[KantianBurke]

“Huckabee aggressively repudiates the Madisonians.”

Huck’s simply mopping up the job Bush began.

[sourcery]

The GOP is composed of multiple factions, each with its own priorities. Unforntunately this election cycle, too many members of the various factions in our coalition are seeking their own faction’s ideal candidate, without regard to the opinions of other factions. The only result of such an attitude will be the destruction of the coalition that is the GOP.

We must unite behind a candidate that is at least acceptable to all the major factions, and who also has a reasonable chance to run an effective, winning campaign in the general election.

[advance_copy]

Under the doctrine that conservatives call "fusion," each faction has respected the other's agenda.

Back when the "other faction" thought it's media could stuff Giuliani down our throats, we were told time and again how we had to set aside our quaint little beliefs about the sanctity of life and marriage as you scolded us for our "intolerance" of "alternative lifestyles".

Well, Mr. Will, when the alternatives offered to us are in the form of Rudy McRomney who (no matter what he says now) is not pro-life and who still thinks the radical gay agenda is "chic", you should have expected the "fusion" to end. It was you, not us, who flushed the coalition. Aside from Mr. Huckabee, there is not one pro-life candidate running for President right now.

And, as we are the majority of voters in the GOP, watch what happens to your Georgetown cocktail circuit.

[Sherman Logan]

The way to achieve Edwards' and Huckabee's populist goal of reducing the role of "special interests," meaning money, in government is to reduce the role of government in distributing money.

Should be bumped, pinged and repeated frequently.

Government regulation inevitably makes capitalism less free market and more cronyish. As such, it is by definition is in the interest of large established businesses as compared to small upstarts.

[hellbender]

Edwards...says a $100-a-barrel price is evidence of... "corporate greed."

He's right! Without "corporate greed," oil would never have been discovered and brought to the market. No oil, therefore no high prices. Problem solved.

[hellbender]

Edwards, the North Carolina of his youth resembled Chechnya today -- "I had to fight to survive. I mean really. Literally."

Maybe he was picked on because he looked effeminate?

[ElkGroveDan]

As a firm member of both “groups” I resent the notion that Reagan conservatism was held together by some unsteady alliance between different thinking people. It’s a crock, and the Huckster is nothing more than a flash in the pan. He’ll be yesterday’s news in a few weeks.

[Dumb_Ox]

God so loves Huckabee's politics that He worked a Midwest miracle on his behalf? Should someone so delusional control nuclear weapons?

I don't like Huckabee, but it's hysterical to see the GOP establishment start mouthing the same impieties of the Left, who said the same thing about Dubya.

[donna]

...defining the middle class as households with annual incomes between $30,000 and $100,000, says a smaller percentage of Americans are in that category than in 1979 -- ... "the entire 'decline' of the middle class came from people moving up the income ladder."

Because, all the mothers in the country had to leave their kids in daycare and go to work.

That makes families feel poor.

[ModelBreaker]

He is the un-Edwards and un-Huckabee -- an adult aiming to reform the real world rather than an adolescent fantasizing mock-heroic "fights" against fictitious villains in a left-wing cartoon version of this country.

I disagree with this completely. Huckabee and Obama are the left and really left versions of the same phenomenon. They both are great speakers who seem to actually answer questions rather than regurgitate focus group pablum. They seem fresh and that they would actually shake things up.

Forget the substance. America has decided to try something really new this year. If you sound fresh and new, it almost doesn't matter what you say. The R's better figure this out. Stick a fork in Romney and Clinton for the general election. They're the most focus-grouped candidates in the whole bunch.

[Clemenza]

Unforntunately this election cycle, too many members of the various factions in our coalition are seeking their own faction’s ideal candidate, without regard to the opinions of other factions.

What I STILL don't understand is how does a meatball like Rudy become the "national security" candidate, when his foreign policy skills have been limited to ethnic festivals? Much as I have problems with Senator Queeg, he at least has experience and knowledge in that area. Plus, Rudy's advisors are the same West End Avenue Commentary Magazine Mafia that got us into the (latest chapter of) "making the world safe for Democracy" crusade to begin with.

Dump the Neocons on foreign policy and keep the snake handlers at bay.

[Sherman Logan]

Huckabee fancies himself persecuted by the Republican "establishment," a creature already negligible by 1964, when it failed to stop Barry Goldwater's nomination.

Strawman argument.

It's pretty obvious that a new GOP "establishment" has developed since then, and that it really, really dislikes Huckabee.

[tbpiper]

Huckabee aggressively repudiates the Madisonians

As an evangelical christian who already has a good pastor in the pulpit and does not need or want one in the whitehouse, I agressively repudiate Huckabee and his social justice leanings.

[The Ghost of FReepers Past]

Every candidate tears the fusion. That’s the problem some of us have been pointing out for months now. I find Huckabee more acceptable than most of the others. I guess it all depends on how many other Republican voters agree. Looks to me like quite a few of them do.

[Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus]

Not a big fan of George Will - for one, he’s boring, just like the game of baseball he always shills for - but as a fundamental Baptist, I am certainly no fan of Huckabee, either. Hick is a socialist. He’s pro-life, but so what? As President, Huck would work for economic policies which largely drive the abortion industry engine (welfare —> illegitimacy —> abortion mills), so even his pro-life stance is negated by his non-pro-life causing economics. Fredhas the pro-life credentials, without the Huck’s unfortunate socialism.

[Dreagon]

Under the doctrine that conservatives call “fusion,” each faction has respected the other’s agenda.

---

Sorry, but if the articles reasoning is based on this lie, then it’s not worth reading.

The evangelicals were getting used, and occasionally thrown a bone. Then the Reps decided they would just go ahead and cram a Guiliani or a Romney down the social cons throats. The truth is it was the corporate conservatives who betrayed the “fusion”, and are now paying the price.

[JSDude1]

This whole piece while fine, does’t mention at all the job that G. Bush, McCain, Guilani and Romney ARE doing to ‘redefine’ and destry the Conservative Coalition!! Very Unbecoming of the author.

[marsh2]

There are few candiadtes for the “fiscal conservatives” and the “pro-individual liberty people like me who want self-government limited and devolved back as close to local people as possible. This allows for cultural, community and regional differences and maximizes individual freedoms and responsibility. Romney, Huckabee, Rudy are all for big federal Nanny state programs to solve our problems. They want to pull power to Washington DC. Fred is a federalist and embraces the limited government devolved to the local level.

[gitmo]

Like Job after losing his camels and acquiring boils, the conservative movement is in distress. Mike Huckabee shreds the compact that has held the movement's two tendencies in sometimes uneasy equipoise. Social conservatives, many of whom share Huckabee's desire to "take back this nation for Christ," have collaborated with limited-government, market-oriented, capitalism-defending conservatives who want to take back the nation for James Madison. Under the doctrine that conservatives call "fusion," each faction has respected the other's agenda. Huckabee aggressively repudiates the Madisonians.

Wrong. It's not Huckabee but all the GOP candidates. None of them are conservatives. They are PARTIAL conservatives. When the conservative voters are faced with a slate of candidates, each of whom is a schizophrenic conservative they are forced to select the one that matches their personal set of priorities within conservatism.

A major part of the problem is ignorance within the movement. Many of us are unable to discern conservative principles when they are couched in new issues. So they fail to recognize the LIBERAL aspects of their favored candidate. And every one of these candidates in the GOP is a LIBERAL to one extent or another.

The problem comes down to determining which candidate is conservative on the issues that are most urgent and most important to us. The WOT is obviously an urgent issue. Abortion is important, but no more urgent than it has been since the 70's. Protecting our borders is important and urgent, in light of the WOT. Protecting marriage shouldn't even be a Federal issue, but the reciprocity clause and the actions of activist judges is forcing it out. Protecting the recent gains in tax policy is urgent because of the expiring legislation.

Lacking a true conservative in the mix, how do we choose?

That is what is fracturing the movement and the party. The fact that we don't have a conservative option on the ticket.

[2ndDivisionVet]

A House Divided Will Not Stand
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1949161/posts