Bachmann: Healthcare law could spell the end for conservatives

Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) told a campaign crowd Thursday that President Obama's healthcare law could be a death knell for conservatives.

Bachmann's remarks, delivered at a forum in South Carolina, appear to imply that full implementation of the healthcare reform law would render conservatives unable to ever advance their principal cause.

"You can't put socialized medicine into a country and think that ever again you can elect a Republican as president — or a conservative or even a tea partier as president — and think that somehow we're going to get back to limited government," Bachmann said, according to a CNN report. "It won't happen because socialized medicine is the definition of big government."

All of the Republican presidential contenders have said they would repeal the healthcare reform law, the biggest pieces of which won't take effect until 2014.