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For video interviews with the Bluffton mayoral candidates, go to islandpacket.com/video.
WASHINGTON -- Rep. Joe Wilson, famous among his congressional peers for his unflagging optimism, refuses to be disheartened by all the gloomy election predictions that Republicans will lose more seats in Congress and slide deeper into the minority-party morass.
Yet the Lexington Republican is well aware that he faces the stiffest challenge of his congressional career in Rob Miller, an former-Marine Corps captain and Iraq war veteran seeking office for the first time.
"He indeed has spent more money than any other challenger," Wilson said. "But the good news is that (expenditure) has alerted my supporters, and they've come forward to contribute more. This is the best campaign I've ever had, one where we have record fundraising."
Wilson had just over $300,000 on hand as of Sept. 30 after spending $787,000 in the current two-year campaign cycle. Miller had spent $394,679, leaving him with $102,010 at the end of last month.
Miller concedes he's the underdog, but he said the economiccrisis of the last two months is giving him momentum.
"It drives home the point that Washington is broken," Miller said. "It shows that the policies of Joe Wilson and the Bush administration have failed and
really painted us into a corner."
Wilson, a 61-year-old Charleston native, is seeking his fifth term in Congress, after serving 17 years in the S.C. Senate. He won a special election in December 2001 to replace the late Rep. Floyd Spence.
With conservative Lexington County as its hub, Republicans still dominate the 2nd Congressional District, which stretches from Beaufort and Hilton Head Island along the Georgia border, bending northward to encompass Columbia.
More than a quarter of the district's nearly 700,000 residents are black, and Miller could be helped at the top of the Democratic ticket by the historic presidential candidacy of Sen. Barack Obama.
Obama's overwhelming defeat of Sen. Hillary Clinton in the state's Jan. 26 Democratic primary helped propel him to the party's White House nomination.
Dick Harpootlian, a Columbia lawyer and former S.C. Democratic Party chairman, said Wilson is far from a shoe-in to gain re-election.
"Wilson's probably got a pretty good chance to prevail, but I think it's going to be a nail-biter," Harpootlian said.
S.C. Attorney General Henry McMaster, former head of the state Republican Party, acknowledged that Wilson and other GOP candidates are sailing into brisk political headwinds.
"There's a restlessness on the part of voters that would not exist were it not for the war and, recently, the financial turmoil," McMaster said.
McMaster said, however, that he would be surprised if Wilson is defeated.
"He's enormously accessible," McMaster said. "People know him. He's hardworking. He, too, has a military background. It would be harder to find a finer congressman than Joe Wilson."
Wilson retired from the military as a colonel after serving in the Army Reserve from 1972 to 1975, and in the Army National Guard from 1975 to 2003. His four sons have all had military service, two in Iraq.
In a different political season, Wilson might be pointing to recent security gains in Iraq as vindication of his long-standing advocacy of aggressive military action there.
"I'm not crowing," said Wilson, is chairman of the House Victory in Iraq Caucus. "I'm not claiming political gain. My whole interest is in protecting American families by defeating terrorists overseas."
Miller, 34, was born and grew up in Charleston. He saw combat in Iraq, leading troops in the decisive battle of Fallujah before leaving the Marines eight months ago to run for Congress.
"Of course the surge has been successful," Miller said. "(Adding) more great American troops will always make things better to a certain degree. My concern is getting U.S. troops off of street corners and forcing Iraqi politicians to take charge of their own country."
Wilson and Miller also differ on the controversial financial bailout package Congress passed and President Bush signed into law.
Wilson voted for it after he said Republican lawmakers added important safeguards.
"I could see that in the communities I represent, as credit lines were being withdrawn, people would lose their jobs, and manufacturing facilities and small businesses would shut down," Wilson said. "I knew we were on the verge of many families losing their jobs."
Miller said the economic rescue package helped banks, brokerages and other financial institutions more than ordinary Americans.
"It was the wrong bill at the wrong time," he said. "Congress did what they always do -- they panicked and threw money at the problem."
