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Published: Monday, Aug. 30, 2010 / Updated: Monday, Aug. 30, 2010 02:29 PM

Indicted SC Sen. candidate Greene brings bizarre candidacy to York

YORK -- 

Tonight, the curious of York County get the chance to see and listen to Alvin Greene in person.

Greene is scheduled to speak and answer questions at 6 p.m. on the patio of the Coal Yard restaurant.

Come on up here, Alvin. Let's see what you have to say. It ought to take, well, minutes.

Alvin Greene could not be made up. Yes, this is the Alvin Greene who is, to the bewilderment of all of us, the Democratic Party's nominee for the U.S. Senate in November's election.

The Alvin Greene who is under indictment for allegedly showing computer porn to a University of South Carolina coed.

The Alvin Greene who has no job and lives with his father.

The Alvin Greene who has mumbled and shuffled through interviews and shown little knowledge, at best, of what the Senate is or does.

The Alvin Greene who was not deployed with his unit to fight in ongoing wars overseas because he was allegedly unfit and a potential danger to the success and survival of his unit.

The Alvin Greene who, along with a supporter, was asked to leave an Oconee County Democratic Party meeting last week following his indictment and the subsequent rescinding of an invitation to attend that meeting.

The Alvin Greene who pounded a former judge and state lawmaker in the June Democratic primary with little or no campaigning.

U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn, the state's leading black politician and one of America's leading statesmen of any color, a man who endured civil rights riots and hatred for the right of blacks to vote and be just like whites in life and politics, has already said he will not vote for Alvin Greene because of the indictment.

Still, Greene is the candidate of a major party for Senate, and he is coming here to York County as a guest of something called the western York County Democratic Forum.

Nobody has ever heard of that forum except its members. This group is trying to re-start itself after years of hiatus. They want publicity and notoriety, to get the public involved in politics again with the Democratic Party.

They sure will get noticed with Alvin Greene on their agenda.

Alvin Greene has become a national story. National because his candidacy is so strange, to be kind. So horrible, to be rough. So embarrassing, to be rougher.

A pair of York's leading Democrats will not be there tonight. Mayor Eddie Lee and City Councilman Charles Johnson said they will be nowhere near the Coal Yard.

Lee, a life-long Democrat, said Clyburn was right on. As a father, Lee can't and won't support or vote for Greene because of the indictment.

"Anyone is welcome in the city of York," Lee said, "but I am not a part of this event."

Johnson, longtime member of the council and a prominent voice in York's black community for years, said he is troubled by Greene's candidacy and put it bluntly: "I will not be going."

But others will.

The Rev. Dennis Wilson, president of the western York County branch of the NAACP, said he is going as an observer. The NAACP does not endorse candidates, Wilson said, but encourages voter participation and education, no matter the party.

Wilson acknowledged that Greene's candidacy is "a little different," but Greene is innocent until proven guilty of the criminal charges, and he legitimately won the primary to become the candidate of the Democratic Party.

"I am interested in what he has to say," Wilson said. "I will withhold my judgments until I hear him speak."

Former NAACP branch president Steve Love will be among the speakers tonight. Love said he has not endorsed Greene, and does not condone any criminal acts.

But Greene has not been convicted of anything, Love said, and local politicians who faced serious criminal charges and lawsuits including Republican County Councilman Paul Lindemann and former Coroner Doug McKown, remained part of the political scene while under clouds of suspicion and conviction.

True, Greene the candidate is no worse than Lindemann the candidate. At least Lindemann was thrashed in the June primary and soon will be gone.

Love's reason for attending is to continue to promote voter registration and participation, he said, especially among black voters who historically have not used their power as citizens at the polls often enough - with the exception of 2008, when Barack Obama was running for president.

"If this helps turnout for candidates including John Spratt and Vincent Sheheen," Love said, "it is a positive."

Both Love and Wilson said the Democratic Party ought to at least give Greene a fair shake, because he won the nomination fair and square.

That also shows that if the lame and directionless S.C. Democratic Party can't find anybody better than Alvin Greene, the party deserves the whipping it will get.

Spratt, a Democratic congressman from York, is in a tight race with Republican state Sen. Mick Mulvaney of Indian Land. Yet Spratt is not expected to be within a country mile of Alvin Greene Monday night.

Sheheen, a state senator from Camden, is the Democratic nominee for governor who faces an uphill battle against Republican state Rep. Nikki Haley of Lexington.

Haley's name is important in talking about Alvin Greene because she was a little-known underdog candidate a few months ago who took the state by storm in the June primaries.

She cruised to victory after she was first endorsed by Sarah Palin, then defended herself from allegations she had affairs. Then Haley, of Indian Sikh heritage, endured racial slurs from a self-described "Redneck" Republican state senator from near Columbia who called her a "raghead" - a racial slur typically aimed at those of Middle Eastern descent.

But Greene is no underdog candidate who might endear himself to voters. He is an indicted, unemployed candidate who barely campaigns.

Nobody has thrown any slur about race toward him. Democrats - black and white - see Alvin Greene and run the other way.

Powerful state Democrats have tried unsuccessfully since Greene's primary win in early June to get him to drop out of the race. He just says no and goes back inside his father's house. Greene does not go back to work because he has no job.

I walked around downtown York's few blocks for hours this past week, near where Greene will speak, looking for a Greene campaign sign, button, bumper sticker - anything.

Greene's name is nowhere. Nobody mentioned him, anywhere. The man is a shadow, an enigma.

Who knows what Alvin Greene might say tonight? Steve Love says he has no idea. Dennis Wilson says he has no idea.

Greene might just stand there on the Coal Yard patio and say nothing at all. Then he will be asked questions, and maybe not answer.

But there will likely be hundreds of people there, and media from Columbia and Charlotte - maybe the national press - all of whom need a map to find York.

But all will come because Alvin Greene sure is news.

Train wrecks are news. Horrible, but news. Car crashes, cop shootings, murders. Terrible, but news.

Alvin Greene, even mute, is news in York. Greene will make news all right, just by showing up as the only unemployed, indicted candidate for the Senate.

The Senate that decides some of the most important things on earth, and a job for which Alvin Greene is the best the sorry South Carolina Democratic Party could offer.

Want to go?

Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Alvin Greene is scheduled to speak and answer questions at 6 p.m. today at the Coal Yard restaurant, 105 Garner St., in York. The event is free and open to the public.