Some Thoughts on Mike Huckabee's Impressive FRC Poll Victory
By Anteater Posted in 2008 — Comments (43) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
First, I must congratulate Mitt Romney for winning the online portion of the FRC Straw Poll. Tony Perkins, head of FRC, said that the results should be thought of as "two distinct polls": the online poll and the in-person poll [source].
While Mitt clearly won the online poll (Mike Huckabee in 2nd and Ron Paul in 3rd), Mike Huckabee blew away all competition and overwhelmingly won the in-person poll, beating Romney by a 5:1 margin. Clearly, the in-person poll is a much more accurate indicator of so-con support than the online poll, and thus, Mike Huckabee emerges as the true winner today.
Huckabee won the straw poll at the values voter debate by an overwhelming margin too, so it is now fair to give Mike Huckabee the "Social Conservative Candidate" mantle.
Now the remaining question is whether the so-con leaders will now officially endorse Mike Huckabee. I am hopeful that James Dobson will endorse Huckabee in the coming weeks (see interview), and I believe Mike could also get a lot of endorsements from the various pro-life groups. Tony Perkins also had some nice things to say about Huckabee:
“I believe that Gov. Huckabee will get a significant bounce out of this."
"He could be a first-tier candidate. He has held his own, he’s got a message, he’s certainly got followers. I think he’s come down here as a winner and a favorite out of this straw poll."
Indeed, I think we will see a significant uptick of support in the coming days. National Review's Rich Lowry had this to say about Huckabee's performance today:
Wow. Let me repeat: Wow. What an incredible communicator ... I found myself getting goose-bumps near the end of his speech when he invoked a long series of Biblical underdogs, beginning with David and his five smooth stones ... Watch out in Iowa.
In terms of being a great communicator, Mike Huckabee could very well be the next Ronald Reagan. Oh, by the way, did you know that Michael Reagan hearts Huckabee as well?
I think they're equally likely to split this party. Absolutely equal.
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Social conservatives are more likely to defect given the choice between two pro-choice candidates. The difference between Huckabee's moderate populism and Hillary's nanny-state socialism is vast, and the choice would be clear for any fiscal conservative. Give Governor Huckabee credit; he's not the sort of person to openly muse about giving $5,000 dollars to every baby born in the United States.
Huckabee was the governor of a state where
(1) he was obligated by the state constitution to balance the budget each year;
(2) he was obligated by state supreme court mandates to fund certain non-discretionary public programs;
(3) the legislature was 90% democrat, thus making any veto of taxation or appropriations bill meaningless; and
(4) infrastruction (roads and bridges) were falling apart
Given these constraints, what would you (a presumably fiscal conservative) have done?
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I myself am a conservative Christian. After doing research at www.ontheissues.org on Mike Huckabee, I found that he is pro-illegal immigration, doesn't seem to mind raising taxes and is prone to legislating morality. Do your own research and see for yourself.
These issues fly in the face of freedom, and are not my cup of tea. I will be voting for Ron Paul.
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...he's right.
With Brownback gone, Huckabee is left as the only "values" candidate, only with considerably less substance. Apart from his refreshing candor and his stances on social issues, though, I don't see a whole lot of differences between Huckabee and the other President we've had from his hometown.
Yes, he is a conservative in the classical sense of the term. It also brings to my mind Hayek's "Why I Am Not A Conservative" essay. We can do better.
"I don't understand why the same newspaper commentators who bemoan the terrible education given to poor people are always so eager to have those poor people get out and vote." - P.J. O'Rourke
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There are some real problems with Huckabee - take a look at Wikipedia and elsewhere. For one thing he's creepy, making the comment that the other presidential candidates should be using razor blades in a bathtub. When someone asked him how he lost 100 pounds almost overnight he said he had been in a concentration camp. He increased the debt in Arkansas by $1 billion and is a serial tax increaser - the 'biggest taxer and spender in Arkansas history'. As governor he pardoned Wayne Dumond, a convicted rapist, who then went out and raped and killed another woman. Then he had a wedding registry made up and took gifts that way so that he could skirt the gift laws as an elected official. He is also pro-illegal immigration and illegally took money from his governor's special fund to help set up a Mexican consulate in the Arkansas state capital. These are not qualities I would like to see in a president. On the other hand, Dr Ron Paul has sterling credentials. What he says makes sense. He says what the founding Fathers said, and always has. He has been married to his wife for 50 years and is pro-life in everything including the fact that we should not be warring on countries who pose no harm to the US.
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...we're under no obligation to let anybody post here, let alone spambots.
Shoo, edw987 / Ward Ciac.
The Fuzzy Puppy of the VRWC. I've been usurped!
Back in 1993, I was living in Mississippi and at that time had never heard of Mike Huckabee. But I listened to Rush Limbaugh almost every day back then. I remember Rush lamenting about the treatment Wayne Dumond had received from the Clinton camp.
Here is what I learned from Rush Limbaugh back in the early nineties: Wayne Dumond had been arrested for the rape of one of Clinton's distant cousin. An overzealous sheriff's deputy busted into Dumond's house and cut his testicles off. Rush Limbaugh reported that the Sheriff kept Dumond's testicles in a jar of formaldehyde, displaying them on his desk.
Now, if we are going to castrate (oops, I mean, castigate) Mike Huckabee for merely signing Dumond's parole, then don't you think we should go after Rush and every other anti-Clinton conservative who treated Dumond as the poster child for Clinton's corrupt cronisim in Arkansas?
Let's be consistent here.
Is anybody else concerned that a preacher who quotes scriptures at forums, if elected, would blur the distinction between church and state? That scares the [redacted] out of me.
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Could you sound any more like an islamic extremist, except for using a different god than they would?? Quoting scriptures doesn't reduce the deficit, get the government out of our lives, or create peace on earth. I'd rather have a president that uses common sense than scriptures.
Feel free to leave now.
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CongressCritter™: Never have so few felt like they were owed so much by so many for so little.
So hos IS that Dale Carnegie class going?
I thought this site was for Republicans and conservatives with grave concern for the future of the country, not restricted to evangelical hypocrites. My bad!
"The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity;
And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth."
Could you sound any more like an islamic extremist, except for using a different god than they would?? Quoting scriptures doesn't reduce the deficit, get the government out of our lives, or create peace on earth. I'd rather have a president that uses common sense than scriptures.
I have absolutely no use for Huckabee, but that is the least of my problems with the guy.
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And recognize that I am someone who is decidedly no on the Huck-a-wagon at this point in the campaign - not only do I not have a problem hearing a candidate for Predsident quoting from scriptures at forums, I actually find it, well, refreshing.
Go peddle Barry Lynn's krap somewhere else.
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Diplomacy is the art of saying 'Nice doggie' until you can find a rock.
Then you're probably OK with him preaching christianity from the White House, and basing important decisions biased toward christianity. That would be OK, except that then you make it OK for the next guy to do the same, who might be morman. Or another religion that would really be against what you believe, maybe islam or buddist? Sorry, but for this reason I believe true conservatism really prefers separation of church and state. That's just me, I could be wrong.
elected President.
James Garfield was.
I am no history professor, but I don't seem to recall James Garfield's quoting of Scripture as being a problem.
Speaking of quoting Scripture... Lincoln quoted Scripture. His "House Divided" line came straight from Jesus Christ. It was Jesus who first noted that a house divided against itself cannot stand.
Gracious, Lincoln even declared days of national fasting and prayer.... Here is link to just one of his proclaimtions:
http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=llsl&fileName=012/llsl012.db...
from leaders such as Dobson and Perkins then what happens to Fred Thompson's candidacy ?
It's my opinion that Thompson waited too long anyway but
I'm a Rudy Giuliani guy who is hoping Thompson got in the GOP Presidential race too late.
It's a wide open race, and Huckabee has plenty of room to join the pack without hurting anyone.
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Was Land even a part of that values voters convention or was that Dobsons and Perkins convention and Land has his own convention later on?
But it sure would have been nice for Thompson to sew up all the social conservatives and make it a two-man race. Now it's Giuliani vs. three possible standard-bearers for the social conservatives, which favors Giuliani.
Mike Huckabee did not win the strawpoll. Wow, you guys are taking political spin to a new level. The FRC organizers themselves announced Romney as the winner. Might wanna check this:
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despite bringing his own personal contingent to the vote. Trying to chalk this up to "spin" is laughable. Huckabee virtually tied him for first place despite Romney's tendency to try and buy victories. And Huckabee won 5:1 with in-person voters. His speech is getting praised all over the place, the crowd went wild for him, and the plan of the leadership to bite the bullet and endorse Romney just went out the window.
That's not spin. That's reality. There are just some folks unwilling to face it.
shows that Romney has been learning from RP.
Even then, Romney only had a half of a percent margin over Huckabee.
These online polls have gotten really silly.
Jim Tomasik
I was about ready to disagree strongly, but 5-to-1 among attendees is a pretty strong win.
The only problem is that supporting a candidate that is fiscally extremely liberal and is at 5% in the polls will just further split the conservative base. If Huckabee became a first tier candidate, it would split the social conservative vote three ways. If Huckabee did become the most popular "socon", then it would be very hard for him to win against Guiliani as a fiscal liberal. Huckabee is less popular among fiscal conservatives than Guiliani is among social conservatives. Don't forget that in every poll Guiliani still does very well among evangelical Republicans.