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Huckabee Declines to Run Open Thread

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Well Huckabee won’t be running according to his announcement today.  Have to give credit to Happy for picking long, long ago a credible candidate as the GOP 2012 nominee but there is a long way to go to the convention.

My guy bailed.  I was a bit disappointed, not because I think Huckabee is a great alternative but because he brought a bit of civility to the partisan discourse even though representing the Evangelical wing of the party.  Things like this:


“I think [Obama] has been an exemplary husband to his wife and an extraordinary father to his daughters,” Huckabee said earlier this year. “Frankly, America needs a good role model like that.”

Ben Smith – Huckabee: The loyal opposition Politico 14 May 11

That was refreshing.  On the other hand he has the social values and, in many ways, the world view of a medieval Pope.  So be it.  I was looking forward to a number of other counter-intuitive gestures from him in the course of the campaign.

Now the field is pretty much comprised of looneys, narcissistic publicity seekers and has-beens.  I’m convinced that the Tea Party phenomenon will drive Republicans to an outsider, populist nominee who will further split the traditional Republican coalition of corporate influence and middle-class values voters.  

How about you?  Do you think this is an opportunity for the Establishment or an insurgent?

And who gains an advantage from Huckabee’s decision to be king-maker not king?

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Categories: Uncategorized.

/ 126 Comments

126 comments

  1. Shaun Appleby

    I must commend you on your prescience in choosing Pawlenty, he seems to be headed for an interesting race.  If he is nominated I will gladly fulfil the terms of our wager.

  2. Chris Blask

    Do you think this is an opportunity for the Establishment or an insurgent?

    These is less chance of a Republican being elected in 2012 than there was in 2008. (FYI, there wasn’t a chance in hell in 2008).

    They aren’t even trying.

    o  It’s a mid-term election for President, which is typically a shoe-in under any circumstances.

    – and we have a President who is quite popular and improving economics and international conditions.

    o  Iraq and Afghanistan are still hanging around stinking the place up.

    – Fox News polls (and all others, frankly) aside, the legacy of Bush’s Iraq war and the empty victory of his engagement in Afghanistan are not lost on the American Middle.

    o  The horrific economic conditions of the Bush era are not lost to memory.

    – The only positive economic activity under Bush was the inflation of home values and spending of that cash, followed by the adding of that cash to the public and private National Debt when it turned out to be imaginary.

    – Polls notwithstanding, again, American remembers a Surplus followed by a massive Debt with the GOP at the wheel.

    o  Serious Republican strategists aren’t even running a horse in the race.

    – Who are these people running for the GOP? Where the hell did they come from, who do they represent, why don’t they have their shit together seven months before the primaries?

    – This isn’t a Grand GOP Conspiracy, this is rudderless ship coasting downstream with the current.

  3. fogiv

    but this shows he’s no fool.  he’s savvy enough to know the general will be a very steep climb (26,000 km on a 90 degree ice slope) and confident enough to know he very might well have been the poor bastard chosen to strap on the crampons.

    so…he’s a douche, but at least he can play a little bass and has enough sense to come in out of the hot lava rain.  he’s still youngish, there’s always 2016.  why wallow in fail between now and then?

  4. Shaun Appleby

    The number of other hopefuls falling over themselves to pucker up and get a kiss from Huckabee would be pitiful if it wasn’t so amusing:


    Pawlenty called Huckabee “an important leader within the Republican Party.”

    “Mike and I agree our nation is facing big challenges and desperately needs new leadership, and I plan to work hard to earn the support of the millions of Americans who have supported him,” Pawlenty said.

    Jon Ward – Mike Huckabee Not Running For President in 2012 Huffington Post 15 May 11

    “Mike and I?”  Sigh.

  7. Shaun Appleby

    This will be worth tuning in for:


    President Obama is expected to address the giant pro-Israel group AIPAC’s annual policy conference next Sunday, at a moment of uncertainty over America’s role in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict after its policy of two years appears to have stalled out.

    Ben Smith – Obama expected at pro-Israel gathering Politico 15 May 11

    Probably the most tightly contested 11th-dimensional chess match going at the moment, outside of the 2012 presidential race.

  10. Kysen

    Check out this new bedtime story:

    Go The F**K To Sleep

    You can read the full of it.

    It is mad funny.

    The flowers doze low in the meadows

    And high on the mountains so steep.

    My life is a failure. I’m a shitty-ass parent.

    Stop fucking with me, please, and sleep.

    /snicker

  11. HappyinVT

    This year’s big spending cut bill that prevented a government shutdown by slashing the federal budget and allowing Republicans to make good on their campaign promises actually — wait for it — increased federal spending by $3 billion, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

    You read that right. Had the federal budget for the remainder of 2011 remained untouched, the government would have spent $3 billion less through September than it will now spend under the Republican-driven course “correction.”

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/

  12. HappyinVT

    15:00 ICC The ICC has asked for arrest warrants for Gaddafi, his “effective prime minister” and son Saif al-Islam and his “right hand man and executioner” Abdullah Senussi. The chief prosecutor said they have evidence that Gaddafi directly ordered attacks on unarmed civilians both in public and in their home, and that Gaddafi is an indirect perpetrator as he “used the entire Libyan system” to commit crimes against humanity.

    12:10 AGI Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini says that “the regime’s days are numbered”. The international community is working hard to sort out exile for Gaddafi. “The messages coming through from the inner circles of the regime: some (members of the entourage, ed.) have spoken under cover and are beginning to say that Ghaddafi is looking for an honourable way out.”

    I’m more skeptical about the second item ~ we’ve heard this for months now although it seems that time is not on Gaddafi’s side.

  13. HappyinVT

    Mitt Romney raised $10.25 million today “after bringing together his network of wealthy donors to dial for dollars in a city with no shortage of them. It’s a hefty one-day total that Romney’s team hopes will show his strength in the emerging GOP field,” the AP reports.

    “Romney’s phone bank fundraiser at the Las Vegas Convention Center, much like one during his first attempt at the Republican nomination, was the centerpiece of a series of fundraising events that included a conference call with volunteers who were asked to solicit their friends and neighbors for donations.”  http://politicalwire.com/archi…  

    But will it lead to bigger things?!

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