My reason is this, I am a ‘Southerner’ but I was not born and raised here so I came here burdened with the stereotypical view that most white southerners were racist and that blacks and whites lived separate lives. Well after 15 years here and another eight plus years in Texas, I can say that is total BS. Yes, you will still find racial hatred, but most everybody gets along quite well. I also learned that bigotry is not a white monopoly and that being critical of a place that is some ones home town/state/area is foolish and unkind. I was born and raised in California, with a two and a half year period in La Paz, Baja California so I know about that.
Sorry about the signup request, I ususally use me @nonya.com for those. So this is the entire is below article:
Victory doesn't surprise Dobey
EDGEFIELD - There's a reason Edgefield County Sheriff Adell Dobey says he stayed out of the public spotlight and avoided mudslinging during the re-election campaign he handily won Tuesday night. That reason became apparent when he pulled in more than twice as many votes as his Republican challenger, retired South Carolina Law Enforcement Division agent Dan Choate, with an appeal that crossed party and racial lines for a 68 percent win.
Sheriff Dobey, Edgefield County's first black sheriff since Reconstruction, won all precincts in the county except for Merriwether and West Side, neither of which he lost by a large margin, election records show.
"I'm honored and humbled, but it wasn't a surprise," said Sheriff Dobey, 51.
The two mostly white, heavily Republican precincts in the rapidly growing southwestern end of the county where Mr. Choate is from went heavy for President Bush. The president claimed more than 85 percent of the West Side vote and about 80 percent of the Merriwether vote.
But presidential coattails weren't long enough to offset Sheriff Dobey's countywide appeal. Even in these precincts, Sheriff Dobey lost to Mr. Choate by narrower margins than expected, election records show.
Of the West Side voters, 53 percent voted for Mr. Choate and 46 percent voted for Sheriff Dobey. In Merriwether, 58 percent voted for Mr. Choate and 41 percent voted for Sheriff Dobey.
In all other precincts, Sheriff Dobey rang up three times as many votes as Mr. Choate.
In Edgefield County, where about 41 percent of the population is black and about 58 percent is white, Sheriff Dobey managed to parlay job performance and door-to-door campaigning into a win that crossed racial lines.
"Race is not an issue if you can do the job. It wasn't an issue in the first race, and it wasn't in this one," Sheriff Dobey said.
Much of his campaign effort was focused on the predominantly white, southern part of the county.
"I went door-to-door in the Merriwether area a lot," Sheriff Dobey said. "I've lived here in the county all my life. The citizens have seen the improvement at the sheriff's office."
Edgefield County Democratic Chairman James Burt, one of Sheriff Dobey's campaign advisors, said volunteers helped rally support for Sheriff Dobey in Edgefield, Johnston and Trenton so he would have more time to campaign in the Merriwether area.
"The (Democratic) Party didn't get him re-elected. It was the job he was doing. He ran a clean race. We told him not to do debates, and it paid off," Mr. Burt said.
Even Sheriff Dobey's Republican rivals acknowledged that his virtually silent campaign was smart politics. County Republican Chairman Frank Maurer said the reason Mr. Choate lost was because Sheriff Dobey had the county's large minority voting block on his side and because some Republicans crossed party lines in voting.
"I hate to admit it, but there were some Republicans who I talked to that were going to vote for the incumbent," Mr. Maurer said.
