I’ve been putting pencil to paper and reviewing the hundreds and hundreds of posts this year, and I’ve come to the conclusion that 2019 has been one crazy year.
Last legislative session’s manufactured residency kerfuffle couldn’t make it to “honorable mention status.” Paul Erickson’s indictment? Not even a blip. Lyn-Lynne-Lindi DiSanto didn’t make it. Neither did the SDGOP pushing past a 100,000 lead in voters over Democrats (Currently 257,284 to 154,091).
Billie Sutton’s never ending campaign for Governor might come close (I just heard this week he’s rumored to be contacting people no longer with the State of SD asking for support for a run in 2022), but aside from his fundraising letters, that’s a lot of talk at the moment. Even Ellee Spawn finally took care of those warrants requesting her appearance in front of a judge, and it was fun while we were waiting, but she stopped being a story a while ago.
So what can you expect will appear in the top ten stories for 2020? As usual, I tend to pick those stories that were big in 2019 that we can expect to reverberate through 2020 and beyond. They’re what we talked about then, and you can expect to continue to hear about for some time to come.
And while I’m working on the list, and second guessing my choices… here’s what last years’ stories were…
Top Political Stories of 2018: #1 – Kristi Noem elected Governor of South Dakota
Top Political Stories of 2018: #2 – South Dakota v Wayfair
Top Political Stories of 2018: #3 – Kristi Noem wins GOP Primary in race for Governor
Top Political Stories of 2018: #4 – Dusty Johnson wins primary, and never looks back
Top Political Stories of 2018: #5 – Paul TenHaken wins 2 in a row to become Sioux Falls Mayor
Top Political Stories of 2018: #6 – SDGOP wins again/Dems fail again… and again…
Top Political Stories of 2018: #7 – Jason Ravnsborg outmaneuvers them all.
Top Political Stories of 2018: #8 – President Trump Visits South Dakota
Top Political Stories of 2018: #9 – Billie Sutton runs to the right but is undone by his record.
Top Political Stories of 2018: #10 – The Great Implosion of Jolene Loetscher.
Top 10
10. House feud with Gov
9. Kennedy Noem
8. Maher appointed Vice Chair of appropriations
7. Gov hunt to Sioux Falls
6. TenHaken takes out Stehley
5. Stace Nelson resigns/ senate resignations
4. McGowan resigns, Democrats still irrelevant
3. Noem CoS leaves 2 weeks before session
2. Hemp wars
1. Meth. We’re on it.
#3 .. really? I don’t think Josh deciding to take a step back even registers a top 30 for me. Part of the problem in serving in an administration is that most people don’t want to live in Pierre.
Don’t get me wrong, I grew up there, and lived there for a lot of years.. but even I have to admit that it’s kind of nice when you’re not 2 1/2 – 3 hours away from most amenities.
I agree that 3 is too high. It should be more like 7 or 8. If it wasn’t in conjunction with the recenct issues the gov office has received I suspect it would not even be noteworthy. Maybe in conjunction it is more newsworthy than 3 if in fact there was turmoil involved. If not then it’s easily forgettable.
Pierre is a great place. What amenities does pierre not have?