Mike Huckabee continues to show the GOP what they are missing this campaign season-a conservative who has walked the walk and who can communicate with voters across America.
Listening to the Michael Medved radio show today, he described today's CPAC speeches stating that Huckabee's speech was phenomenal and Mike Huckabee gave his best speech yet.
See for yourself:
"Thanks to President Obama, We are all Catholics now, standing together."
"Let me be very blunt with you and whether this is a popular sentiment at CPAC or not, I don't care...I am going to say it anyway...One of the things that the President has shown us this week is that morality matters even more than money does because where there is a nation that's lost it's morals, that is a nation that will freely give up it's money. Because if we give up the basic right to life, we will certainly give up what is in our pockets. Let us never act as if somehow our liberties under the constitution of the United States don't matter. If we lose those, money won't matter"
"All of us are created equal, and then endowed not by our government, but by our creator with unalienable rights. Unalienable meaning they cannot be taken away from us by a government because a government did not give them to us in the first place. A Creator gave us the rights and government's only job is to secure and protect the rights given by God."
"When we devalue a life that is unborn, we ultimately will devalue a life that is born."
Mike Huckabee went on the Michael Medved radio show to promote his book, A Simple Government. In the second segment Huckabee explains why we have to change the way we spend money, why it is important to have more local government and less federal government, and why the family matters. He says,
"The most important form of government is a mother and father raising kids."
"In the very first chapter of the book I quantify the costs of broken families. In this country, we have a 300 billion dollar a year Dad deficit. That is the amount of money taxpayers pay because fathers have disappeared from raising their kids and allowed some other taxpayer to pick up the financial costs."
"When people make the argument that the family thing does not matter and we need to focus on the economy, you can't focus on the economy if you don't focus on the stability of families where mothers and fathers raise their own kids."
Then Medved jumps in with the whole Oscar night Natalie Portman question. Four minutes into the second segment of the show Medved says, "She is very visibly pregnant. It's a problem-they are not married, before 2 billion people, says she wants to thank her love, he has given me the most wonderful gift. The best kind of gift would be a wedding ring. It just seems to me that sending that kind of message is problematic."
Well there you go, Medved is clearly upset about Portman. But Huckabee is not upset. In fact, he never brought up the topic. He did answer the question stating that it was unfortunate that we glorify and glamorize the idea of out of wedlock children. Huckabee quantifies with statistics: "75% of African American kids are born out of wedlock. 61% of Hispanic kids. 41% across the board live births are out of wedlock births and the costs are staggering."
In today's Dallas Morning News an article called Expecting to Fail by Gerry Garibaldi, talks about this exact issue. The picture on the page is of a school girl, visibly pregnant, asleep at her desk. The author of the piece talks about No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top initiatives and how they do little good when there is no moral accountability. He states that Personal Moral Accountability is the electrified rail that no politician want to touch.
Well this week one potential presidential candidate did touch upon that subject-stating that there is a Dad deficit in our country-that not only hurts the children (social issue) but also the pocket book of every single tax payer (economic issue). He stepped up to the plate and answered the question, only to be lambasted by every liberal talk show host and journalist.
Later in the article the author goes on to say "Within my lifetime, single parenthood has been transformed from shame to saintliness. In our society, perversely, we celebrate the unwed mother as a heroic figure, like a fireman or a police officer. During the last presidential election, much was made of Obama's mother, who was a single parent. Movie stars and pop singers flaunt their daddy-less babies like fishing trophies." The author, a teacher, asks his student to do research on unwed mothers, the statistics they find are frightening: "From the FBI: 63% of all suicides are individuals from single-parent households. From the Centers for Disease Control: 75 percent of adolescents in chemical-dependency hospitals come from single-parent households. From the Children's Defense Fund: More than half of all youths incarcerated for criminal acts come from single-parent households. and so on."
I listened to Mike Huckabee's answer. I didn't hear any slam about Portman. I heard a well versed author talk about the statistics that he had just uncovered writing his book. I heard a potential candidate talk about how both the fiscal and the social issues are important. And I heard a concerned person talk about the state of our country.
It has been interesting to watch and listen to those in the media, radio and blogosphere spin their tale about Mike Huckabee. I ask the question, do you want a president who answers the questions that he is asked or do you want someone who hides behind the spin?
Candidate Barack Obama when asked at the Saddleback forum at what stage of development does the baby have legal rights? His answer was to say that it was above his paygrade.
Do you want a President who avoids questions, two steps around the answer, is only comfortable answering "questions" off a teleprompter, has his press secretary give you a bunch of spin, won't commit on a position, can't say who the enemy is or do you want a President who gives you the honest, somber truth?
I want a president who is not afraid to step up to the plate and swing. When you hold the office of the presidency, you do not know what financial, foreign policy, or social crisis will hit on your watch. It could be a curve ball, a fast ball, or a wild throw by the pitcher. But you have to have the courage to take any ball that is thrown your way. Mike Huckabee steps up to the plate every time he has an interview. He will talk about any subject that is asked of him. He gives a straightforward, honest answer. Whether you like it or not, Americans deserve to hear the truth.
The deficit needs to be cut. Medicare/Medicaid/Social Security have to be reformed. The Radical Islamic Terrorists who threaten our way of life need to be eliminated. And in today's Sunday morning paper, ironically a former Hollywood executive/screenwriter turned English teacher in an urban city school in Connecticut asks the question: What to do about the teen pregnancy problem?
Sounds like listening to Mike Huckabee could be the answer.
No one, for instance, questions the presidential qualifications of Mike Huckabee -- despite the fact that the former pastor's evangelical Christian commitment is every bit as fervently outspoken as Palin's, and his undergraduate degree (from Ouachita Bible University) is no more prestigious than Palin's communications B.A. from the University of Idaho.
Huckabee, however, served 10 years as governor of his state (and three prior years as lieutenant governor) and in his eight books, weekly TV broadcasts on Fox News and innumerable public debates he demonstrates a mastery of public issues and political ideas that impresses even those who disagree with him.
Huckabee's example indicates that the populist instinct is correct in disregarding the idea that a Yale or Harvard education is a necessary prerequisite for national leadership, but it goes wrong if it suggests that blue chip academic credentials should count as a disqualification of any kind.
Only Huckabee among the Republicans is viewed favorably by a plurality of voters in the state of Pennsylvannia, Gingrich and Palin both way under water.
