Gov. Huckabee addresses National Conference of Editorial Writers

Arkansas Business News Story

Huckabee Defends McCain Over Economy Comments
By The Associated Press
9/18/2008 8:36:11 AM

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LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) _ Mike Huckabee says criticism of Republican presidential nominee John McCain over his remarks that the economy's "fundamentals" remain strong is as silly as trying to paint Democrat Barack Obama as sexist.

"It's nonsense. If that's the best argument they've got, they're in real trouble," the former GOP presidential candidate told The Associated Press on Wednesday. "That's like trying to say Obama's 'lipstick on a pig' comment was substantive, and that's just as silly."

Obama has called McCain out of touch on economic issues for proclaiming that "the fundamentals of our economy are strong."

Republicans, however, have tried to say Obama was slurring vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin when Obama call McCain's call for change in Washington "lipstick on a pig," days after Palin made a lipstick joke at the Republican convention. In a post on his political action committee's blog and as a commentator on Fox News Channel, Huckabee has said he doesn't believe Obama was referring to Palin.

The former Arkansas governor addressed members of the National Conference of Editorial Writers at the group's convention in Little Rock.

Huckabee, who dropped out of the race in March after McCain won enough delegates to claim the party's nomination, said that he was working on a "provocative" book about his failed presidential bid, to be released in November.

"It's going to give a lot of insight on what happened behind the scenes and not only behind the debate stage, but also in the conservative movement and the Republican primaries," Huckabee said.

Huckabee also defended McCain's campaign for not making Palin available for many public interviews since the Alaska governor was tapped as McCain's running mate.

"I think the McCain campaign wanted to make sure she was ready for the onslaught of having 75 people yell questions at her and that would be a pretty different experience for an Alaska governor to be throw into," he said. "I don't think it means she can't handle it. I think she's shown so far she can hold her own."

Another good older Blog Post (Jan 31, 2008) about Huckabee's Solid Economic Plan

The following was originally from the blog, NEW YORKERS FOR HUCKABEE, which can be found at http://nyforhuckabee.blogspot.com

Thursday, January 31, 2008

CNN Debate: Romney Reveals Big Business Bias

Governor Mitt Romney, who has only recently been touting his support of the Second Amendment, is obviously not too experienced in the use of firearms. Am I the only one who noticed him pull that big fat gun out of his pocket and shoot himself in the foot last night?

He was, in fact, being asked a question about his record in Massachusetts re: taxes. Specifically, he was asked to defend his raising fees by hundreds of millions of dollars; to explain why those did not constitute tax increases. To defend his record, he gave as an example increasing the fee for McDonald’s to put a sign on the Massachusetts Turnpike to advertise their restaurant from $200 to $2,000.

Well, that’s just fine and dandy, if you’re a big multi-national corporation like McDonald’s. But what if you’re just a Mom & Pop family restaurant struggling to compete with places like McDonald’s? Forget it, Mom & Pop, says Governor Romney, you have to pay the 900% fee increase! Thus does Romney reveal that he cares about Wall Street, but not Main Street. And I’ll just bet that there were plenty of Moms and Pops out there in TVland who got his message, loud and clear.

Leave it to Mike Huckabee to define the divide between two different strains of economic conservatism with the Wall Street v. Main Street distinction. But since so many people—including Rush Limbaugh—seem not to get it, I’ll expound on it a bit more here. Because Mike Huckabee has the audacity to talk about the proverbial little guy and to criticize genuine examples of corporate greed, conservatives like Limbaugh conclude that Huckabee is a liberal and opposed to business; i.e., he can’t be a real economic conservative. They need to listen a little better to what Mike Huckabee has to say.

What liberal Democrats do is complain that the little guy is being crushed by the interests of big business. Hence, they justify greater taxation, regulation and litigation. And of course, that punishes all businesses, large and small, and drags the whole economy down.

On the other hand, Gov. Huckabee complains that small business is being crushed by excessive government taxation, regulation and litigation, and that this needs to be reversed (and the implementation of the Fair Tax would do it in one fell swoop). But big business can safeguard its profits against big government by outsourcing jobs and moving its capital offshore. This has the same ultimate effect of dragging down the national economy, and with it, ultimately, our national security. This process is, however, more insidious because, at least in the short run, profits—and therefore, tax revenues—keep rolling in, even as whole industries keep moving out overseas.

Mike Huckabee understands that most of America’s industry and most of its jobs are generated by small business—not big business. And just as importantly, he understands that what is good for small business is good for all business, big and small.

Unfortunately, Mitt Romney just doesn’t get it. He obviously believes that if we take care of big business, small business will benefit also. That ain’t necessarily so, as I have pointed out above.

Now how does this all play out in the political calculus of the current presidential election? Hmmm, it seems to me that there are plenty of billionaire industrialists (Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, George Soros come to mind) who are eager to throw in their fortunes with liberal Democrats like Hillary. Ever wonder why that is?

My point here is that if you want a President in the White House who will just take care of big business, you don’t need a fiscal conservative of Romney’s stripe or even a Republican. Hillary will do just fine.

But if you want a President in the White House who is a real conservative—fiscal and otherwise—you need to help elect Mike Huckabee!

(And as for all you guys who want to post, on this blog site, pleas for Mike to withdraw from the race because he’s hurting Mitt Romney’s chances, you can forget that. And if you’ve taken the time to read this post all the way through, now you also know one reason why.)

Posted by Joel Brind at 4:51 PM