I would say he's more charismatic, the base adored Palin in OTL, you won't get much more support from then. Whilst he's less gaffe-prone, the things he means to say are bad enough.
Sorry to tell you this but this is a president huckabee TL.
I would say he's more charismatic, the base adored Palin in OTL, you won't get much more support from then. Whilst he's less gaffe-prone, the things he means to say are bad enough.
Sorry to tell you this but this is a president huckabee TL.
Gee, we didn't figure
Seriously though, I look forward to the actual presidency. Policy is more interesting than horse-races.
Sorry to tell you this but this is a president huckabee TL.
The damage avoided by not picking Sarah Palin as Veep will be offset by having a Sarah Palin-style figure running for President. His lack of moderate appeal is what lost him the primaries in OTL, it's going to be even worse trying to get genuine independents on his side.
Huckabee is hardly a Sarah Palin esque figure. He is inteligent, articulate, likeable, and has far more moderate appeal than you might think, from blue collar workers to . He's also far more moderate than Palin, yet more conservative than McCain. Had he run in 2012 in OTL, the nomination, and the election, would have been his.
I agree and I think that's something a lot of people forget. Him losing in the GE in 2008 is extremely likely, but I think you're assuming he would do worse than McCain and that's not something I'm inclined to agree with. Pawlenty was the wrong VP Choice though, IMO.
Huckabee is hardly a Sarah Palin esque figure. He is inteligent, articulate, likeable, and has far more moderate appeal than you might think, from blue collar workers to . He's also far more moderate than Palin, yet more conservative than McCain. Had he run in 2012 in OTL, the nomination, and the election, would have been his.
Also, what cost him the primaries in OTL was the open primaries went overwhelmingly to McCain.
With the exception of some iconoclastic positions on manufacturing -- which are neither left nor right, IMO -- on what issues do you consider Huckabee a 'moderate'? On every social issue, he's a doctrinaire far-right conservative, up to and including the fact that he's an evolution-denier. He's Sarah Palin without the lipstick; Michele Bachmann without the crazy eyes.
Now, I agree that Huckabee has some surface-level 'aw-shucks' folksy semi-charm -- although his mediocre ratings on Fox News (consistently finishing below Lockup reruns on MSNBC??) seem to indicate someone who wears thin awfully quickly. Huckabee '08 is ASB, and President Huckabee in any year is a long-shot; less likely than President Dukakis, for sure, but more likely than, say, President Chris Matthews.
I disagree that he was unelectable, I believe if he would have ran in 2012, he would have a much better shot than Romney with all of his problems, the problem is not ideology since Bachmann and Palin both come off as idiots while at least Huckabee isn't a gaffe machine and he has some executive experience and he was an outsider in '08, he slightly reminds me of Jimmy Carter in an odd sense.