He could have just secured the GOP nomination

by Eric Dondero

In the race to succeed libertarian Republican Governor Mark Sanford, most libertarian Republicans and libertarian-conservatives have been firmly in the Nikki Halley camp. The state representative, an American of Indian descent, has been viewed as a Bobby Jindal-style budget-cutting fiscal hawk, which has won her great support from this blog and other libertarian media outlets.

But now sitting Lt. Governor Andre Bauer has expressed some stunningly hardline libertarian sentiments in a recent speech regarding welfare and treatment of the poor. His remarks have been garnering universal condemnation in the leftwing blogosphere and mainstream media. But ironically, his statements may have just gained him the nomination, given the importance of the hard right and libertarian vote, in the State's GOP. And since SC is the Reddest of Red States, in an otherwise good Republican year, the likelyhood of him being the next Governor of South Carolina, after securing the nomination, is now extremely high.

Truly Survival of the Fittest

From the Greenville Times:

GREENVILLE - Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer has compared giving people government assistance to "feeding stray animals."

Bauer, who is running for the Republican nomination for governor, made his remarks during a town hall meeting in Fountain Inn that included state lawmakers and about 115 residents.

"My grandmother was not a highly educated woman, but she told me as a small child to quit feeding stray animals. You know why? Because they breed. You're facilitating the problem if you give an animal or a person ample food supply. They will reproduce, especially ones that don't think too much further than that. And so what you've got to do is you've got to curtail that type of behavior. They don't know any better," Bauer said. "You see, for the first time in the history of this country, we've got more people voting for a living than we do working for a living."

Later in his speech, Bauer said, "I can show you a bar graph where free and reduced lunch has the worst test scores in the state of South Carolina," adding, "You show me the school that has the highest free and reduced lunch, and I'll show you the worst test scores, folks. It's there, period.

"So how do you fix it? Well you say, 'Look, if you receive goods or services from the government, then you owe something back.'"

Bauer said there are no "repercussions" from accepting government assistance.

Bauer's past troubles with the Right

The Lt. Governor has not previously been high on the libertarian radar screen. If anything he was held in a bit of contempt by libertarians for having ruffled libertarian darling Mark Sanford's feathers during his Argentine mistress troubles. Bauer let it be known that he would be happy to replace his boss if he decided to step down, which won him great condemnation even from Sanford critics.

Not too mention, Bauer has been held under suspicion by social conservatives for suspected support for agenda items of the gay rights movement.

But with such hardcore anti-moocher sentiments, seemingly straight out of an Ayn Rand novel, Bauer may instantly become the same sort of hero as Sanford has been, at least to libertarians on the hard right. One has to wonder, even if they weren't pals, if at some point Bauer was influenced by his boss's hardline libertarian beliefs.

Will Ms. Halley now have to on-up her opponent to gain back critical libertarian support?