On MEET THE PRESS on NBC on Sunday, Mike Huckabee received an appropriately aggressive grilling from Tim Russert --- and showed, once again, why those who write him off as a country-bumpkin/religious zealot/political-flash-in-the-pan utterly underestimate the guy and his appeal.
Yes, he couldn't defend his own stupid "plan" on immigration-- no one could -- but he was no more embarrassing on that issue than is Romney or Thompson (they're all pathetic -- and Rudy isn't much better. Only McCain speaks with anything like credibility on immigration).
Meanwhile, I've attached some of the excerpts of the transcript where Huckabee is hit hard-- and hits right back, effectively it seems to me. The selections begin with his response to Romney criticism about his foreign policy...
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And it's interesting to me that while a few weeks ago on this program Mitt Romney was very critical of me for making that statement, a few months earlier on MEET THE--rather, on "60 Minutes," he himself had talked about the major mistakes that had been made by the administration. He demanded of me an apology, but he did not demand of himself an apology for also being critical, as have most Republicans. Now, I think Republicans are big enough and maybe wise enough that we can be in disagreement with certain policies and still be behind our president and behind this administration in many of the things which they have done right. And I've been very complimentary of the president on the issues where I think he's been right. I stood by him in the war, I stood by him in the surge. I wasn't a latecomer like Mitt Romney was to believing that the surge was effective. And we've seen 76 percent decline in civilian deaths, 62 percent decline in military casualties since the surge began. It is working. We are finally beginning to see those signs of victory in Iraq.
MR. RUSSERT: You're suggesting that Mitt Romney's not running an honorable campaign.
GOV. HUCKABEE: I've been very clear about it. Mitt Romney is running a very desperate and, frankly, a dishonest campaign. He's attacked me, and, and yesterday--or Friday, I guess it was, he launched then just a broadside attack against Senator McCain. Now, Senator McCain and I are rivals for the presidency, but I've said on many occasions, I'll say it again here today, Senator McCain is an honorable man, and I believe he's an honest man. I believe he's a man of conviction. And I felt like that, when Mitt Romney went after the integrity of John McCain, he stepped across a line. John McCain's a hero in this country. He's a hero to me.
And I just felt like that when Mitt Romney gets on your show and says that he had the NRA endorsement when he didn't; when he comes on and says he's pro-life and yet he signed a bill that gives a $50 co-pay for an elective abortion in his state's health care plan; when he claims that he's really for the Second Amendment, but he--on this show he talked about how he supported limitations and restrictions on lawful, law-abiding citizens having gun ownership rights, those are not the marks of a person who's pro-life and pro-Second Amendment. And then the things where he's made up these visions that he's had of marching with Martin Luther King and his dad marching with him. You know, Tim, what I've said, and I've been pretty blunt about it, if you aren't being honest in obtaining a job, can we trust you to be honest if you get the job?.....
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MR. RUSSERT: Do you think some of the commercials that have been on the air talking about your record have hurt?
GOV. HUCKABEE: Well, they may have. I mean, people in Iowa have been bombarded. I mean, bombarded. Not only on commercials, but in the mail, at a time when most people were kind of looking forward to going out to the mailbox and picking up some nice Christmas cards, instead they were finding out what a bum Mike Huckabee is. And I don't know what kind of effect it has. People of Iowa, I think, like a positive campaign. But the relentless attacks--and they have been relentless. And when you're outspent 20-to-1, as I have been here in Iowa, you know, I think it's pretty amazing that I'm where I am.
MR. RUSSERT: But has Mitt Romney said anything that's untrue about you?
GOV. HUCKABEE: How long do we have on the program today? He's said many things that are untrue. He said that I reduced methamphetamine sentences in Arkansas. Truth is I signed a bill in 1999 that doubled those sentences. We did not reduce them. Our sentences were four times harsher than they were in Massachusetts. He said that I supported special breaks for illegal aliens. That's not true, Tim. We supported simply giving children who had earned a scholarship the same--it never happened, it didn't make the legislature. He made allegations that our increased spending by ridiculous amounts, and The New York Times came back and defended that, and said that's just simply not true. And they took him apart and showed that the increases in spending were, frankly, the same if not a little better than his if you took into consideration the accounting methods we changed in Arkansas, very modest gains in spending.
He made claims about things like tax increases, but he failed to mention that some of those were either court ordered or they were voted on by the people and approved by the people for things as roads. And I left my roads in great shape, took them from the worst in the country to what Truckers magazine said were the most improved. He left his roads in a mess in Massachusetts, with huge problems in the infrastructure. He claimed that he didn't raise taxes, but, in fact, he did raise taxes by half a billion dollars.
MR. RUSSERT: Fees.
GOV. HUCKABEE: Fees. It's a tax. If you're a small business person and you pay more money than you paid last year to the government, you can call it a fee, call it a tax, it's a three letter word that means the same.
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On faith as central to America...
MR. RUSSERT: But where does this leave non-Christians?
GOV. HUCKABEE: Oh, it leaves them right in the middle of America. I think the Judeo-Christian background of this country is one that respects people not only of faith, but it respects people who don't have faith. The, the key issue of real faith is that it never can be forced on someone. And never would I want to use the government institutions to impose mine or anybody else's faith or to restrict. I think the First Amendment, Tim, is explicitly clear. Government should be restricted, not faith, government. And government's restriction is on two fronts: one, it's not to prefer one faith over another; and the second, it's not to prohibit the practice of somebody's religion, period.
MR. RUSSERT: So you'd have no problem appointing atheists to your Cabinet?
GOV. HUCKABEE: No, I wouldn't have any problem at all appointing atheists. I probably had some working for me as governor. You know, I think you got to realize if people want--say, "Well, you were a pastor," but I was a governor 10 1/2 years. I have more executive experience running a government. I was actually in a government position longer than I was a pastor. And if people want to know how I would blend these issues, the best way to look at it is how I served as a governor. I didn't ever propose a bill that we would remove the capitol dome of Arkansas and replace it with a steeple. You know, we didn't do tent revivals on the grounds of the capitol. But my faith is important to me. I try to be more descriptive of it. I just don't want to run from it and act like it's not important. It drives my views on everything from the environment to poverty to disease to hunger. Issues, frankly, I think the Republicans need to take a greater leadership role in. And as a Republican, but as a Christian, I would want to make sure that we're speaking out on some of these issues that I think we've been lacking in as a party and as, as a nation.
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on homosexuality....
MR. RUSSERT: But this is what concerns people. This, this is what you did say about homosexuality: "I feel homosexuality is an aberrant, unnatural and sinful lifestyle." That's millions of Americans.
GOV. HUCKABEE: Tim, understand, when a Christian speaks of sin, a Christian says all of us are sinners. I'm a sinner, everybody's a sinner. What one's sin is, means it's missing the mark. It's missing the bull's eye, the perfect point. I miss it every day; we all do. The perfection of God is seen in a marriage in which one man, one woman live together as a couple committed to each other as life partners. Now, even married couples don't do that perfectly, so sin is not some act of equating people with being murderers or rapists...
MR. RUSSERT: But when you say aberrant or unnatural, do you believe you're born gay or you choose to be gay?
GOV. HUCKABEE: I don't know whether people are born that way. People who are gay say that they're born that way. But one thing I know, that the behavior one practices is a choice. We may have certain tendencies, but how we behave and how we carry out our behavior--but the important issue that I want to address, because I think when you bring up the faith question, Tim, I've been asked more about my faith than any person running for president. I'm OK with that. I hope I've answered these questions very candidly and very honestly. I think it's important for us to talk about it. But the most important thing is to find out, does our faith influence our public policy and how? I've never tried to rewrite science textbooks. I've never tried to come out with some way of imposing a doctrinaire Christian perspective in a way that is really against the Constitution. I've never done that.
MR. RUSSERT: But you said you would ban all abortions.
GOV. HUCKABEE: Well, that's not just because I'm a Christian, that's because I'm an American. Our founding fathers said that we're all created equal. I think every person has intrinsic worth and value...
MR. RUSSERT: But many Americans believe that that would be, that would be you imposing your faith belief...
GOV. HUCKABEE: But, no. It's not a faith belief. It's deeper than that. It's a human belief. It goes to the heart of who we are as a civilization. If I believe that your intrinsic worth is not changed by your ancestry, your last name, by your IQ, by your abilities or disabilities, if I value your life and respect it with dignity and worth because it is human, then that's what draws me to the inescapable conclusion that I should be for the sanctity of every and each human life. That's why we go after that 12-year-old boy in the woods of North Carolina when he's lost, not because he has greater worth than someone else, but because we believe he has equal worth as everyone else. I like it that in this country we treat each other--at least we should--with that sense of equality. Our founding fathers penned that in the Declaration of Independence when they declared...
MR. RUSSERT: Some Americans believe that life does not begin at conception, and that it's...
GOV. HUCKABEE: Well, scientifically I think that's almost...
MR. RUSSERT: But...
GOV. HUCKABEE: ...a point that you couldn't argue. How, how could you say that life doesn't begin at conception...
MR. RUSSERT: Right. Do you respect that view?
GOV. HUCKABEE: ...biologically?
MR. RUSSERT: Do you respect that view?
GOV. HUCKABEE: I respect it as a view, but I don't think it has biological credibility.
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I hope that Huckabee does well on Thursday. A strong showing in Iowa for the former Arkansas governor would constitute an appropriate rebuke to the negativity and saturation advertising by the Romney campaign. Even if Romney goes on to win the nomination (still a very real possibility) he will help himself, the party and the country if he turns away from the idea of spending millions of dollars to distort the records of his opponents. Surely, the Mittster has a more positive message to offer the nation about his own vision and leadership abilities (both of which command respect) than concentrating all his resources on sliming Huckabee and McCain.
Meanwhile, good luck to all our candidates and heaven protect us from the Democrats.....