the same impression that people get after seeing this guy
Posted on 02/04/2008 8:20:41 PM PST by JRochelle
Of all the possible Super Tuesday outcomes, one is more certain than any other: Mike Huckabee will not carry the state of Utah.
In large part it’s because Mitt Romney, a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the man credited with saving the Salt Lake City Olympics, is more popular here than in any other state.
But the other reason is that overwhelmingly Mormon Utah has taken a profound dislike to the Southern Baptist preacher best known for his nice-guy persona.
The wellspring of Huckabee hate is a now-famous Dec. 16 New York Times Magazine interview in which the former Arkansas governor, in an “innocent voice,” is reported to have asked, “Don’t Mormons ... believe that Jesus and the devil are brothers?”
To Mormons, Huckabee’s eyebrow-raising question represented not only a gross distortion of their beliefs but also a carefully calculated move by a Christian politician who surely knew better.
Huckabee’s remark prompted Romney to call the comments “just not the American way” on NBC’s “Today” show.
Huckabee quickly apologized, saying that Romney’s Mormonism had nothing to do with whether he should be president. With that, the candidates and the national media moved on to other topics.
In Utah, however, all was not forgiven.
“There is a feeling that Huckabee has exploited a lot of the anti-Mormon sentiment,” said LaVarr Webb, a political consultant and publisher in Utah.
“The feeling is that he would certainly know the answers to these questions that he’s been asking sometimes,” said Chuck Gates, assistant managing editor of Utah’s Deseret Morning News.
According to Webb and other state political insiders interviewed by Politico, many Mormons maintain that Huckabee’s apology did not go nearly far enough.
Quin Monson, assistant director of the Center for the Study of Elections and Democracy at Brigham Young University, says many observers believe that “evangelicals have rejected Romney, and that Huckabee is aiding and abetting that. ... He’s egging it on.”
As it turns out, this isn’t the first time that Huckabee has rubbed Utahans the wrong way. In the summer of 1998, then-Arkansas Gov. Huckabee, along with fellow national church leaders, attended the National Southern Baptist Convention in Salt Lake City.
At the time, the decision to hold the event in the shadow of the Mormon Tabernacle was viewed by many Mormons as an insulting stab directed at the very heart of the LDS church.
Worse, according to an account published in the Salt Lake Tribune during the convention, some 2,000 “messengers” of the Southern Baptist Convention went door to door in Utah and proselytized, “armed with questionnaires and their personal belief in Jesus Christ as their savior.”
Because of his participation in that convention and because of his theological background, many Utahans believe that Huckabee has been deeply disingenuous throughout the campaign — not just in one well-publicized interview — in his approach toward the issue of Romney’s Mormon faith.
The Huckabee campaign did not respond to e-mail and phone requests for comment.
The Baptists’ choice of Salt Lake City was a deliberate one, said James Guth, a leading authority on the influence of religion in politics and professor at Furman University.
The Baptists intended to “create a new mission field.” Mormons and the Southern Baptists, he explained, are members of “competing missionary religions.”
“It used to be that the Mormons were in Utah and Southern Baptists were in the South,” Guth said. “Now, Mormons are all over the world, and Southern Baptists want to be all over the world.”
Aside from the issue of clashing faiths, there is a more practical component to Huckabee’s unpopularity.
There is a widespread belief, not just in Utah but among many Romney partisans, that Huckabee’s long-shot — and lingering — candidacy is serving little purpose other than to siphon votes from Romney, Utah’s adopted son, by splitting the conservative vote against John McCain.
“There’s just the feeling that if we really wanted to unite behind a conservative candidate, we would unite behind Romney,” said Dave Hansen, former campaign manager for Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah).
“You can’t force [Huckabee] out, but all things considered, I think there are a lot of conservatives who wish he were not still in the race.”
In the unlikely event that Huckabee does capture the Republican nomination, his Utah baggage could come back to haunt him.
In the deeply red state where President Bush still maintains some of his highest approval ratings, a place that has ranked as the most Republican state in the nation in six of the past eight presidential elections, a BYU poll released Monday reveals that Huckabee would pull off the seemingly impossible.
As GOP nominee, he would lose the state of Utah in a hypothetical matchup with Democrat Barack Obama, 58 percent to 42 percent.
Romney, by contrast, would defeat Obama 69 percent to 31 percent. McCain would also win against Obama, though by a more modest 55 percent to 45 percent.
Still, there are limits to how much Utah dislikes Huckabee: In a head-to-head matchup with Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton, Huckabee wins handily, 60 percent to 41 percent.
here’s what Romney said in 2002
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kk1bJOpYUqE
“”We do have tough gun laws in Massachusetts; I support them,” he said. “I won’t chip away at them; I believe they protect us and provide for our safety.””
Here’s Huckabee’s views on guns:
Our Founding Fathers, having endured the tyranny of the British Empire, wanted to guarantee our God-given liberties. They devised our three branches of government and our system of checks and balances. But they were still concerned that the system could fail, and that we might someday face a new tyranny from our own government. They wanted us to be able to defend ourselves, and that’s why they gave us the Second Amendment. They knew that a government facing an armed populace was less likely to take away our rights, while a disarmed population wouldn’t have much hope. As Ronald Reagan reminded us, “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.” Without our Second Amendment rights, all of our other rights aren’t inalienable, they’re just “on loan” from the government.
Romney would only win those 6 states in the general election.
Hey DOOFUS, I agree.
Why are you guys such idiots. Didn’t you see my previous post?
Here let me repeat is again for you.
Huckabee is absolutely unelectable in the intermountain west due to his stupidity whether it is intentional or not.
Mitt is unelectable due to his religion in the South even though he tries not to make it an issue or not.
McCain irritates the base across the board, but he is still our jerk and we will still reluctantly get behind him, because we are familiar with him. He may be irritable, but he electable unlike the other two candidates.
It disgusts me but that is the reality of this cycle.
if Orrin Hatch or Bob Bennett were running, I would be first in line to support him. They are real and Romney is not.
Oooooohhhhh!
McCain isn’t going to follow Osama to the gates of Hell?
and bring him to justice?
and let Johnny Cochran represent him in a Los Angeles court?
.
.
.
.
.
Isn’t that why he has to go to the gates of Hell? To bring Cochran back, too?
Nope.
I won't.
He won't get a dime from me. He won't get a minute from me. And he won't get my vote.
And I'm generally a pretty practical person.
Huckabee is not a nice person. Go, Mitt!
ok I can agree with that though I think huckabee has a better chance than Mitt.
remember, Bush somehow managed to win twice...
mcCain will win NY in a landslide but I want my vote to send a message that the GOP should strongly stand for life and the 2nd amendment...and it also wouldn’t hurt to overhaul the tax code with just one rate, something that Romney strongly opposes.
McCain also has a pretty decent pro-life record but a vote for Huckabee would be much stronger. A vote for Romney would show that conservatives aren’t that interested in pro-life. It’s my #1 issue because millions of babies are killed throughout America.
Ha, I suppose MR is on the right side of the Republican conservative movement...Pull you head out of your @ss!
No more threat of Saddam seeking WMD's is there?
The McCain of 2004 for the war against how it was run.
How many of us have been railing for years about how the war started with Shock and Awe and then was fought with one hand tied behind our backs?
The McCain of 2005 for the war but wanted 250,000 more American “boots on the ground”
If a Surge of that magnitude had been carried out in 2005, the war might very well have been wrapped up by now. As it was, lack of progress in the war allowed the Democrats to gain control of Congress with Cut & Run promises and we are now one Presidential election away from losing a war that should have ended with victory already.
The McCain of 2006. Fathers the Baker Commission. Wants to cut a political deal with Iran and Syria so the USA could slink away from Iraq
Do you make up this Bravo Sierra, MNJohnnie, or does somebody else make it up for you?
This was McCain really said about the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group:
The McCain of 2007. Presidential Campaign dead in the water. McCain has surrogates fraudulent start claiming HE was the real father of the Surge strategy.
Well, here is an article dated December, 2006 where even conservative columnist Robert Novak is saying that McCain's pushing of the Surge was costing him politically.
Novak: McCain's 'aggressive surge' stance backfiring
So, Count of Monte Logan, which McCain is the real McCain?
The McCain whose actual positions are documented by the historical record or the McCain of MNJohnnie's creative writing?
OMG! where have you been all my life?
I certainly wouldn’t posit that Huck’s conservatism was as pure as the wind-driven snow, but have you taken a serious look at the other guys? Romney-care and McCap’n’trade don’t strike me as particularly conservative policy directions.
At bare minimum I know Huck will always be rock-solid pro-life and pro-2nd amendment, which is more than I can say for the other two.
On the earlier comment...If he gets the nomination...watch what Hillary does to the Mormon doctrine.
What the hell are you talking about?
You are crazy!!!!
You do know that cap and trade is a conservative policy for reducing all kinds of other pollution, right? The liberal position was always to just stick a big tax on everything.
The other possibility would be to set property rights for air so that if someone significantly pollutes the airspace that you own, you could sue or charge a fee. But that’s just an idea and nobody has really explained how that could actually work.
>>>Vote for the fellow freeper. yes, he’s on the left with the bass guitar.<<<
That looks like the Huckster. The only way the Huckster would get a vote out of me is when I voted with my fellow jurors to convict him of fraud.
you sound like a political hack working for the Hillary campaign. Too bad you can’t debate the issues.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.