I don’t know that it is either paranoid or delusional. I certainly don’t think it is a coordinated plan between, say, Jeb Bush’s campaign and Huckabee.
I think that the drive and type of a person who proffers himself to politics is one of two basic types. One is the kind that really has that compunction to serve this country (this one is RARE; it is the Unicorn). The other is ego, self-serving and elitist.
The run for President is a powerful aphrodisiac for that self-admirer as well as the opportunity to step up their lifestyle (even if temporary) in the campaign and in its aftermath as a “formal Presidential candidate.” I think that with a little creative campaign accounting there are multiple ways to disappear campaign contributions to pockets unknown.
Yet, even in the difference between the two, there is still the opportunity for one side (like Bush, and the GOPe Chamber of Commerce Cabal) to take full advantage of another candidate’s run. An opportunity to quietly support and steer the contest to the desired outcome (Jeb Bush) via strategic puff pieces on Huff versus, say, Walker or Cruz while running background hits on the two as well.
So. Not a conspiracy of the secret meeting between both sides, but a confluence of events from which opportunities can be had.
Nonetheless, paranoid or not, there are interests afoot here that certainly do plot and scheme and maneuver for their own purposes and not for conservatism, certainly. They’re the same ‘interests’ who call themselves PACs, and ‘consultants’ and ‘pollsters’ and all the other campaign equivalents of military strike team positions, and the delusion is to think they do not exist.
I think Huckabee is running for the ego reason...but I think there are pro Jeb forces at work on the financial end letting Huck know he’ll get X support from this group, that group, etc......
The two are not mutually exclusive, and it’s not necessary for every one of the co-conspirators to know there’s a conspiracy going on, as long as they do their specific job.