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 he most likely person to replace retiring Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), at least according to early political prognostications, is Rep. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), a black conservative first elected in the Tea Party wave of 2010. DeMint reportedly favors Scott to replace him, other conservatives love him, and he appears to have a good relationship with the only person who matters, Gov. Nikki Haley (R-S.C.). (Haley will handpick a senator who will serve until an election is held in 2014.) But almost as soon as Scott's name popped up, another South Carolina native was roped in: Stephen Colbert. 
 
 The ubiquitous mock Twitter feed, @ColbertforSC, appeared almost immediately after DeMint shocked Capitol Hill with the announcement that he's jumping ship to head up the Heritage Foundation. But Colbert didn't exactly run away from the encouragement. "Stephen is honored by the groundswell of support from the Palmetto State and looks forward to Governor Haley's call," says his personal publicist, Carrie Byalick. And on his own (real) Twitter feed, Colbert just fed the speculation: 
 
 Tweet @nikkihaley & tell her why I belong in the US Senate. For one, I wouldn't just block legislation, I'd body-check it! #SenatorColbert — Stephen Colbert (@StephenAtHome) December 7, 2012 
 
 Conservatives are throwing cold water on the idea, though perhaps a little defensively. "Colbert and his supporters are likely destined for disappointment in getting the host appointed to fill DeMint's seat," says Madeleine Morgenstern at Glenn Beck's site The Blaze. "Haley, a Republican, will make the call and is no doubt familiar with Colbert's bombastic, faux-conservative stage personality." 
 
 But it's not entirely implausible that Colbert could make a strong run for the seat in the 2014 election. He's "made no secret of his desire to hold higher office," having staged mostly satirical runs for the White House in 2008 and 2012, notes Andy Kroll at Mother Jones. Plus, he has a real-life, bona fide super PAC, Americans for a Better Tomorrow, Tomorrow, which he transformed into a dark-money nonprofit, Colbert Super-PAC SHH! "Colbert would have had a tough road in the primaries," both Democratic and Republican, says David Graham at The Atlantic. But a Senator Colbert isn't impossible, and it would certainly shake up Washington. "Consider it, Governor Haley." 
 
 Colbert is a comedian, but he does dabble in real politics — he appeared before Congress to testify about campaign finance, and he's appeared at a fake rally in South Carolina with real presidential hopeful Herman Cain. And he has up to $900,000 left in super PAC money that would go a long way in a "run for national office as a senator from the state that calls him its 'favorite son,'" says Ross Luippold at The Huffington Post. "There's one problem, though: Colbert can't actually serve in the Senate." His contract with Comedy Central isn't up until 2014, after the special election. Oh well, "we certainly hope he has some fun in the meantime." ||||| Stephen Colbert has launched a Twitter campaign to get South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley to appoint him to replace Sen. Jim DeMint, who announced he was quitting Thursday. And the problem is not that Colbert isn't qualified. It's that he's too qualified. 
 
 "Let's see, you need someone young, someone conservative, someone from South Carolina, maybe someone who had a super PAC?" Colbert said on The Colbert Report Thursday night, as his left hand tried to smother his right. Sure. But let's be real. What you need to be a senator these days is the ability to "say words good on the TV." Colbert says words too good. Instead of displaying talking points-style discipline during interviews, he engages in spontaneous riffing. Worse, Colbert has a skill set that is way to broad for the Senate. He appears to speaks Latin nearly fluently. He studied philosophy in college. His favorite book is not nearly down-to-earth or biblical enough — it's Lord of the Rings. He believes that science is real, at least given the number of scientists he books on his show. He told New York magazine in 2007 that he loves Richard Nixon — but not for the appropriate reasons, like that Nixon got really good at winning presidential elections. Instead, Colbert loves Nixon's policy: "He started the EPA. He opened China. He gave 18-year-olds the vote. His issues were education, drugs, women, minorities, youth involvement, ending the draft, and improving the environment. John Kerry couldn’t have run on this! What would I give for a Nixon?" 
 
 Think about the man Colbert would be replacing. Jim DeMint might be quitting to run a think tank, but he's no thinker, according to The Washington Post's Jennifer Rubin, a conservative blogger. Rubin writes: 
 
 Even DeMint would not claim to be a serious scholar. He is a pol. He’s a pol whose entire style of conservatism – all or nothing, no compromise, no accounting for changes in public habits and opinions — is not true to the tradition of Edmund Burke, Russell Kirk and others... Every individual who works [at Heritage] should take pause and consider whether the reputation of that institution is elevated or diminished by this move. And I would say the same, frankly, if any other non-scholarly pol took that spot. 
 
 Colbert is a nerd. We can't waste his brains in the Senate. 
 
 Looks like it's still Tim Scott's seat to lose after all. 
 
 Want to add to this story? Let us know in comments or send an email to the author at ereeve at theatlantic dot com. You can share ideas for stories on the Open Wire. 
 
 Elspeth Reeve ||||| Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period. ||||| 2 years ago 
 
 (CNN) - The swell of online support for Republican South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley to appoint comedy show host Stephen Colbert to her state's open U.S. Senate seat hasn't gone unnoticed by the Palmetto State Republican, who pointed out one hangup on her Facebook Friday. 
 
 "Stephen, thank you for your interest in South Carolina's U.S. Senate seat and for the thousands of tweets you and your fans sent me," Haley wrote, before delivering one piece of archive material that could sink Colbert's chances. 
 
 
 
 – Follow the Ticker on Twitter: @PoliticalTicker 
 
 "You forget one thing, my friend. You didn't know our state drink. Big, big mistake," she said, pointing back to a "Colbert Report" interview in April when she asked the host – who grew up in Charleston – to name the official South Carolina beverage. 
 
 "There's a state drink?" he asked, befuddled, before she told him it was milk. 
 
 On Thursday, Colbert ticked off the traits he thought South Carolina's new senator should possess: "Somebody conservative, somebody from South Carolina. Maybe somebody who had a super PAC." 
 
 Colbert, who mockingly started a super PAC in the summer of 2011 that raked in more than $1.2 million, came to the conclusion he'd be an ideal replacement for Sen. Jim DeMint. DeMint announced Thursday he was leaving the Senate to become president of the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank. 
 
 By the time Colbert's show came on the air Thursday, the online swell of support (however joking) had begun, including a website that specifies it's "in no way affiliated with Stephen Colbert or The Colbert Report." 
 
 "Folks, I'm not going to sit here and say I should be South Carolina's next senator. Not when so many other people are saying it for me," Colbert said on his show – adding he had thought to himself, "You know what they could use? Another white guy."
– Who could take over Jim DeMint's Senate seat at the end of the year? Conservatives are talking Rep. Tim Scott, but another South Carolinian has thrown his rather high-profile hat into the ring: one Stephen Colbert, reports the New York Post. Colbert dedicated a segment of his show last night to less-than-subtly suggesting himself, and encouraged his 4 million followers to tell Gov. Nikki Haley to pick him, noting, "I wouldn't just block legislation, I'd bodycheck it!" “Stephen is honored by the groundswell of support from the Palmetto State and looks forward to Governor Haley’s call,” says a Colbert publicist. Sure, Colbert would face a lot of resistance from more, uh, enthusiastic Republicans—Madeleine Morgenstern, for example, called Colbert a "bombastic, faux-conservative," notes the Week. But Colbert is a strong Catholic who loves Richard Nixon, says the Atlantic, which proclaims him "vastly overqualified." Even so, he shouldn't hold his breath: Nikki Haley swung back via Facebook today, reports CNN: "Stephen, thank you for your interest in South Carolina's US Senate seat and for the thousands of tweets you and your fans sent me," she said. But: "You forget one thing, my friend. You didn't know our state drink. Big, big mistake." Got milk, Stephen? Here's the exchange.