“In the right hands it creates a solid connection between the speaker and his audience and among the audience; in the wrong hands I suppose it’s a great way to manipulate crowds.”

This is precisely why popular elections of the POTUS is a bad idea, and precisely why it was not called for in the founding documents. The electoral college is there for a reason.

Yet, we, the dumbed down, government educated sheeple, seem h3ll bent on repeating the mad mob decay of ancient Greece by shredding our founding constitutional philosophy.

God save the republic.

That’s my impression, reinforced by Mike Huckabee’s performance in tonight’s debate. If you question my post, I’m going to seriously, and several times, question whether you even read it before commenting or just read about it ……

I find it funny that some are saying that Huckabee sounds just like a Democrat. Hell, we’ve got a mess of Democrats playing conservative these days. Now GOP just means Democrat Lite for the big business folks so they can have their low cost labor and big stock market while selling out middle class jobs to our enemies. McCain, Rudy, Mitt and Huck’s just the one with the cross and the snake oil at the moment but not a one of them comes close to conservative. Personally I’m voting for Fred in the primary and leaving the GOP to sink into the swamp. Money doesn’t trump everything and there isn’t room for conservatives in the GOP anymore.

Fully agree because they have no idea what he stands for, or not, on the issues, or what his lack of experience is. Same for Obama.

Entelechy on January 5, 2008 at 6:08 PM

Exactly. The more I talk to supporters of Obama and Huckabee, the more I realize that they don’t support them based on their policy positions, but they support them based on their delivery of their empty rhetoric and populism. So they come across to me as very well-intentioned, idealistic, yet naive and uninformed people. Those people are not swayed by info when it comes across angry and insulting, but may be swayed if people engage them, show them some respect and then present them with the facts about their candidate and let them decide if they still want to support them.

It’s almost like the tactic parents need to use with their teenagers. Teenagers don’t like being told what NOT to do and don’t like being reminded that they are young and naive and ignorant. But if they are made to feel good about themselves and feel respected by those older than them, they will show the same respect in return and may show humility in listening and learning from their elders.

But it is all in the approach. If you come across demeaning and insulting, no one is going to listen.

I can use myself as an example. For the longest time, I just skipped right over csdeven’s posts (and some others on here), because of their snark and mean-spirited comments in a lot of cases. I did the same with MB4. But as they softened their approach (or I became more tolerable of their approach, probably a combination of both), I began to read their input more and I am glad that I did. Because they have much to offer the discussion here.

We need to use this same approach with Huckabee supporters. Right now, I have a feeling many of them have tuned out the criticism and have become even more entrenched in their support for him due to spite.

I think if we swallow some of our pride and frustration and stop insulting those who support Mike Huckabee and try as we can to appeal to their logic on the issues, we may be able to get them to see the light on this guy.

At least that is my hope. We have a lot of work to do though.

Michael in MI on January 5, 2008 at 5:15 PM

Fully agree because they have no idea what he stands for, or not, on the issues, or what his lack of experience is. Same for Obama.

There is a contradiction there in light of Huck’s support from Home Schoolers, but it’s because of the teacher’s unions.

As Governor, he knew which side his bread was buttered on.

Buy Danish on January 5, 2008 at 1:20 P

I don’t get that either, since home schoolers more than anyone want small government.

Yep, believe me, this homeschooler’s not voting for him.

Homeschoolers that support him do so because he’s saying now that he supports homeschooling, but if more people knew about his past (taxes included), it’d be a different story.

At least that is my hope. We have a lot of work to do though.

Michael in MI on January 5, 2008 at 5:15 PM

So much to do, so little time.

Very sad state of affairs we are in and it has nothing to do with Mike Huckabee. It seems that our citizens are ignorant, superficial and shallow. If we had an informed, educated and engaged American public, they wouldn’t fall for the speaking style of anyone, because they would see beyond the style and understand the speaker had no substance.

I am beginning to feel that we cannot call Mike Huckabee’s supporters “evangelicals” or “Christians” or whatever. His support seems to come from people who are either conservative Christians who are ignorant of his policies or liberal Christians who agree with his policies or maybe even a combination of both: ignorant liberal Christians.

csdeven noted on the thread yesterday that many of his supporters are supposedly coming from people who were once for Fred Thompson, but switched to Mike Huckabee over the whole “fire in the belly/lazy” stuff. Which makes absolutely no logical sense if these people are conservatives. But, from what I took from csdeven’s post, these people aren’t conservatives, they are abortion and likeability people. Those are their only two qualifications for voting for someone.

That is depressing. But I still tend to agree with Rush Limbaugh that the best way to fight this kind of thing is to get people educated, informed and engaged in politics. That way, they won’t be falling for this nonsense. If you notice, there are many Christians who post here at HotAir and I don’t think any of us like Mike Huckabee. But most of us here are also very informed, educated on the issues and engaged in politics. So that seems to be the difference.

I also think we need to go the route of Laura from PursuingHoliness.com. She posted about talking with one of her friends who supports Mike Huckabee, but this friend was completely ignorant about the man’s background. I think if we swallow some of our pride and frustration and stop insulting those who support Mike Huckabee and try as we can to appeal to their logic on the issues, we may be able to get them to see the light on this guy.

At least that is my hope. We have a lot of work to do though.

Bad on taxes. Bad on fiscal conservatism. Bad on illegal immigration. Bad on crime. Bad on foreign policy!

I’m a Christian and I think the religious right is NUTS for voting for this guy.

Huckabee is not qualified to be President!

I’ll vote for Obama before I vote for Huckabee.

Also, Mr. Medved is to Huckabee, what Mr. Hewitt is to Romney.

I’m still keeping hope alive, against all odds. As it is now, it’s two preachers, from two isles, but much can still happen.

Timely article from the WSJ, but requires subscription.

You can get around forced subscriptions by going to bugmenot d0t c0m.

V15J on January 5, 2008 at 2:15 PM

You know, you’re right! We’re all a bunch of mind-numbed robots who can’t think for ourselves.

This robot linked to numerous sources on this thread which have nothing to do with Rush Limbaugh.

Like this.

You’re right. He’d be worse.

Why? Because Rush said so?

NH has very small homeless and illegal alien problem, also.

But it has a terrible problem with legal aliens from Massachusetts and New York. :-D

Seriously, though, I think those Massachusetts residents and New Yorkers moving into NH has changed its political culture.

NH and Alaska are only 2 states with no sales tax and no income tax. And AK has oil revenue taxes for state income.

To see a side-by-side comparison of conservative government versus liberal, compare VT and NH here.

Both (adjoining) states have similar size, geography, resources, industry, etc. NH has very small homeless and illegal alien problem, also. I’ll be back!!!

Even if Huckabee is a big government Republican, I doubt he’d be as bad as Bush.

V15J on January 5, 2008 at 12:57 PM

You’re right. He’d be worse.

There is a contradiction there in light of Huck’s support from Home Schoolers, but it’s because of the teacher’s unions.

As Governor, he knew which side his bread was buttered on.

Buy Danish on January 5, 2008 at 1:20 P

I don’t get that either, since home schoolers more than anyone want small government.

There is a contradiction there in light of Huck’s support from Home Schoolers, but it’s because of the teacher’s unions.

As Governor, he knew which side his bread was buttered on.

The very same evangelicals who vote for the Huckster will be the ones moaning and complaining when he turns out to be against all their political beliefs.

Mojave Mark on January 5, 2008 at 12:39 PM

Are they though? If, in great numbers, values issues are their number one priority, who is to say that they really care about fiscal conservatism, illegal immigration, low taxes, the W.O.T. and so forth.

Here’s a look at the God-o-meter.

This provides a ray of hope, although I foresee a repeat in South Carolina, I don’t see this happening in NH, or on Super Tuesday.

…Among the remaining, non-evangelical Republican voters, by contrast, only about one in seven supported Huckabee,

A look at the entrance polls shows that among non-evangelicals, Huckabee was bested by Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson, and John McCain. In fact, Huckabee barely beat Ron Paul in this group. To God-o-Meter, that’s not exactly “mass appeal.” That’s the-only-ten-on-God-o-Meter appeal.

bnelson44 on January 5, 2008 at 12:59 PM

Biased story, much? Sheesh.

He pleased teachers unions with his consistent opposition to school choice and voucher programs.
Buy Danish on January 5, 2008 at 12:08 PM

Seems odd that evangelicals would be against vouchers and school choice.

I recall the Left decrying vouchers as an unconstitutional subsidy to the Bible-thumpers in Jesusland.