I can’t say for sure what drove South Carolina, but my opinion is that it was outrage over the media using Newt’s ex-wife against him. If I am correct, that’s a hard pattern to reproduce in other states, or in the general election.
Are you serious? That's not what drove SC. That issue was right at the end. The first debate, where Newt turned the whole thing into a conservative versus liberal contest - re focused everyone on the media, academia, Obama and political correctness - drove the state. I know exactly what drove SC and SC was baked before the issue you brought up even happened. Were you not paying attention? It was an "us" versus "them" in SC instead of an us versus us - and damned right it can be exactly duplicated nationally and should have been. Newt should have ignored Mitt in Florida and made Florida the same thing. He'd have the thing won if he had, I'm convinced.