Huckabee: Pastor-in-Grief

"That person who agrees with you 80 percent of the time is a friend and an ally; NOT a 20 percent traitor."
Ronald Reagan, quoted on KCBS radio in 1972 by Reagan's gubernatorial chief of staff

Normally, I am apprehensive of participating in too much overt criticism of a potential GOP candidate. After all, I may end up having to defend the elected candidate in a general election.

Ron Paul and Mike Huckabee seem to be the exception to the "Reagan rule" of "My 80 percent ally is not my 20 percent enemy". One is the Dennis Kucinich of the right; the other, the GOP version of Jimmy Carter.

Wearing a Bill Clinton mask, a supporter of Republican presidential candidate and former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee stands outside a campaign rally in Des Moines, Iowa January 1, 2008.
REUTERS/Andy Clark

I don't know if the Reuters caption is in fact correct in labeling this man a Huckabee supporter. AP and Reuters have gotten captions wrong before with their pictures. But if he is a true-blue supporter, it's quite a telling photo.

Most of the conservatives I consort with in the blogosphere are mercilessly anti-Huckabee. Born Again Redneck compared him to Jimmy Carter. As did Stephen Green at Vodka Pundit. Ann Coulter also made the comparison. Selwyn Duke of American Thinker sees evangelical Southern Baptists being duped all over again.

Mike's America has an excellent roundup of quotes from prominent conservative pundits and leaders, criticizing the Huckster. Here's just a sampling:

"We are engaged in a global war on terror which will not disappear because you imply a willingness, without any preconditions apparently, to sit down with the enemy."
Bob Dole

"I'm sorry to say it is my sense that Mr. Huckabee is not so much leading a movement as riding a wave. One senses he brilliantly discerned and pursued an underserved part of the voting demographic, and went for it. Clever fellow. To me, the tipoff was 'Don't Mormons believe that Jesus and the devil are brothers?'"
Peggy Noonan

"Since he is not running for head of a theological college, what is he doing proclaiming himself a "Christian leader" in an ad promoting himself for president?...I suspect that neither Jefferson's Providence nor Washington's Great Author nor Lincoln's Almighty would look kindly on the exploitation of religious differences for political gain."
Charles Krauthammer

"Mike Huckabee is a Christian socialist. He is a good man, but with a Big Government heart. He is the most liberal of all the Republican presidential candidates on economic issues...Huckabee's approach to every problem or perceived problem is to pass a law and launch another government program...Four years of a Huckabee presidency would ensure that there wouldn't be a penny's worth of differences between the Republican Party and the Democratic Party on economic issues."
Richard Viguerie ,"the funding father of the conservative movement" for his role in helping build dozens of conservative organizations.

Ann Coulter: "Huckabee is a "compassionate conservative" only in the sense that calling him a conservative is being compassionate."

Read more (also cross-posted at Flopping Aces)...

A parting quote....

Stephen Bainbridge:
Mike Huckabee may be a “different” kind of Republican. He’s also the wrong kind.