How Huckabee Could Stop President Palin

“A nightstick the size of a telephone pole and the muscle to wield it effortlessly.”

Mike Huckabee, who knows a thing or two about insurgent campaigns, sees the power of the Palin candidacy. Taegan Goddard links this morning to the Des Moines Register:

Mike Huckabee told the Des Moines Register that Sarah Palin would be a strong contender for president should she decide to run.

Said Huckabee: “No question, she will be a very, very strong presence and force, if she gets in. You know, she may run away with it. And that’s one of those things everyone needs to be prepared for.

Huckabee’s words are more than an observation. They are a warning. And they are a warning especially to be heeded because they come from the one politician who can probably do most to stop Palin, the candidate best positioned to win Iowa.

Huckabee himself is also persona non grata with party leaders, because of his repeated criticism of Wall Street and Wall Street minded GOP insiders.

But Huckabee is a very different cat from Sarah Palin. He’s smart and policy-minded. And while he expresses a strong social conservative message, he does not play the politics of division, disparagement, and resentment in which Palin specializes.

In the days of party conventions, the answer to the Palin problem would have been obvious: party leaders would assemble and force the mutually mistrustful Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee onto the same ticket.

In modern times, the game is played differently, but the structure of the situation remains the same: an early Huckabee pact with a candidate acceptable to Republican donors (if not Romney, then Tim Pawlenty or even Jeb Bush) would command enough clout to push Palin off the stage.

If not, all bets are off. As I think about it, that’s one of the big problems with the candidacies of a Thune, a Daniels or a Barbour: They will need Huckabee as much or more than Romney does.

Yet Huckabee is also a re-elected governor, plus he won the second largest haul of delegates last time. Why should he defer to any of the lower-polling governors? And who will make him?

But if the evangelicals vote for him in droves like they did last time, he can change the overall outcome again. Hopefully they will actually look at his positions instead of just blindly supporting him because he’s a minister.

Years ago, I used to respect Ex- Gov. Huckabee and writer/editor David Frum. But, they both have turned out to be statists, supporting abortion (at times) and echoing a lot of the left’s ideology. I no longer see either of them as conservatives. Both are total disappointments.

With all due respect to Mr. Huckabee, who seems like a very nice guy, affable if you will, (see Kevin Costner’s Wyatt Earp)I do not think America elects a Huckabee president....I just don’t see it at this time....

We don’t need affable as much as we needs BALLS

With all due respect to Mr. Huckabee, who seems like a very nice guy, affable if you will, (see Kevin Costner’s Wyatt Earp)I do not think America elects a Huckabee president....I just don’t see it at this time....

We don’t need affable as much as we need BALLS....right now we need a sheriff...

Oh good grief. Is that crazy preacher against her? I can’t recall his name?

Right. I agree with that.

That’s my thinking , also. If Huckaboob is Frum’s candidate, he’s in trouble with Tea Party patriots.

He can’t shake romneycare and Huckaboob can’t shake all those pardons or his regained weight....lol.

We just have a President of Iowa and New Hampshire?

PAY ATTENTION here, folks...we have got to stop allowing the DEMOCRATS of NH to pick the GOP nominee...CLOSE or move the damn NH primary, and do it before 2012.

I think the efforts of many on the internet, with FR playing no small role, have educated many believing Christians as to the dangers of overweening governance.

A big government social conservative such as Huckabee will find himself practically relegated to retirees for supporters. This is in the Protestant realm of voters who predicate support upon sharing religious views on political and social matters.

Then, we have a similar phenomenon among Catholics (Newt appears to me to have been scheming to jump on that bandwagon for years, counting his amnesty chickens before they hatched, imho) and Mitt Romney with Mormons.

They’ll have been divided and scattered, hopefully leading to the fiscal and social conservative candidate with something of a western-tinged libertarian streak that we all know has worked successfully for conservatives working to regain the White House in the past.

One potential candidate in this mold would be Sarah Palin. Others would be ... ?

LOL. Right.

There’s nothing wrong with the primary calendar. We fudged around with it once and look what happened.

RINOs pushing RINOs. Not surprised.

...the Huckster is just doing the obligatory pre-strike.Can’t let an opponent get an early lead.....
He has to wait to see where the money is, who’s got what, and who’s willing to send some his way, before he’ll commit. He’ll run to get before the public, to sell few books, play a set or two with a local band.....but to be President? That is not in the cards for him.

The Hukster will not get my vote any more than Romney - wont do it - Those idiot Republicans need to put someone up that is a true conservative. I would vote for Sarah and would conceivably vote for someone else but those two losers will NOT get a vote from me.

There’s nothing wrong with the primary calendar. We fudged around with it once and look what happened.

You are dead wrong. NH is one of the main reasons Barack Obama is in the White House. They provided the momentum for McCain's DOA Presidential campaign. It is a deliberate strategy of the NH Democrat party to crossover to the GOP primary to vote for what they perceive to be the weakest presidential candidate. There is a reason Palin's book tours avoids New England like the plague. If Palin runs; NH will do everything in their power to abort her campaign before it can gain any momentum...

Frum, and his husband, Mitt Romney, are behind
most attacks on Gov. Palin for their Obama and their DNC.

"Frum was indeed a critic of Palin, calling her nomination a "huge mistake" during an October 13 (2008, weeks before the election) Early Show appearance."

David Frum: "Two of our most plausible candidates for president in 2012 are leading Mormons: Mitt Romney and Utah governor Jon Huntsman."

David Frum: "I have a lot of regard for Mitt Romney as a man and politician… I will support him without qualm."

Late in October, The American Spectator's The Prowler revealed:
"Former Mitt Romney presidential campaign staffers…
have been involved in spreading anti-Palin spin to reporters, seeking to diminish her standing after the election.
'Sarah Palin is a lightweight, she won't be the first, not even the third, person people will think of when it comes to 2012,'
says one former Romney aide…
'The only serious candidate ready to challenge to lead the Republican Party is Mitt Romney.
"Some former Romney aides were behind the recent leaks to media, including CNN, that Governor Sarah Palin was a 'diva' and was going off message intentionally."

The Palmetto Scoop reported: "One of the first stories to hit the national airwaves was
the claim of a major internal strife between close McCain aides and the folks handling his running mate Sarah Palin."
"I’m told by very good sources that this was indeed the case and that a rift had developed, but it was between Palin’s people and the staffers brought on from the failed presidential campaign of former Gov. Mitt Romney, not McCain aides."
"The sources said nearly 80 percent of Romney’s former staff was absorbed by McCain and these individuals were responsible for what amounts to a premeditated, last-minute sabotage of Palin."
… aides loyal to Romney inside the McCain campaign, said The Scoop, reportedly saw
that Palin would be a serious contender for the Republican nomination in 2012 or 2016, which made her a threat to another presidential quest by Romney.

"These staffers are now out trying to finish her off ….hoping it would ingratiate themselves with Mitt Romney."

"Who's the Palin Leaker from the McCain Campaign?
National Review Online The publication of a Vanity Fair profile of Sarah Palin
appears to have opened old wounds in the McCain campaign.
... the source of the “Diva” leak was Nicolle Wallace’s husband."

Kathleen Parker: "[I]t is increasingly clear that Palin is a problem." "Parker ... says something publicly that many of us have thought privately
but lacked the courage to say out loud - Palin should step down:"

"Kathleen Parker: After Interviews, Palin Should Bow Out"

Kathleen Parker: "Romney would bring more than squeaky clean qualifications
and youthful good looks to the ticket.
Romney would seem a logical choice."

"Parker: Romney raised bar on freedoms"
Kathleen Parker: "If Kennedy's speech was an important landmark in American political history,
Romney's was surpassing. With heartfelt humility and poetic eloquence,
he tracked the nation's struggle with and for freedom."

Staggering bigotry of Kathleen Parker - UPDATED"

Who benefits most from Sanford meltdown? Californian (that's right) Mitt Romney

"Peeking Out From the McCain Wreckage: Mitt Romney"

"Someone's got to say it: IS MITT ROMNEY RESPONSIBLE FOR OBAMA'S VICTORY?"

"Vanity: Team Romney Sabotaged Palin and Continuing to Do So?"

"Romney Supporters Trashing Palin"

"Romney advisors sniping at Palin?"

You’re talking about an issue that’s up to the people of NH.

Right, no Huckabee, no squishy-wishy-washy on issues. Too much to do. Complete dismantlement of several unconstitutional government agencies and departments. No nonsense, no messing around. President Palin will have no ties to Washington, D.C. and in fact, she’s hostile to the way OUR business is conducted and to the fossil incumbents and the old boys club. 2012 will be all about restoring our Republic with clear cut Constitutional government and SCOTUS appointments.

David Frum: "I have a lot of regard for Mitt Romney as a man and politician… I will support him without qualm."

So I guess "qualm" is a synonym for "any rational consideration of the facts."