There was a time back in 2008 when I started becoming aware of Mike Huckabee that I thought that he seemed like a compassionate conservative, someone who was religious but also cared about helping the poor. He would go on shows like The Daily Show and The Colbert Report and act all affable and avuncular and talk a good game, as if he was a reasonable person.
But it soon became apparent that it is all a façade, that I had been completely hoodwinked, and that he is a raging and hateful bigot masked by an urbane manner. His latest outburst is to argue, using some truly weird logic that betrays a lack of understanding of the interplay of the three branches of government, that states would have the right to ignore the US Supreme Court if it were to declare that state bans on same-sex marriage are unconstitutional.
Even Jon Stewart, who had also seemed to fall for Huckabee’s bogus reasonableness, seems to be realizing that he is being completely disingenuous about what he says when he comes on shows like his. In his interview with him two days ago, Stewart was far more skeptical that he has been before, shooting down Huckabee’s bogus implication than the people in the ‘heartland’, wherever the hell that is and whoever the hell they are but who presumably think just like him, are better than the rest of us.
Huckabee is an awful man.
(This clip aired on January 19, 2015. To get suggestions on how to view clips of The Daily Show and The Nightly Show outside the US, please see this earlier post. If the videos autoplay, please see here for a diagnosis and possible solutions.)
When Huck-a-bull gives his scenario about breaking down on a lonely road and choosing between a Harvard MBA and a “couple of good-ol-boys”, I would have said, “If I were a black man, I’d want the MBA. He may not fix my car, but he probably won’t chain me to his bumper and take me for a drag, either.”
As for him, or anyone, being a “compassionate conservative”, there’s no such thing, really. I used to think conservatives wanted to turn back the clock to 1950, but actually it’s more like 1890. They think Downton Abbey is a model society. Their idea of compassion is to let you clean out their stable in exchange for a bucket of slop and a pile of hay to sleep on. And if you do a good job, at Christmas they may even give you a shovel. The really ridiculous part is that those “bubbas” that he claims to care about so much, and who keep voting for him would not get any better treatment than the rest of us.
My brother-in-law worked for El Paso Natural Gas for decades, and he was fiercely loyal to it, even though he often was working on the president’s home instead of actual company business. That’s right -- the president was using employees to do under-the-counter jobs for his own benefit while the corporation was footing the bill. Last year, El Paso was bought out, and my B-I-L was laid off, probably because his offiicial work record was too thin due to all the shady jobs he did, but he still won’t say a bad word about either El Paso or the new company. And of course he now spends his free time watching Fox News and cussing out Obama.
Another particular moment I found egregious of Huckabee when he defended a ridiculous commercial here. Huckabee tries to dance around his own viewpoints, but Stewart really doesn’t have any of it. Stewart is basically saying “come on, be real with me,” while Huckabee absolutely refuses.
Mike Huckabee Wants Every American To Be ‘Forced At Gun Point’ To Learn From Habitual Liar David Barton
He knows what people on the coasts are like because he’s seen TV shows about them. Fer realsies? Because Sex in the City and Beverly Hills 90210 were documentaries.
He also repeats the mantra about a difference between ‘educated’ and ‘smart’. True enough, but uneducated does not automatically imply intelligence.
He’s now defending his performance of Cat Scratch Fever with Poopypants Nugent by saying the suggestive lyrics were changed. He is, of course, lying.
http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/mike-huckabee-falsely-claims-ted-nugent-changed-lyrics-explicit-song-they-performed-together
Over at Diuspatches:
Huckabee’s PAC Appears to Be a Scam Too
The whole “educated isn’t the same as smart” thing is obvious anti-intellectualism. It’s purpose is to dismiss the value of education and excuse shoddy education systems like in his own state of Arkansas.
Education should be a baseline standard. An educated populace is a good thing in of itself.
On educated versus smart:
I actually put more stock in educated. We have ways to measure that, whereas ‘smart’ tends to be a very subjective evaluation. There is a benefit to having systematic knowledge of a subject, and of having learned how to do research, test hypothesis and asses where a person lacks knowledge. “Smart” people often forget that there is such a thing as knowledge, and overestimate their ability to understand topics outside of their area of expertise and falsely assume that if you are ‘smart’ you’re a match for any expert in any field.
@8 smrnda
Well my point is that it’s not one vs the other. Smart people should be educated! Everyone should be educated! People should have a base level of knowledge about topics.