Radio radio (update)

Today on the ever-fabulous Daisy Deadhead show, we covered the following:


>>Is the 'Occupy Wall Street' movement being hijacked by newcomers? More people and organizations are joining Occupy Wall Street or expressing solidarity every day. Whether it's an infusion of vital energy or a force that tears at cohesion is up to the movement.

>>Governor Haley uses the South Carolina Governor's Mansion as a Motel 6 for Republican millionaires campaigning for president. You'd think millionaires wouldn't have to ask the poor people of SC to foot the bill for their ridiculous, ego-ridden presidential campaigns... but you'd think wrong. Newt Gingrich stayed there this week (en route to Hilton Head), Michele Bachmann has racked up two visits, and Mitt's spouse, Ann Romney, stayed overnight once. And the campaign season isn't even in full swing yet!

Mitt and Ann Tomney have a net worth of between $190-250 million (I guess its too much to count accurately, at those levels) and yet, can't afford to pay for their own Hampton Inn bill. Do you trust him to be the president? Think of what ELSE he will charge to us.

Meanwhile, Governor Haley continues pretending she is a "fiscal conservative"--while spending our money on her friends. Nice work if you can get it!

>>Three women's rights activists win the Nobel Peace Prize! Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, activist Leymah Gbowee of Liberia and rights activist Tawakkul Karman of Yemen share this year's Nobel Peace Prize, the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced Friday. These women were chosen "for their nonviolent struggle for the safety of women and for women's rights to full participation in peace-building work," the Nobel committee said in Oslo, Norway.

>>Secret panel can put Americans on "kill list'. American militants like [recently assassinated] Anwar al-Awlaki are placed on a kill or capture list by a secretive panel of senior government officials, which then informs the president of its decisions, according to officials. According to Reuters: There is no public record of the operations or decisions of the panel, which is a subset of the White House's National Security Council, several current and former officials said. Neither is there any law establishing its existence or setting out the rules by which it is supposed to operate.


And we wrapped up with earnest exhortations to join local OCCUPY TOGETHER demonstrations: Thursday, October 13th, noon, Bowman's Field at Clemson University, ... and at about the same time, MoveOn is sponsoring one in Daniel Morgan Square, Spartanburg, which will be going on all day.

Your humble narrator will be in attendance at the latter event, so come on down!

And please join us on the air next Saturday morning at 9-10am, streaming on WFISradio.com or locally at 1600am or 94.9fm on your radio dial. (The podcast is up!)

Texan showdown

After Labor Day's extended nonsense, I wasn't too eager to watch any more Republican debates. Bah. So I skipped last night's; I figured there would be plenty more where that came from.

It turns out the big news is what happened during the commercials.

According to RonPaul.com:

During a commercial break at Wednesday’s Republican debate, Rick Perry and Ron Paul continued their spirited exchange on stage. Suddenly, Perry grabbed Ron Paul’s forearm while aggressively pointing his index finger towards the Congressman’s face. Alerted by Perry’s menacing gestures, Ron Paul’s bodyguard [front left in photo below] was standing by, ready to protect the Congressman.

But don't expect to find out what all the hoopla is about, since Ron has forgotten it already:

On Thursday, a Rick Perry spokesman stated that the two contenders were having a “cordial conversation” about border security, while Ron Paul diplomatically downplayed the incident, saying he did not even remember the exchange.

I don't believe that for a minute, but I like how he disses Perry as not memorable. AND not worth getting upset over.

And quite honestly, who looks ruffled in these photos? It isn't the good doctor.

From the Washington Times account titled Perry vs. Paul: A Texas-sized war:

At one point when the video cameras weren’t rolling — though the incident was caught by still photographers — Mr. Perry walked over Mr. Paul’s lectern, took hold of the congressman’s wrist and wagged his finger at him.

A spokesman for Mr. Perry said Thursday it was a policy conversation, not a heated exchange.

“The governor and the congressman talked about border security. It was a cordial conversation,” said Mark Miner.

The two Texans, though, lost few opportunities to focus on one another in the debate.

The first shot was invited by the debate moderators, who asked Mr. Paul to expand on his accusations, made in recent days, that Mr. Perry, who has spent more than a decade as governor of Texas, is less conservative than voters think.

“Just take the HPV,” Mr. Paul said, referring to Mr. Perry’s scrapped plan to require schoolgirls in the state to be given a vaccine against the sexually transmitted virus. “Forcing 12-year-old girls to take an inoculation to prevent this sexually transmitted disease, this is not good medicine, I do not believe. I think it’s social misfit.”

Mr. Perry acknowledged he’d gone about the plan the wrong way when he tried to bypass the legislature, but said he’d been trying to combat cervical cancer, which can result from HPV, and said his plan would have allowed parents to opt out of the inoculation program.

Later, after Mr. Perry criticized the health care law Mr. Romney signed in Massachusetts, Mr. Paul jumped in and said Mr. Perry should worry about his own record, since he had written “a really fancy letter supporting Hillarycare” — the health program former first lady Hillary Clinton tried to enact in the 1990s.

Mr. Perry fired back, pointing to a letter Mr. Paul wrote in 1987 announcing he was dropping out of the the party he now seeks to lead because he was disappointed in then-President Reagan.

“Speaking of letters, I was more interested in the one that you wrote to Ronald Reagan back and said I’m going to quit the party because of the things you believe in,” Mr. Perry said.

He didn’t any further before Mr. Paul insisted on responding.

“I support the message of Ronald Reagan. The message was great. But the consequence — we have to be honest with ourselves — it was not all that great,” Mr. Paul said.

The attacks kept up even during the commercial breaks — and not just on stage. Mr. Paul had paid to run an ad during the MSNBC broadcast attacking Mr. Perry, pointing to his support for Al Gore’s presidential bid in the 1980s, including twice calling the governor a “cheerleader.”

“Al Gore found a cheerleader in Texas named Rick Perry,” the ad announcer intones.

I'd love to read the Ron Paul letter. It will probably be guarded as closely as the Fatima Letter though, and we'll never get the chance.

It's getting interesting.

As I've said, I have already called South Carolina for Perry (barring any unforeseen scandals, and he looks like he eats scandals for breakfast, so that's a big caveat), and I haven't changed my mind since his visit here in the upstate on August 19th. But the Ron Paul people have also figured this out, and they know who to go after. They are INTENT on winning South Carolina and are very single-minded and hard-working.

Could they do it?

Well, maybe if they start talking about the fact that the reason Texas is burning up right now is that Rick Perry slashed fire departments around the state, to the tune of $23 million... from $30 million to $7 million. And now they have uncontrollable wildfires they can't stop. What about that?

Oh wait, Ron wants to cut MORE than that (including cops, according to what I heard him say in the Labor Day debate), so of course, he can't criticize Perry on THAT score. Ron would let the state burn too, wouldn't he? Or would he? Let's talk about THAT, and the 1400 people burned out of their homes by Republican greed. OR we could talk about where Rick Perry's gets his money, conservative Texas tycoon James Leininger:

Leininger also helped bankroll the transformation of the Texas GOP from a merely conservative party to one dominated by religious fundamentalists. Partly because of his influence, the Texas political culture that Rick Perry emerges from is significantly more right-wing than the one that shaped George W. Bush. And now that Perry is running for president, Leininger is working to make sure that national conservative Christian leaders coalesce behind him

Leininger is in tight with the fundies, as owner of Promised Land Dairy, which sells milk in bottles printed with Bible verses.

And now he is going to sell Rick Perry, former buddy of Al Gore, to the Religious Right.

Stay tuned, sports fans.

Jim DeMint's Tea Party Presidential Forum

At Left: On CNN a few minutes ago, Rep. Michele Bachmann supports a Human Life Amendment.







Yes, I am LIVE BLOGGING Jim DeMint's teabagger forum in Columbia AS IT HAPPENS!



I was unable to hitch a ride down to Columbia in the thunderstorm, so can't be there to yell and scream in person. (sigh) So I am listening online to South Carolina Senator (and major Tea-Party busybody) Jim DeMint and his thoroughly offensive, reactionary love-in. DeMint is tossing lovey-dovey softball questions, along with his trusty minions Congressman Steve King (R–Iowa) and Dr Robert George, founder of the American Principles Project. Dr George just employed the phrase "respect the dignity of all members of the human family, including those in the womb." See, I think they really mean WHITE HETEROSEXUALS in the womb, but then "the human family" has always meant very specific things to Republicans.



Bachmann just said she believed in "equal protection under the law"--wait, what? And she also believes in limiting marriage to heterosexuals. So, she just contradicted herself within three-and-a-half minutes.



Waiting for the Ron Paul fireworks. The rest of these people are wind-up dolls.



Herman Cain, pizza man, is up now.



The questioners are playing immigration-gotcha with Cain. I wonder why? Was he "soft on immigration" at some point in his career? (Did Godfather Pizza neglect to check those Green Cards? Uh-oh!)



These DeMinted minions are pretty obsessed with abortion. In particular, Dr George keeps repeating his line above, ALL MEMBERS OF HUMAN FAMILY... etc. Is he going to use this exact cult-phrase with each and every candidate? (If so, DAISY'S DEAD AIR will hereby reward him with his own post, as I try to do with all the Tea Party whack jobs.) He seems equally obsessed with Catholics being discriminated against by adoption agencies. (NOTE: I didn't understand the importance of this point until his conversation with Governor Romney, later in the debate.)



Cain supports DOMA and traditional marriage. No surprise there. He most especially wanted to talk about his "999" taxation program; Cain's "999" plan replaces the current tax code with a nine percent tax on corporate profits, nine percent on personal income, and nine percent on national retail sales. That magic NINE again! As we discussed here, NINE is the number of completion. Clearly, Herman's been reading his numerology and tarot texts.



Even so, he is a pest, and gets a big fat ZERO from DEAD AIR.



Newt Gingrich!!!! It's the intellectual! Batten down the hatches! Newt is suddenly onstage and makes football jokes out of the box... he appreciates teams like USC that "fumble early in the game, and then come from behind to win." Applause. Cute.



Newt drones on, like a college lecturer (which he has been), talking about the meaning of existence and how the founders were telling us what LIFE MEANT in the Constitution. (Really? Wow, who knew?) And then he goes back to 1802, when Thomas Jefferson eliminated some federal judges. If Jefferson can do it, Newt certainly can. (I just realized that Ohio wasn't even a state then, so I am thinking most of the rest of the country did not exist either... this little fact doesn't derail Newt in the least.)



Gay-baiting time, Newt has a lesbian sister! But the four-times-married heterosexual snubs his sister and the rest of the GLBT population, and says, in so many words, fuck you. He makes it clear that conservatives should not be intimidated by saying marriage is man-woman only.



In this instance, the message for progressives is obvious: INTIMIDATE THEM and call them bigoted haters at every opportunity ... obviously, cautioning his comrades that they should not be intimidated, means they already are.



He calls President Barack Obama "the most effective food stamp president in history"--engaging in some oblique race-baiting. (Newt was always really good at that, while running for congress in Georgia.) Then he accelerates the race-baiting ever-so-slightly, by talking about Detroit. (Why Detroit, of all places? Hm?) Why hasn't Obama fixed Detroit? And repeal Dodd Frank while you're at it! (no explanation of WHY is given) And he likes offshore drilling, the Webb Warner bill, drill baby drill! He reminds everyone in the audience what this would mean for Charleston Harbor. ($$$) Talk about pandering.



Yes, the minion repeated his "respect the dignity of all members of the human family, including those in the womb" cult phrase, for the third time.



Ron Paul gets a squeal from the back of the convention hall, the biggest applause of the afternoon so far.



Congressman Paul starts off sounding like a zealot; a little too wonky. He knows his Constitution and quotes Article 1, section whatever, as impressively as Newt does. Did you know only gold and silver were intended to be legal tender? (I expect a spate of CASH FOR GOLD ads on my blog now.)



He basically wants to dismantle the state, including (did I hear him right?) the police force. He says thousands of bureaucrats were not supposed to be armed, the PEOPLE are supposed to be armed. Hm. Jefferson got rid of the Central Bank, Jackson demolished the Central Bank and we must have the courage to take on the fed. Stop printing money. Keynesian economics will bankrupt the country. Etc.



And then, they asked about our global role. Representative Paul was unequivocal: bring all the US troops home. Now. No nation-building! A woman in the back screamed in approval; there was applause. Ron Paul pointed out that the USA is basically subsidizing South Korea, Germany and Japan's defense. Make them pay for it themselves, he said.



But, but, but... Rep. Steve King says, no troops ANYWHERE? ANYWHERE? He is clearly in shock.



Nope, Ron stands firm. Nowhere. (Audience applause, and I found myself grinning at this.) The man has balls!



About the welfare state, he said a generation had grown up believing in "entitlements" and that is a bad thing. And then, he segued into corporations garnering staggering entitlements, and he almost made me swoon. Nice touch, dude.



Dr George delivers the anti-abortion cult statement once more. (He is going for the gold.) Ron Paul says he would let the states settle the issue. Dr George seems happy with Ron Paul's anti-abortion voting record, but he doesn't like his states rights position. (See, conservatives love "states rights" when it suits them, but not when it doesn't.) Dr Paul compares this to the capital punishment situation, which is different in all states. He seems pleased with that. Dr George, obviously, is not pleased with that AT ALL.



Aside: What about the old Libertarian position, which Ron Paul used to tout when he was running for president as a Libertarian in the 70s? Am I the only person who remembers that? He said THEN, that abortion was not a political issue. When did he change his mind and WHY WON'T SOMEBODY ASK HIM THAT????



Too wonky and disjointed. DEAD AIR gives him a 25% for effort, and for being original.



And now, the android from the catalog, Governor MITT ROMNEY! (Does anyone remember Barbie's boyfriend, KEN, by MATTEL?)



He starts off quoting Justice Brandeis: "The STATES should be the laboratories of democracy." It sounds nice, so he gets all pumped up and pleased with himself.



During Romney's rap, thought I heard some chanting from outside... did somebody bust in? (Or is it just somebody yelling at their kids in the lobby?) I hope it was a hell-raiser! Yeah!



Romney dutifully regurgitates what the others have said, throws in criticisms of Dodd-Frank and all the rest of it. The thing is, he LOOKS so much better than all the rest. He is totally TV-ready, no umming and ahhing like Herman and Ron, no bad hair like Newt, no gollee-gee flat Midwestern accent like Michele. In fact, he sounds like a radio personality with NO regionalisms at all; as George Carlin once said, the DJ voice says, "HELLO! I'm from NOWHERE!"--and Romney sounds like he is most assuredly from Nowhere. He does remind us that he prays. (Better not linger on that TOO long, dude.)



For the fifth time, Dr George repeats his cult phrase about the members of the human family. I am starting to find this really super-creepy. Why these special words, this particular incantation? Why does he say it the same exact way every time? He appears to be a reasonably intelligent and informed person, able to speak extemporaneously... why does he keep up the mantra? Does he think this phrase will especially prick the consciences of pro-choice people or something? I dunno. However, it does finally become clear why he keeps mentioning adoption and Catholics: Catholic adoption agencies won't place children with gay parents, and of course, conservatives don't think they should.



And on this Labor Day, asshole Jim DeMint trashes UNIONS and grills Romney about Right-to-Work laws. The fact that the whole audience is allowed to sit there and have a LABOR DAY holiday, obtained for the American people by UNIONS, makes me damn livid... and I nearly STOPPED THIS WHOLE POST. Hypocrisy SUCKS, Senator.



Ending on a note of definite dyspepsia.



Rick Santorum is right here in Greenville, a few miles away, at Chiefs Wings and Firewater... they didn't invite him to the show. Tee hee.

GOP still snoozing in SC

From Politico, comes the best non-story of the upcoming election season:

GREENVILLE, S.C. — In the first two presidential states, the GOP picture is clear enough: Mitt Romney and Michele Bachmann top the polls in Iowa and Romney is the candidate to beat in New Hampshire.

As for South Carolina, the other critical early state, it’s anybody’s guess.

The first-in-the-South primary couldn’t be any more unsettled. By this point in the 2008 campaign, the Republican contenders had the state’s top consultants locked up, expansive staffs on the ground, and extensive rosters of endorsements. Voters had already been inundated with TV ads. A variety of pollsters had been in the field for months.

This time around? Crickets.

There’s been very little polling, no ads have been aired, and the campaigns are barely staffed up. Just one of the state’s top consultants — who play a unique and exaggerated role in Columbia’s political culture — has signed up with a major candidate. A Fox News debate in May turned out to be a dud, since most of the best-known presidential prospects skipped it.

And almost all of the state’s key endorsements — Gov. Nikki Haley, Sen. Jim DeMint, almost all of the state’s congressmen, most of its state lawmakers — are still sitting on the sidelines.

If that doesn’t sound like the South Carolina of GOP primary lore, that’s because it isn’t.

In four short years, the Republican scene here has been dramatically reordered, leaving the state’s political class and the GOP field uncertain about the South Carolina electorate—and what kind of candidate is best suited for it.

In just the last election cycle alone, the state has emerged as one of the nation’s tea party’s strongholds, electing a conservative African-American to Congress in Charleston, ousting an insufficiently conservative GOP House incumbent Upstate and putting a female Indian-American in the governor’s office.

“It’s wide open — and there’s a big question mark about [Texas Gov. Rick] Perry getting in, among the infrastructure types and the activists,” said Katon Dawson, a former state GOP chairman.

DeMint, a tea party standard bearer who endorsed Romney last time around in January 2007 , has spent the early primary months calling his state’s congressmen, big donors and state legislators to explicitly ask them to wait until after Labor Day to pick a candidate. DeMint’s supporters are privately calling themselves the “Keep Your Powder Dry” caucus as they organize a candidate forum scheduled for Labor Day weekend.

Read the rest here.

Haley Watch: Transcript of Haley on ABC's THIS WEEK

Last Sunday, our very popular governor took time off from posing for magazine covers to talk to Christiane Amanpour on ABC's THIS WEEK. A mostly predictable interview, Governor Haley nattered on about what is appropriate and sounded like a veritable Mother Superior, whilst assuring us that she is NOT running for Vice President, like that other Lady-Tea Party-governor who didn't finish her term.

I figure I'll just give it to you straight; here is the transcript.

~*~

AMANPOUR: Governor, thank you for being with us.

GOV. NIKKI HALEY (R), SOUTH CAROLINA: It's great to be with you.

AMANPOUR: Let me ask you first a big burning policy issue which is consuming a lot of time here in Washington and that is the raising of the debt ceiling. Do you think that this should happen or are you on the side of those who say hell no?

HALEY: Absolutely not. You know, we are seeing total chaos in D.C. right now. The very first thing they need to do is -- is make sure that they stop raising the debt. They need to make sure that they balance their budget like every other state in the country, and we've got to get control of our spending. It is chaos in D.C. and they need to stop.

AMANPOUR: So you say absolutely don't raise the debt ceiling. But what about the Fed? What about the treasury sector? What about Wall Street who's really worried that if this even goes down to the wire, it's going to really damage America's credibility and its ability to pay for doing its business.

HALEY: You know, government is notorious for saying the sky is falling. What I will tell you is every governor in the country has balanced their budget through very tough times. We have all had to make strong decisions. We have all had to go back to the basics and say what is the role of government? What do we have to have and work our way up?

AMANPOUR: So let's now then turn to the presidential race and the GOP candidates. Is Newt Gingrich an exciting candidate for you? You have said recently that there was a place and a time for him. Do you think he's the right candidate for the Republican party right now? Will he win the nomination?

HALEY: You know, I think the press always tries to paint a dark picture on everything. I think every candidate has their challenges. And I think that what we have seen with Newt Gingrich is he's had great ideas in the past, and what we are already starting to see is he's coming out and showing how his ideas today match the feelings of what we're dealing with today, whether it's the Medicaid mandates, whether it's food stamps, whether it's the unions. And he's come out and talked about the unions. That's what we want to hear about is the issues of the day. And I think that's what every candidate's going to have to do, and I was pleased to see him start to do that this week.

AMANPOUR: Well, but how do you square that saying that he did have a time and a place? Does he speak to the future to you?

HALEY: You know, I think that will remain to be seen. I think that's what he's got to tell. I think that the people of South Carolina and across this country are really going to push these candidates in a way that we've never pushed them before. And I think that Newt Gingrich has dealt with a lot of issues in the past, and I think now he's going to have to show that he's got those ideas to deal with the future.

AMANPOUR: So talking about policy debate, Mitt Romney gave a big speech this week about health care, about other issues, but primarily about health care. And he seemed to try to, again, put a square peg in a round hole saying that his health care for his state was great, but he would never do it for -- for federal health care.

The "Wall Street Journal" has called him compromised and not credible on this issue. Do you think that he's compromised and not credible? Could he be a nominee?

HALEY: You know, I think he absolutely could be a nominee. The interesting thing was he was one of the only governors that showed courage when it came to dealing with health care. I will tell you we do not want a Massachusetts health care plan in South Carolina. I think that he will have to continue to deal with that issue. I think he's going to have to talk about how that was not good for the country. That wouldn't be a good thing that we'd want to mandate on all of our states. And I think he'll have to respond to what his thought process was. But I think that we are looking for a leader that's willing to, one, make courageous stands, take strong policy decisions, but two, also admit when a mistake was made.

AMANPOUR: So do you think he adequately addressed that in his speech on Thursday? Has he laid that issue to rest?

HALEY: I think that issue's going to continue to be part of the debate. I think that every, like I said every candidate's going to have their challenge, I certainly think that's going to be his challenge.

AMANPOUR: So when it comes to social issues South Carolina is a pretty conservative state. What about Mitch Daniels who may or may not get in? Some are saying that he probably will. He has called for a truce on social issues and to be able to push the economy and other such issues forward. Do you agree with that?

HALEY: We're very conservative on maintaining family values, keeping our families strong. But also understanding the value of a dollar and that government is overspending in a time where we need to be cutting back.

AMANPOUR: Let's just take what you talked about family values and sort of make it about family. Mitch Daniels -- obviously there's been a lot of talk also about his wife, how sort of reluctant she is as a political spouse. Do you think there is enough, too much, not enough focus on the families, the wives of the candidates? How do you assess all of that?

HALEY: I think it's ridiculous. I think it's a terrible distraction to a campaign. I think what you need to be looking at and what I'm certainly looking at is what type of governor he was. He was an amazing reformer in his state. He brought great issues. He showed great courage at times that he needed to. Those are the issues we need to talk about. He needs to give his stance on where he stands with family values and what he'll do to make sure those stay strong in this country. But I think to go into a candidate's personal life and to try and attack them and distract the country, people are smarter than that.

AMANPOUR: You, of course, suffered your own attacks on that regard. Do you think that it's finished, that kind of smearing or do you think that that's going to be part of the race in 2012?

HALEY: We won't allow it in South Carolina. You know, the one thing about the people of South Carolina -- they showed it in my election, they will show it in the presidential -- is we will ask the hard questions, but we will show every candidate respect. And the second a political consultant tries to play dirty tricks, it will backfire and it will hurt that candidate. And so my warning to every candidate coming into South Carolina is come in, talk about the issues, that's what we want to hear about, but the distractions are not welcome in South Carolina.

AMANPOUR: Let me ask you about Donald Trump. What would you say to him, given that he has revealed himself, at least in one speech with women's group, to have a bit of a, I suppose what one might call a potty mouth, would you tell him that that was appropriate? What would you say about that? It offended a lot of women.

HALEY: That is not appropriate in South Carolina. We will give all of our candidates respect, and we certainly expect our candidates to come in and give the people of South Carolina respect.

AMANPOUR: You also said that it's time for Republicans to stop just attacking President Obama and look forward, look towards leadership, look towards their own positive ideas for government. Do you think for instance a politician such as Sarah Palin, who's a big supporter of yours, would her style, would her tone be the kind that you look for in a 2012 election since she really does spend a lot of time attacking President Obama's policies?

HALEY: You know, what we're saying is -- we're not saying don't attack his policies, that is what's gotten us into this policy debate that we're in today. What we are saying is we want to hear the solutions.

AMANPOUR: Do you think Sarah Palin would get in?

HALEY: I think she is amazing at getting people to know the power of their voice. I think that she woke up a lot of people in our country that just really thought that government was a waste of time and she got them to care again. And for that, I think that there will always be a place for her. But now it's time to talk about policy. And I think that if she chooses to get in, she'll understand that the policy issues of today are relevant and important right now too.

AMANPOUR: There have been a lot of suggestions that would make a great vice-presidential nominee, that you'd be great on any ticket. It's been discussed publicly. Where do you stand on that? Would you want to do that if you were asked?

HALEY: No. What I will tell you is it is -- I find it silly that it's being talked about, but I will tell you this. The people of South Carolina took a chance on electing me. It is my job and my family's job to prove to them that they made a good decision. I plan on committing to the people of this state my full four years in office, and I look forward to watching the 2012 and making sure those policy discussions are there, but I also plan on making the people of South Carolina very proud. I represent the best state in the country. There's no better job than that.

AMANPOUR: I heard a very strong commitment there. No waffle room. No wiggle room.

HALEY: No wiggle room at all. We are staying in South Carolina, and we're going to continue to lead it in a way that makes everyone proud.

AMANPOUR: Governor Haley, thank you very much for joining us from South Carolina.

HALEY: Thank you.

~*~

EDITED TO ADD: Nikki Haley muscles up for 2012 (Politico)