He knows his brand of extreme fiscal conservatism is suddenly very much in fashion, as the Obama administration runs up the deficit. And he knows he’s shot himself in the foot, big time. “I’m a wounded soldier; I took myself off the battlefield,” he says. “It’s not until you lose something in life that you appreciate some of your blessings. If I ever had the chance to get back on the playing field, it would be a great honor and a privilege and a blessing.”

“You know,” the South Carolina governor continues, “everybody is assigned their own secret-agent mission in life. And at times the tricky part, the hard part, is finding out what that secret-agent mission is. Some of us do it early, some of us do it later in life.” Simply put, nobody else in the Palmetto State’s political class talks like that.