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GOP establishment feeling heat in South Carolina
Politico ^ | 12 Apr 2011 | JONATHAN MARTIN

Posted on 04/12/2011 6:10:22 PM PDT by mandaladon

SPARTANBURG, S.C. – For thirty years this state has served as the firewall for establishment Republican presidential hopefuls, the place where insurgents who emerged from Iowa and New Hampshire went to die.

In 2012, that tradition might end.

GOP activists attending county party conventions last weekend here and in next-door Greenville County – the heart of the conservative Upstate –made scant mention of Mitt Romney, Haley Barbour and Tim Pawlenty. Instead, the talk is of Michele Bachmann, Donald Trump and even Allen West, a rookie Florida congressman who’s shown no interest in running for president.

The state that’s been the establishment’s bulwark, it seems, is being buffeted by the same grassroots forces of change that are remaking the GOP elsewhere.

The amorphous shape of the 2012 field is clearly having an effect in South Carolina. There is no George W. Bush-type candidate who can unite both the Christian conservative wing of the party and the country club donor set, as the then-Texas governor did in 2000. Nor is there even a John McCain or a Romney, circa 2008, vacuuming up endorsements and laying down early markers.

But more important, conservatives here, as elsewhere, have been radicalized. What began as disappointment in the fiscal sins they believe were committed by the Bush White House has now turned into rage and fear over the policies pursued by President Obama, who they see as nothing short of a wild-eyed liberal intent on turning America into France.

South Carolina Republicans are as conservative as they’ve ever been, but now it’s of a different nature. Old hang-ups about race are fading – Republicans elected an Indian-American governor and African-American congressman last year – and giving way to a more generic, national sort of conservatism that demands ideological purity, especially on fiscal issues.

(Excerpt) Read more at politico.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Extended News; Politics/Elections; US: South Carolina
KEYWORDS: elections; gop; southcarolina; trump
And just as the hunger for an ever more unadulterated brand of conservatism grows among grassroots activists, the power of endorsements and connections here wanes....Time to clean house !
1 posted on 04/12/2011 6:10:25 PM PDT by mandaladon
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To: mandaladon
These media outlets sure know how to juice their titles with the most eye-catching buzzwords to drive the most click-throughs possible. It's all tripe.

They know if the throw in "establishment" or "birther" or "Palin", they'll drive up web traffic. It's not journalism of any sort. It's marketing, period.

Plus, they know that if they sew seeds of doubt amongst Republican voters and amplify discontent, it makes Axelrod's job exponentially easier. It's a game with a political bent - a game that's played brilliantly by Politico and several other media outlets.

2 posted on 04/12/2011 6:30:57 PM PDT by OldDeckHand
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To: mandaladon

The American Rebels. We are going to have to choose sides like they did in 1860 sooner or later.


3 posted on 04/12/2011 6:31:20 PM PDT by screaminsunshine (Shut up and eat your Beans!)
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To: screaminsunshine

“The American Rebels. We are going to have to choose sides like they did in 1860 sooner or later.”

I think most people have already chosen sides.


4 posted on 04/12/2011 6:36:19 PM PDT by ought-six ( Multiculturalism is national suicide, and political correctness is the cyanide capsule.)
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To: screaminsunshine
We are going to have to choose sides like they did in 1860 sooner or later.

1861.

Today is the fiftieth anniversary of the first shots fired at Fort Sumter.

5 posted on 04/12/2011 6:40:16 PM PDT by okie01 (THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA: Ignorance On Parade)
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To: okie01
Today is the fiftieth anniversary of the first shots fired at Fort Sumter.

Again? :-)

Actually, I'd like to choose sides like we did in 1776 or thereabouts.

6 posted on 04/12/2011 6:44:46 PM PDT by meyer (We will not sit down and shut up.)
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To: OldDeckHand

Hey...don’t forget “radicalized”. You can take anything Politico prints with a grain of salt.


7 posted on 04/12/2011 7:01:44 PM PDT by Shamrock-DW
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To: okie01
Today is the fiftieth anniversary of the first shots fired at Fort Sumter.

Give or take a hundred years....

8 posted on 04/12/2011 7:09:40 PM PDT by thulldud (Is it "alter or abolish" time yet?)
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To: okie01
"Today is the fiftieth anniversary of the first shots fired at Fort Sumter."

I can remember 1961 like it was only fifty years ago. :)

9 posted on 04/12/2011 7:24:13 PM PDT by Enterprise ("Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities." Voltaire)
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To: Enterprise

Oops! :)


10 posted on 04/12/2011 7:44:26 PM PDT by okie01 (THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA: Ignorance On Parade)
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To: mandaladon

They nominated and elected Lindsay Graham. How conservative can they be?


11 posted on 04/12/2011 8:06:36 PM PDT by Zhang Fei (Let us pray that peace be now restored to the world and that God will preserve it always.)
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To: Shamrock-DW

Ohs-nos! We’ve been “radicalized”!

Once, this guy joked, “The bombing starts in five minutes”; I suppose he would be considered “radicalized”?

Probably Jefferson, Madison, Adams — oh, and most DEFINITELY that Patrick Henry dude — THOSE guys were “radicalized.”

Was Jesus “radicalized” too??

Patton. Yeah, for certain HE was “radicalized.”

But not the pansy-ass who kept him from marching to Moscow. No, that guy had “foresight.” It took sixty years of blood and fear to prove which of them saw it right back then in ‘45.

Oh. Wait. Can we still put “45” in print, or will BATFE pop a breaker? Is the 1st Amendment working today? Did we get our 1st Amendment Utility bill paid??

Who stole my Constitution and left me with Obama’s used toilet paper?

So far, Trump has my vote because he’s out with the biggest stick stirring up the most $#!+, and in 2012 I’m about voting for whichever GOP candidate stirs up the most $#!+ during the campaign.

And — YES — as a matter of fact I DO mean on BOTH sides of the aisle. Whole lotta dead [or should be] political wood in the GOP needs their $#!+ stirred.

I want to elect someone who knows how to be a raging thorn in the ass of the DNC and dos not give a DAMN what they say in response in their snarky NY Times OpEds.

I want to elect someone who scares the ever-lovin’ piss out of the entire f’n political spectrum; from Bill Ayers all the way across to that closet poo pusher Lindsey Graham and his butt-buddy John McCain.

I want to elect someone who gives every RINO on the planet the creepy feeling that they’re walking around all the time with cross-hairs on their foreheads.

I want to vote for — and elect — someone who’s victory in 2012 will make John Batchelor and his lapdog moderate pals shit pink Twinkies.

I want a candidate rolling into the White House on January 20th, 2013 whose presence will keep the entire Democrat caucus of both houses of Congress in a backroom with the few surviving RINO’s passing the Kaopectate around — for FOUR frackin’ years.

I want the LEFT to spend four years ripping out their hair, for a change.

I want the media to cry in their OWN damned oatmeal for four years, for a change.

I want news out of Washington D.C. that gives me some reason to think that the Constitution may have some life left in it, for a change.

I was BORN IN THIS COUNTRY, and I CAN PROVE IT. I want a President who both CAN, and WILL do likewise.

I want a President who’ll go to Congress, grab the GOP leadership, tell them how it’s gonna go down, get on TV and tell us what he told them, then hold them f’n accountable to get it onto his desk in recognizable legislation, and crack their skulls together like f’n coconuts if they don’t deliver.

I want a President with some gut, grit, and guns; a straight shooter who’ll tell it how the Constitution says it needs to be, tell how it’s gonna be made to be that way, and then go make it STICK. If that means there has to be a trail of dead bodies between here and there, I’m good.

This whole country need a good, solid, hickory stick beating to snap it out of its present, sissified, effeminate, self-indulgent, perpetually-adolescent state, and if it takes electing a man who can deliver a solid national ass-kicking to get that done — I’m ALL IN!


12 posted on 04/12/2011 8:07:39 PM PDT by HKMk23 (Nietzsche: "God is dead." God: "Nietzsche is dead." Cthulu: "Dead is god." God: "LOL! Riiiight.")
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To: mandaladon

bttt


13 posted on 04/13/2011 12:15:15 AM PDT by Sprite518
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To: mandaladon

Transcript from Rush Limbaugh:

RUSH: "Okay, gonna try to get Trump on one day this week. We should be able to do that. Actually, you know, I think Trump might actually be the real illegal alien here. I mean, you say what you will, but he is once again actually doing a job that most Americans wouldn't touch. He fits the bill in that regard."

END TRANSCRIPT


14 posted on 04/13/2011 10:45:23 AM PDT by Grampa Dave (ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION IS DESTROYING AMERICA-LOOK AT WHAT IT DID TO THE WHITE HOUSE!)
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