In this day and age in politics, there are a lot of ways to fill a U.S. Senate seat. Comedian Stephen Colbert is hoping to tweet his way into South Carolina’s seat, left vacant by Sen. Jim DeMint last week.
DeMint, a Tea Party favorite, announced last Thursday that he was stepping down from his post to lead the Heritage Foundation starting in January. The announcement quickly made the political world abuzz about who would replace him. It didn’t take long for the name of South Carolina’s favorite native-son, Colbert, to come up. Within hours, Colbert was aiming for the job, at least on Twitter. That evening, he started to encourage his followers to tweet their support for Colbert at South Carolina’s governor, the person who will decide who takes DeMint’s seat.
“Nation! Tell @nikkihaley why I should take over for Jim DeMint! #SenatorColbert Could our Better Tomorrow be… Tomorrow?,” Colbert tweeted.
Of course, Colbert aiming for Republican jobs is nothing new. Just this year, Colbert (jokingly?) toyed with the idea of running for the Republican presidential nomination. And surprisingly, the comedian is well-accepted as a possibly political contender, at least according to Public Policy Polling, which reported this weekend that Colbert would be the most popular pick to replace DeMint.
Colbert was helping his chances on Twitter this week, promoting the hashtag #SenatorColbert. According to Topsy.com, the hashtag has been used thousands of times since the weekend.
“#SenatorColbert Mr.Colbert should be senator. He would set a much-needed precedent: the first senator to know what the hell he’s doing,” wrote Kathy Rath.
But it didn’t take long for Gov. Haley to respond, and on Dec. 7, she thanked Colbert and his supporters for the hundreds of tweets. But, unfortunately for Colbert fans, the comedian wasn’t about to get selected to replace DeMint. Why? Because he didn’t know South Carolina’s official drink, something Haley was quick to point out. “Big, big mistake,” she wrote on Facebook.
The social media-savvy Colbert then responded that Haley herself wasn’t qualified to lead South Carolina because she didn’t know that the spotted salamander was the state’s official amphibian. He again urged his fans to bombard Haley with tweets, this time with hashtag #SpottedSalamander.
But sadly, even with an endless number of tweets, this week it seems unlikely Haley would pick the ever popular comedian, at least according to Politico. Maybe next time, Stephen.
Photo via U.S. Army/Fotopedia
