In New Hampshire, Lindsey Graham Retools the Straight Talk Express
U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) fields questions from Bruce Rastetter at the Iowa Ag Summit on March 7, 2015 in Des Moines, Iowa.
Photo by Scott Olson/Getty ImagesCONCORD, N.H.—The fireplace is getting to be a problem. It’s Sunday afternoon, and South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham is making his first visit to New Hampshire as a potential presidential candidate, speaking at the Snow Shoe Club—all wood panels, low ceilings, and aging photographs of local worthies. The handful of reporters watching Graham are getting an image so perfect, so New Hampshire, that it may be worth checking the negatives for Teddy White’s ghost.
But, man, that fireplace. Graham had dressed for winter, but as he paces back in forth between the fireplace and 50 or so voters, he’s getting blasted. An hour into the town-hall meeting, he removes his fleece and gnaws into a question about sequestration. “Ronald Reagan is rolling over in his grave,” says Graham, “because the GOP put the Department of Defense on the chopping block.” As if on cue, a log tumbles and catches; a flame shoots up behind him.