But don't dare change his Social Security

U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham is in hot water again with tea party activists for his comments that their movement cannot endure "because they can never come up with a coherent vision for governing the country."

It's an opinion Graham has expressed before, but it drew national attention recently in a profile published in The New York Times as he was leaving for the Middle East during the Senate's Fourth of July recess.

Ralph Billeter, 76, said he heard it on Fox News and it reinforced to him that Graham, a Republican from Seneca, is out of touch with the people of South Carolina.

Billeter, a member of the Carolina Patriots, said Graham might say he's a conservative Republican, yet he worked with Democratic Sen. John Kerry and Independent Sen. Joe Lieberman, who caucuses with Democrats, on an energy bill that included capping greenhouse gas emissions.

The debate over health care reform is what pushed Billeter, a Conway resident, to political activism, he said.

Billeter said he is speaking for himself and not his tea party group. Like most tea party activists, he believes in less spending and more government control at the state level to give people greater input and reduce the size of federal government.

"We lost our government when our government representatives we elected stopped listening to us," he said. "And if you want any proof of that, all you've got to do is watch Fox News. They've got all these town hall meeting clips that they play."