A Tina Hampton of Greenville, South Carolina, told the New York Times why in the end she voted for Newt Gingrich in her state’s primary. The reason was fidelity to values. “We’re a party that says ‘Where’s the birth certificate?,’” she said, “yet how can we have a candidate who says he might release his taxes? It should be a no-brainer.”
I would have suggested to Tina Hampton that a better question is whether the Republicans should be the party that says, where’s the birth certificate? But no one changes minds by questioning first principles, strange as those principles might seem to an outsider.