Wednesday, December 05, 2007
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Huckabee Didn't Know About NIE Yesterday?
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Posted by:
Mary Katharine Ham at
9:30 AM
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That's a day after its release, and at least several hours after a rare Bush news conference on the subject.
Kuhn: I don’t know to what extent you have been briefed or been able to take a look at the NIE report that came out yesterday ...
Huckabee: I’m sorry?
Kuhn: The NIE report, the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran. Have you been briefed or been able to take a look at it —
Huckabee: No.
Kuhn: Have you heard of the finding?
Huckabee: No.
I know the Huckabee campaign doesn't have that much cash, but use some of that new front-runner influx to get the man a Blackberry. That's a big blow to any candidate's credibility on national security.
Huck's finding out quickly that, even for a skilled politician, it's much more brutal at the top of the game than playing the charming second-tier candidate. He's described as "bristling" at an evolution question yesterday:
Huckabee — who raised his hand at a debate last May when asked which candidates disbelieved the theory of evolution — asked this time why there is such a fascination with his beliefs. "I believe God created the heavens and the Earth," he said at a news conference with Iowa pastors who murmured, "Amen." "I wasn't there when he did it, so how he did it, I don't know," Huckabee said. But he expressed frustration that he is asked about it so often, arguing with the questioner that it ultimately doesn't matter what his personal views are.
Probably a fair bristle, but the tone of press coverage has certainly changed.
Over at Hot Air, Bryan's asking of the newly anointed sorta-front-runner, why he flip-flopped on Gitmo so quickly.
Fred Thompson is hitting him hard on foreign policy, too:
“When confronted with a serious question about his lack of foreign policy experience, Mike Huckabee makes a joke. The security of Americans and our allies is no laughing matter. What Americans are looking for in their next president is a commander in chief, not a Court Jester,” added Bob Haus, Executive Director of Iowa Friends of Fred Thompson. Ouch. I don't imagine the hits are gonna be getting any lighter from that precint in light of this:
I spoke to Rasmussen about Huckabee's rapid rise yesterday, and our chat can be found here. Key quote: "Had anybody else resonated with GOP primary voters, this would have been impossible. What Mike Huckabee is doing is validating the dream of Thompson’s supporters - that there was a vacuum or void in the race, but Thompson didn’t grab it for whatever reason." Of course, Huck says he's having fun, and the surge in support is showing in his Iowa offices:
His campaign headquarters in downtown Des Moines is expanding into another office in the same building. The new space is three times bigger to accommodate the surging crew of volunteers. Huck was boasting the added endorsement of Tim LaHaye yesterday, author of the Christian novel series, "Left Behind."
But he wouldn't say whether he thought Mormonism was a "cult," when asked by reporters:
Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee, a one-time Southern Baptist preacher who's seen his standing in Iowa surge with Christian evangelicals' support, wouldn't say Tuesday whether he thought Mormonism — rival Mitt Romney's religion — was a cult."I'm just not going to go off into evaluating other people's doctrines and faiths. I think that is absolutely not a role for a president," the former Arkansas governor said during a week in which religion has become an important issue in the Republican presidential race, particularly in Iowa. It's a stereotypical "gotcha" question from the press corps, but it seems like a smooth talker like Huckabee should be able to offer a more compassionate answer than that. Instead of ducking entirely, he could have chided the reporter for using inflammatory language, and offered that while his and Romney's religions don't agree on every tenet, there are plenty of great Americans practicing both and that's what this country's all about, yadda, yadda. But he didn't. If I didn't know better, I might suspect he's trying to benefit from some of that anti-Mormon prejudice we've been hearing about.
To his credit, he's asked a pro-Huckabee group doing robo-calls on his behalf to stop, but Romney's taking his shot on that issue nonetheless.
Welcome to the top, Mike.
Update: Fred on a Thompson/Huckabee ticket. Heh. Fred can be great on his feet sometimes. I wish we saw more of it in debates, where he's often amusing, but not enough to overcome an apparent lack of spirit.
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A guy running for the office that controls our military didn't even know about the NIE.
Yeah...that's the guy I want at the helm. I'm sure he's said his prayers abour Iran and that's enough to know all the facets of a political and military stance regarding them.
Wake up Iowa! |
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The Boy King apparently didn't know about it until last week. Which is worse? The Decider is either lying or too stupid to run the country.
And does it even matter at all, since the whole thing was likely conjured up just to descredit the Neo Cons and silence the war drums (sarcasm)? |
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You're making a big deal about a presidential candidate that "didn't know" about the NIE report...a report that 99.9% of conservatives call pure crap??
That Rush Limbaugh shredded on air yesterday??
Wow.
Pretty weak. |
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This was nothing but a long, rambling smear job. I love the part about Thompson. Thompson doesn't look like, or act like he could fight, or debate his way out of a wet paper bag. Thompson is clueless about every issue presented to him and you try to use that he attacks Huckabee? Who cares who Fred attacks?
Huckabee isn't President yet, when he is, then you can complain when he's unaware of what a President should know. A report? Give me a break. My respect for Ham just went way down. |
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It is NOT a conservative republican opinion to worry more about what the rest of the world thinks than about America's national security. Considering his views on immigration, global warming, taxes, being soft on crime and drug offenses, and now, being soft on the War on Terror, it has become clear to me that Huckabee is running in the wrong primary. This man is Jimmy Carter all over again. Being a nice Christian man does not make someone a good president. We need someone who is strong and who believes in true conservative values. There are other prolife men of faith in this race. I am flabbergasted that Huck has gotten this far. |
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Good point though about Guantanamo. However, Guantanamo is controversial because of Bush and torture. It wouldn't hurt to clean up our image after Bush, like Reagan did after Carter. We should not be torturing anyone. McCain and Huckabee are right about that. |
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Hugh Hewitt Believes Governor Huckabee's appeal is due to the press who have conspired together to get Huckabee the nomination So Hillary can beat the republicans!!!?? He also criticizes Huck for not knowing about the NIE report (re: Iran's threat status)that came out yesterday!!??
Yeah hugh it's a vast left wing conspiracy.
The other cansdidates have time to look at the NIE report that came out yesterday because they are not surrounded by a ton of media and interested voters like Huckabee is in Iowa!!! Huckabee is too busy responding to all the fallacious charges, coming from the jealous republican establishment (yourself, George Will, Novack etc..) that are piling on him. He does not have a huge paid staff like the others..he is virtually running a one man campaign. I will help defend him with the truth to one of your ongoing critiscm's. SUCH AS YOUR FALSE TAX CHARGE-as cited below:
According to figures from the non-partisan Tax Foundation (based on data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis, Department of Commerce), Huckabee’s term as governor (1996-2007) led to a modest increase in the overall State-Local tax burden for Arkansas: from 10.1% in the year he became governor to 11.1% the last year he served. In terms of overall tax burden (state-local-federal) Arkansas remained virtually unchanged--- from 30.3% (39th among the 50 states) to 30.5% (32nd place). In the words of George Will, Slightly altered you are a "Horrible Hack!!!!!!!!" |
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I can't believe that Huckabee does not have internet access. You know, you might think that would be kind of important if you're an emerging frontrunner, but what do I know? Does Huck read the news at all?
Apparently his advisors are not the sharpest tools in the shed either.
This just shows that Huckabee is in way over his head. The wheels are coming off his bus pretty fast. Just goes to show what folly there is in letting the MSM determine the status of candidates.
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Mike Huckabee pardoned or commuted the sentences 669 convicted criminals. 11 of those were convicted MURDERERS.
Huckabee defends his record by saying he is a Christian and he believes in
REDEMPTION.
Well, I'm also a Christian and I believe in JUSTICE. |
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...to balance out the RAH-RAH nonsense chanted Hugh Hewitt on occasion.
I disagree that Huck not knowing about the NIE thing was devastating, but you do raise a lot of good points, MKH. Indeed, it does get harder at the top. We'll see how he handles it as we head into the primaries. |
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http://www.arktimes.com/Articles/ArticleViewer.aspx?Articl eID=154e1aad-fd18-4efd-8d80-b5dab8559419
Stuff like this ought to really kill off the Huck surge.
Romney got a bad rap when one of his appointed judges released a convicted murder, who then killed two more people - but at least the blame goes fully upon the judge in this situation.
Huck, on the other hand, was the bad guy's strongest advocate...Huck intervened before the board (who had previously decided agaist the bad guy) and convinced them to release the bad guy...who went on to rape and murder a high school cheerleader. Good One Huck!!!! (Welcome to the front, HUCK!!!! Let's see if you can hold onto it for more than a day or two. Maybe a week if you're lucky.)
Plenty more skeletons in Huck's closet. |
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Nothing but whiners...Huck is not on the attack...you are..and you are desperate. |
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It's not an attack if its true - is it?
If he's good enough to be president, his record should withstand attacks...Hucks record will not withstand attacks - watch what happens over the next 3 weeks...Huck's numbers will be right back down with Ron Paul (where they belong.) |
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Mike Huckabee seems like a very nice person, and he certainly seems to be gaining in popularity across the country. But, that's what he's gaining -- popularity. Not support from informed and eduated voters. Nice person or not, he remains unacceptably soft on illegal aliens, soft on taxes, soft on reduced spending, soft on convicted criminals and completely unproven when it comes to fiscal conservatism.
PArepublican is correct. When it comes to infractions of the law, you don't release people because you're a Christian. We have a nation of laws to achieve justice. Huckabee doesn't look nearly strong enough in that regard. |
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If I remember correctly, Holiday Inn Express was running radio commercials where people were taking the positions of experts (at fixing cars, brain surgery, stuff like that), and when asked for their credentials, they claimed they were not experts, but did stay at a Holiday Inn Express (the idea being that staying there was a smart decision, I guess).
The link Hugh puts up indicates that Huckabee made the lame joke yesterday morning on the Don Imus show, but the only thing I can find where he said it was on the Imus blog, which had an entry in October of 2006 that quoted Huckabee saying that. SO Fred Thompson was pulling stuff from when Huckabee was first considering running for President. It was not something Huckabee said recently, as far as I can tell. I can't even find any info on Huckabee being on the Imus show on 12/04/2007, although I'm pretty sure I heard he was going to be on the show. |
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It wasn't enough for Hugh Hewitt to embarrass himself with this article and now Ham has to as well?
Governor Huckabee has just surged to #1 in the national polls and is gaining in all of the state polls....all of this on a very tight budget. The man has been so busy overtaking all of the other candidates, how could he have the time? So what if he missed a headline...a story that is debatable anyway.
Fred Thompson is finished and Mitt Romney can't ever seem to get above 13% in national polls no matter how much money he spends or how many people in buys.
I did some research and Salem Communication's Chairman (which owns Town Hall) is a Romney supporter so what a surprise that nearly all of the articles are anti-Huckabee and pro-Romney. |
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We're not electing a pastor in chief of backwards Baptist congregation in Arkansas. |
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Might want to read those polls then again. The latest from Rasmussen
Huckabee: 20%
Giuliani: 17%
McCain: 13%
Romney: 13%
Thompson: 10%
Rasmussen does not poll simply adults, but *likely Republican primary voters.* |
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Just like I said on some of last nights post, "it scares me to think that someone would lack all intellectual curiosity to at least seek some sort of working knowledge on one of the greatest threats facing the US. I think Mike is a nice guy, but falls too short in understanding any foreign policy. I think it's a legitimate argument that he is severely under prepared for this aspect of the Presidency." If he is tired now, wait until he is President, and even then, you can't afford to not have complete knowledge of this stuff. Nice to see his staff is completely clueless about this, they should do a great job in a crisis when Huck is Prez. "Mr. President, I was busy scheduling the press interview for you and forgot to bring your Idiot Guide to National Security Acronyms.? |
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You make my point. The man IS gaining in popularity. I not only didn't say he wasn't; I said he WAS. And whether those polled turned out to be actual voters, or whether they turn out to be those polled who do not vote -- it doesn't make any difference. The point I was making is -- yeah, the guy is affable. He is is likeable, cordial person who communicates well with average everyday Americans -- i.e., popularity. Rasmussen might asser that they are polling those people most likely to vote -- but educated voters? Uh uh. No one can prove it or disprove it.
I do believe that people who educate themselves on Mike Huckabeee's record will find a candidate who is soft on illegal immigration and border control, soft on reduced spending, and soft on punishing convicted criminals. I'm one of those people. I liked Huckabee a lot 3 months ago, mostly because of his support of the Fair Tax. But, he is squishy on illegal immigration and that, to me, is the absolute No. 1 most pressing domestic issue. He's a big spender and his Arkansas record proves that. I don't see nearly enough proof of fiscal conservancy.
So -- polls mean not a lot of squat to me. November 2008 is a long way off, and Mike Huckabee has a tough record to defend, in my opinion, not the least part of which is supporting the release of a convicted felon who went on to rape and murder an innocent victim. I don't want him for president. |
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He would probably keep me awake in Church. But his record is not worthy of being president.
He's wrong on immigration. He's wrong on taxes. He is wrong on justice (his lobbying for and granting of a convict's parole cost the lives of two women) (See link above).
Can people seriously endorse this man, the next Jimmy Carter, who self-righteousness nearly ruined our nation. |
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Rudy, Romney, or Huck, if you think you are going to get my vote in 2008, GOOD LUCK. |
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I love all the people that refer to Romney as Flipper. Have you all not seen Hucksterbee's immigration plan? He has flipped since the last debate! That he is for the flat tax is joke as well. Both positions are polar opposites of his record as Governor.
Huckster is an empty suit and I, for one, am tired of "Compassionate Conservatism". Haven't we realized that Comp Con is code for Fiscal Liberal? Even if Iowans are gullible enough to vote for this joke, Huckster will crash and burn and it will be a pleasure to watch. |
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