Posted on 03/19/2007 8:24:14 PM PDT by no dems
The big-name, big-money candidate with big question marks, or the no-name who checks all the right ideological boxes?
Values voters in South Carolina — pro-gun rights, anti-abortion and anti-gay marriage conservatives who helped put George W. Bush in the White House and remain a potent force in the Republican Party — are grappling with that question.
“I don’t really have a candidate,” said Bob Sawyer, a retired boat distributor who lives in Lexington County. “Right now, it’s open.”
National polls show former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., to be the early GOP front-runners, with former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney getting consideration, too.
But those polls also show a majority of Republicans want someone different to run.
Nonetheless, GOP candidates are beating a path to the Upstate, where values voters hold sway, hoping to impress them in the run-up to South Carolina’s crucial, first-in-the-South primary.
Knowing a primary win in South Carolina could propel them to the nomination, they are touting their conservative credentials.
However, opposing abortion, gay marriage and gun control are not necessarily essential components in a candidate’s resume.
Even with a professed religious conservative in the White House and control of Congress for much of the past six years, values voters have not seen major gains on key issues — outside Supreme Court nominees. Now, they appear to be open to Republicans who don’t agree with them on some values issues but have the money and stature to keep the White House in GOP hands.
Giuliani, for example, is on top of national polls even though he favors abortion rights and civil unions for gay couples and has supported some gun control .
“In Spartanburg, some of the far-right people — people who have told me their litmus test has been whether a candidate opposes abortion — these people have told me that they are working every day for Giuliani,” said Rick Beltram, chairman of the Republican Party in Spartanburg County.
While GOP candidates are doing their best to paint themselves as true-blue conservatives, voters are saying values matter — but not necessarily more than having good answers to the questions of terrorism, border security, job creation and tax cuts.
Beltram said 650 Spartanburg Republicans, surveyed at a party function in February, listed those four issues ahead of values in their ranking of priorities.
“It would appear that, so far in this campaign, (values issues) are not as important as they were,” Beltram said.
Justin Tye, a civil engineer who lives in Charleston, agrees.
“I think the most important issue is fiscal responsibility,” Tye said.
Tye’s candidate?
“Rudy Giuliani,” he said. “He looks to be the best one right now.”
SHOOTING FOR A STAR
Not everyone is on the Giuliani bandwagon.
Take Lexington’s Sawyer, for example.
Six or seven days a week, Sawyer is in the woods, on a duck pond with his hunting rifle or hitching his boat to his truck and driving away in search of a good fishing hole.
It’s usually quiet, just Sawyer, his Jack Russell terrier Dynamite and the outdoorsman’s thoughts.
Now that the men and women who want to be president have begun to make South Carolina their own personal playground, dropping by with increasing regularity, Sawyer’s thoughts frequently turn to politics and what he wants from those candidates.
First and foremost, he wants strength, he says, a commander-in-chief who won’t slink away when the decisions get tough.
“I don’t want somebody who walks around with his tail between his legs,” Sawyer said.
But values issues also are important to Sawyer, particularly opposition to abortion and gun control.
That’s why he already knows the candidate he won’t support.
“It won’t be Giuliani,” Sawyer said. “I loved what he did in New York (after the 9/11 terrorist attacks), but he’s for gun control.”
Values issues are “very important as far as I’m concerned,” Sawyer said. “Abortion is very important. I feel like it’s used as birth control as much as anything else. And I’m an outdoorsman. I do a lot of hunting and fishing. Gun control is very important to me.”
Sawyer is like a lot of other S.C. voters who believe a candidate’s stand on values issues will go a long way in determining what chance he or she has to win the state’s primary.
Most values voters oppose abortion rights, are wary of gun control and oppose gay marriage. Republicans tend to share those values, and it is GOP candidates who are trying hardest to mold previous positions to match those of voters they hope to impress.
But the top three Republican candidates — Giuliani, McCain and Romney — all have sizable warts in the eyes of many conservative voters.
Giuliani’s personal life has featured one scandal after another, replete with high-profile marital infidelity and strained relationships with his own children. Politically, Giuliani strays from some key GOP principles. He supports abortion rights, backs civil unions for gay couples and has supported some gun control.
McCain has been firmer in his opposition to gun control, but he has given conflicting statements on civil unions and abortion. Recently, he told a Spartanburg audience he believes Roe v. Wade, the landmark case in which the Supreme Court ruled abortion bans unconstitutional, should be overturned. Previously, McCain said he opposed abortion but did not favor overturning Roe.
On gay marriage, McCain said he opposes it. But he voted against a proposed constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage.
And McCain’s caustic remarks about well-known religious conservatives — he once called them “agents of intolerance” — leave many values voters skeptical.
But perhaps no candidate has strayed as far from the values line as Romney.
Some values voters are uncomfortable with the fact that he is a Mormon. His shifting views raise doubts, too. He once supported abortion rights and said he’d support gay rights. Now, he opposes abortion rights and opposes gay marriage and civil unions.
There are, of course, other candidates in the race.
California congressman Duncan Hunter did surprisingly well in a Spartanburg straw poll earlier this month, finishing in a virtual tie with McCain and Giuliani.
Hunter’s signature issue is border security.
U.S. Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, also a Republican, have each touted their religious conservatism as they have campaigned.
But Hunter, Brownback and Huckabee remain long shots at this early stage, and many values voters are hoping someone else joins the fray.
They could get their wish.
Tommy Thompson, a former Wisconsin governor and member of Bush’s Cabinet; Chuck Hagel, a U.S. senator and Vietnam veteran from Nebraska; and former U.S. senator and current “Law and Order” star Fred Thompson all have expressed interest in running.
Sawyer wants Fred Thompson to run.
“I love that man,” Sawyer said. “He thinks like I do.”
REPUBLICAN RHETORIC
At this early stage, the GOP has not yet launched the type of unified, all-out effort to win over values voters the party has used to great success.
“The Republican Party in 2004 went after values voters,” said Laura Olson, a political science professor at Clemson University. “People had been primed in their churches. People might not be primed right now and are focused instead on the big issues hanging over all of us, border security, terrorism.”
And there is frustration that values issues themselves have not been addressed.
“The values voter constituency, such as it is, is realizing that a lot of the appeal of the Republicans to them is rhetorical,” Olson said. “There is a sense of, ‘What have you done for me lately?’”
President Bush has spoken often of his desire to create “a culture of life,” but abortion remains legal. Efforts to pass a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage have flopped. And government spending has morphed into somewhat of a moral issue, as today’s free-spending leaders fail to make the hard choices needed to move the country from its deep deficit back to a balanced budget.
Beltram said the drubbing Republicans took in the November mid-term congressional elections was a sign that saying the right things to values voters will no longer be enough to win.
GOP candidates lost, Beltram said, “because of Iraq and spending like there’s no tomorrow.”
The new trend of pragmatism in values voters is perhaps most harmful to McCain, Beltram said.
While polls show him leading in South Carolina, McCain is trailing Giuliani nationally by increasing margins.
“McCain is clearly trying to appeal to religious conservatives,” Beltram said. “He’s deciding to make pro-life a big deal, but he’s not getting any traction. He’s been plummeting.”
But will values voters cast their lot with Giuliani, a thrice-married New Yorker?”
Olson isn’t so sure.
“If somebody like Giuliani is the nominee, you might see a third candidate pop in,” she said.
Sounds like Rick Beltram thinks Republicans don't even have to say "the right things" anymore, let alone actually bother doing them. Talk about wrong impressions, lol.
"...It will either work beautifully, or it'll turn into the biggest screw up of all time."
Nah. I'm beginning to think that "W" will hold onto that dubious honor.
Being anti-gun is a losing issue . To bad for anti-gun Rudy .
"“In Spartanburg, some of the far-right people — people who have told me their litmus test has been whether a candidate opposes abortion — these people have told me that they are working every day for Giuliani,” said Rick Beltram, chairman of the Republican Party in Spartanburg County.
While GOP candidates are doing their best to paint themselves as true-blue conservatives, voters are saying values matter — but not necessarily more than having good answers to the questions of terrorism, border security, job creation and tax cuts. "
Fred Thompson - the solution.
“I love that man,” Sawyer said. “He thinks like I do.”
C'mon, Fred..you have more support out there than you know. Run!!
Fred Thompson: Stalking for McCain? (by NewsMax)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1803533/posts
There is, however, another theory circulating about Thompson, one being floated by critics of the Tennessean. Some Republican insiders suspect that Thompson, who makes no effort to hide his close friendship with McCain, instead might be working a behind-the-scenes, McCain-orchestrated strategy to build support among conservatives for the Arizonan.
According to this theory, Thompson – who backed McCain in the 2000 presidential primary race – would build support and anticipation among conservatives for his own campaign, and then abruptly direct them instead to McCain's camp.
Sources note that Thompson and McCain had an extensive telephone conversation on March 9, just two days before Thompson discussed his presidential ambitions on "Fox News Sunday." And both camps have worked hard to keep the substance of that conversation private.
Whether or not he runs, Thompson might benefit McCain, if only because he appears to be slowing the momentum enjoyed recently by McCain's two main rivals, Giuliani and Romney, among conservatives.
I don't think Thompson's dumb enough to think he could pull that off in this political climate.
Ref. your post #6:
Sad isn't it?
He isn't dumb, but he thinks the voters are.
We are facing an enemy that wants to kill all bornes and unbornes -- the first thing is to defeat them. There won't be any "Unborn children" if we are all dead.
Also -- what the president can do is nominate constructionist judges, which Giuliani promised and Ted Olson vouches for him.
But Rudy is the only one who can defeat Hillary and prosecute the War on Terror with determination. People recognize that this does take precedence over morality. Let's make sure we have a future first.
You think THOMPSON isn't trustworthy...yet you believe all of RINO Rudy's lies?
Rudy has a record of prosecuting the mob, of cleaning up NYC, of demonstrating leadership after 9-11.
What has Thompson done?
Rudy also has a record of far-left liberalism, statism, and gun-grabbing.
Thompson's Senate career proved that he is pro-life, STRONGLY pro-gun...better than most on immigration (no Tancredo by any means...but better than McCain, Rudy, Romney. etc) and is an upstanding guy - yes, he too was divorced, but there was no public humiliation of his ex-wife, no affair, and he didn't remarry for YEARS afterwards.
I just don't buy that Rudy's the be-all end-all for 2008, nor is he the only one that can beat Hillary. Thompson could too. McCain - NO. Romney - NO. Hunter - actually, Hunter probably could if he could ever make it through the primary...but that's not gonna happen.
Yeah, who needs a stupid thing like "morality" when you can WIN, WIN, WIN!
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