[Originally posted at Backcountry Conservative]

Yesterday's Primary News

Today's Schedule:
3 p.m. Dick Gephardt, Charleston, ILA Union Hall, 1142 Morrison Drive
[Remaining schedule at the bottom of this post.]

News:
NRO features a column by Michael Graham on John Edwards.

S.C. Democratic Party Chairman Joe Erwin released a statement on the impact of the Iowa caucus results on the S.C. Primary.

Gephardt has cancelled a trip to Charleston today and will remain in Missouri to withdraw from the race.

Mike discusses the Iowa results and the possibility of a Kerry-Edwards ticket.

Wyeth Ruthven discusses Gephardt's showing in Iowa and wonders whether Congressman Jim Clyburn will make another endorsement when Gephardt drops out. Ruthven also disccuses some minor points over some endorsement claims by Kerry and Edwards yesterday.

The State picks up the ball from Ruthven regarding Gephardt supporters and runs with it today (excerpts below.)

More on Iowa from the Charleston Post & Courier (excerpts below.)

An article in The State discusses the Iowa results and what they could mean for S.C. (excerpts below.)

Sharpton and Clark both spoke against the Confederate Flag at King Day events (excerpts below.)

Al Sharpton and Wesley Clark participated in ceremonies for MLK Day including the march and rally in Columbia. Clark also participated in a discussion at Southside High School in Greenville (excerpts below.)

Update: A Knight-Ridder article chronicles Clark's day in South Carolina yesterday (excerpts below.)

S.C. blogger Jason Trommetter also has Iowa reactions.

The State on Gephardt supporters:

The exit of U.S. Rep. Dick Gephardt from the presidential race means the surviving candidates are jockeying to pick up his former supporters.

Just Monday night, S.C. Rep. Leon Howard, D-Richland, switched from Gephardt to Sen. John Edwards. Herbert Fielding of Charleston, a former state senator, switched from Gephardt to Sen. John Kerry.

Of course, the biggest prize is U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn, whom all of the candidates had wooed, but who ultimately went with Gephardt....

...Clyburn once listed Gephardt, Edwards and former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean as possessing the characteristics he would seek in a nominee. The congressman could not be reached for comment Monday night.

Edwards also has the endorsement of Clyburn's first cousin, S.C. Rep. Bill Clyburn, D-Aiken.

Iowa reactions from the Post & Courier:

John Kerry's convincing win in the Iowa caucuses breathes new life into his South Carolina campaign after he had all but disappeared from contention.

Kerry, a U.S. senator from Massachusetts, has not been in the state since September, but his supporters said Monday they're ready to unleash a Southern front for a candidate who arguably is the new Democratic front-runner.

"What this does is give us an enormous bump," said Kerry's Lowcountry organizer, Diane Aghapour of Charleston. "Iowans recognized that John Kerry is the candidate who would be able to beat President Bush."...

...Iowa has shown that "anything can happen," said Wofford University political scientist Robert Jeffrey. "In just a week somebody new can jump out of the pack. I think we have to wait and see before we start to predict or handicap South Carolina."

Although Kerry has no plans to visit South Carolina before the New Hampshire primary next week, he is expected to begin his South Carolina advertising campaign this week.

"We look at South Carolina as an opportunity, and we expect to be competitive," said Kerry's Washington, D.C.-based press secretary David DiMartino, who downplayed Kerry's lack of stump appearances here....

...Edwards is set to spend most of the week in New Hampshire but will be back in South Carolina on Friday, stumping in Columbia, his campaign said.

U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., who had endorsed Dick Gephardt, said he was sorry to see his close friend from Congress end his bid for the Democratic nomination and predicted it probably would help Edwards the most.

"I think it bodes well for Edwards," he said. "They both had the same kind of resume."

Clyburn's endorsement of Gephardt had been seen as key in South Carolina, particularly in helping to sway the state's black voters. Clyburn said he didn't know if he would make another endorsement before the S.C. primary....

...Lowcountry Edwards organizer and Charleston County Councilman Leon Stavrinakis said the candidate's second-place finish in the Midwest was "enormous," since Edwards went from single-digit support to second place in a matter of days.

Iowa Reaction from The State:

Can Kerry still win in South Carolina?

Yes, said Samuel Tenenbaum of Columbia, one of Kerry’s staunchest supporters.

"The right stuff is there,' Tenenbaum said Monday night from Mac's on Main, where about 30 Kerry supporters were celebrating.

Tenenbaum said Kerry now has plenty of the ever-crucial momentum. "'Big Mo' is happening right now,"he said.

Kerry's momentum, however, might not penetrate the South Carolina border, said Winthrop University political scientist Scott Huffmon.

"He's just not going to have time to build a network in South Carolina that can overcome image problems," Huffmon said. The problems are based on regional biases that are inherently unfair, he said, but that doesn’t make them any less true.

"We're as bad as Northerners," Huffmon said. "They paint us with horrible brush strokes. We do the same. Kerry suffers from that wealthy Northeastern Boston Brahmin image. You would need an incredibly strong, active network to overcome that."

The most important issue for John Kerry now is not South Carolina, but New Hampshire, said former Democratic National Committee chairman Don Fowler of Columbia....

...As for Edwards, Fowler said, Monday night's results certainly count as a victory for the North Carolina senator.

'From the beginning, almost no one considered Senator Edwards serious except a few people in the South," Fowler said. "He proved himself in Iowa. They (Kerry and Edwards) are very much in play."

Huffmon agreed.

"People are starting to take a lot of more notice of Edwards," he said. "Edwards is really honing his message, and refining it. It was one that always found an audience here."...

..."The product of Howard Dean never really sold well in Iowa," Huffmon said. "I don’t think he was hoping to knock a home run in Iowa. He was betting more on New Hampshire."

Sharpton and Clark speak against the Confederate Flag:

Clark, a retired Army general who sat out Monday's Iowa caucuses to focus on later primaries, said the Confederate flag is "hate-filled" and should be put in a museum.

"It is a flag of the past," said Clark, who is from Arkansas. "This American flag is our flag, and it is a flag of the future."

Sharpton, who has protested the flag several times in South Carolina, called it a treasonous symbol for rebels who wanted to separate from the nation.

"We stand against foreign terrorism," Sharpton said. "We should not reminisce fondly about domestic terrorism."

Other campaigns sent supporters to the rally. They mingled with people opposing the flag, supporting reparations for former slaves and advertising a host of issues from education to unions.

Former U.S. Sen. Carol Moseley Braun of Illinois — who last week dropped out of the race and now supports former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean — attended the pre-rally church service at Zion Baptist with Clark.

Dean's brother Jim also attended the services and marched to the State House....

...[Clark] and Sharpton criticized President Bush for invoking executive authority and, on Friday, appointing conservative Judge Charles Pickering to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans despite objections from Democrats.

Critics say Pickering has opposed voting rights for blacks and is too right-wing. Pickering's supporters say the judge has defended blacks against discrimination.

Sharpton and Clark participate in King Day activities:

Clark listed what he said was a string of civil rights problems in the nation and in South Carolina.

"We have not yet overcome when black Americans are twice as likely to be put out of a job; when black Americans are twice as likely to live in poverty and when they are a third less likely to have health care..."

"When our president has the audacity to visit the grave of Dr. King on one day and then dishonor his memory the next by appointing an anti-civil rights, anti-voting rights, anti-justice, anti-American judge, then we have not overcome.

"And when a political party in this United States of America can suppress the vote and steal a presidential election, when a man can sit in the White House in Washington, D.C. and the only vote he won took place in the U.S. Supreme Court, then my friends, we have not overcome."

At Greenville's Southside High, Clark was greeted by a crowd of 150, mostly middle-aged and older, that waited out his 50-minute late arrival....

...Former Gov. Jim Hodges traveled with Clark and later said the former general is rapidly making the transition to candidate, "going from a guy feeling his way to a guy who's really good."

Sixteen supporters, some local, from other states, sat in a double row of plastic orange chairs on a platform behind Clark. Among them were, U.S. Reps. Marion Berry of Arkansas and William Jefferson of Louisiana and former Clinton administration Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater, also of Arkansas, Clark's adopted home state. Clark campaign placards framed a blue cloth backdrop.

Clark immediately went on the attack against Bush.

"I don't think it's patriotic for the president of the United States dress up in a flight suit and prance around the deck of an aircraft carrier," he said, referring to Bush's flight to proclaim the end of the war in Iraq last April.

Clark said that even before the 9/11 terror attack, "we had a president who wasn't minding the store. He did not do everything he could to keep us safe from the terrorist threat of Osama bin Laden. The truth is going to come out, I'm going to bring it out and we're going to hold George Bush accountable for not having done everything he could have done."

His voice rising as the crowd stood, whooping, cheering and applauding, Clark shouted, "He didn't do it, he didn't do it, he didn't do it and he knew it." ...

...During his remarks in Columbia, Clark called for the Confederate flag flying near the Confederate Soldiers' Monument to be taken down, saying "it doesn't belong on public grounds."

In an interview in Greenville, the Chicago-born Clark who grew up in Little Rock, said that while displaying the flag in the days of his youth was commonplace, "what a lot of white people didn't understand, or maybe they did (but) I didn't, what an object of hate it was and how it affected other people.

"It's time to take the Confederate flag and put it in a museum. I don't think it ought to be flying. Why fly a flag that brings back hurtful memories of slavery, lynching. It doesn't belong in modern-day America," Clark said.

During the King rally, Clark talked to reporters inside the partially enclosed African American History Monument prior to his speech, just as Sharpton took the stage. Clark said it was a coincidence and not an attempt to draw the media away from Sharpton's speech. While Sharpton thundered at the crowd, his voice sometimes threatening to drown out Clark's, Clark said he was in South Carolina "to honor Martin Luther King and I want to help the people of South Carolina pull together."

Clark campaigns in South Carolina:

While his rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination fought it out Monday on Iowa's frozen turf, retired Gen. Wesley Clark spent the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday campaigning in South Carolina, where blacks will make up perhaps 50 percent of voters in a key primary Feb. 3.

Clark has spent more time in South Carolina than any of the other six states that have primaries Feb. 3, and Monday was the 10th day he's campaigned here. Thirty-second television ads for him have been airing since Dec. 2, and the Clark campaign has five state offices, 40 paid staffers and a dozen full-time volunteers....

..."Wes Clark fits like a nice little shoe with Southern voters," said Jim Hodges, the state's former governor. "The South holds a critical part of the success of the Democratic Party. Clark is a native son of the South: He speaks the language of the South and understands the voters here."

Clark began the day Monday at a raucous prayer service at Zion Baptist Church, where he smiled, sang and clapped along with gospel music....

...Clark then marched to a rally sponsored by the NAACP at the state Capitol, where the Confederate still flag flies on the grounds, to enormous controversy. Clark almost encountered another of his long-shot rivals there - the flamboyant Rev. Al Sharpton, who spoke at the rally - but Clark's aides hastily arranged a 10-minute news conference that began as Sharpton started speaking.

Then, in a passionate speech to honor King's legacy, Clark blasted President Bush's recent appointment of Charles Pickering of Mississippi to a federal appellate bench and pledged to secure voting rights for all Americans....

...Clark was almost giddy in his closing remarks before 800 or so people on the statehouse grounds.

"Dr. King, Dr. Martin Luther King, happy birthday to you, sir!," said Clark. "We honor you, and we honor your memory, and we are going to complete your work! Happy Birthday, Dr. King! Thank you!"

Clark then flew on a plush chartered jet to Southside High School in Greenville, S.C., for a "Conversation With Clark," his signature town-hall style event. By then, his voice was hoarse.

Last Thursday, Clark flew to South Carolina for just one event: A discussion of school funding and equity. His pledge to raise the minimum wage to $7 an hour by 2007 led the students at Dillon High School to cheer....

..."A lot depends on what happens up the road in Iowa and New Hampshire," said Neal Thigpen, the chair of the political science department at Francis Marion University in Florence. "But I haven't seen much from the Clark people in the way of a ground operation. Edwards and Dean have a pretty decent organization in the state. My sense is that the vote here is pretty loose. There's a huge percentage of voters who are undecided."

Remaining Schedule:
1/23: 2:30 p.m., Meet-and-greet with John Edwards, Margarette H. Miller Cosmetology Center, 1509 Fontaine Road, Columbia
1/27: Wesley Clark
1/28: John Edwards
1/29: John Edwards
1/29: 12 noon, Lunch forum with Wesley Clark, Margarette H. Miller Cosmetology Center, 1509 Fontaine Road, Columbia
1/29: Democratic Primary Debate, Peace Center for the Performing Arts, Greenville
1/30: 8:30 p.m., John Edwards - Hootie & the Blowfish Concert, Jillian’s, 800 Gervais St., Columbia

Complete coverage at Google News and SC Hotline.

Yesterday's Primary News