By FITSNews || Late last Friday, the gubernatorial campaign of U.S. Rep. Gresham Barrett blasted S.C. Rep. Nikki Haley for “negative and false attacks” against their candidate. Obviously this wasn’t the first (and it certainly won’t be the last) time a politician “cries foul” during the 2010 election season, but as a fierce GOP undercard battle develops between these two candidates, it could be a telling dynamic.
“It is obvious that Ms. Haley’s campaign is not gaining much traction,” Barrett’s campaign manager says in the release, before going on to accuse the Lexington Republican of “trying to hide her own record.”
From the Barrett campaign’s statement:
Nikki Haley has no plan to address our State’s job crisis and has since resorted to attacking Gresham Barrett, all the while not telling the truth about her own record.
On January 28th, in a televised debate in Charleston, Ms. Haley directly attacked all three other GOP candidates on the stage suggesting they all supported President Obama’s stimulus plan. On February 12th she penned a guest column in the Greenville News repeating the false accusation, and today her campaign sent out a blast email again attacking Gresham.
These underhanded dirty attacks must come to an end. For someone who talks about good government, Nikki Haley is embodying all that is wrong with politics today.
Wow.
Not mincing words, are they?
Obviously, Barrett’s “jobs plan” – like Barrett himself – sucks donkey balls. He’s proposing nothing more than additional bureaucratic circle-jerking that subscribes to South Carolina’s tired old “government first” approach to job creation.
It’s the same crap S.C. Attorney Henry “Foghorn Leghorn” McMaster proposed – a bunch of good ole boy guffawing that does nothing to actually address our state’s underlying lack of economic competitiveness.
But we digress …
When it comes to Barrett’s basic point – namely that Nikki Haley has “gone negative” against him – is he correct?
In a word? Yes.
Don’t get us wrong, there’s plenty about Barrett (and Andre Bauer and Henry McMaster, for that matter) that Haley should be criticizing. And make no mistake, she’s criticizing them.
But here’s the thing – that’s about all Haley has been doing, and absent the introduction of any sort of economic plan of her own, she’s opened herself up for precisely the sort of counterattack that Barrett is now dishing out.
If that dynamic continues, watch out.
Part of the problem, as we see it, is Haley’s choice of a campaign consultant. In picking Washington D.C.-based pollster Jon Lerner to run her campaign, Haley has selected a predictable establishment consultant whose only real success in South Carolina came in spite of – not because of – his advice.
Indeed, had S.C. Gov. Mark Sanford – another Lerner client – followed the Beltway-based advisor’s counsel in 2002, he never would have made it out of the GOP primary. Left to his own devices, Lerner ran the 2006 campaign of Spartanburg Republican Karen Floyd into the ground – as Floyd became the only Republican to lose a statewide election four years ago.
Lerner is from the Arthur Finkelstein school of GOP consultants, whose basic campaign strategy consists of “negative repetition” – i.e. calling the opponent a “liberal” or some other derogatory term as many times as possible.
Is it any wonder we’re now hearing one of Haley’s opponents refer to her as “Negative Nikki?”
By Liberty for Me March 1, 2010 at 10:53 am
Again…we are so screwed.There is nobody running that is worth spit.
By Darth March 1, 2010 at 11:04 am
Is it really possible to go negative on Gresham? I’ll grant this early in the campaigns some things are like lobbing mortar shells in the dark, though in the rough direction of an opponent, though if some of the issues raised are legit, does Al Jazerah’s reporting of friendly fire incidents bring great veracity?
By dotell March 1, 2010 at 11:22 am
I totally agree… we are screwed.
By Groundball March 1, 2010 at 11:52 am
….and have been for some time!
By Sicster March 1, 2010 at 12:07 pm
Haley has no plan and it now comes to light that she’s tainted…
By ManWithoutaPArty March 1, 2010 at 12:11 pm
Looks like it’s time for Nikki to dump the consultant and go for an outsider. Or, even run her own race.
By Ynotfirst March 1, 2010 at 12:35 pm
Barrett should be a little more careful before he starts stepping on anyone’s toes…. I promise.
By Dr Giggles March 1, 2010 at 1:19 pm
Nikki Haley should have come clean about the China Trip, before outright lying about not flying coach, stupid Bitch knew she didnt fly standard like the rest of the state employees to which she and Sanfraud hate so much. She should quit now and not waist her effort, she laid down with the weasel Sanfraud and now much suffer the consequences, still a shame that the GOP does not have a viable candidate. McMaster is an idiot, Bauer wants to starve the poor and the rest have no clue.
By Old Bike Dude March 1, 2010 at 1:34 pm
Poochee versus the Pimpstick, yeah baby.
By Cancerman March 1, 2010 at 1:41 pm
Any credibility she had she pissed it away when she climbed in bed with Sanfraud!!
By WorkingTommyC March 1, 2010 at 2:10 pm
Nikki’s got a plan: make a level playing field for everyone with the lowest possible taxes and then get out of the way of business.
I’m disappointed that she’s not promoting it primarily and succinctly in her responses. It does indeed sound like it’s time to get another consultant.
Besides quick, dismissive responses to his whining, Gresham Barrett is a political tar baby that should be avoided like the plague–just as the voters are doing. Using arguments with him to get attention will go nowhere. The big guns should always be aimed at the front runners.
By Old Yeller March 1, 2010 at 2:59 pm
Willie, who did you beat up at home and why? She must have deserved it.
By fred March 1, 2010 at 4:21 pm
Didn’t good old Gresham get Brecke Latham a job???
By Roger March 1, 2010 at 11:49 pm
Nikki Haley is the only GOP candidate who hasn’t promised she’s going to fix the economy from Columbia. Good for her. Because no governor can fix the economy any more than Fidel Castro can. What can a governor do? Cut spending in the executive branch, control as much as the legislature will let him/her and veto corporate welfare and giant budgets, and do battle with the crooked rednecks who run the state.
More than any governor in this state has ever done, including Sanford. Hope Nikki gets the chance to do it. She’s the only one who might have the guts or brains.
By Mike at the beach March 2, 2010 at 2:17 am
If Nikki stays this negative she’ll get ass-whippings of her own: tied to Sanford (whose numbers couldn’t get much worse); a la John Kerry she was for first class tickets to China before she was against them (but after she forgot where she sat- really?); voting to take stimulus funds while berating everyone else in the pack for the same thing. She’s just clinging to relevancy, so any press is good press at this point.
By Toyota Kawaski March 2, 2010 at 8:19 am
Negative Nikki just like her poll #
By WorkingTommyC March 2, 2010 at 10:00 am
Mike aka Toyota aka Dr. Giggles aka Amanda:
I’m not sure who your audience is but if they have sense enough to get on the internet and, further, are capable of reading, I’m sure they know that business-class and first-class are in the same physical compartment on the plane. It is merely the seats that are sold at different rates according to the deal made by the Commerce Department.
Nikki did not make the arrangements herself just as I did not when my company took me on a trip a couple of years ago. Your argument is obviously with the Commerce Department.
I wonder if you realize that by pointing out and attempting to make a huge deal out of an obvious NOTHING, you’re actually pointing out how Nikki Haley has the cleanest record by far of not only the candidates for governor but the entire statehouse as well. Her character, in my opinion, is as clean as any human being’s can be. Go ahead and keep pointing that out.
By Dr Manhattan March 2, 2010 at 10:26 am
The only thing clean about Nikki is her shaved pussy just ask Mark Sanfraud motherfuckers.
By WorkingTommyC March 2, 2010 at 12:00 pm
LOL! Another “doctor?” How about a professor for a change? You’d still sound just as ignorant but then there are limits to what a label can do for you.
By Richard March 2, 2010 at 12:39 pm
I think these comments epitomize the good ol boys club in Columbia. If you want more jokes about SC vote for Barrett, McMaster, or Bauer.
By Roger March 2, 2010 at 12:52 pm
WorkingTommyC hows your mother I fucked her last night and she said you stank hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahah.
By howard bond March 2, 2010 at 12:57 pm
I thought Hollings was “Foghorn Leghorn?”
By SherryTaylor March 2, 2010 at 1:22 pm
WorkingTommyC you do realize you are arguing with an anonymous poster all be it an idiot, which begs the question what does that make you?
By WorkingTommyC March 2, 2010 at 3:00 pm
Sherry,
My policy is to treat all such idiotic posters as the same person who, under various guises, has been relentlessly attacking Nikki Haley. I know who this person is. I put her in the same category as the anonymous trolls just to keep my classification system consistent.
So, yes, there is a method to my madness.
All of which, of course, begs the question, “Why am I not putting you in the same category?”
By WorkingTommyC March 2, 2010 at 3:02 pm
Mr. Bond:
McMastah is Foghorn Leghorn, JUNIOR!
“Ah said, JUNIOR, son! Get it?
“Ah’m, Ah say, Ah’m, Ah say, Ah’m runnin’ fo’ gubnah!”
By WorkingTommyC March 2, 2010 at 3:08 pm
Roger:
My mother’s been dead three months now so I can imagine that was quite a noxious soup of decayed flesh, embalming fluid, and bones that you had carnal knowledge with.
Just out of curiosity, did you do her in the vault or did you “take her out?”
In such a case, I think your statement is more of an admission of your unparalleled depravity vs. anything to get me upset.
By Sherry Taylor March 2, 2010 at 8:55 pm
WorkingTommyC:
You obviously dont have a happy home life, since you are constantly defending your comments from random posters on a political blog website, I wish you well sir.
By Carolina Slim March 2, 2010 at 11:00 pm
Defend Haley all you want, but people who know her most know that she has become fake and to not trust anything that comes from her campaign. I guess you’re making money off her dipshit effort if you’re going to post crap like this.
By Real Roger March 3, 2010 at 12:06 am
Some psychotic stoned moron is using my name. Fake Roger, go back to hole you live in. Or take your meds. Or both.
By McKay March 3, 2010 at 9:25 pm
I can’t get enough of Fits News. His stories are always entertaining and real. I like the comments section just as much. Especially Tommy C. He argues with everyone who attacks Haley.
I personally think Haley is tainted, McMaster is entrenched, Gresham is beholden and Bauer is the last man standing.
Uh Oh, I guess I will be attacked now. I don’t comment often but opportunity was too good to pass up.
By McKay March 3, 2010 at 9:33 pm
I just looked this up on SC Ethics Commission and thought it was interesting.
Nikki Haley Expenditures
10/29/2009 Red Sea LLC 4550 Montgomery Ave, Ste 906
Bethesda, MD 20814 CONSULTING $10,251.70
By WorkingTommyC March 7, 2010 at 11:49 am
Sherry:
It’s called a “capacity for having fun.” You may not enjoy it, I do–just for the heck of it.
Oh, well. That must be my “[un]happy home life” shining through. Maybe it will give you further opportunity to insult me at some later date. Doing so seems to give you some satisfaction. I know returning the favor gives ME a chuckle or two.
McKay:
Haley has shown herself to be a fighter who will be USEFUL to US if she does nothing other than leading the fight to successfully get on-the-record voting (and hopefully online publishing of records showing every state dime spent).
If elected and successful, she will have changed the fundamentals of government to the point that we, the people, can get a handle on the state’s politicians. We may then actually be able to make further significant reforms on our behalves to rid ourselves of the institutionalized corruption.
If there were a better candidate than Nikki, I’d support him or her. However, the three good ol’ boys don’t even begin to compare to her in terms of character nor in terms of what she has accomplished for us already. She is not absolutely perfect but her performance record is unmatched in this race.
By kookyone March 13, 2010 at 9:41 am
WorkingTommyC you are an idiot sir.
By Witty March 13, 2010 at 11:12 am
TommyC or whoever you are you will never get the last word so give it up moron.
By WorkingTommyC April 9, 2010 at 3:01 pm
Oh, yeah?
:D