Huckabee just turned the political world upside down. And there’s no way that the Republican party is happy about it. The candidate who represents vehement anti-gay sentiment, who wanted to quarantine AIDs patients, and who will actually take action to criminalize abortion just won the Iowa Caucuses.
The Republicans have held their coalition together by winking and nodding at the Christian right without ever taking real action on abortion or their other pet issues. Now the Christian right has become the face of the party – and the question is how will economic conservatives, neoconservatives and other members of the Republican coalition view that change?
Given that Huckabee recently criticized President Bush’s foreign policy, you can bet that the neoconservatives aren’t happy with him. Given that Huckabee raised taxes when he was governor, you can bet that the economic conservatives aren’t happy with him. The Republican coalition is in disarray.
1 response so far ↓
1 Howard // Jan 4, 2008 at 11:00 am
Aaron – thanks for getting the whole blog started.
I certainly agree that the Republican Party is all over the place right now, but I would urge a bit of caution in your characterization of Gov. Huckabee and his support. I certainly don’t agree with Gov. Huckabee on many issues and some of his comments from 1992 are offensive, but to be fair he represents a lot more than the ‘vehement anti-gay sentiment’ of some. An angry and vitriolic tone towards Gov. Huckabee and the Christian right is going to make it harder for the Democrats to win in November, and more importantly is going to make it harder for Democrats to govern if they win.
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