Posted on 02/12/2008 8:03:58 AM PST by TornadoAlley3
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, showing no signs of giving up in his quest for the GOP nomination, on Tuesday questioned presumptive nominee Sen. John McCain’s (Ariz.) ability to turn out conservatives in a general election.
Huckabee, who has repeatedly bested McCain in conservative, Southern states, said he is the candidate winning the “states that are essential to being elected as a Republican.”
“Republicans are not going to be elected because they carried Delaware, Connecticut, New York and California,” Huckabee said, referring to some of the states McCain has won. He added that the question is whether the Arizonan will be “able to energize the base of the party in a way that will get the foot soldiers out.”
In a wide-ranging discussion with reporters at a breakfast sponsored by The Christian Science Monitor, Huckabee encouraged reporters to “look a little deeper than just the number board.”
Despite the long mathematical odds Huckabee faces as he remains in the race against McCain, the former governor indicated Tuesday morning that he has no plans to withdraw anytime soon. Huckabee said he plans to start campaigning in Wisconsin, which holds its primary Feb. 19, on Wednesday.
Campaign manager Chip Saltsman said after the breakfast that Huckabee would campaign there for much of the week and then make a decision about how much more time to spend in the state.
Wisconsin, which holds an open primary, would seem to be an obvious place for McCain to continue his path to the nomination on the backs of independent voters.
But Huckabee said the state has a strong “pro-life” core of Republican voters. The former governor said his support of a constitutional amendment banning abortion – coupled with McCain’s opposition to such an amendment – and his opposition to embryonic stem cell research will help him with conservative Republican voters there.
Huckabee also said his campaign planned to put a lot of effort into Texas, which is scheduled to hold its primary on March 4.
“Texas is very, very important to us,” Huckabee said, adding that he plans “to spend a great deal of time there between now and March 4.”
Despite the occasional attempt to distinguish himself from McCain on conservative issues, Huckabee continued to show an unwillingness to attack the senator.
That said, the former governor did question the long line of conservatives who have endorsed McCain in recent days, saying they are “people that had nothing nice to say about him, and now they’re suddenly standing on stage with their arm around him.”
Huckabee said he would never be the “establishment” candidate, but his supporters are not “me-too people.”
The former governor also sized up the current state of play in the Democratic contest, saying Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), who is riding a wave of momentum, should have been taken more seriously from the beginning.
“People underestimated Barack Obama and his capacity to inspire,” Huckabee said. “Obama may present a difficult challenge [for Republicans] because he’s new and different,” he added.
“His weakness is he [has] never been tested.”
Huckabee said Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) has run into trouble in recent contests because she can be too wonkish, and not as inspirational, as a candidate.
“She does not have the personality of her husband. Very few people do,” Huckabee said.
Despite the nearly cemented conventional wisdom that Huckabee cannot win the GOP nomination, he declined to talk about what he might do if he fails in his quest.
The former governor did rule out a third party bid and a Senate run. There has been a great deal of speculation that Huckabee might challenge Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.), and the filing deadline to do so is inching closer.
“There’s a greater chance that I would dye my hair green, cover my body with tattoos and go on a rock tour with Amy Winehouse,” Huckabee joked.
The only way Huckabee would discuss the future, other than talking about his ongoing campaign, was to say that he would “absolutely” push for the anti-abortion rights amendment to be included in the GOP platform at this summer’s convention.
Yes, that’s the great irony.
McCain can’t energize the base (so far), but neither has Huckabee.
If Huckabee could, obviously we wouldn’t be in this situation. While it’s true that the early primaries were not in the more conservative states, the showing made by the more conservatives candidates was insufficient to demonstrate viability by any standard.
>>”I question Hucksterbee’s ability to energize anyone”<<
So much tripe in here lately. Anyone? His base is more motivated than McCain’s by far, which is why he has a chance in Wisconsin.
Wisconsin’s an open primary and McCain supporters are either weak, or figure he’s got it locked up, or both, and will be easily tempted to go screw with the Democratic primary. I do this regularly when we have no important contest on the ballot, as do a lot of Democrats. But this year, there’s no way I’ll mess with the Democrats because I’m voting for Huckabee. But many of McCain’s potential supporters, as I said, might cast Democrat ballots instead.
This will be a big enough factor to have a chance at influencing the outcome, and I’m not sure the pollsters will pick it up.
McCain Sucks! maybe less than the dims, but he still sucks. So does this primary process. This cycle is the first exercise of the mechanics in my voting lifetime (when we don't have a pre-ordained successor candidate) of the primary process, and it's totally broke. The fact that 4% of the population can deselect half of our candidates is unbelievable ( and those states are mostly blue states, they're not gonna vote red anyway...). We need to rebuild.
Well, we’re energized, but just not the way the RNC hoped we’d be...
When Republicans carry the South, they tend to win. When Dems pick up a few southern states, the Reps always lose. McCain has been losing in way too many Southern states.
“Republicans are not going to be elected because they carried Delaware, Connecticut, New York and California,” Huckabee said, referring to some of the states McCain has won. He added that the question is whether the Arizonan will be “able to energize the base of the party in a way that will get the foot soldiers out.”
Huckabee has a strong point. During those months when Giuliani had a big lead over all Republican hopefuls, I often commented that blue states want to nominate a candidate that red states will have to elect.
Well, that’s what we’ve got, only the mostly blue states are nominating McCain, and the red states will have to provide probably 80% or more of the support for him to have a chance to win. Anyone counting on New Hampshire, New York, New Jersey and California going for McCain in November??
This scenario is inevitable as the country club Republicans try to gain greater influence in the party.
“This cycle is the first exercise of the mechanics in my voting lifetime (when we don’t have a pre-ordained successor candidate) of the primary process, and it’s totally broke.”
And that’s another reason why I say both Bushes have trashed and weakened the Republican party built up by others.
Neither of the two VPs selected by the Bushes became a strong presidential contender after the Bushes, Quayle because he was so unknown when selected and too easily diminished by the media, and Cheney because of health considerations and maybe age.
But neither Bush picked a VP that could logically became a strong presidential candidate. They picked for purely personal reasons (many guesses what those were), and as with many of their decisions, did nothing to strengthen the party or its future prospects. Each seriously damaged the party’s future, and their selection of VPs is just one more example.
I agree completely. GWB should have “accepted” Cheney’s resignation for his second term. God bless Dick Cheney for his service, we couldn’t have had a better VP. I would love to have him for President if his health was OK.
Okay. I understand and don’t disagree. However, if we’re going to rebuild, what do we coalesce around? What are the core issues that we all agree on? You can’t put together a coalition of voters without a platform. Politics in general has become so sound-bite oriented, so divisive and full of factions that I really don’t know what the common threads are that hold us together. We have to identify those things, and agree on candidates based on those things, or we will just bicker ourselves to insignificance while the pragmatists (and/or those who will say anything to anybody to gain power) get their way.
How can you believe anything that cultist the huckster says?
I am no prophet, and I don't know. However, in your question lies the problem, i.e., what are the agreeable core issues?- and that points up great problems. Cultures have traditionally looked to "a religion" to provide bedrock values, but our country, and party has outgrown that, witness the conflict raised with a Mormon, and a Southern Baptist. We are many diverse religions, so religion is not a viable catalyst. It's somewhat hard to define Conservatism, because we have all sorts of people telling us now that McCain is conservative, when most of us know that is total BS. Many others are convinced Romney or Huckabee or even Bush are Conservative, and I don't believe that. We can't even agree on "Conservative". Everybody is now invoking Reagan but that's a fad, just like "Change" is for the Rats. So I am in the same boat as you- I don't really know what we need, just that we need another primary system for starters.
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