Thursday, Aug 21, 2008
It may have been ugly, but it was a big victory Saturday night in South Carolina for the governor from Texas.
Feb 20, 2000 | When chief strategist Karl Rove delivered the good news to his candidate Saturday afternoon a few hours before the polls closed, George W. Bush remained mellow.
"Great," Bush said, as recounted by Rove. "I'm going to take my power nap."
It just might have been the best sleep the Texas governor has had in the nearly three weeks since his New Hampshire nightmare, where he lost to Sen. John McCain by 19 points. Here, Bush breezed to victory Saturday, defeating John McCain by a 53 percent to 42 percent margin (Alan Keyes placed way back with 5 percent). Winning nearly all the key demographic categories, and nearly two-thirds of the vote among the Republicans who cast ballots in the open primary, Bush leaves South Carolina back in the GOP driver's seat.
Nearly 600,000 South Carolinians turned out to vote, more than doubling the state's 1996 primary count, indicating that something -- the Bush message, say supporters; his inflammatory ads, say opponents -- ignited interest in this year's race.
But in his victory speech, Bush made only a passing reference to McCain, focusing his fiery rhetoric on the incumbent administration, promising that "tonight is the beginning of the end of the Clinton/Gore era." (His Web site, however, whacked McCain for what it called an "ungracious concession speech.")
The immediate spin from the Bush camp after the victory was that its candidate had "survived a 19-day test" after New Hampshire, as spokeswoman Karen Hughes put it, and "emerged as an even stronger candidate" in the process.
Ever since New Hampshire, Bush has been in full fight mode, unleashing a brutal barrage of TV attack ads and refusing to grant McCain ground even on the issues -- government reform, veterans -- that most assumed McCain had long since locked up.
There was also a more obvious, physical change in Bush. Gone was the smirking, frat-boy demeanor he showed in the initial stage of his campaign, replaced now by an intense, pumped-up politician given to barking his message out at the crowds.
In his victory speech, Bush kept the volume high, accusing the administration of basing "decisions on polls and focus groups" while he promised to "stand on principle." He also promised to "return the highest standards of honor to the highest office in the land."
Those comments were read as bitter irony in Charleston, where McCain supporters continued alleging dirty tricks by the Bush campaign. Bush burned through money at a rate estimated at $3 million a week, filling the airwaves with a relentless barrage of ads hammering McCain. Said Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb.: "I think George Bush made a huge mistake here. It's the worst campaign I've ever seen. I think he mortgaged his political future here. He made a pact with some pretty bad elements."
Hagel discussed the "push polls" -- telephone smear campaigns -- alleged to have been committed by Bush supporters, and leaflets that were circulated with ugly allegations about McCain and his family. "You're going to tell me the Bush people didn't know anything about any of that?" Hagel asked. "Come on."
Get Salon in your mailbox!