Mike Huckabee

Does Huckabee Understand the Threat of Avian Flu Mutation?

Bob Fertik — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 12:50:43 -0500

Everyone knows Mike Huckabee doesn't believe in evolution:

after evolution came up in a debate earlier this year, Huckabee said in a conference call with reporters, "If you want to believe that you and your family came from apes, that's fine. I'll accept that. I just don't happen to think that I did."

Watch him avoid the question during a CNN debate:

But does that mean Huckabee can't get elected President? Of course not - millions of voters also don't believe in evolution, so Huckabee could easily become President despite his willful ignorance.

There's a famous story about a man who approached Adlai Stevenson during one of his losing campaigns against Dwight Eisenhower. The man declared, "Governor Stevenson, you have the vote of every thinking person!" To which Stevenson replied, "Thanks, but I need a majority."

Huckabee's hostility to evolution isn't just a personal view; as Governor, he supported it as government educational policy:

During Huckabee’s tenure as Governor, evolution education in Arkansas languished in an environment of general hostility and insufficiency. Two anti-evolution bills were introduced in the state’s House of Representatives; textbooks in the Beebe, Arkansas public high school carried disclaimer stickers denigrating evolution; the state’s science curriculum earned a grade of “D” overall and an abysmal “zero” for its treatment of evolution; a creationist “museum” enjoyed state-funded advertising; and evolution was systematically and broadly squeezed out of schools and other educational institutions across the state. Huckabee did nothing to deter any of this – in fact, some of his public statements might indicate his tacit support.

But apart from promoting ignorance, why should Americans care if Huckabee denies evolution?

Simple: because the lives of millions of Americans might depend on it.

One of the most serious potential health threats we face is the mutation of the H5N1 virus that is epidemic among birds ("avian flu") into a form that can be spread among humans.

That mutation hasn't happened yet that we know of, but a number of humans have caught and died from the virus, and scientists believe a human-to-human mutation is a serious possibility. Since no humans have acquired immunity to H5N1, the impact of such a mutation could rival the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918, which killed 50-100 million people worldwide.

If an H2H mutation appeared, it could take years to create, mass-produce, and distribute a vaccine. The key to saving millions of lives is understanding the threat, preparing for it, and responding immediately.

But if President Huckabee doesn't believe in evolution, how can he possibly understand that H5N1 could mutate and threaten the lives of tens of millions? And if he doesn't understand, how can he be prepared to deal with it if it happens while he's President?

This is not a hypothetical question. Ronald Reagan refused to deal with the emergence of AIDS during his Presidency because he was ideologically (and politically) hostile to homosexuality. He wouldn't even say the word "AIDS"

until the illness of movie star and national icon Rock Hudson became public news in July 1985. By that time, over 10,000 Americans had been diagnosed with AIDS, and over 6,000 had died.

Similarly, South African President Thabo Mbeki let millions die because he refused to believe the HIV virus caused AIDS.

So here's a question journalists should ask Huckabee:

If you do not believe in evolution, do you believe the H5N1 virus could mutate and threaten a deadly global pandemic like the Spanish Flu of 1918?

Tens of millions of lives could depend on Huckabee's answer.

"I'm The NRA And I Vote" - But for Whom??

Bob Fertik — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 11:49:43 -0500

We've all seen the signs and bumper stickers - "I'm the NRA and I Vote."

But with the Republican Party in chaos, time the question must be asked: for whom??

Grandpa Fred is putting his last eggs in the basket of South Carolina gun owners, but gun owners aren't fools and they have no interest in backing a sure primary loser.

Their dilemma is expressed by F. Hewitt Grant, the grandfatherly president of Ellett Brothers gun manufacturing:

Grant has been wooed by three candidates: Thompson, Huckabee and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani.

He’s leaning toward Thompson, hasn’t completely ruled out Huckabee, and “laughed at” the overture from Giuliani, who as mayor backed a lawsuit against New York gun manufacturers that is still in litigation and remains an unforgivable sin among gun advocates.

“We’re in a world of hurt,” Grant says when he sizes up the Republican front-runner field.

McCain, who wandered off the pro-gun reservation in the late 1990s by supporting gun control but has now come back to the fold, “wavers” too much, says Grant.

As for Romney, who signed gun control legislation while governor, Grant playfully loads on the Southern drawl and simply says: “He’s from Massachusetts.”

But for gun owners looking past the primaries to the general election, Romney has appeal - if you can stop laughing at his hunting "prowess".

Devin Sweeney, a gun buyer from Inman, S.C., who attended the Ellett Brothers gun show, said he’s leaning toward Romney because he thinks he has the best shot of winning the White House in November.

He concedes that Romney’s record isn’t perfect, but notes the former governor did join the National Rifle Association and claims to be a hunter, albeit of mostly “small varmints.”

So how is the NRA telling its members to vote?

The rank and file has been left largely on their own because the NRA, itself, is struggling with how to manage a field filled with front-runners with tainted records.

The NRA weeks ago released a Democratic voter guide that made clear that New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson had the best record on gun issues.

But they have yet to offer a similar guide for the Republican field, even though all of the first primary states are home to significant numbers of Second Amendment activists.

“We are inching towards making some kind of determination,” said spokesman Andrew Arulanandam.

Translation: we're not betting our credibility on any of these losers!

I can't imagine gun owners will vote for Grandpa Fred, so they really have no choice except Huck, who leads in SC (caveat: Rasmussen shows a post-NH bounce for McCain) and who just passed Rudy as the national GOP frontrunner.

Why Can't Scientists Be Fair to Huckabee, the Mentally Challenged, the Insane, and Hardcore Christians?

davidswanson — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 11:17:45 -0500

NANCY ZUCKERBROD of the Associated Press must have written this before Iowan Republicans caucused for the Neanderthal of their choice:

WASHINGTON (AP) — Scientific advisers to the government emphasize in a report the importance of teaching evolution in public schools.

The report by the National Academy of Sciences and its Institute of Medicine follows up on similar past publications, the last of which came out in 1999. The new document includes recently discovered evidence supporting evolution, including an important fossil find.

The report released Thursday also takes swipes at creationism and other anti-evolution views.

"Despite the lack of scientific evidence for creationist positions, some advocates continue to demand that various forms of creationism be taught together with or in place of evolution in science classes," the report says.

Evolution is a continuing topic of debate in some states. Florida officials are considering revisions in state science standards that would add the word "evolution" to the standards. The state Board of Education plans to vote on the guidelines next month.

In Texas, the state's director of science curriculum, Chris Comer, maintains she was forced to resign recently due to evolution politics. Comer said she came under pressure after forwarding an e-mail that her superiors felt made the agency appear to be biased against the instruction of intelligent design, an alternative to evolution favored by some religious conservatives.

Intelligent design holds that the universe's order and complexity are so great that evolution cannot explain it.

The Texas State Board of Education is expected to begin a review of the state science curriculum soon.

Josh Rosenau, a spokesman for the California-based National Center for Science Education, which supports the teaching of evolution, said the new report is important because the debate over evolution in school is not going away.

Casey Luskin, program officer for the Discovery Institute, a Seattle-based think tank that supports teaching students about the criticism of evolution, was critical of the document.

"Students should learn about the evidence for and against evolution," he said.

The Institute of Medicine is part of the National Academy of Sciences, a private organization chartered by Congress to advise the government of scientific matters.
On the Net:

* The National Academies: http://www.nationalacademies.org/

Huckabee Lies About the Cross

Bob Fertik — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 18:15:48 -0500

Yesterday Mike Huckabee released a TV ad featuring a white cross.

Today, Huckabee lied about the cross, claiming it was just a bookshelf, and dismissing those who see a cross as nuts. "I will confess this: If you play the spot backwards it says, 'Paul is dead. Paul is dead.'"

The Grand Inquisitor of American Catholicism, Bill Donahue, wasn't amused. "What he's trying to say to the evangelicals in western Iowa (is): I'm the real thing," Donahue said Tuesday on Fox News Channel's "Fox and Friends. "You know what, sell yourself on your issues, not on what your religion is."

Why is Huckabee lying about the cross? Is he ashamed of his Christian faith? Or does he think Americans are blithering idiots?

Outrageous info I just received about Huckabee...

desertwolf — Mon, 17 Dec 2007 19:44:36 -0500

I received an email today from the Humane Society. Following is a part of the story that was the focus of the email:

"Huckabee was the state’s chief executive for more than a decade, and was largely viewed by animal advocates as an impediment to moderate reforms, or at the very least, someone who never lifted a finger to advance animal welfare. The governor’s record on animal issues was further tarnished in 1998 when the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported that Huckabee’s 17-year-old son, David, was fired from his job as a Boy Scout camp counselor because he and another teen allegedly killed a stray dog. Animal protection groups reported that the boys hanged the dog, slit his throat, and stoned him to death—but the teens were never charged with any crime. "

And further into the article:
"The story about Huckabee's son has been circulating on some blogs, like Dogster for the Love of Dog Blog and The Real Mike Huckabee, but new information has come to light. At the time of the camp incident, a local prosecutor apparently asked the Arkansas State Police to investigate whether David Huckabee violated state anti-cruelty laws. Newsweek broke the story this week that the former director of the state police, John Bailey, says that Huckabee’s chief of staff and personal attorney leaned on him to drop the investigation. According to Bailey, he refused to play ball, and was fired seven months later. It seems that the governor tried to stop the state police from investigating the cruelty charges against his son, and Bailey’s story is corroborated by the former FBI chief in Little Rock.

At worst, the governor acted unethically and obstructed the police investigation, but even at best, Huckabee and his staff took a “boys will be boys” attitude toward malicious animal abuse. The governor’s then-chief of staff Brenda Turner belittled the accusations, asking, “Is it normal for the state police to…investigate something that happened at a Boy Scout camp?” Well, it should be. The public wants nothing less, in fact. The Michael Vick case demonstrates what happens when the justice system is allowed to work and when animal cruelty is taken seriously—a star quarterback is brought down to serve a 23-month prison sentence, an example for countless thousands of young Americans. The Huckabee case shows what happens when the system is thwarted—or when cruelty doesn't occupy a serious place in the political arena."

For the complete story and more (and I urge you to check this out) go to:
http://hslf.typepad.com/

Terry

Dumond Ad Targets Huckabee - Is McCain Behind It?

Bob Fertik — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 12:28:18 -0500

Someone is trying to knock Mike Huckabee out of the race with this hard-hitting ad attacking Huckabee for freeing Wayne Dumond. Who's behind the ad and the web site huckabeefacts.com? The most obvious suspect is Mitt Romney, who lost his crucial (and expensive) Iowa lead to Huck. But like a good Agatha Christie novel, anyone in the GOP race could be behind this.

There's lots of great detective work at TPM Election Central.

wanderindiana thinks McCain's team did it:

The whois information posted by james upthread points to a service provider, 1and1, who has been used in the past by isupportjoe.com (a GOP-based Joe Lieberman site which never came to fruition, outed before it was operational), which had been registered in a netblock used by Becki Donatelli and other GOP types. Now, IIRC, a bunch of these folks were to be running John McCain's internet ops. Just speculation, by my money would be on McCain's camp.

Nickm adds another McCain connection:

Although the huckabeefacts.com domain was registered through 1and1.com, the server where the page resides is in Scottsdale, AZ, run by secureserver.net. One of the last hops to the server is through Phoenix. Hmmmmm...

Will the Corporate Media ask Mr. Straight Talk about it? Stay tuned...

Update 1:Arkansas Republican Keith Emis is taking credit:

Hello. This is Keith Emis. I organized the production of the attached video. Below is a statement regarding Mike Huckabee, Lois Davidson and Carol Sue Shields.
I saw Mrs. Davidson on CBS News last week talking about how Wayne Dumond murdered her daughter Carol Sue Shields. Shields was murdered because Mike Huckabee began pushing for Dumond's freedom when he became governor. Dumond was eventually released.
There is no doubt Mrs. Davidson has a powerful story to tell, but I wasn't sure she had an outlet to share it. I agreed with her that Mike Huckabee has no business being president.
I have always been a behind the scenes guy in Arkansas politics, working for Fay Boozman in 1998 and Senator Tim Hutchinson in 2002, so being out front on anything political is highly unusual for me, but this is different.
I contacted Mrs. Davidson and asked her if she would be willing to speak on camera about her daughter, her daughter's murderer, and the man who helped win his freedom. I got a camera crew to go with me to Missouri to Mrs. Davidson's home. We filmed a very kind lady who shouldn't have lost her daughter.
Mrs. Davidson's story is important. It's one that anyone voting in the Republican primaries should hear.
Sincerely,
Keith W. Emis

According to Arkansas Times edit Max Brantley, Emis isn't supporting any of the Republicans:

Emis, 29, grew up in Fayetteville and works in his family's Data Forms business in Greenland. He said he incurred no expenses, save gas and video tapes, and used friends as volunteer help, including one with video production experience. His uncle Donn Emis, a Fayetteville DJ, did the voiceover.
Emis said the stories about the Missouri victims "made him sad." He called Mrs. Davidson and asked if he could visit. She talked to him Sunday and he returned Tuesday and Wednesday to do the video. He declines to talk about politics, such as other disagreements he might have, if any, with Mike Huckabee. Emis comes from a part of the state where Huckabee has left many disaffected Republicans, however, on account of issues ranging from taxes to immigration. Emis wants to stick to Dumond.
"I am not supporting anyone in the presidential race," he said.
"It really made me sad. She's just a simple, nice woman [and a retired Wal-Mart employee]. Her daughter was murdered and it didn't have to happen. And it did happen because Mike Huckabee worked to get Wayne Dumond out of prisons."

We'll see if Emis' story holds up or if one of the candidates is secretly behind his work...

The Baptist v. The Mormon

Bob Fertik — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 10:02:06 -0500

AP reports,

Mike Huckabee, an ordained Southern Baptist minister, asks in an upcoming article, "Don't Mormons believe that Jesus and the devil are brothers?"
The article, to be published in Sunday's New York Times Magazine, says Huckabee asked the question after saying he believes Mormonism is a religion but doesn't know much about it.

Huckabee is being coy - he certainly knows enough about Mormonism to cite some of its wackier theological positions that will make Baptists gasp.

Romney fired back by saying attacking his religion was "un-American."

But arresting millions of "tired, poor, huddled masses, yearning to breathe free" and sending them back is "American"?

And wasn't it just yesterday that Romney said he would not include any Muslims (like UN Ambassador Zalmay Khalizad) in his cabinet?

The Grand Old Party - isn't it simply Grand?

Here's a great spoof on Huckabee's message to Iowa:

Dems Crush Huck - How Will GOP Stop Him?

Bob Fertik — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 15:51:43 -0500

CNN reports:

While presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee is surging in new polls of GOP candidates, a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll released Tuesday shows he would lose to all three leading Democratic candidates by double digits in hypothetical contests.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee has doubled his support nationally among GOP voters, a poll says.

In head-to-head matchups -- the first to include Huckabee -- the former Arkansas governor loses to Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York by 10 percentage points (54 percent to 44 percent), to Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois by 15 points (55 percent to 40 percent) and to former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina by 25 points (60 percent to 35 percent).

The poll comes on the heels of a CNN/Opinion Research poll released Monday that showed Huckabee doubled his support nationally among likely Republican voters in the last month and is in a statistical dead heat with former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani.

The sound you hear is Republicans Money Men pouring themselves very stiff drinks as they contemplate Mike Huckabee winning Iowa, sailing on to victory in the Republican primaries, and getting crushed by the Democrats in November.

I know there are fools like MSNBC's Jonathan Alter who think Huckabee has miracle-making TV skills that will crush the Democrat. But Alter clearly has never looked at an electoral college map. Huckabee could turn out the religious right in Dixie, but the swing states are Ohio, Florida, and the Southwest, where the key issue of 2008 will be mortgages, not miracles.

Moreover, Huckabee has more political baggage than any candidate who has ever run for office, starting with Wayne Dumond but hardly ending there. Last week we learned Huck wanted to quarantine AIDS patients as recently as 1992. Today we learn:

In August of 1998, Huckabee was one of 131 signatories to a full page USA Today Ad which declared: “I affirm the statement on the family issued by the 1998 Southern Baptist Convention.” What was in the family statement from the SBC? “A wife is to submit herself graciously to the servant leadership of her husband even as the church willingly submits to the headship of Christ.”

Remember the key group of swing voters in 2008 is single women. Huck's views on marriage will be a huge hit with them, dontcha think?

Of course the Republican Money Men know Huckabee will get crushed. And they also know Huckabee will lead the GOP to electoral disaster everywhere outside Dixie. But what can they do to stop him?

Mitt Romney just launched his first attack ad against Huckabee on immigration, trying to appeal to the GOP's racist base. But that won't cut Huck's support with his Southern Baptist base. Mitt will never get their votes because he's a Mormon, and his massively-hyped speech increased his GOP support by a pathetic 1% at best. And by going negative against Huck, Mitt is squandering his one true asset - his image of optimism and CEO-style accomplishment.

And Huck is no dope at right-wing politics, as his cute Chuck Norris ads demonstrated. Huck immediately answered Mitt's attack ad with an endorsement by Jim Gilchrist, founder of the far-right Minuteman Project.

If immigration was Mitt's Iowa trump card, he might as well fold. Mitt cannot stop Huck in Iowa, and Mitt's victory in next-door New Hampshire has already been fully discounted by political pundits, just as it was for Paul Tsongas in 1992.

So the crucial test will be South Carolina, where Ralph Reed's religious-right dirty-tricks machine helped George Bush bury secularist John McCain in 2000. If Huck wins the Bob Jones University vote, it's all over for Mitt. Can Mitt use his personal fortune to buy off South Carolina's religious right leaders? I'm sure he'll try, but that strikes me as a bridge too far.

So once again I say: Go Huck Go!

Huckabee Goes for the Gold

Bob Fertik — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 23:02:48 -0500

Jerayln think Huckabee's hatred of AIDS victims will hurt his campaign. Back in 1992, Huck told the AP:

“If the federal government is truly serious about doing something with the AIDS virus, we need to take steps that would isolate the carriers of this plague,”

Jeralyn writes:

Huckabee will sink like a stone.

But why would Huck's homophobia hurt him with the GOP base?

The GOP base is all about hatred of everyone who is not exactly like them - blacks, women, liberals, Mexicans, Jews, Mormons, and gays, to name just a few.

Digby points out that one week after playing "compassionate conservative" on immigration in the Youtube debate, Huckabee did a triple back-flip.

And lest anyone defend this jerk's comments [on AIDS] from 15 year ago as being old news, he came out with a really great new plan for undocumented workers last week that's sure to set aside any lingering doubts that he might be soft of the Mexican invaders...

Wingnuts do not vote on creationism and blastocyst worship alone. Huck knows that to close the deal he's got to publicly get some hate on for somebody. Going after the gays is so 2004. This year's designated Republican hate object is teh Mexicans. They just need a little more reassurance that he's one of them. This should do it.

Mexicans may be the right's top domestic enemy at the moment, but that doesn't mean the right has embraced gays. The right is capable of hating an unlimited number of perceived "others" at the same time. Remember that Jews were far from the only victims of the Nazi Holocaust:

Other groups were persecuted and killed by the regime, including the Roma [Gypsies], Soviets (particularly prisoners of war); ethnic Poles; other Slavic people; the physically or mentally disabled; gay men; religious dissidents such as Jehovah's witnesses, and political dissidents.

Rightwingers hate. And if they are not stopped, they go from hate to murder. That's who they are. That's what they do.

Why Does God Always Back the Dumbest Candidate? Are Elections the Place for Charity?

davidswanson — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 14:58:30 -0500

From Buzzflash:

We received a memo from Liberty "Falwell" University on November 30th, signed by Jonathan Falwell, son of the recently deceased Jerry -- and now overseer of the vast Liberty University/Moral Majority corporate empire.

According to Jonathan Falwell, presidential aspirant Mike Huckabee believes that it is God, not himself, who is behind his rise in the polls: "Mr. Huckabee also said that Divine providence was responsible for his recent surge in the polls in Iowa, as he noted that he is the candidate with much less capital firepower than his rivals."