sunday, May 5 in West Columbia
4 p.m. to 6 p.m. at the Conundrum Music Hall ( 626 Meeting St) Moderated by Corey Hutchins of Columbia’s Free Times- Tuesday, May 7 in Greenville
6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at Coffee Underground ( 1 E Coffee St) Moderated by Journal Watchdog’s Charlie Sowell - Thursday, May 9 in Charleston
6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at Gage Hall ( 4 Archdale St) Moderated by Paul Bowers of Charleston City Paper A Q&A session will follow the screening of select clips of “I Voted?” (See preview below.) There is no charge to attend at any location, but tax-deductible donations to aid completion of the documentary are welcome. Actor/director Smith’s inspiration for the non-partisan film was the strange results of a 2010 South Carolina election. In June of that year, a prominent and much-respected candidate lost the Democratic primary race for U.S. Senate to an unemployed Manning resident who was awaiting trial for obscenity charges. “Obviously, something bizarre was taking place and I wanted to try and understand it,” Smith says. Smith’s research led him on a track of untraceable voting results produced by electronic voting machines, which are used in 16 states. “I had no idea that 24 percent of the country uses touch-screen systems that are paperless and cannot be audited or recounted,” he says. Not just a historical recap, Smith hopes “I Voted?” can inspire correction to the most principle right of voting. “We could change elections dramatically with a federal mandate for evidence-based elections, meaning elections that can be completely reconstructed utilizing a voter-marked, durable record of intent and risk-limiting audits.” Helping Smith schedule the upcoming screenings is another Smith, activist Susan Smith of Pawley’s Island (no relation), who also helped the director make contacts with key persons during the production of the documentary. Also booking these events was Chris Cherry, SCDWC’s Director of Communications. The film is still under final production, and donations to aid its completion can be offered through its website.
 (image from Red Racing Horses; click for larger view) A survey released on May 2 found that his extramarital affair didn’t just cost him divorce, and his violation of the divorce settlement isn’t just costing him a trip to court two days after the election, either. Mark Sanford’s personal record could cost him the upcoming special election, too, the survey by Red Racing Horses found. The sum results found the Republican nominee in a 46-46 tie with Democratic candidate Elizabeth Colbert-Busch. Seven percent remain undecided. Were Sanford replaced by another Republican, however – state Sen. Larry Grooms, who placed third in the GOP primary – Colbert-Busch would only take 40 percent, RRH says, trailing Grooms’ 47 with 13 percent undecided. “The closeness of the race in the normally Republican district is almost certainly due exclusively to Republican ex-Gov. Mark Sanford’s personal issues,” RRH says in its poll release. In 2009, Sanford was caught traveling to Argentina to meet his then-mistress; he was later fined $74,000 for using state funds to pay for those trips, as well other violations. A recent charge of violating divorce terms by trespassing on his ex-wife’s property will be heard in family court on May 9, two days after the election for the 1st Congressional District. The poll finds Sanford to lead in the suburban Berkeley and Dorchester counties by sizable margins, but also finds a Colbert Busch advantage in the larger Charleston and Beaufort. The Democrat has a slight lead amongst female voters, and holds a considerable margin over Sanford in the opinions of minorities. The surveying company admits a Republican lean, it should be noted, as can be found in its tagline (“Candidates, elections, and politics from the right perspective") and "about" statement ("Red Racing Horses is a collaborative, Republican-oriented online community of politics and election enthusiasts."). Other polls on the race lean toward Colbert Busch, including the most recent by the progressive Public Policy Polling, which found her to lead Sanford by nine percent. PPP was rated most accurate in poll results regarding 2012 elections. RRH conducted its survey of 5,000 likely voters between April 29 and May 1, and says its findings have +/- 5 percent margin of error.
Buzzfeed recently noticed a similarity between the (non-homemade) campaign signs of Mark Sanford and the flag of Argentina. See both below: The light blue banners running across the top and bottom, with that white-colored center that hosts the logo/image, sure are similar, alright.
But doesn't that only bring to mind Sanford's infamous (and extramarital) excursion to Argentina? And which he himself only brought up all over again when his Argentine girlfriend joined him onstage for the night of the GOP runoff election?
Was the use of this logo on campaign signs a psychosomatic slip or Freudian error, or is it just Sanford's latest tongue-in-cheek?
Here's a merged combination of the two images:
 photo provided by Brad Woodhouse
While Sanford’s losing NRCC funding of advertisements, the campaign of Democratic opponent Elizabeth Colbert-Busch is picking up much ad support. House Majority PAC, a national committee that aids progressive campaigns and projects, today released a 30-second advertisement that criticizes Sanford’s use of state funds to pay for personal travel, including his infamous trips to Argentina. "He charged us $400,000 to travel around the world,” a narrator states in the sarcastic ad. | | The advertisement will run on local television stations for three weeks beginning April 18, the group says. A second video by a state progressive group began distribution today, too. Titled “ Remember,” the ad by South Forward includes statements made by both Republicans and Democrats from the state legislature who voted to censure Sanford in 2009. While he was already trailing Colbert-Busch by a slight margin in recent polls, this rising tide of negative news, loss of campaign funding, and increase in support and ads for his opponent should knock Sanford’s comeback campaign even further. | | The Colbert Busch campaign has declined comment on these recent incidents.
The special election for the 1st Congressional District is May 7.
 Google Trends for "Mark Sanford" from Jan. 1 through April 13, 2013 So what if he's running for congress?
According to Google Trends, so far this year websurfers have had more interest in Mark Sanford's personal life than his political aspirations.
Instead of searching for the "love gov" regarding his latest campaign, many more have searched for information on his girlfriend/fiancee and his ex-wife.
Folks have even searched the specific names of those two women (Maria Belen Chapur and Jenny Sanford) more frequently than they've looked for information on his born-again bid for congress.
Is that saying anything about his chances in the May 7 election?
 “I think it would be much better for the country and for him personally (to resign). I come from the business side. If you had a chairman or president in the business world facing these allegations, he’d be gone.” [Sanford on Clinton, The Post and Courier, 9/12/98]
“The issue of lying is probably the biggest harm, if you will, to the system of Democratic government, representatives government, because it undermines trust. And if you undermine trust in our system, you undermine everything.” [Sanford on Clinton, CNN, 2/16/99]
"I've been unfaithful to my wife." [Sanford to the general public on national television: 6/24/2009]
“I think it would be much better for the country and for him personally (to resign). I come from the business side. If you had a chairman or president in the business world facing these allegations, he’d be gone.” [Sanford on Clinton, The Post and Courier, 9/12/98]
“The issue of lying is probably the biggest harm, if you will, to the system of Democratic government, representatives government, because it undermines trust. And if you undermine trust in our system, you undermine everything.” [Sanford on Clinton, CNN, 2/16/99]
"I've been unfaithful to my wife." [Sanford to the general public on national television: 6/24/2009]
 (Davis Turner/Getty Images) After his recent runoff win, Mark Sanford may be manning the deck of his political campaign, but it seems he has no crew onboard. And no gas in the tank, either. No one of foundation is standing behind him or publicly supporting him, and he has no positive record to project to voters, either. For example, the only endorsements Sanford’s received from persons who’ve worked with him in government are: Tom Davis, who was Sanford’s chief of staff before being elected to his current role of state senator, Edie Rodgers, who only had one year of her term as state representative overlap with Sanford’s as governor before she retired, Barbara Nielsen, who was an advisor to Sanford after she ended her termas Supt. of Education (which she served before Sanford took the governor’s office), and Scott Richardson, a state senator from 2000 to 2007 until Sanford appointed him to be state insurance commissioner for $130,000 a year. Thus, no one who ever worked with (instead of for) Sanford has offered an endorsement. National media have taken note of these no-shows, too. Politico reported “Not a single member of the South Carolina congressional delegation has endorsed Sanford, an indication of his weak standing among his would-be Washington colleagues.” The reason he’s not getting support could be that Sanford’s never done anything to earn it. When he last served in Congress, not one of the 44 bills he sponsored ever made it out of committee, for example. That’s a good thing, though, because 10 of Sanford’s bills were attacks on Social Security. He wanted to let Wall Street handle those funds, where they’d immediately be subject to fees for brokers to collect, and where they’d have no insurance or guarantee. If Social Security had been handed over to private companies, imagine where seniors who retired in 2007 would have been – practically broke, due to the stock market crash that began that year. Sanford also accomplished nothing as governor. For example, instead of working with the State Assembly, he only tried to work against it, vetoing 106 budget bills in 2004 alone.
“(I)n politics, you cultivate friends and create enemies. Sanford has done more creating than cultivating.”
There were quite a few enemies Sanford cultivated in his own party, too. It was Republicans in the State Legislature who tried to impeach him, and 61 GOP from the state House alone called for his resignation. They successfully voted to censure him. Even now- Sen. Tim Scott sent Sanford a letter telling him to resign. Add in the $750 million shortage in school funding due to the budgets he passed, the continuously rising rate of unemployment under his term as governor, his cuts that lead to even more lost jobs, and his attempt to refuse our own federal tax dollars for use in South Carolina (which took the state Supreme Court to correct), and it might seem like it can’t get any worse. But it does. Sanford’s record is chock full of hypocrisy, as his current campaign itself verifies. Sanford pledged to never serve more than three terms in Congress, and he upheld that promise when he left in 2000 (after six stale and non-productive years). But now he’s running for a fourth term? While in Congress, he voted to impeach Bill Clinton following the Lewinsky scandal, calling the circumstance “ reprehensible.” He also publicly chastised Rep. Bob Livingston (R-La.), whose extramarital affair was revealed about the same time as Clinton’s, and called for his resignation, saying “The bottom line … is he still lied.” But Sanford only went on to have his own extramarital affair. And lied about it. And then got forced to pay us back for his use of our tax dollars for that fling. By his public pledge for limited terms, combined with the precedents he himself set in the Clinton and Livingston situations, how he can possibly seek office now? This makes Sanford a hypocrite. He has no support from elected officials in his own party. He’s flip-flopped on his own standards, both political and moral. But he still has the audacity to ask for our vote? Sorry, Sanford, but your ship’s about to go under on May 7.
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