Huckabee gaffes tarnish credibility

MANCHESTER, N.H. - Republican Mike Huckabee won the Iowa caucuses by campaigning as an honest conservative, yet he has made a series of blunders that raise questions about his credibility.

..."He's not plastic," said GOP strategist Greg Mueller. "He speaks American, not Washingtonian. The way he communicates is coming off as a person who understands and can connect with middle America."

...For all his directness, Huckabee, a former Arkansas governor, sent a series of conflicting messages in the days before the caucuses:

_He decided not to air a commercial attacking Romney but played it for journalists, anyway.
_He said he supports the Hollywood writers' strike but crossed the picket line to appear on the Jay Leno's "Tonight" show.
_He campaigned at a casino in Burlington, Iowa, despite his opposition to gambling.

Even his senior aides have had trouble keeping their story straight.

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Obama, Huckabee sweep to Iowa victories

DES MOINES, Iowa - Sen. Barack Obama swept to victory in the Iowa caucuses Thursday night, pushing Hillary Rodham Clinton to third place and taking a major stride in a historic bid to become the nation's first black president. Mike Huckabee rode a wave of support from evangelical Christians to win the opening round among Republicans in the 2008 campaign for the White House.

Obama, 46 and a first-term senator from Illinois, told a raucous victory rally his triumph showed that in "big cities and small towns, you came together to say, 'We are one nation, we are one people and our time for change has come.'"

Nearly complete returns showed the first-term lawmaker gaining 37 percent support from Iowa Democrats. Former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina appeared headed for second place, relegating Clinton, the former first lady, to a close third.

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What ALL other candidates of any party need to address now is the magnetic attraction Barak Obama has with the American people and the REASONS FOR IT. Here's a hint: People regard Mr. Obama as a family man who speaks for REAL family values -- not the kind of "family" values that the Republicans push that entails sex scandals and blatant corruption and a crazy man who wants to be Emperor of the World occupying the Oval Office -- and not the slick political machine that is the now stopped-dead-in-its-tracks Clinton "juggernaut."

The just plain folks of America, especially those of independent mind, those who cherish real family values are sick unto death of the stinking pile of shit that our government has become.

Americans are going to vote for the candidate they believe actually cares about their family and the struggles that most working families must face on a daily basis.

Oh, the reality may very well be that Barak Obama is as heartless as the rest of them but that's not what he represents. And people will vote for the representation.

Is Huckabee his own worst enemy?

Huckabee's latest antic truly belongs in the bizarre column. It was "The Great WTF Moment" of his campaign.

It seems Romney launched an ad campaign that highlighted questionable things that Huckabee had done in his political past. All of the factual data in that ad was correct even if presented as negatives against Huckabee. Pretty much, par for the course in politics.

A source from Huckabee's own campaign said Huckabee went "white-hot" with rage over the political ad. So, Huckabee fired back with his own disturbing and nasty anti-Romney ad.

The problem with Huckabee's ad is that it was not entirely truthful. At least, Romney stuck with the facts. Huckabee, it seems, did not.

Probably, also par for the course in politics but there's just one problem when it comes to Iowans and their elections: they tend to turn against negative campaigners.

Somebody must have whispered same into Huckabee's ear so he thought to launch a preemptive strike against negative campaign ads in general by featuring his own negative campaign ad!

Are you still following this? LOL.

What Huckabee did was to hold a news conference in which he played his negative campaign ad for all the assembled media types stating something along the lines of, this is not the sort of ad he would be using in the media for his campaign.

HUH????

Dude, that's exactly what you just did! Huckabee claims he was using his negative attack ad for demonstration purposes only and not as an actual negative attack.

From the article:

Huckabee showed off the spot to the journalists, knowing full well his negative message would seep out of the room. He told the media to pay close attention.

"You're not going to get a copy of it," he warned, "so this is your chance to see it, then after that you'll never see it again."

The media laughed.

This man is indeed his own worst enemy.

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Clinton holds lead as Romney slips in Iowa

Interesting. See post below that proclaims Obama beating Clinton by a handy margin.

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Poll: Obama, Huckabee leading rivals

DES MOINES, Iowa - Presidential contenders rang in the 2008 election year with near-constant campaigning on Monday as a poll showed Democrat Barack Obama and Republican Mike Huckabee leading their rivals with three days remaining before the Iowa caucuses.

The poll by the Des Moines Register showed Obama, an Illinois senator, with the support of 32 percent of those surveyed, compared to 25 percent for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and 24 percent for former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina.

Among Republicans, Huckabee, a former Arkansas governor, had the backing of 32 percent of those surveyed, and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney had 26 percent.

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Highlights from the CNN/YouTube GOP Debate

This is actually quite a good little collection of quips and sound bites and worth listening to if you want to get some measure of who the candidates are. I think the most genuine and honorable of the GOP candidates, as they appear on this video, are Huckabee and Ron Paul. I think Mitt Romney has the looks and style and grace of a Presidential candidate but when he turns sideways, so to speak, there's little substance there. Fred Thompson, while seemingly genuine, does not make a great impression for himself as "President material" and Rudy Guiliani comes off as the uber-slick politico and I think our country is sick unto death of the uber-slick ones.