Thank goodness. The 5th Circuit Solicitor General's office is investigating U.S. Senate candidate Alvin Greene and his finances to determine if any laws were broken on his way to stardom. In case you didn't know, Greene is the Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate out of South Carolina who mysteriously found his way into the national spotlight, even though every interview he's done proves that he was being manipulated by someone else.

Greene doesn't appear to have even average intelligence, and I'm not sure if an unemployed man with a pending felony who lives with his parents can afford the $10,400 filing fee to participate in an election for which he doesn't seem to have campaigned. In other words, Greene is the great joke of the 2010 midterm election cycle, and I while I am inclined to cheer for black success, I cannot cheer for him.


In November 2009, Greene was being charged with felony porn charges and told the judge that he was too poor to afford an attorney. He'd been accused of harassing a University of South Carolina student with computer pornography. However, in March, Green paid $10,400 to the South Carolina Democratic Party to run for the U.S. Senate. In June, he made headlines when he defeated Vic Rawl to win the nomination. He is now set to face Jim DeMint in November.


South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford signed a new law last week requiring banks to turn over information about account holders in cases where they are suspected of financial wrongdoing. In Greene's case, there is a need to investigate the inconsistency between the facts that he couldn't afford an attorney for his pending felony, yet he came up with $10,400 to run for an election.

Greene said he'd been saving the money, but declined to produce any financial records. During interviews, he says he ran a "good, hard campaign," but was completely unable to explain exactly how he campaigned, whom he met with, whether he had any fundraisers, how many meetings he held or even if he had a gathering to announce his candidacy. It appears that the courts are going to get Greene on the obvious; by alluding to the fact that this man took public defender resources from the state by claiming he was indigent, and then turned around and spent $10,400 on an election in which he barely participated (for example, in one interview, Greene could not remember if he'd printed out "thousands" of fliers, or just 100).

Hopefully, the authorities will find a way to get to the bottom of this mess. When added to the other embarrassments of South Carolina politics, Greene is the straw that breaks the camel's back. There's something seriously wrong in the state of South Carolina.

More Hot Stories:

+Tiger Woods' Wife Earned $411,000 Per Day During Marriage

+No, Oprah Winfrey's Contest Didn't Cheat for the Black Woman

+Katherine Jackson May Get Financial Backlash from Judge

+Howard Stern Attacks Oprah Winfrey, Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith

---

Dr. Boyce Watkins is the founder of the Your Black World Coalition and the author of the new book 'Black American Money.' To have Dr. Boyce's commentary delivered to your e-mail, please click here.