Axe-throwing, sword fights, haggis — it's the awesome, annual Scottish Games in Greenville, where no one seems to know who Jim Webb is or that he's running for president. “We have our own pace.”

John Stanton

GREENVILLE, S.C. — “No, no! Don’t throw it yet!” a burly Scotsman warned the beauty queen. “Put your foot on the line, there—” he motioned toward her black stilettos, “and then throw.” She laughed nervously. Next to her, Miss Greenville Scottish Games Teen stepped up to the line, looked down range, and in lightning quick, fluid synchronicity loosed an axe from manicured fingers. It landed with a satisfying thud. This — the annual Scottish Games in Greenville — is where Jim Webb, former U.S. senator and longshot candidate to defeat Hillary Clinton, spent last weekend. The Republican contenders spoke to conservatives in air-conditioned Oklahoma City last week. Hillary Clinton toured small businesses in Iowa and New Hampshire. And Jim Webb casually walked past a woman straining under the weight of a 15-foot poplar tree trunk, which she then hurled into the air. It’s not your normal presidential campaign stop, sure. But what about Webb’s candidacy is quite normal? Since announcing the creation of a 2016 exploratory committee in November, he’s essentially moved, unnoticed, through the early circus of the campaign season as bigger names on both sides of the aisle have announced their own campaigns, each seizing a week or more of media attention. All the while, Webb has done his own thing, and whether that’s good or bad for his prospective campaign doesn’t really seem to bother him. During the course of 18 hours in South Carolina, he made only one, oblique reference to the race, telling the Gathering of the Clans dinner that he and his fellow Scotch Irish have “had 13 presidents, so far — so far.”

While he’s spent a fair amount of time in some early primary states (“I’ve been in Iowa several times, I’ve been in New Hampshire, I was down here in South Carolina once before … I think we’re fine,” he told me), it’s certainly not the saturation level pursued by his opponents. They’ve spent the last six months in constant motion between Iowa, New Hampshire, and big money trips in New York and L.A.

Meanwhile Webb has either played the small venue circuit like the Scottish Games, or just gone missing altogether. Instead of attending the South Carolina Democratic convention last month, he sent Mudcat Saunders (“I’m supposedly an adviser,” Saunders told the crowd. “I don’t advise. I tell him what’s going on. There’s no whisperin’ in the ear. There’s no, you know, design, strategy. Jim Webb is Jim Webb.”) At the end of March, Webb left the country entirely for 10 days at the behest of the government in Thailand, which had asked for his assistance in quelling an ongoing major social and political upheaval. It was an odd move for someone like Webb, who needs all the exposure he can get in the early states. Odder still, though, was the fact that his campaign didn’t use the trip to tout his foreign policy chops. Even at the most overt campaign-style event of the weekend in Greenville, Friday’s Gathering of the Clans dinner, Webb entered to virtually no fanfare. Taking the stage from a visiting clan leader from Scotland, Webb admonished the crowd, “Please, do not call me a politician,” before launching into arguably the briefest stump speech in presidential history — a six-minute-and-five-seconds contemplation of the role of the Scotch-Irish in American history. Aside from his closing quip about the number of Scotch-Irish presidents, there was virtually no reference to the primary campaign, Hillary Clinton, the Republican field … not even his own policy positions or beliefs. In fact, Webb wasn’t even the main attraction. As his speech wrapped up, a group of men dressed in traditional tartan kilts made their way into the hall, carrying swords and a stuffed sheep’s stomach, parading the haggis through the hall to cheers.



The next morning, walking around the heavily tattooed and kilted crowd, Webb was both clearly at home and yet detached from his environment, more observer than participant. Sporting a tan suit and green Marine Corps tie, he could easily be on hand to provide emergency legal services in the event of a fight between clans rather than serve as guest of honor. He mixed with the crowd, shaking hands and trading pleasantries, watching groups of thick muscled men and women participating in the Caber Toss, a traditional Scottish feat of strength that is one of the highlights of the games. When Webb was announced, the crowd only clapped politely. There were no planted campaign volunteers the crowd waving Webb 2016 signs, no t-shirts with campaign slogans. It was clear that aside from his one staffer and the handful of VIPs that organizers introduced him to, I was probably one of the only person in the crowd that recognized him, let alone knew that he’s running for president. It was a deeply weird moment and Webb, or anyone for that matter, could be forgiven feeling and looking awkward as he walks solitary to the viewing stand. But Webb was at ease, casually walking past the caber tossing as he made his way, unaware, to join the gathered VIPs.