11: That's how many towns Rick Weiland plans to visit today in what looks like the most ambitious Senate campaign in South Dakota. (Rep. Stace Nelson is a close workhorse second.) He starts in Plankinton, where he'll have a chance to convert GOP candidate Annette Bosworth's parents back to the party of sanity.The Weiland bandwagon then thunders up the US 281 corridor through Broadland, Bonilla, Hitchock, Tulare and Redfield. Broadland, Bonilla, Hitchcock, Tulare, and Redfield. The campaign then veers left (a joyful clamor erupts from the McGovern-Wellstone bleachers!) for a hot lap through Faulk County: Rockham, Orient, Cresbard, and Chelsea (the last is a conciliatory nod toward the purportedly resurging New Democrats). Finally, Team Weiland refills the tank in Aberdeen at the Brown County Democrats' Holiday Potluck at the Americinn at 5:30 p.m.
Rick Weiland is holding meetings in a lot of places, but when you rock 'em in Rockham (pronunciation, locals?), you ain't no placeholder.
4: That's the number of months that have passed without any response from Annette Bosworth to my opening reportage on her raffle scam.
4: That's the number of days that have passed without any response from Annette Bosworth since KDLT followed up on the Madville Times raffle scam scoop. Sure, Bosworth's campaign manager Nate Johnson e-mailed KDLT a "none of the Senate campaign's business—Vote for Annette!" non-response, but Bosworth must have forgotten to pay Johnson and his Twin Cities consultancy firm Ainsley Shea over the weekend, because Johnson's been silent since. Annette and her co-conspiring husband Chad Haber also have not dispatched anyone to respond to the three calls I've placed to their office.
0: That's the number days we have left to wait until Pat Powers brings out his teasingly juicy information that will paint the "accusers" in the Bosworth raffle scam in a less-than-favorable light. "Accusers"? What, is Powers going to attack Nate Fluit, who has stated pretty clear facts about buying a ticket for a raffle that never held a drawing and never receiving a refund?
Pat's weekend blog post mirrors the Chad Haber "Robert Florida for Dummies" intimidation tactics he trotted out last summer when Chad didn't like seeing the Senate campaign he's plotted for years critiqued in public. As happened in August, expect a "couple of days" to drift into a couple of weeks, a couple of months... and by then you'll all be so busy reading about the GOED/EB-5/Northern Beef Packers/Dakota Provisions/Richard Benda/Jeffrey Sveen investigations that you won't even notice that Pat never followed up.
Yup Cory, it's Rockham, just as you thought.
When I was in high school I played softball in several of those towns. I have cousins living very near Rockham. They used to have pretty good parties, er, dances there.
I used to haul wheat to the Tulare elevator.
I've been in every one of those towns. Hope Weiland has as good a time as I did!
Check out Rick's pix from today's roadtrip, including Broadland and Tulare!