Contrary to the clear implication of previous news reports, it does appear that Jon Huntsman -- former Governor of Utah and Ambassador to China -- will spend some of his own money on a presidential race.
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I had been critical of what seemed, judging from earlier news reports, to be Huntsman's complete refusal to "self-fund" in his campaign -- on the grounds that, if a candidate of means declines to use any of his own money to become President, why should those of much lesser wealth sacrifice for him?
But according to USA Today, Huntsman apparently intends to spend at least several hundred thousand dollars of his own money:
If he runs, Huntsman says he will take out a personal line of credit of several hundred thousand dollars to finance the early stages of a campaign, but he would rely on fundraising rather than his own resources for the campaign.
As the story also notes, his father is a very rich industrialist; on the other hand, as the Wall Street Journal has pointed out, that doesn't mean that Huntsman has easy access to the funds for the purpose of a presidential campaign.
No doubt Jon Huntsman has some significant hurdles to overcome -- among them, his relative lack of name ID and his tenure as Obama's ambassador to China. But as to the latter, given that, in an ideal world, politics supposedly stops at the water's edge, I think he deserves a full and fair hearing as part of the GOP field.
After all, our main objective is two-fold: To find the candidate who will best serve America, and who can beat President Obama. If Jon Huntsman is that person, I want to know about it. And I'm glad he isn't making the mistake of asking others for their money, while refusing to chip in any of his own.
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