'Hi, how are ya. So how many racist nutjobs we got here today? Stand up if you're a racist nutjob.'
Over the weekend a goodly number of would-be and already-announced Republican presidential candidates made their way to the South Carolina Freedom Summit, a hard-right shoutfest in a state that has been a reliable producer of embarrassing Republican moments painstakingly crafted by the finest and most skilled embarrassing Republicans. There, they kindled the fires of pants-wetting terror in usual hard-right fashion, lest anyone forget that the primary reason anyone would vote for a conservative candidate would be because they were convinced that to do otherwise would mean instant death at the hands of immigrants or Muslims or gay people demanding wedding cakes.
Not that the audience needed any help with that.
The tone was set by an onstage focus group. The moderator, pollster Frank Luntz, handed the microphone to a woman from the audience. He asked her what she wanted from the candidates. She said she had once been a Democrat but had seen the light and switched parties. “People are coming in this country across the borders like rats and roaches in the woodpile,” she fumed. The audience applauded. She complained that states were registering people to vote and failing to “check them out.” “We’ve got to get control,” she demanded. When she was done, Luntz asked the crowd: “How many of you would vote for her for president?” The room erupted in cheers.
You would think that after all this time conservative conference planners would have learned the one most important lesson about conservative conferences: Never let the audience speak. Ever.
Well, I think that about sums up this year's South Carolina Freedom Summit. Also the various candidates said some things, most of which were just various rephrasings of the rats and roaches argument presented in better clothing. Oh, and Rick Santorum was there for some reason. Yeah, It's a mystery to me too.