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by Nicholas Beaudrot of Electoral Math
Some assorted thoughts on the Mike Huckabee boomlet:
- I'm glad some more people have made it to the party. Markos and I were wondering if anyone else would show up.
- I have to think there's a certain amount of pundit's fallacy behind support for Huckabee. Huckabee is very affable on television, and he seems to be willing to separate campaigning from governing in a way that the Republican party hasn't done since at least the H.W. Bush Administration. In addition, I'd much rather the GOP turn into the party of "Sam's Club Republicanism"—socially conservative, economically moderate or even liberal on occasion— than become the quasi-libertarian party (lower taxes and less regulation of sex), or the War Party. I can't speak for Ezra, Matt, et al., but in my judgement the odds of passing a good health care bill with Huckabee as President are much higher than, say, with Giuliani or Romney in charge. It's not entirely clear that the GOP will be forced to adopt a Huckabee-esque approach in order to win elections. A pro-choice candidate who pushed other pro-family policies and promised more tax cuts might win back more of the socially moderate suburbs while holding on to enough conservatives in the South and West to get to 270 votes.
- That said, the Supreme Court is already awfully reactionary as it is. The pro-Roe majority on the Supreme Court is currently 5-to-4, and the justices most likely to retire or both pro-Roe. To say nothing of the rulings like Ledbetter or the Seattle/Louisville school integration cases.
