Thinking About The Perpetually-Heating Criticism Of Huckabee

I got an email from a friend today:

Huck has been getting hammered on liberal behavior when it comes to illegals and taxes based on what he has said and done. What do you say to that.

Of course, the criticisms get worse and probably will continue to until Huckabee wins or loses. Why might that be? Lacking a crystal ball, here are my speculations.

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I have written about the fact that this criticism comes not from liberals, but from conservatives. Of course, I understand it coming from Republican competitors and their supporters. But, what is bothersome is when it comes from ostensibly conservative sources. The fact that it comes from acknowledged smart people highlights to me that it is frantic grasping at everything but the kitchen sink by people who otherwise would know better than what they are saying. So, why are they so agitated?

I’ve only come up with a few possible factors, which I’ll list and qualify. But first, anyone who knows me might ask why I would support such a supposed conservative infidel? I wrote about this in my last post: If I thought these accusations were valid, I wound not support him. But, I don’t think they are true or totally sincere. Some of these conservatives say that once Republicans get informed about what Huckabee is really about, his support will fall. But, the fact is that 99.9% or more of even the active and engaged Republicans are not as informed about Huckabee, his competitors, and even conservatism in general, as I am. Am I just stupid? Well, I guess people will decide for themselves. If so, I have read a lot on all sides of many questions, for nothing.

Let me emphasize that a lot of this criticism comes from people who are certainly smart enough and should be informed enough, not to throw out the things that they are. So, I would ask anyone who says or repeats these things what, specifically, they are referring to relative to immigration and taxes; and I hope we can dismiss the nakedly politically motivated assertions of Romney and Thompson. Speaking of that, consider this: why do I not support Romney, Thompson, Giuliani, or McCain? In the simplest terms: because they are not conservative. They have some propensities in a conservative direction. But, they have no clear view of the proper role of government at its various levels and about human nature, in general. That is clear with respect to every one of those I mentioned. I’m not mad at them, personally. You aren’t mad at someone for their incapacities. I am not near in the position that I can determine intentions. But, I can say that there is a problem either with intentions or perceptions and the facilities to form them. As I have said before, if they are serious, I don’t want these incompetents as chief executive charged with defending American principle, anymore than I would hire an honest carpenter to perform surgery.

So, set aside the politicians. What about the conservative writers? They are saying things that literate people (and some of them are very literate) are plenty able to find invalidating information about. If you know what you are talking about, you know that the charges are inaccurate and/or unfair. And again, the suggestion of insincerity is underscored by the fact that many of these are vested in other candidates, all of whom as I said, are eminently vulnerable to criticism on conservative grounds. So, what might be an unspoken motivation for these criticisms?

First, I’ll mention the most nakedly visceral possibility: There are a few public observers who simply have a sentimental reaction to the fact that they do not see enough fury from Huckabee about things that they are themselves all in knots about. That’s why it’s easy to fall for the immigration criticism. If you look at Huckabee’s immigration plan (at his website), I see nothing to object to: immigrants should leave the country within 4 months and get in line for legal entry, if they want to come back.

But!: the process for legal entry should be streamlined for people who plainly want to be law-abiding and work. And in Arkansas, he supported a failed proposal to allow children of illegal immigrants who have attended Arkansas public schools for years, to apply for a merit scholarship program IF they are drug-free and apply to become citizens. Huckabee said 1) that we shouldn’t punish children for the crime of a parent, and 2) we should want them to become productive tax-paying citizens rather than being long-term low-wage potential tax-takers.

I entirely agree with that. But for some people whose anger is not just with the legal chaos that government has allowed, but extends to people who like ordinary human beings have exploited chaos to provide for themselves and their families. And, that does extend to the children of illegal immigrants. And, they often don’t want them in the country, under any circumstances: Tom Tancredo proposed a moratorium on legal immigration, which is basically to redefine America. All you can do is state what you believe. Mike Huckabee says, “I’m a conservative, but I’m not mad at anybody about it.” There are some people who could say, “I’m a conservative, and I’m mad as hell at a whole lot of people!” (and I’m not gonna take it, anymore!)

Ann Coulter for instance, though she is bright and her books are usually well-documented (never mind the snide and provocative comments) has blistered Huckabee about even accommodating statements toward people who disagree, previously criticizing Huckabee’s comments about immigration, among other things. Last night she took another tack: like Alan Keyes the night before, she credited Huckabee on things like abortion. But then, flipping the liberal criticism about not believing in evolution, she suggested he was “backing down” because when pressed in a debate, Huckabee said, “I don’t know how God did it…I wasn’t there. But, I believe that God did create.” Coulter’s last book heavily criticized the lack of evidence of the case for evolution, and I agree with her. But, I think Huckabee is absolutely right that that argument is only a distraction and has nothing to do with the business of being President of The United States. Ann Coulter likes Duncan Hunter: a serious and decent guy, last polled at 1% in Iowa and between that and nil, elsewhere.

Now, let’s consider these other people like Robert Novak, George Will (who attacked again, today), Charles Krauthammer, Rich Lowry, Jonah Goldberg, Fred Barnes and others. For one thing, I think a lot of wealthy people don’t like The Fair Tax that Huckabee is proposing. They are doing fine with accountants writing off most of the luxuries in their life, thank you very much. Under The Fair Tax, they will pay for everything new that they or their businesses purchase, from paper clips to vehicles for road, water, or air or for real estate and developments. The net effect of all of those tax write-offs is to shift the tax burden toward less wealthy Americans: people accustomed to being special, may not be happy about a system being “fair.”

But larger than that, and this is admittedly speculation encouraged by what seems to be hollow and unnecessary criticism, I think a lot of establishment people are just ill-at-ease with someone at the head of their party who is an undaunted evangelical Christian: “EEEuuuww!” To quote Frank Costanza: “This guy…he’s not my kinda guy!” They’d prefer a flip-flopping and posturing plastic man like Romney, a social liberal Mario-Cuomo-endorsing cosmopolitan who doesn’t understand bedrock American principle like Giuliani, or a muddled-headed infidel to constitutional principle like McCain or Thompson. “Evangelical Christians are great for delivering us votes, but not for sitting at the head of our tables: Ick!”

This noise gets ever more frantic, the longer Huckabee sits at the top of the polls. On the blogs of course, particularly the viscerally conservative ones, you read al the people who in their zeal have picked up and run with these charges about Huckabee’s supposed fiscal liberalism and illegal immigration friendliness. I ask as a lifelong conservative and intense observer of the process, “Never mind what you’ve HEARD. Can you tell me what you have heard Mike Huckabee SAY that tells you that he favors illegal immigration, or even amnesty or sanctuary? Or why would you think that he just loves to spend government money without constraint and would do so as an American President?”

Mike Huckabee has opposed amnesty and sanctuaries all along. He opposed the “comprehensive” immigration bill that would have defined a path to citizenship for illegal aliens (amnesty with a slap on the wrist) and which gave John McCain’s campaign a huge blow earlier this year. And on taxes, Mike Huckabee governed a state with a Democrat legislature and a constitutionally mandated balanced budget. At one budget shortfall, he consented to the legislature’s choice of tax hikes to balance the budget AFTER the legislature had rejected spending cuts. The Club for Growth’s mercenary attack-Huckabee campaign made an ad of this special balance-the-budget session of the legislature, splicing together Huckabee’s listing of the tax options left available, to make it appear that Huckabee was inviting taxes.

Huckabee signed on early to the no-tax pledge of Americans for Tax Reform. He correctly says the federal government doesn’t need more money. And unlike his relative dullard competitors for the Republican nomination, Huckabee perfectly well understands and respects the 10^th Amendment distinction of federal and state jurisdiction and power, and cites it, frequently. That’s why I suspect that there is underlying motivation: many of these critics are not so silly and incompetent as to not understand these facts. I think their words are a way to try to spook conservatives from a cultural interloper.

Here’s what Huckabee is “guilty” of. He doesn’t let differences of opinion drive him to either scorn or to neglect of a problem because he can’t unilaterally impose the solution. And yes, he would use the bully pulpit of the president to verbally admonish Americans to strive for morally prudent behavior in their commercial operations (from this is derived criticism of his supposed disrespect of free markets), and he would ask foreign imports to meet basic American standards of safety (from this arises criticisms of his supposed disrespect of free trade) If you prefer spite and dysfunction, then yes, perhaps he isn’t the candidate for you.