As Mike Huckabee rises in the polls, an
inevitable process of vetting him for conservative credentials is under
way in which people who know nothing of Arkansas or of the
circumstances of his governorship weigh in knowingly about his record.
As his political consultant in the ea rly ’90s and one who has been
following Arkansas politics for 30 years, let me clue you in: Mike
Huckabee is a fiscal conservative.
A recent column by Bob Novak excoriated Huckabee for a “47
percent increase in state tax burden.” But during Huckabee’s years in
office, total state tax burden — all 50 states combined — rose by twice
as much: 98 percent, increasing from $743 billion in 1993 to $1.47
trillion in 2005. In Arkansas, the income tax when he took office was 1 percent for
the poorest taxpayers and 7 percent for the richest, exactly where it
stood when he left the statehouse 11 years later. But, in the interim,
he doubled the standard deduction and the child care credit, repealed
capital gains taxes for home sales, lowered the capital gains rate,
expanded the homestead exemption and set up tax-free savings accounts
for medical care and college tuition.
Most impressively, when he had to pass an income tax surcharge
amid the drop in revenues after Sept. 11, 2001, he repealed it three
years later when he didn’t need it any longer.
He raised the sales tax one cent in 11 years and did that only
after the courts ordered him to do so. (He also got voter approval for
a one-eighth-of-one-cent hike for parks and recreation.)
He wants to repeal the income tax, abolish the IRS and
institute a “fair tax” based on consumption, and opposes any tax
increase for Social Security.
And he can win in Iowa.
When voters who have decided not to back Rudy Giuliani because of his
social positions consider the contest between Mitt Romney and Mike
Huckabee, they will have no difficulty choosing between a real social
conservative and an ersatz one.
Romney, who began as a pro-lifer and switched in order to win
in Massachusetts, and then flipped back again, cannot compete with a
lifelong pro-lifer, Huckabee.
But Huckabee’s strength is not just his orthodoxy on gay
marriage, abortion, gun control and the usual litany. It is his opening
of the religious right to a host of new issues. He speaks firmly for
the right to life, but then notes that our responsibility for children
does not end with childbirth. His answer to the rise of medical costs
is novel and exciting. “Eighty percent of all medica l spending,” he
says, “is for chronic diseases.” So he urges an all-out attack on teen
smoking and overeating and a push for exercise not as the policies of a
big-government liberal but as the requisites of a fiscal conservative
anxious to save tax money.
So what happens if Huckabee wins in Iowa? With New Hampshire
only five days later, his momentum will be formidable. The key may boil
down to how Hillary does in Iowa. Hillary? Yes. If she loses in Iowa,
most of the independents in New Hampshire will flock to the Democratic
primary to vote for her or against her. That will move the Republican
electorate to the right in New Hampshire — bad news for Rudy, good news
for Huckabee. But if she wins in Iowa, there will be no point in voting
in the Democratic primary and a goodly number will enter the GOP
contest, giving Rudy a big boost.
And afterward? If Romney wins Iowa, New Hampshire, Michigan and
South Carolina, sweeping the early prim aries, Giuliani will have a
very tough task to bring him down in Florida or on Super Tuesday. It
can be done, but it’s tough. But if Romney loses in Iowa (likely to
Huckabee) then Rudy can survive the loss of Iowa and even New Hampshire
without surrendering irresistible momentum to Romney.
In any event, neither Hillary nor Giuliani will be knocked out
by defeats in Iowa and New Hampshire. Their 50-state organizations,
their national base and their massive war chests will permit them to
fight it out all over the United States. Even if they lose the first
two contests, they will remain in the race and could well come back to
win.
Source: Townhall.com
Mike Huckabee is a Fiscal Conservative
By Dick Morris and Eileen McGann
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Republican
presidential candidate Mike Huckabee speaks to attendees at the Family
Research Council's Values Voters Summit in Washington October 20, 2007.
REUTERS/Joshua Roberts (UNITED STATES)
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