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Subscribe to RSSCHARLESTON, S.C. – As Rick Santorum’s supporters celebrated his strong Iowa showing, they were also making preparations for a push through South Carolina that will begin even before the New Hampshire primary vote.
Andrew Burton / Getty Images
U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum addresses a crowd in Iowa on Jan 3.
Santorum’s South Carolina fans, some of whom were gathered at his relatively well-appointed campaign headquarters to watch the caucus returns, will be able to see him in the Palmetto State on the afternoon of Sunday, Jan. 8th, when he stops in Greenville just two days before the New Hampshire vote.
His campaign also added another South Carolina staffer: political consultant Andrew Boucher, a former executive director of the New Hampshire Republican primary – a ramping-up of staff that suggests Santorum will seek to capitalize on his Iowa momentum here, a state that has picked every Republican presidential candidate since 1980.
Recommended: 11 things you might not now about Santorum
Santorum’s supporters, about 15 of whom remained at the headquarters as the final votes trickled in, were ecstatic about his neck-and-neck finish with Mitt Romney – but some of them said they weren’t surprised he did so well.
“I knew this was going to happen,” Kathy Hughes, a retired teacher from Mt. Pleasant, said. “So many people were saying, ‘why are you supporting him? Santorum can’t win!’ But I knew.”
She added that the phones at Santorum’s headquarters here had been ringing non-stop over the past few days. The phone did buzz a few times into the wee hours of Wednesday morning; the last call, Hughes said, came from a voter in Peoria, Illinois who was trying to get in touch with one of Santorum’s early-state headquarters.
Joan Peters, a member of the Charleston Tea Party board from Moncks Corner, said she supported Santorum’s decision not to skip New Hampshire and come directly to South Carolina as Michele Bachmann is doing and Rick Perry was going to do before he announced he’d first return to Austin to reassess his campaign.
“He’s probably not going to win because Mitt Romney’s got New Hampshire pretty sewn up, but he’ll do well and then he’ll come down to South Carolina and the money’s going to start coming in,” Peters said. “People now realize what we’ve always realized, which is that he’s a credible candidate and he can win.”
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Romney may have been wearing his mormon magical underwear (they really do have this) but he will lose, in the primary or if need be in the election. This man will say anything - and it is funny that he is running as the "man who can actually win" - this man has not won an election since he was a liberal, pro-gay, pro-choice republican - I can already see the videos- he was very critical of Regan too and now he mentions him every 2 days now - he essentially got the same amount of votes this time around in Iowa as he did 4 years ago -pathetic.
Good points, George. There's just something about Romney that I don't trust. He's a little too polished, too perfect. Kind of like the used car salesman who would say anything to make the sale.
Mormons have magical underwear?
GOP & George;
No one has longed for the Presidency this much since Al Gore.
This job murderer will bury the middle class so deep that we will need magic socks to make it back to the earth's surface. GOP, unless you are a secret millionaire, think about that as you 'decide'.
FOX Lies.
The only way Santorum maintains his momentum is to not let anyone know his positions on things. He only put a token effort in on Iowa and won big. If he had truly informed the electorate, his fate would have been just like Bachmann's. Their points of view of very similary hateful, ignorant, paranoid, and greedy.
He didn't win big...he won by 8 votes.
He didn't win. Romney did.
GCV, his actually voting record isn't that bad. If only he could learn to keep his mouth shut about things that really aren't poliltical anyway.
Santorum... 1. The frothy mix of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the byproduct of anal sex. 2. Senator Rick Santorum.
"Santorum...google it."
This message has been approved by the Committee to Keep Insane People Out of the Oval Office.
I like Perry the best but Rick Santorum seems pretty good for a yankee.
Re: Common Man please see post# 64.....
"..fertile ground?"
Ricky, please don't jump it, or try to keep it off birth control.
As a conservative Republican I understand why Santorum is looking to SC - the Bible thumpers. He's a good man that is not a phoney and he wants that consitituency. Frankly, he needs all the help he can get with his limited cash resources. I get it.
But looking ahead to when the eventual nominee emerges the evangelical wing of our party is about as important to winning the general election as the OWS dum-dums are to the Dems. And running on faith, so to speak, in the general will only be a waste of time. The vast majority don't care about it.
I know Rove pushed hard on getting the evangelicals out to vote in 2004. He had to - it was shaping up to be a nailbiter even though Kerry was the biggest BS'er since John Edwards - check that - since Huey P. Long. I won't compare Kerry to an adulterer and soon to be convicted felon.
The people do care about the economy, jobs, and the price of food and gas. Obama has delivered on none of these things. It is shaping up to be a comfortable 10 point victory for whomever the Republican nominee is this summer.
Funny, I don't remember Obama campaigning on jobs. I seem to recall that was the big campaign promise of all the Republicans who were elected to Congress. Three years later, they still haven't delivered. Obama promised health care reform, and love it or hate it, he DID deliver.
One wonders if "Sanitarium Santorum" will be getting his KKK Uniform from the Dry Cleaners before he goes to SC??
Any candidate that states that they would just bomb Iran scares the crap out of me. We may think that Iran is backwards. But I bet they feel the same.
Enough War, protect our freedoms here.
I think it's a JOKE that nowhere on the headline page of MSN is there WORD ONE about RON PAUL!
Got news for you MSN...better get used to mentioning him because he was RIGHT BEHIND these two in third place with MANY IN IOWA WANTING RON PAUL!
He will be our next president! I'll like to see you try to censor THAT!
Remember the tbagger rant of "Keep your government hands off of my medicare"???? Ron Paul will remove your medicare and take away your Social Security by turning both of those programs over to the greedy Wall Street Criminals. They will siphon off the trust funds to their personal fortunes because they have never been shown that it is WRONG to do so.
My guess is that you are a one issue lover of Paul like most others.
His own party hates him and he refuses to leave them. Does that sound like a sensible man to you?
Re: humansmatter I hope they take your medication away, it's seriously hampering your thought process!!!!
keep religious conservatives out of American government. Our government should believe in pluralism. One only has to look at the Taliban, iran and Pakistan to see what religious zealots can do to a country. We are not - and should never be - a theocracy. Keep your religion private and to yourself.
I'm not particularly religious, mtjh06, and I'm certainly not a Christian, but guess what? Religious conservatives have the exact same right to be involved in American government as every other citizen? With the exception of principled libertarians, everybody tries to push their agenda onto everybody else. Is it really "pluralism" when the public schools brainwash kids in a leftist direction rather than teaching the basics? When the government tells private businesses how to run their businesses (anti-smoking laws; dietary restrictions; telling them how large their portions should be, etc.) is that "pluralism"? Pluralism that doesn't respect a wide range of viewpoints means nothing at all. It is telling people they will be accepted regardless of ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability, etc., IF and only if they march in lockstep with everything you happen to believe.
Remember -- the voters in PA kicked Santorum out by a 2 to 1 margin. The biggest favor Republicans can do for President Obama is to nominate this religious fanatic.
So what he sees fertile ground......my pooch sees fertile ground in my neighbor's yard every day
The GOP should try to recruit Rush, Hannity, or Bill to run for President......oh I almost forgot, they are all millionaires who got rich being demagogues......they may be rich cowards but they ain't stupid
Given what the word "santorum" means, having fertile ground to poop on is rather appropriate.
Santorum? Oh geez...this pretender's whole Iowa campaign was based on fear. Keep the population terrified, tell 'em over and over again how the so-called jihadist (as Ricky likes to refer to them, who's them?) attacked us and will continue to attack us because we're free, prosperous and promote democracy. What a line of crap! Ricky's foreign policy is dangerous mainly due to the fact that he hasn't a clue to the reasons behind the attacks. NOT A CLUE!!! People you have to research to attain the facts! Please, please, please go to YouTube and type in the following names: Michael Scheuer, John Perkins, Philip Giraldi, Chalmers Johnson, Robert D. Steele and Ray McGovern - all ex CIA agents that tell exactly why the attacks occur...the psychopaths that run the government insist on meddling in the political, economical affairs of other countries, especially the middle east! Ron Paul is 100% correct! Santorum is dangerous lying fear/war monger and needs to be exposed, then sent home!!!
Why don't YOU tell us, Danny boy, why the attacks occur? Briefly, please. We can hardly wait.
Better that the Story Tagline reading Gingrich sees South Carolina as Furtile ground
:P
Go away, you frothy douche!!!!
Santorum is nothing but a facist, blood thirsty warmonger posing as a Christian to pull the religious vote. He is as fake as they come and one of the most corrupt politicians ever. He has supported abortion, massive debt, unnecessary war, big government and threw his cap in the ring with Arlen Specter. You know who that is right? Do some research on this piece of trash and you'll see how Santorum swings more than a 70's sex addict. He'll start WW3 and put martial law into place faster than you can pull the hair trigger on your AR15 to stop him. I can't stand Obama but Santorum makes him look like a boy scout.
He's an arrogant prick who needs to have his ass whipped to show him he's nothing but a whiny bitch in a suit and tie. Every time another candidate talks on stage he constantly shakes his head and looks like he's trying to squeeze something out his ass. Maybe its something one of those pedophile loving priests he loves so much gave him. He's a disrespectful, rude, sexist pig. If he gets the nomination I'm voting 3rd party. I hate to say it but Obama is the lesser of the 2 evils in this case.
That's it - I will never look at this site again. You clods can go ahead and re-elect your idol Obama and his idiot sidekick Biden. I can't take this anymore.
TO: Rick Kyle who wrote:
Thank you very much! And yes, we will re-elect President Obama and Vice President Biden!
Obama / Biden 2012
Santorum is a certifiable whackjob. How this guy is even mentioned in the same sentence as presidential nominee is testimony to just how screwed-up our society has become...
I wouldn't trust Romney as far as I could throw him. He wants this too bad, he's been running too long, and I'd bet dollars to donuts he's got a field map of everything he's going to destroy if he gets in.
I lived in PA for a long time. Rick Santorum is a f***ing loony tune, straight up fact. He is also CLEARLY a white supremacist, and the more he gets to speak, the more you will see that.....another middle aged, white jacka**, too stupid to grasp that most people on welfare are white....by a large margin. I'll just give all of you righties a quick clue: no matter what you say about the economy, which stays the way it is because of YOUR members of Congress sabotaging the process at every turn, if you don't nominate Romney, you have NO PRAYER of winning the election....not the slightest chance, at all.
Fertile ground for Santorum? You bet. Lots of racists and right-wing loonies and religious nuts in SC.
Of course there is fertile ground in SC, they are still fighting the Civil War and wish to return the country to the 1800's. These candidates can talk all they want about the economy but we need to heed the 2010 election to understand their real agenda. In 2010 they campaigned on the economy and jobs. Once in office it has been the cultural agenda and the war on the working class and protection of the rich from day one. God help us if they win the presidency as that is exactly what they will do at the national level.
Why should we give President Obama another term? He doesn't deserve it and in most companies, any CEO would have been kicked out. We need someone new! This country is stuck and something has to change. Three years is enough time to see whether we are headed in the right or wrong direction!
We need to get rid of 2/3 of Congress also!
Will any of these pathetic Republican candidates TALK ABOUT THE ISSUES?!? It's all platitudes and religion from these nutjobs.
I don't think Santorum goes all the way , it'll be Newt and maybe the big guy Christy ,, But Obama had his shot , he just didn't pull it off .
and it looks like you are reading your news from your alphabets cereal