The Huckabee Surge
Foreign policy has been much more exciting than political campaigns lately, so I’ve been pretty light on the ostensible purpose of this blog. However, I would be negligent in my duties if I failed to note that while Giuliani has been struggling under the cloud of ‘scandal’, Mike Huckabee has been skyrocketing. Those looking for proof needn’t look to the small early primary states – his rise has gone mainstream, now:
Mike Huckabee’s dramatic jump in the polls is going nationwide. The former Arkansas governor is in a virtual tie with Republican presidential front-runner Rudy Giuliani in a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation national poll out Monday.
Giuliani, the former New York City mayor, is backed by 24 percent of Republican voters nationally while Huckabee, the former governor of Arkansas, is at 22 percent.
The two-point difference is well within the survey’s sampling error of plus or minus 5 percentage points.
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney is at 16 percent in the new poll, followed by Sen. John McCain of Arizona at 12 percent, Former Sen. Fred Thompson of Tennessee at 10 percent, Rep. Ron Paul of Texas at 6 percent, Rep. Duncan Hunter of California at 2 percent and Rep. Tom Tancredo of Colorado at 1 percent.
Huckabee’s rise can be attributed to several factors:
(1). A slumping frontrunner in Rudy G.
(2). His very effective performances during the debates and on the stump (he’s a good campaigner).
(3). The widespread abandonment of Fred Thompson by social conservatives who now view him as a flash in the pan without the fire in the belly to go the distance.
Number three cannot be overstated, but it’s a mixed bag. Huckabee’s appeal to religious conservatives is undeniable and well-deserved, and he seems to be a likeable, thoughtful, serious candidate. However, some of the very positions that make him the current darling of the SoCons will likely bite him in a general election (see his 1992 desire to ‘quarantine’ AIDS patients and his refusal to repudiate those remarks).
My gut feel is that Huckabee may be capable of winning the Republican nomination. I think he has a far better chance than Mitt Romney, who still sounds like a bad used car salesman every time I hear him. (Giuliani still must be counted as the favorite – give the current ‘public-paid security for my girlfriend’ scandal a bit of time to wear off, and see how Huckabee does under the glare of far-more-focused attention for a couple of weeks, and then check back).
I have a much harder time seeing Huckabee winning the election. It’s not beyond the realm of possibility, as with Ron Paul, Tom Tancredo, and Duncan Hunter (the last two should just give up now – Paul should probably ride this train to the end, as he will NEVER be this popular again)…but I think he would take more baggage in than Giuliani, as odd as that may sound. Giuliani’s baggage is mostly personal, and as we’ve seen from Bill Clinton, voters can forgive personal flaws if the sinner is perceived as a strong leader. Huckabee’s baggage is ideological, and his refusal to back down completely from the AIDS quarantine story is not a good sign.
In the interest of fairness, though, Huckabee has clarified his stance somewhat:
Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee refused to retract a statement he made in 1992 calling for the isolation of AIDS patients.
Responding to an Associated Press questionnaire, Huckabee said steps should be taken to “isolate the carriers of this plague” during his failed run for a U.S. Senate seat from Arkansas 15 years ago.
He said he probably would not make the same statement today because of what is known about how HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, is transmitted.
“I had simply made the point — and I still believe this today — that in the late ’80s and early ’90s, when we didn’t know as much as we do now about AIDS, we were acting more out of political correctness than we were about the normal public health protocols that we would have acted,” Huckabee told Fox News on Sunday.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention concluded in 1985 that AIDS was not transmitted by casual contact. But Huckabee said at the time, “there were other concerns being voiced by public health officials.”
He disputed the characterization that he was calling for individuals infected with HIV to be quarantined.
“Now, would I say things a little differently in 2007? Probably so,” Huckabee told Fox News. “But I’m not going to recant or retract from the statement that I did make because, again, the point was not saying we ought to lock people up who have HIV/AIDS.”
Huckabee did not explain how individuals with HIV would have been isolated.
During his Senate run, Huckabee also told the AP in the questionnaire that he found homosexuality to be “an aberrant, unnatural and sinful lifestyle.”
Speaking Monday in Miami, Florida, Huckabee said he still stands by his earlier remarks on homosexuality.
“Let’s understand what sin means,” Huckabee said. “Sin means missing the mark. Missing the mark could mean missing the mark in any area. We’ve all missed the mark.”
The former Baptist minister said the “proper relationship” is one between a married man and woman having children.
Now, let’s leave aside pointless, argumentative conversations about the moral merits (or lack thereof) of Huckabee’s comments for the moment. I am making a political observation here, and that observation is this: Huckabee is talking in the language of the Southern Baptist preacher that he has been, and while that language is music to the ears of many Republican primary voters, it will alienate the moderates and fencesitters we need to win in 2008.
This election will not be won by a candidate whose only appeal is to the base, because the base has shrunk, dramatically. That is why I remain of the conviction that any candidate except Giuliani is doomed to defeat. Giuliani may lose, too, but at least he can appeal to some crossover voters with his heavy name recognition, residual good feeling from his performance during the early days of the GWOT, and moderate stance on abortion and gay rights.
The only way I can see any of the other Republicans winning is if Hillary is the Democratic nominee, and if she alienates such a large portion of voters (as she is certainly capable of doing) that “Anyone But Hillary” is the popular vote. Obama is also surging, however, though Hillary’s margin is safer than Giuliani’s.
Meanwhile, the primaries are right around the corner…
UPDATE 10:01 p.m.: Further confirmation that the Huckabee charge is real comes from the newest CBS News/NY Times poll, which shows Giuliani with a mere 1-point lead over Huckabee. Remarkable, though we’ll see if he has staying power…
Two words that will stop Huck: Wayne DuMond.
The Willie Horton of this cycle. Wait til you see the first commercials with the rape victim.
I’ve got three more: Holiday Inn Express
Who needs a foreign policy when you can make jokes?
What strikes me the most about Huckabee is the way he comes across as some kind of straight-talking folksy minister when he says things that are completely preposterous. Like, for instance: “It doesn’t embarrass me one bit to let you know that I believe Adam and Eve were real people.” Really? Because that’s actually a little, you know, crazy.
I think at this point he gets a lot of credit among Republicans for being an honest-to-God (pun fully intended) “social conservative” and a lot of credit with the media for seeming like less of a prima donna than Giuliani/Romney/McCain. I mean, I have no other way of understanding how someone could say we should have quarantined people with AIDS and get so little flak for it. I, like you, expect that this may change, but we shouldn’t underestimate how much it matters that Huckabee is basically the only “photogenic” Republican candidate.
I think the interpretation of these polls as indicating the approaching death of the “front runner” candidates greatly overstate the case. It seems to me that Huckabee is enjoying the sort of surge that happens with the, to now, largely unknown candidates (see: Fred Thompson). This results from a general curiousness among those polled that leads to a jump in the candidates support. I think of this as being like trying on a new hat – try it on, see how it fits, look at yourself in the mirror, and so on.
Huckabee’s support will crest and then wane. I also read that he doesn’t have the organization and money to run a strong national campaign. I disagree with him on a bunch of stuff, mostly in the social category (as opposed to fiscal and national security), but there’s nothing useful to be gained from name calling. He’s just wrong, which is enough for me not to vote for him.
Who is a greater beneficiary of “the Surge”- Bush or Huckabee?
The ugly underside of Huckabee’s surge is the increasingly not-so-subtle ways he is drawing attention to Mitt Romney’s Mormonism. Most recently, Huckabee himself is now claiming that he “heard” that Mormon doctrine teaches that God and Satan were brothers.
Now, Romney is way, way down my list of Republican nominees, and probably doesn’t have the cleanest of hands on the religion issue (his much-ballyhooed “speech” did, in fact, endorse a religious test, albiet one in favor of religion in general as opposed to a specific creed, and he has ** allegedly ** claimed that he would’t hire muslims in his administration). However, Mormons are an important Republican constituency and Huckabee’s campaign is increasingly attacking and villifying them. At this point, I suspect Mormons would be more than happy backing Mr. Messy Personal Life than Mr. Babtist minister in the general, and the longer his campaign wears on, those numbers will only grow. If Huckabee is the nominee, it is increasingly likely that Republicans will lose Nevada and Colorado, possibly Arizona — hell, even UTAH might be competitive in ’08. To say nothing about the social moderates who will not be willing to stomach a so-con for another 4 years.
Huckabee won’t be the nominee. End of story.
Mitt Romney makes a speech to unite Americans of all faiths…Mike Huckabee uses his bully pulpit to smear Mormons and divide people of religion. Who do we want to lead our country, a uniter or a divider. Huckabee should be ashamed.
Carolee
Kansas City
Mitt Romney should respond to ethical questions about his religion, Why they had to leave America,
why his family went to Mexico, What his network of evil bishops did on 9-11 at mountain meadows.
Most of all Romney should use his real name or let the voters know why not.