South Carolina Democratic Nominee for Senate Facing Felony Obscenity Charge

The late South Carolina Congressman James L. Petigru once said, “South Carolina is too small for a republic and too large for an insane asylum.” First there was Mark Sanford, who resigned after an affair with a woman in Argentina. Then the woman who wants to replace him, GOP gubernatorial candidate Nikki Haley, became embroiled in a couple of alleged “inappropriate” trysts with a blogger and a lobbyist — a normally damaging problem for a family-value, Palin-supported conservative. Now, Alvin Greene, 32, the Democratic nominee for the United States Senate has revealed that he is facing a pending felony charge for obscenity.

Incumbent U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint already shredded his primary opponent and now faces a relatively unknown candidate who will have to fight a felony charge while running for election.

Greene, an unemployed veteran who lives with his parents, was a surprise winner in the primary over former four-term state lawmaker Vic Rawl, 64. He was arrested in November and charged with showing obscene Internet photos to a University of South Carolina student. If convicted, he could be sentenced to up to five years in prison.

He has refused to comment on the charges, though he reportedly showed the woman the pictures and wanted to go up to her room. Of course, his defense could be that he was just trying to show how South Carolina is full of “Smiling Faces. Beautiful Places.”

Normally, this type of case does not result in an actual trial. If the individual is not distributing pornography or making threats, prosecutors usually treat this as creepy or boorish behavior. Obscenity remains an often ambiguous concept in criminal codes. Reports indicate that Camille McCoy, a 19-year-old rising sophomore, said that Greene sat down next to her in a computer lab and asked her to look at his screen which showed a porn site. That is usually not enough for a criminal charge. Moreover, it is hard to imagine that the police could show for sure which image was showing on the screen at the time. There are often complaints of people watching pornography on airplanes or college computer labs. Such conduct can result in expulsion from a public area or even a school, but rarely rises to the level of a criminal charge. We will have to know more about the case to see why this resulted in an arrest.

However, that is a legal, not a political, analysis. I am frankly not sure what constitutes a political scandal any more in South Carolina. Citizens in the conservative state may have to look to God-fearing public servants in places like Massachusetts and California as examples of good government.

For the people of South Carolina, they were already having a bad day and may have confused two different Alvins :

Sometimes the system goes on the blink
And the whole thing turns out wrong
You might not make it back and you know
That you could be well oh that strong
And I’m not wrong

(yeah…)

So where is the passion when you need it the most
Oh you and I
You kick up the leaves and the magic is lost

Cause you had a bad day
You’re taking one down
You sing a sad song just to turn it around
You say you don’t know
You tell me don’t lie
You work at a smile and you go for a ride
You had a bad day
You’ve seen what you like
And how does it feel for one more time
You had a bad day
You had a bad day

For the full story, click here and here.