Here’s what Mike Huckabee had to say when visiting Utah this week:
“Boy, do I ever know” that he is not well-liked in Utah, said Huckabee. But, he added, “I have never said anything unkind about Mormons.”
When “11 words were completely misconstrued” when spoken about the LDS religion in a long New York Times profile of him, Huckabee said he “immediately” apologized publicly to Romney and church members in general.
The context of his comments and indeed his entire campaign in Iowa was to set up himself as the “real Christian” and Romney as the cult member who believed Jesus Christ and Satan were brothers. That is the reality of what happened. His campaign — and subsequent partnership with McCain to bring down Romney in West Virginia and elsewhere — were cynical and deliberately intended to exploit the worst fears of Republican primary-goers.
Huckabee’s statement takes first prize in any competition for Disingenuous Nonapologies. It was one of those statements that throws guilt onto the sinned against rather than the sinner.
So yeah, I can sign on to your “Huckabee is a liar” agreement. No problem.
Hmm. Why does he have a need to suck up to Mormons now? Even more curious…why does he think that his dissembling will suddenly become credible? All I gleen from his self-serving revisionism is his lingering belief that anyone who thinks Satan is Jesus’ brother is so unredeemably stupid they will believe anything he says.
Oops, that would be glean not gleen. But while I’m at it…does anyone think Mormons will ever warm up to him?
I know I am in a minority in the Church, but I like Huckabee. I think he was among the most genuine of the candidates, with a wonderful sense of humor (as long as it did not involve LDS). I also think he cares about people as well as programs (to use more or less LDS jargon)–I do not think he is an idealogue.
I also think that how we perceive a statement or actions depends upon where we sit. For example, I do not see baptism for the dead as insulting to anyone. However, some in other faith traditions, particularly those whose peoples may, in the past, have been compelled to become of a different faith, see it differently. They may see as insulting something that I see as a matter of fairness.
(I see it this way–“we think we are right, you think you are right, fair enough. But just in case we are right, we are going to make it possible so that in the hereafter you can go to heaven also if you want to.” Does not seem insulting to me. Fact is, I would be honored if my brothers and sisters of other faith traditions performed ordinances for me so that, if they are right, I could go to heaven too (not that I think I am wrong.))
With that preface of how hard it is for many of us in our world view to understand why some would be insulted by LDS baptism for the dead, I think that Huckabee in his world view may genuinely not understand why LDS consider some of his comments offensive to us, particularly when he quickly apologized for his wise crack about Mormons’ believing that Jesus and Satan are brothers.
Huckabee’s use of the “Christian Leader” title and the Cross in his ads and his attempt to denigrate Mitt Romney’s religion was a thinly-veiled attempt to impose a religious test in violation of Article Six of the Constitution.
The Huckster was the keynote speaker at an anti-Mormon 1998 conference in Salt Lake City. And he was quoted saying he “knows nothing about Mormons”?
I see no reason to believe him, now.
DavidH, I know what you are talking about regarding Huckabee. I watched all of the Republican debates during the primaries, and I have seen several of Huck’s talks on Youtube. He is a charming speaker, certainly more inspiring than Romney for example. He certainly comes across as warm, and is more of an average Joe than most of the other Republicans. This is, of course, one of the things that I continue to love about Sarah Palin.
The big difference, however, and the area where I feel we are going to have to agree to disagree is that Huckabee is NOT a conservative. He is an old-style Southern populist, more Huey Long than Ronald Reagan. Of course Huey Long also was a social conservative, but he had a complete inability to expand his base anywhere outside of the South. Huckabee has the same issue — his base is confined to evangelical voters. Huckabee is a populist — an economic liberal and protectionist.
I can’t imagine a worse combination to lead the modern-day Republican party — a toxic Southern social conservative who knows nothing about foreign affairs and is an economic populist. A guaranteed disaster.
People have forgotten or chosen not to remember the 1998 conference where Huckabee spoke as many people assaulted Mormons. They have also forgotten all of those “Christian leader” ads from the primaries. Well, people in Utah have not forgotten, which is why Huckabee has figuratively gotten some rotten tomatoes when traveling there.
I am not a fan of Huckabee, but the comparison to Huey Long is a bit of a stretch. Long was socialist enough to make FDR look like a conservative. For example, he proposed an income tax system that would tax all income above $1 million / year at a 100% rate. Huckabee’s deviations are more like Bill Clinton lite, a man with which he bears a far greater similarity.
I certainly called him a liar when I read his claim, and I added a number of adjectives to that label when doing so. I’ve watched him a bit on TV, and suspect that I could find him to be personable and probably someone I would be at least a 70% friend with. And I wasn’t a rabid Romney fan — he was my candidate because I disliked him the least of the viable candidates in the primary.
But Huck came into the race to knock Romney out, and he did it by pandering to anti-Mormon fear among evangelical voters. You don’t do that and say “whoops, I didn’t mean to do what I just intentionally did,” and recover credibility. And there’s virtually no way he’s going to be candid about what he did and why — when you play political hard-ball like that, you don’t tip your hand about it until the end of your career in your memoirs, if then.
Huckabigot is still an apt name for this scoundrel.
Mark D, you make a good point, and Clinton is a better comparison.
@Juliann
Traditionally, the second place in the primaries comes back as number one the next time around.
He is trying to patch up his base for the next election, he sees himself as the front runner for 2012, expects the country to be ready for change following the depression.
Which explains what he is doing.
Let’s look at Mike Huckabee’s record:
Mike Huckabee was regarded by fellow Republican governors as a compulsive tax increaser and spender. He increased the Arkansas tax burden by 47 percent, boosting the levies on gasoline and cigarettes. The Arkansas Leader.com editorialized that Mike Huckabee raised more taxes in 10 years in office than Bill Clinton did in his 12 years.
The National Education Association endorses any candidate who raises taxes and opposes school choice – thus they endorsed Mike Huckabee.
Huckabee “broadly repudiates core Republican policies such as free trade, low taxes, the essential legitimacy of America’s corporate entities and the market system allocating wealth and opportunity,” according to George Will.
The Arkansas Ethics Commission held proceedings 20 times on the former governor. During his tenure, Huckabee accepted 314 gifts valued overall at more than $150,000, according to documents filed with the Arkansas secretary of state’s office. (He accepted 187 gifts in his first three years as governor but was not required to report their value.)
Two months after taking office, Huckabee stunned the state by saying he questioned rapist Wayne DuMond’s guilt and that it was his intention to free the rapist, DuMond murdered a women in Illinois after Huckabee set him free
Huckabee battled conservatives within his own party who were pushing for stricter state-level immigration measures, such as:.
– proof of legal status when applying for state services that aren’t federally mandated
– proof of citizenship when registering to vote
– Huckabee failed in his effort to make children of illegal immigrants eligible for state-funded scholarships and in-state tuition to Arkansas colleges.
He joined the Democratic chorus in indicting President Bush for his “arrogant bunker mentality.”
Agree that Huckabee is no conservative. He is an old time Southern Democrat redressed up as a Republican but no thank you.
Oh yes and he is a liar.
Umm, we’re _all_ Jesus’ spirit brothers and sisters. And we’re _all_ Satan’s spirit brothers and sisters.
The frustrating aspect of the accusation that Mormon’s think Jesus and Satan are brothers is that, technically, it’s true. Satan is, or was, a son of God, just like all of us.
The problem is the lack of context, and the anti-mormon accuser rejecting, or refusing to allow to be spoken, the full story of how angels are all people, who haven’t been born yet, or who used to live, and are all spirit children of God the Father. And that Satan and his followers are just fallen angels.
The problem is that we allow the negative implication of the accusation to stand. There is just no quick way to counter it, and “no, we don’t think that” is not an accurate rejoinder.
The accusation is both bigoted and tricky, and plays into the fact that people don’t want to know the details, but rather want to think in sound-bites. Therefore, those who make the accusation, are either very intelligent in their attack, or else ignorant of Mormon theology.
Perhaps an apt rejoinder would be, “I think you’re Satan’s brother.” Which would also be technically correct.
A) Could Romney have beaten McCain in the primaries without Huck in the game?
B) Could Romney have beatn Obama in the general?
Maybe we’ll find out in 2012.
I try not to get offended, but when Huck sent Chuck to represent him on a number of shows and Mr. Norris, who I’ve always respected in the past, said some offensive things about Mormons and Romney I was disgusted. To send someone to say things that you would say if they weren’t politically correct is one of the lowest tactics.
McCain also ran a campaign that lacked the integrity of his 2000 campaign and based on the 3 gang up on Romney techniques I saw in the debates I would not be surprised to discover a coordinated effort for Huckabee to divide the social conservative vote and take Romney out for McCain. I wonder what he was promised to stay in, knowing he couldn’t win.