South Carolina voters liked Gingrich's confrontational style

Washington Post:

They wanted a fighter. 

On Saturday, as Newt Gingrich won a startling victory in the South Carolina Republican primary, many voters chose him for reasons that had little to do with his ideas, his hyper-complex proposals to fix immigration or Social Security. 

Many voters said they liked the scrap in the former House speaker’s personality — his willingness to seek confrontations with his GOP rivals and the news media. That, they said, was what the GOP would need in the race against President Obama this fall. 

“I think Mitt Romney is a good man,” said Harold Wade, 85, leaving a polling place in this picturesque seaside suburb outside Charleston. “But I think we’ve reached a point where we need someone who’s mean.” 

And Gingrich, he said, was the only one mean enough. 

“What we need is someone who’s got some brains,” Wade said, explaining his vote for the former speaker. “And we need someone with some guts.” 

Surveys of voters at South Carolina polling places showed the roots of Gingrich’s resurgence. About two-thirds of voters said recent debates — in which Gingrich stood out, partly by blasting debate moderators for their questions — were the most important thing in their voting decision, or one of several important factors.

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The problem with that thinking is that Gingrich has not seen anything like the hostility he will see if he faces Obama.  The Media will not back off like a debate moderator, but will respond with vicious attacks on Gingrich and the rest of the Republicans.  Reagan showed a better way of dealing with a hostile media.