MARK SANFORD: Wrong on Social Security, wrong for South Carolina." This slogan blared into living rooms all over the Palmetto State in 2002, when Sanford was running for governor against Jim Hodges, the incumbent Democrat. It was Sanford's reward for daring to reform Social Security as a Republican congressman in the 1990s. Hodges figured that a negative campaign would boost his reelection chances, especially if he could shine a bright light on Sanford's support for letting workers invest a portion of their payroll taxes through personal accounts--or, as Hodges put it, forcing seniors to "bet their retirement fund on corporate disasters like WorldCom and Enron."

It didn't work. Voters decided that Sanford was in fact right for South Carolina, and he won by six points. Since then, he has gone on to become one of the best new governors in the country, ranking near the top of the Cato Institute's latest fiscal-policy report card and putting himself in position for an easy reelection next year. Conservatives have praised his efforts to slash taxes and limit the growth of government. A college student in Maryland has even launched a "Draft Sanford for President 2008" website.

Call it a Social Security survivor's benefit. "I learned that this doesn't have to be the third rail of American politics," says Sanford.

The governor, now 44, decided to enter politics in 1991, after listening to Jim Davidson of the National Taxpayers Union talk about government finances at Renaissance Weekend, the annual confab made famous by regular attendees Bill and Hillary Clinton. Sanford is a fitness buff--he swims daily, likes to windsurf, and usually sports a dark tan from spending so many hours in the sun. He grew irritated as he learned about Washington's budgetary unfitness. "Davidson scared the bejesus out of me," he says.

Two years later, Sanford was running for Congress from a coastal district that included Myrtle Beach. "We had a lot of retirees living there," he says. Yet he wasn't afraid to stand outside Wal-Mart stores and stump for tax cuts, spending restraint, school choice--and Social Security reform. Sanford grabbed the GOP nomination and was elected to Congress in the class of 1994.