The best thing that Pat Robertson did for Mike Huckabee was to endorse Rudy Giuliani. Look at the poll numbers: Huckabee started a meteoric rise right after the Robertson endorsement.Robertson's surprising move was so shocking to the evangelical community that they immediately looked for the candidate with the best Christian conservative values and settled on the only choice, Mike Huckabee.
Of course, the primary issue to most Christian conservatives is the abortion debate.
Robertson's endorsement of Giuliani shocked the religious right into realizing that their hard fought victories secured through Bush's two presidential terms and right-ward swing of the Supreme Court were now in danger.
Mike Huckabee, a former Baptist minister, is the only viable candidate whose pro-life record is beyond impeachment.
Thus, the Christian conservatives responded with one of the greatest grass-roots efforts in political history and propelled Huckabee into the top tier of the Republican presidential hopefuls and eventually into a competitive position nationally.
Add to this a persuasive campaign to push the Fair Tax, a sterling record as a Second Amendment believer, and a commitment to win the war on Islamic terrorism, and you have the most natural candidate for not only the right wing, but also for those of the libertarian mindset.
Interestingly, the blue-blood Republicans are lashing back at Huckabee because they fear a Christian conservative take over of their party. Robert Novak has been especially vicious, not only taking swipes at Huckabee, but at the Christian right also: "Huckabee's surge is driven by the evangelical Christian vote within the Republican Party -- highlighting the risk the party undertook by embracing this voting bloc that is not necessarily a limited-government constituency."
How someone who is a proponent of the Fair Tax and wants to abolish the IRS, as Huckabee does, can be a "big government" guy and opponent of the "free-market line" as Novak contends is beyond belief. Dick Morris even wrote a column soon after titled "Mike Huckabee Is A Fiscal Conservative" dispelling some of the smears being perpetrated by Huckabee's detractors such as Novak and Ann Coulter.
Fair Tax supporters know that the Fair Tax will inherently limit the power of the Federal government just by nature of it's structure. The true power of the free market will be unleashed in the most powerful way since this nation's founding when people get their full paycheck and decide how much they are going to pay in taxes.
The truth is that Novak and his ilk don't really trust the free market and relish the control the government has through tax legislation and the power of the lobbyists on K Street. Thus their opposition to the most important legislation sitting in Congress today.
Despite their efforts, Robertson and Novak prove to be part of the old guard that has lost it's vision and sense of proportion.
The Christian right and the Fair Taxers will continue to fight for their underdog candidate and leave dinosaurs like Pat Robertson and Robert Novak in the past where they belong.
3 comments:
This is the best summary of the Huckabee phenomenon I've read. Well done! People need to link to this article you've written. I'll try to do that tonight on my blog: http://huckablogger.com
This is an insightful analysis! I haven't heard anyone link the Giuliani endorsement to Huckabee's success. But I think the endorsement let Christians know that their "leaders" were playing political games as much as the government does. It made us sit up and take notice, and decide for ourselves!
Sarah, you are absolutely right.
One of Robertson's motivations for endorsing Rudy had to be Rudy's firm lead in the national polls at that time.
Robertson had his own past failed campaign and has not fared will in his political life, so he decided to throw away his convictions for the sake of victory.
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