56,429 Huckabee Supporters Refused to Vote for Hutchinson in AR on Nov. 5

AR Secretary of State (statistics) | 12-23-02 | Theodore R.

[Theodore R.]

In the AR general election of Nov. 5, 56,429 persons who supported the reelection of Republican Gov. Mike Huckabee (a 53 percent winner) did not vote for Republican Sen. Tim Hutchinson (a 46 percent loser). Huckabee polled 427,082 votes, compared to Hutchinson's 370,653.

It is believed that many of these 56,429 persons were Christian conservatives who objected to Hutchinson's divorce and remarriage to a young staffer. Their actions enabled the Democrat senatorial candidate, Attorney General Mark Pryor to unseat Hutchinson and resume the Pryor family dynasty in AR. While Hutchinson was strongly prolife, Pryor is expected to support abortion on demand but perhaps not partial-birth abortion. Ironically, in upholding the highest standard for their candidate, Republicans in AR allowed the far more liberal choice to emerge victorious. When will Republicans stop shooting themselves in the foot? Besides Huckabee, the only other Republican statewide winner was the pro-abortion Lt. Gov. Winthrop Paul Rockefeller, a 60 percent winner.

[Robert_Paulson2]

baloney...

I normally would agree with you.
BUT, this is a consistant pattern with us.

The sooner we admit it and deal with it, the better.
We have a judgementalism problem that is costing us a moral agenda. People make mistakes. We have to learn how to rehab folks who fail... folks like YOU as well as ME... for we all do FAIL, MORALLY and othewise.

Denying we have a problem with judgementalism that is hindering our positive agenda, is like LOTT denying he has a problem with his mouth, whilst being the equivalent of "speaker of the house" for us as "senate majority leader."

We got a problem with the holier than thous.
THEY need to get over thinking THEY can hold people to a higher standard than even GOD does... in something as carnal as human politics.

We have our own moral crisis in the Church and it ain't about divorce and marriage to a member of the opposite sex. Were OUR own house in order, I could see where a little harshness might fit in with our world view... as it is, with pedophilic homosexuals running rampant across denominational lines... we cannot expect a man whose wife left, to stay single like a priest, or widowed pastor.

double standards make me sick, and not just when liberals use them... we have our own double standards.

The blood of children yet unborn is on the hands of those who refused to vote prolife over an ALLEGED affair, after an amicable and uncontested divorce of a good man, by a woman who loathed political life altogether.


Get out of denial. We have a problem with our own double standard and "snatch defeat from the jaws of victory at any cost," moral superiority...

otherwise, on the michelle malkin "growl..." I would hasten to agree with you as on other issues. On this one. I don't.
FWIW... and I know it aint much.

[Theodore R.]

The decision by these 56,000 AR to permit a follower of AR Bill to go to the U.S. Senate will have ramifications in the state for years to come. And conservative Christian voters in other states will in time be faced with a dilemma similar to their situation with the Hutchinson-Pryor race. So often the Republican candidate is not what these voters are looking for, but they can they sit out the election and permit the opposition to win time and time again?

I have a cousin. She and her husband are Christians, but only she is conservative. The husband is a union official and staunch Democrat. He even put a sign for Mary Landriue in his yard, but I think his wife voted for Terrell. So there are some Christian voters who stand firmly with the Democrats. Remember, it was said in 1996 that perhaps 1/3 of Christian voters deserted the divorced Bob Dole and actually voted for AR Bill's reelection. Yet, many of these Christian conservatives did not hold Ronald Reagan's divorce from Jane Wyman against him in 1980, and certainly not in 1984.

[Robert_Paulson2]

get over yourself... christian conservatives who fail to vote for prolife conservatives because of an allegation, unproven, are idiots...

Is that you?

[Ahban]

...she was not going to win anyway. I don't want to bad-mouth Gov. Huckabee. Let's just say I have my reasons.

[Robert_Paulson2]

The wages of sin were always death... but GOD intended for you to kill and eat the fatted calf, not actually kill the adutleror...

"I will have mercy instead of sacrifice" actually means God did NOT want the penalties to be carried out, literally, but that folks would find a merciful way to correct a failed lifestyle of sin...
So...
Calm down yourself... we (who are allegedly christian conservatives) have a problem with the holier than thou attitudes... we effectively kill babies by imposing an unreasoned and impossible standard... and NOT voting for the pro life guy as a punishment to him...

It is a fools form of righteousness... YOU get over it.

[Theodore R.]

Fisher got 8,000 more votes than Hutchinson. AR Bill came into the state on the weekend before the election to boost Fisher. It is still remarkable that the people of AR will do as AR Bill instructs them, but of course not every time do they follow his lead. I think the AR voters were at their best in 1980, when they defeated Clinton for reelection as governor. Still they kept the ultraliberal "Dandy" Dale Bumpers in the Senate in that election. I wonder if there is a contingent of voters in AR who wish "their Bill" would come home.

[Robert_Paulson2]

Actually they DID hold it against Reagan (it was a VERY big deal at the time)... but carter was such a sucking loser, they thought they were all going to die at the hands of Fidel Castro if he got re-elected... and therin lies the problem...

In this case, THEY themselves won't die... just some worthless crack-whore's unwanted "fetus." So, do the moral thing and punish that hutchinson feller, after all who cares if it's not MY child that gets partial birth aborted?

[cynicom]

Why do republicans want conservative votes???? Ask the socialists for theirs.

[Sabertooth]

The sooner we admit it and deal with it, the better. We have a judgementalism problem that is costing us a moral agenda. People make mistakes. We have to learn how to rehab folks who fail... folks like YOU as well as ME... for we all do FAIL, MORALLY and othewise.

This isn't about a guy with a divorce in his past. Reagan had that, and Republicans were OK with that.

This is about a guy who dumped his wife for a younger woman and didn't break a sweat. Screw him and the horse he's riding out on. He shouldn't have left his wife, shouldn't have been so crass, and if he couldn't help that, he should have stepped down and let a decent candidate run.

The real problem in our party is that our politicians think we owe them something, like our votes. My franchise is the currency of my political influence. I'll spend it as I please.

[Theodore R.]

I don't remember Jane Wyman being an issue in any of the Reagan gubernatorial or presidential campaigns. Didn't Jane vote for him in all the elections? I understand that she was a conservative but was not politically involved.

[Ahban]

My, aren't you a snarling, mean-spirited fellow. Since you are so fond of telling everyone what God likes and does not like, I suggest you read Matthew 5:22 and comprehend how He feels about those who call people idiots.

My vote is obligated to NO ONE. No group has supported the GOP more, and gotten less of their agenda from it, than Christian Conservatives. Who are you to tell us what to do with what is our own? Why don't you go blame some group that votes 5% GOP instead of carpet-bombing the GOP base because they hold fast to thier independence and integrity? It is fellows like you that will run conservative christians off. Then how many elections will you win? WHo will you have to snarl at and blame then?

We don't owe you secular 'power-first' types a thing. Not a thing, do you understand? Find some one else to bad mouth besides the people that have faithfully held your party up for decades. And you dare to call us idiots?

[Ahban]

Amen. Hutchinson was even so ungracious as to campaign with new wife in front of the same people who were friends with the first wife. Why did he have to rub people's face in it?

[Sabertooth]

Amen. Hutchinson was even so ungracious as to campaign with new wife in front of the same people who were friends with the first wife. Why did he have to rub people's face in it?

Pride, hubris, narcissism, and a sense of entitlement to rule. No thanks.

[Ahban]

Where are you getting this idea of what God wants? Of course He does not want to punish, but He has and He will. Even in the last chapter of Revelation, He punishes as well as loves, or maybe even because He loves.

I mean He literally let a heathern nation come and take His rebellious people out of the land He swore to give them, killing many. When David sinned with Bathsheba, He forgave, but there were also consequences that involved death. "The sword shall never depart from your house" because of David's sin with Bathsheba, the prophet told him.

You are basically mouthing the arguments of Clinton's supporters, that we should forgive someone regardless of repentence and no matter how hard they rub our face in it. We should just 'move on' when those who turn aside are powerful and can help us get our way. I thought it was disgusting when Slick's supporters mouthed their phoney version of mercy and I do not think any more of it now.

I don't think we imposed, as you put it, "an impossible and unreasonable standard" on Tim Hutchinson. Is it impossible and unreasonable to expect a politician to keep the vows he made to his wife? If so, how much are the vows he has made to us worth?

Fool? So now I am a fool as well as an idiot eh? Perhaps you are right about the nature of God, maybe He just forgives even when their is no repentence, even where there is continued willful defiance of the way He tells us to live. When you compare the poison coming out of your keyboard to Matthew 5:22, you had better hope that you are right.

[org.whodat]

There is no such thing as someone to sleazy for some christan conservatives. How did the PTL bunch get there money....

[Theodore R.]

Didn't Nelson A. Rockefeller campaign with "Happy" in 1966, after having been with his first wife in the 1962 race?

[Arkinsaw]

If we ever have a Senate vote and a Supreme Court nomination comes down to one vote and that vote affects a pro-life ruling.......they can consider if their judgment and sentencing of Senator Hutchinson actually sentenced countless others.

[GraniteStateConservative]

Because I followed the campaign and his candidacy was a joke. I can guarantee you that he wouldn't have come within a hundred miles of that nomination had Tim decided to pull a Torch and not run for re-election. I'm from Arkansas and I have worked in campaigns there and read the Arkansas papers (the DemGaz, the Morning News, etc.) about the race.

[JohnGalt]

While the GOP wished to blame the red herring libertarian voters, that excuse only serves to prove the point that the battle for the center is what is costing the GOP elections.

[Jerrbear]

Following your logic, we should only adhere to our principles if by doing so we advance our cause. I am not innocent in this. I consistently vote the conservative ticket, even when it means choosing the lesser evil. But the entire system has become so Clintonized, so compromised, that there is virtually no difference between the conservative and liberal camps. I don't see this as a victory, having a majority of spineless whimps who govern based on the polls rather than principle. Shouldn't someone stand up for what is right and just, even if it means we lose for a while?