Friday, July 20, 2007

Home School Solutions for Huckabee/Real Not Phony "Consensus" Candidates.

Here is a home schooling blog on the Huckabee blogroll. Home School Solutions

Of course, The Home School Legal Defense Fund has also endorsed Huckabee, Like this blogger, I saw Huckabee speak, 9 years ago for me, and have liked him since. Actually, it was at a Christian Coalition dinner at a Republican state convention, in Ft. Worth.

Anyway, you can also look up the HSLDF web site to find their endorsement. For me, Huckabee isn’t just my favorite option among the current presidential candidates. He is the ONLY option for people who deeply care about the things we value for the nation.

I know: the supposed experts still act as though there are only three or four choices. I just heard Bill Krystol on Michael Medved’s radio program doing the McCain (though he’s inclined to think McCain won’t make it)-Giuliani-Romney-Thompson cha-cha. Bill Krystol is a conservative commenter and magazine editor and a Washington insider. And he buys the “pop” consensus hook, line, and sinker.

Now the largest constituency in the Republican Party is mostly Christian social conservatives. McCain has spoken disparagingly of social conservatives in the past and shown no philosophical coherence on these and other large matters. Giuliani is a serious and assertive administrator, but he’s pro-choice, pro gay marriage, and pro-gun control! In themselves of course, these things demonstrate serious specific problems. But on the whole, it’s obvious that he has no coherent traditionally American context from which to develop his positions: one has no idea what is next. Mitt Romney has been all over the map to where now, he just happens to be exactly where polls of dissatisfied conservatives suggest he should be. Coincidence? You’ll have to decide. But he also is historically a strong salesman. I’m not signing up. He’s shown me nothing of Huckabee’s Christ-like motivation.

Speaking of which, I know it’s not supposed to be appropriate to consider, but Romney’s a Mormon. Let’s just be frank about that. They are generally clean-living people of pretty positive community values, and I know a lot of good and respectable Mormons. And I wouldn’t rule out the best candidate only because he or she was Mormon. I don’t even insist that a candidate be a Christian. I can name some Jews that I would support enthusiastically, for example. But, I think the biggest attraction of Mormonism to a lot of people is exactly those positive community values, and not necessarily an intimate relationship with Jesus Christ. Mitt Romney has said, “Jesus Christ is my personal savior” and I think we should be very slow to contest that assertion on doctrinal terms.

But, though most Mormons don’t dwell on or even delve into doctrine, for the Mormon hierarchy who do, Mormonism involves a lot of really bizarre stuff, either on a secular or a Christian basis, including the defiance of some bare Christian essentials. But, I would guess that Mitt Romney isn’t deep into that. As I said, if he were the best candidate, I wouldn’t rule him out, just for that. But, he isn’t the best candidate! I don’t feel at all comfortable about what drives him at his center. Given that mine is as close as you can get to Mike Huckabee’s priority of representing and emulating the grace of Jesus Christ with respect to everyone! It isn’t even near a close call. And Fred Thompson is also unclear in his expressions, most notably in his history regarding abortion and his enthusiasm for McCain-Feingold’s patent defiance of the 1st Amendment.

So, what’s up with these guys being supposedly the only Republican candidates, when there are 6 (until recently 7) other candidates? It’s really simple: non-conservative anti-Republican people are defining who will be the leading Republican candidates. And, Republicans are falling for it. It was the same in 2000: at the beginning of the cycle, there were 14 Republican candidates. In terms of their philosophical clarity, the worst two were the ones who made it farthest in the campaign. George Bush of course, had an ex-president father named George Bush and was governor of a large state, Texas. But, John McCain wasn’t even a blip in the 1999 Ames Straw Poll. He became a star with the media because he was a Republican heretic. Bush’s money came from his name and his office. But McCain’s momentum came from the media circus about a “Straight Talk Express” with nearly constant coverage. The media wanted to make this 1999 nobody-inm-the-polls into the Republican nominee, and they almost did it. In the end, they had to settle for the second worst.

You can’t blame money because money comes from celebrity and celebrity comes from positive coverage. It amazes me that people don’t see that the media has power to make a celebrity of anyone. I’ll go this far: It wouldn’t have happened because he was a conservative former chairman of the Republican National Committee, but otherwise, If Jim Gilmore had come out with some liberal position like supporting gay marriage or Roe v. Wade or even tax increases, he wouldn’t have dropped out of the race, this week. The media would have focused on him like a laser, his contributions would have increased, and he’d have been on a charge like McCain was in ’99-2000, picking up Independent support for New Hampshire’s open primary, for example. Mike Huckabee, on the other hand, will have to do it all, himself.

Again, conservatives must spread the word to ignore the media and do your own homework!

Larry Perrault

http://larryperrault.blogspot.com/

http://mikehuckabee.com

http://mikehuckabeepresident2008.blogspot.com

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3 comments:

Anonymous said...

hey great post...i was wondering if you would check out the video i made for huckabee on my website...it was posted today

Larry Perrault said...

rhatch:

I've been out all day. Perhaps we've spoken before, but by your handle, I don't know where your web page is. I tried a longshot search on rhatch. No luck/ But I liked your profile information.

Larry

DR said...

Great post.