South Carolina Democrats' latest attempt to undermine their own primary winner has fizzled before it ever really got going. Just a week after 32 year old, unemployed and politically unknown Alvin Greene won the party's nomination to challenge incumbent Senator Jim DeMint (R-South Carolina) in November; supporters of Democrat Linda Ketner began mounting an effort to get her name on the ballot as an Independent. Today that effort ended.

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In an e-mail to supporters, Ms. Ketner said that while South Carolinians "deserve - and desperately need - better government...a last minute campaign without essential resources won't get us that outcome." (source)

Ms. Ketner, a grocery chain heiress who spent more than $1 million of her own money in her losing campaign against Representative Henry Brown (R-South Carolina) in 2008, would have given the Democratic establishment a candidate of their own despite both the Independent mask she'd wear and the fact that Mr. Greene actually won the Democratic Party primary.

But the website created by supporters of the Ketner for Senate drive now carries the headline "Petition Initiative has Ended" and contains Ms. Ketner's e-mail as well as a message from one of the organizers which begins with an admission of frustration and embarrassment over the process that allowed the voters of South Carolina to nominate Mr. Greene.

Ms. Ketner's now-defunct Independent bid was not the first attempt by the Democratic establishment to stop Mr. Greene's fledgling political career in its tracks. Days after the primary, a formal protest was initiated by primary loser, former state legislator and judge Vic Rawl who claimed his loss was due to unreliable electronic voting machines. (It wasn't.)

And so the investigation into Mr. Greene's finances and the felony case against him on obscenity charges go on. He will not be certified as the Democratic nominee until August 16 when the party sends its candidate list to the state election commission. Who knows what else the Democrats in South Carolina might try before then to un-nominate their own nominee. Stay tuned!