After pulling an upset in the Iowa caucus, Mike Huckabee has now placed a respectable third in two northern primaries, New Hampshire and Michigan, but he has hopes of doing much better in South Carolina.
Huckabee spoke to MSNBC's Joe Scarborough from Columbia, SC, saying enthusiastically, "South Carolina's a great place for me. I mean, I know how to eat grits and speak the language. We even know how to talk about eating fried squirrel and stuff like that, so we're on the same wavelength."
"Mika, I bet you never did this," Huckabee went on, addressing Mika Brzezinski. "When I was in college, we used to take a popcorn popper, because that was the only thing they would let us use in the dorm, and we would fry squirrels in a popcorn popper in the dorm room."
"Ewwww," responded Scarborough, wincing. "Too much information!"
Huckabee continued by emphasizing the populist basis of his campaign. "It's amazing," he stated. "I'm the only guy that's just getting hammered from some of these special interest groups. And I think that'll turn for me and against some of these folks, because it's pretty obvious... There's just an anxiety that exists in the Washington power circles about our candidacy. ... Truck drivers know why they're voting for Mike Huckabee ... and that's why I'm convinced we're going to win."
Huckabee insisted that no matter what the New York Times may say, "the Republican party is ... quite vibrant" and is merely trying to find a "new voice," and that he is rebuilding the Reagan coalition on a platform of strong defense spending, economic conservatism, and cultural issues.
"Good lord, that guy's going to connect down there so well," was Scarborough's final comment.
The following video is from MSNBC's Morning Joe, broadcast on January 16, 2008