Free Republic

Some people in Britain hate grey squirrels enough to devour them. With the UK’s biggest purveyor of fried chicken in crisis, perhaps we should be cooking up our furry feral friendsne cold Sunday morning last month, I visited Pow Hill, a glorious moorland thick with pine trees that overlooks the Derwent reservoir, north-west of Durham. In a clearing, three amateur wildlife photographers, in full camouflage gear, sat on plastic bags and watched a red squirrel race across the bracken. As I watched the little fella leap from log to tree, the sunlight dancing across its tail, naturally my thoughts turned...

“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...

Former Arkansas GOP Gov. Mike Huckabee says he is against changing the 14th Amendment to remove birthright citizenship. "The Supreme Court has decided that, I think, in three different centuries," Huckabeee said in a radio interview Wednesday with NPR. "In every single instance, they have affirmed that if you are born in this country, you are considered to be a citizen. The only option there is to change the Constitution."... But asked Wednesday if he supported such a change, Huckabee responded simply: "No."...

Is this Mike Huckabee attempting to position himself as the voice of GOP reason heading in to 2012, or merely have his political cake and eat it too? Huckabee appeared on Rosie O’Donnell’s Sirius-XM radio show over the weekend and perhaps not surprisingly talk turned to gay marriage and same sex adoption. Huckabee, a former pastor, is against gay marriage, though gently so…or at least that is what he’d have us believe if this exchange is any measure. During the appearance, Huckabee fended off criticisms from O’Donnell telling her that “I have great respect for you. I respect your choices....

If former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee has any 2012 presidential aspirations at all, then it was a mistake to help raise money for the Iowa Family Policy Center, a former Republican Party of Iowa chairman and adviser to Terry Branstad said Wednesday Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in Des Moines last year promoting a book. “Maybe Mr. Huckabee shouldn’t be raising money for an organization that says it won’t support the Republican nominee in Iowa,” said David Kochel, a veteran GOP strategist who has done consulting work for Branstad’s campaign for a fifth term as governor. He previously advised former...

I’m resisting the idea that he said this purely out of personal pique but I can’t come up with a good alternative strategic explanation. What political benefit is there, in this year of all years, to knock CPAC for being “more libertarian” and “less Republican”? Libertarianism has never had more cachet within the GOP than it has right now; it’s not perfectly synonymous with the tea-party movement (of which Huckabee is predictably complimentary) but it’s close enough, especially with Beck in the role of TPers’ patron saint. Maybe Huck thinks finding any reason to knock an “establishment” event like CPAC...

Cop-Killer??? A little bit of light needs to be shed on a funny little thing called FACTS as it pertains to the issues surrounding the suspected cop-killer Maurice Clemmons. Shamefully prominent voices in the Conservative punditocracy (mostly ones who supported Romney in the last go-round) have come out attempting to link Gov. Mike Huckabee to the killings in Seattle that took the lives of four police officers. Most of these spared little thought for the families, and jumped right into the band-wagon in denouncing Huck as soft on crime, and a friend to criminals, or a bleeding heart Christian. (Funny...

“I think that she’s not anywhere near the person that sometimes she’s been portrayed to be –- as completely lacking of any intellectual capacity.” –Mike Huckabee, subtly putting the stress on the word “completely.” Is this emerging as the new party line on Palin among other top Republican politicians? Last week, Haley Barbour told Chris Matthews that Palin is “a lot brighter than she gets credit for,” and on yesterday’s @katiecouric, Fox News Channel host and former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee trotted out a similar-sounding soundbite. Huckabee did go with the ‘Palin has more executive experience than Obama’ line, which...

Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin’s forthcoming autobiography has been at the top of the Amazon book charts for weeks, and it hasn’t even been released yet. At least in the eyes of the political Left, she is now perhaps America’s most visible national Republican. But new Rasmussen Reports national telephone surveying finds Palin losing handily in face-to-face march-ups with her two likeliest challengers for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination. Among likely Republican primary voters, Palin now trails former Arkansas governor-turned-Fox-TV-host Mike Huckabee by 20 points – 55% to 35%. When her opponent is ex-Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, Palin loses by...

WASHINGTON (CNN) - Former presidential candidate Mike Huckabee compares his past weight problem to President Obama's economic policies in a pitch Wednesday for a financial newsletter. Huckabee, a former Arkansas governor who failed to win the 2008 Republican presidential nomination, charges that the president "is devouring the entire free-enterprise system" and lists Obama's decision to bail out the auto and banking industries as mistakes. The pitch for "Successful Investing" was sent out to readers of the conservative publication Human Events.

There are a handful of times in life where you get to experience something that has the feeling of brushing the presence of greatness. In my life at various times that has been something I didn't always realize up front. But having returned from a day and a half and a sum total of nine events over that period of time with one person in particular I have to tell you... I think I did this weekend. In December of 2006 I wrote a column in which I was the first pundit in America to predict that Barack Obama would...

Excerpt - Many FOMHs (Friends of Mike Huckabee) have been buzzing about the former governor’s new dental work. In fact, one longtime Huckabee pal, who asked not to be named, confirmed yesterday that Huckabee has traded in his God-given smile, which left a lot to be desired, for porcelain veneers. “It’s no secret that his (Huckabee’s) teeth were in bad shape,” the Huckabee friend said. “But, make no mistake about it, his new blinding-white grill will make Jessica Simpson jealous.” There is now visual evidence of Huckabee’s cosmetic dentistry. Here’s the before from Nov. 2007: ~ snip ~

Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee vowed Tuesday to continue his campaign for the White House despite another loss to presumptive nominee Arizona Sen. John McCain in the Wisconsin GOP primary. "It's not about ego," Huckabee told reporters at the Peabody Hotel after he telephoned McCain to congratulate him on winning the Wisconsin primary. "Let me assure you that my ego doesn't enjoy these kind of evenings where we don't win the primary election," he said, adding there are several issues, such as pro-life and taxes, he wants to continue to speak out on and hopes to do so at the...

SAN FRANCISCO -- Mike Huckabee brushed off predictions Thursday that he would drop out of the Republican presidential nominating contest, but dropped new hints that he'd prefer John McCain to Mitt Romney as the party's eventual pick. Huckabee, who hasn't won a caucus or primary since Iowa, emphatically dismissed the suggestion that the GOP race was a two-man contest, with Rudy Giuliani out of it and questions about whether he was sticking it out to angle for a running mate spot. "I'm staying in the race because I still think I can win," he told an enthusiastic audience of about...

PENSACOLA, FLA -- A reporter asked Mike Huckabee, who famously lost 110 pounds after being diagnosed with diabetes, how he he takes his fried chicken as both a Southerner and health junkie. The question had been inspired by reports that Mitt Romney, in front of his amused media entourage, pulled the skin off his Kentucky Fried Chicken before eating yesterday. "Going through the weight loss program I try to eat it more broiled and baked," Huckabee said. "But I can tell you this: any Southerner knows that if you're not gonna eat the skin, don't bother with calling it fried...