In the traditional sense of those terms yes. People are just ignorant.
Remember we are talking about South Carolina Primary voters. Ignorant or not, it doesn't change the fact that shammy would need to win here and he wouldn't come close to doing so. Even McCain was a Military Veteran and had some things going for him which Hamilton has none of. He would lose the Evans and the Military vets. That leaves the Urban/surburban fiscally conservative social moderates(Duke type people), though growing they still can't command enough voting power to win a primary.
Yankee, the South is irrelevant to winning the primary. Ask Huckabee.
Ask McCain who won South Carolina in 2008 and become the front runner, and who lost SC in 2000 and couldn't recover his momentum.
I could win SC in an OPEN PRIMARY, dumbass.
Independents make up a small amount of the electorate. Far below 50% and I will gurrantee that a large portion of them are born again evangelicals and they would want nothing to do with you considering you are atheist and Phil is Roman Catholic. That would make all the difference.
Nice Try.
South Carolina was won in 2008 by John McCain, who was hardly the evangelicals' top choice for the nomination. An infinitely more appealing candidate like Alexander Hamilton could just as easily swing independent voters and even some Dems to deliver victory in SC.
And I'm at least one Catholic who would have no problem voting for Hamilton.