Sparks Fly Between Superintendent of Education Candidates Sheri Few and Charmeka Childs
The Pickens County Tea Party held a Rally and celebration of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness, Saturday morning, April 26, 2014, at Legacy Square on East Main Street.
An estimated 200 people attended the rally on a sunny but pleasant morning perfect for listening to political candidates.
The Magnuson Family musicians and singers provided patriotic music for the event.
Pickens County Tea Party Coordinator David Merck kept his tight schedule and ran a well-organized program.
Pickens County Sheriff Rick Clark greeted the rally attendees and Clemson Professor Dr. Bill Reid delivered an informative and entertaining talk.
U. S. Senate Candidates Richard Cash and Sen. Lee Bright were generally complimentary of each other, but were highly critical of incumbent Sen. Lindsey Graham who was not present. They were mostly “speaking to the choir, because Graham has virtually no support among tea party people, especially in Upstate, South Carolina.
Should one of them find themselves in a runoff with Graham, the other has pledged support. They stressed that it is more important to remove Graham from office than for any individual to win the senate race.
Graham has $7 million to spend on the re-election campaign and is running frequent radio and television commercials currently. He has the support of the Republican Party elite, supporters of amnesty for illegal immigrants, and Democrats.
Bright is known as a Tea Party favorite, however, Pickens County is close to home base for Cash who ran a close race with Third District Congressman Jeff Duncan in the Republican Primary four years ago.
Richard Cash brought one of his ice cream trucks to the rally and provided free ice cream to all attendees.
Duncan made a brief presentation and spent the entire morning talking with rally attendees. He is one of the most conservative members of the United States House of Representatives based on his voting record. After redrawing of lines, his District now includes southern Greenville County.
State House candidates Rick Tate, Ed Harris, Michelle Wiles and Harley Staton spoke.
Tate is a well-known outspoken caller to Talk Radio WORD who is always ready with a patriotic commentary.
Wiles was introduced by her campaign manager who told a story illustrating how aggressive she would be in solving the problems in the legislature.
She had arrived in New York City by air and took a subway into the city. A voice came over the PA system to move away from the doors so they would close. The door in their car was partly open. The voice continued to announce for people to stand away from the doors so the subway could depart.
Wiles asked a young man who was standing to push the door closed. He pushed and nothing moved. The announcements continued. Wiles stood from her seat, walked across the car and kicked the door closed, returned to her seat, the subway car began to move and she commented: “I’ve been in New York only 15 minutes and already had to fix their subway.”
Retired Army Chaplain and leader in the Christian and home school movements E. Ray Moore is one of four candidates for Lt. Governor. Moore explained how he would use his two primary duties as Lt. Gov. to improve state government. The duties are presiding over the Senate and supervising the office on aging. Moore, who was awarded the Bronze Star during a tour of duty in the Iraq War, has spent recent years urging parents to remove their children from public government schools.
Charmeka Childs, candidate for Superintendent of Education was one of the first candidates to speak at the rally. Sheri Few, the other candidate for that position spoke later in the program.
Childs discussed her impressive credentials and the fact that she served as Deputy Superintendent to General Dr. Mick Zais for the past three years, and that Zais has endorsed her candidacy. She served on the South Carolina Education Oversight Committee (2008-2010) during the time the Oversight Committee voted for and approved Common Core for South Carolina, although she said she opposes Common Core, the controversial program adopted by several states in order to have better chances of getting federal grants. She is a native of South Carolina and earned degrees from Duke University. She taught school for 5 years in Richland County.
Sheri Few is founder and president of South Carolina Parents Involved in Education (PIE). Few and her organization has spent recent months educating South Carolina citizens of the dangers to children and the future of the republic if Common Core is fully implemented in state schools.
The most dramatic and potentially explosive part of the rally came when Sheri Few asked, how Childs could claim she was opposed to Common Core Standards when she served on the committee that approved Common Core for South Carolina? “How can she say she is opposed to Common Core when she has spent the past three years as Deputy Superintendent of Education implementing the Common Core Standards in South Carolina Schools”
