From Bloomberg:

In the last week before its Jan. 19 primary, the Palmetto State is awash in stealth e-mail attacks, fake polling calls and other dirty tricks reminiscent of the scurrilous rumors that scuttled John McCain’s candidacy in 2000.

The dubious tradition stretches back to native son Lee Atwater, the Republican operative who invented many of the modern techniques of negative campaigning, including the 1988 ad that linked Democratic presidential hopeful Michael Dukakis to the parole of murderer Willie Horton and contributed to the victory of President George H.W. Bush that year.

“Many understudies of Lee Atwater are still in this state, in the political-consulting business,” said Blease Graham, a scholar of Southern politics at the University of South Carolina in Columbia.

Among Republicans, the shenanigans this year include automated telephone pseudo-surveys trashing former Tennessee Senator Fred Thompson’s stance on abortion, mailings claiming Arizona Senator McCain turned his back on fellow prisoners of war in Vietnam and a phony Christmas card from former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney extolling polygamy.

With anti-mormon Christmas cars hitting Romney to calls against Thompson saying he voted for abortion and gay marriage while in the Senate, dirty tricks seem to be taking hold in SC. Will it matter? Is it as bad now as its been in the past?