Huckabee's Rise

By Hugh Hewitt

Mike Huckabee's November rise in the polls has brought increased scrutiny in December. While the former Arkansas governor is certainly a pro-life and pro-marriage candidate, he is not a traditional conservative. His economic polices are decidedly populist, his proprosal to give in-state tuition to illegal immigrants is conspicuously outside the GOP mainstream, and his position in 1992 that people with AIDS should be isolated was a stunner. Quarantines weren't mainstream then, and Huckabee's refusal to admit as much now suggests a stubbornness about past policy mistakes that could easily be exploited in the general election.

The Huckabee boomlet may well have faded before Iowa caucuses on January 3, but if it hasn't, Hawkeye voters and those that follow in Wyoming, New Hampshire and Michigan have to realize that a Huckabee candidacy could put the GOP on the path to a general election wipe-out that would rival that of the Dems in 1980 or 1972. Populism combined with radical proposals does not carry the American center, and not even much of the American right.