Pirate's Cove

Republican presidential contenders need to 1. not tick her off, 2. stay on her good side, and 3. stay out of her gunsights (oops, sorry, that was uncivil) Nikki Haley muscles up for 2012

Make way for Nikki Haley.

With noted smackdowns of two top GOP 2012 contenders, a high-profile presence at the May 5 Fox News debate and a schedule heavy with cable news show appearances, the first-term Republican governor is signaling her intent to use South Carolina’s key early presidential primary to claim a place on the national stage.

Nikki 2020? I say 2020, because a Republican will be in office for the next two terms. People have had their time with hopey changey, and learned what a disaster it is to elect someone like Obama.

Anyhow, she’s smacked Newt Gingrich around a few times, as well as Mitt Romney

One state party operative without any 2012 allegiances who is close to Haley explained that the attack on Gingrich was a “clean hit” for her—meaning it came at no political cost for the governor—and noted that she’s “extremely ambitious” and “angling for something bigger.”

Let’s hope so. Obviously, Dems have to take shots

South Carolina Democratic Party Chairman Dick Harpootlian accused her Tuesday of being “distracted by the allure of celebrity” in a scathing statement alleging that Haley was ignoring her duties as governor.

“In a state that’s 50th in the country in education, the highest unemployment in the South, we have huge economic problems which put the state more in the class of a third-world nation than a state of the United States of America…she again has been attracted like a moth to the flame to camera and celebrity,” he said.

I declare that to be sexist and possibly racist, since she is part Native American.