Did Huck really say he didn't believe in evolution? My recollection is that he didn't say he didn't believe in it, but did say he believed God the Creator. Didn't he also say he didn't really know the science for sure because he wasn't there? Isn't that the Peter Lawler position? Seriously, there's some deliberate caricaturing going on along with the snideness and condescension. Someone at The Corner today had an interesting post about the origins of the Club for Growth ad campaign against Huck that antedated his rise, funded by one of their big donors from Arkansas that had run-ins with MH as Gov. In light of Paul Greenberg's most interesting column that Joe linked to below, this is worth more inquiry (Greenberg is a man of great integrity). My last word tonight is that Huck needs a quick course on James Ceaser's Nature and History in American Political Development if he is going to break the ceiling. He needs that more than Ed Rollins--needs it much more. Natural right--that's the ticket!

What's fascinating is that the people heaping scorn on Huckabee the most are the people who sold their souls to Romney!

AS IF THEY have ANY reason to heap scorn on anybody! It's the people who went out and prostituted their convictions for that political prostitute Romney, it's they who need to go into a corner, rend their garments, pour ash over their heads and cry out "Alas, alack and a woe!" It's the Romney supporters who need to go hang their heads in shame.

The people supporting Huckabee are simply looking for someone who shares their attitudes and their beliefs, which they've GOOD REASON to believe were mocked and ridiculed throughout the entirety of the Bush administration by the Republican leadership, both in The White House and up on Capitol Hill. Social conservatives have learned the hard way how much they've been played over the last two decades. And they're angry about it, and who can blame them. Their mistake in supporting Huckabee at least has a certain innocence about it, a certain naivety.

But there's NO innocence attending the Romney campaign, ... that's for damn sure. And there's no innocence on the part of those who've decided to give up on conviction politics, and purchase into what Romney's selling.

I feel sympathy for the Huckabee supporters, who are supporting a man not remotely the equal to the challenges that will naturally descend upon him, not on the campaign trail, certainly not in The White House, were he lucky enough to prevail in the general. But I've NO such sympathy for those who've sold themselves over to Romney, and his campaign.

Obama has a single advantage, and that's his verbal agility. It looks increasingly probable that he's going to win the Democrat nomination, overturning the Clintons and their machine. Were he to go one on one against Huckabee, He could easily make Huckabee look like a dope. Which won't be very difficult by the way.

To handle an Obama you need GREATER intellectual firepower, coupled with cultural confidence and a certain intellectual pugnaciousness. There's only a single Republican candidate who has that in spades, and that's the fella from New York City.

But Giuliani is having his own problems, he was sitting on cash not running any advertisements, waiting for the general. That strategy, always risky, appears VERY suspect right about now.

Huckabee probably can't win the general election because he is too much like Bush II. He was a governor of a Southern state, Evangelical, compassionate; it is Bush II all over again. Even if Bush II was our very best President, people are tired of him after eight years and want a change in the themes of discourse, etc.. If Clinton II is NOT in the general, then I am certain Huck won't win; only the prospect of another Clinton in the White House could scare people enough to endure another 4 years of what we have right now.

I can think of nothing more depressing than a Clinton v Huckabee election. It would be like having to choose between Clinton I and Bush II and all the baggage that comes along with either candidate. Hopefully someone better will come along.

Huck said in his debate answer that he doesn't know if the earth is young or old. This whole evolution vs. creation thing is particularly irksome. Evolution these days does not just mean common descent. It means uncritical acceptance of purist naturalism and materialism that rules out any Supernatural agency. A Christian can not uncritically accept this modern meaning because Christianity requires a belief in Supernatural intervention. Is there a natural and materialistic explanation for the Virgin Birth? On what possible grounds could a Christian reject a Supernatural explanation of origins? They can't?

Any well-informed Christian who understands the nature of the current debate, has to reject evolution as the other side means it. That does not mean they have to be young earth creationists, but they can't be pure naturalists and materialists.

So what exactly are the cosmopolitan eliticons at NRO saying they believe? Are they endorsing naturalism and materialism?

All this "Oh my, Huckabee doesn't believe in Darwin" is just silly gotcha politics. They are either playing games or they don't understand the nature of the debate.

Agreed with Red; the NRO is shameless. So is the Weekley Standard and all the other establishment that is distorting Huck's record and making up dumb issues like evolution and being a preacher.

Red Phillips wrote: "Evolution these days does not just mean common descent. It means uncritical acceptance of purist naturalism and materialism that rules out any Supernatural agency."

Bravo ... that is exactly correct. Those opposed to God have set up a false dichotomy: choose between a 4,000 year old earth and the instantaneous creation of humans ... or a mechanistic existence absent any pre-existent creator.

People who rail against "creationism" view the debate through the lens of this dichotomy.

Any time a question of "evolution" is raised by the press, about the only answer that won't invite trouble is: "I believe that God created our reality ... exactly how that was done I leave to Him."

AS IF THEY have ANY reason to heap scorn on anybody! It's the people who went out and prostituted their convictions for that political prostitute Romney

Are you the same Dan who supports the political prostitute Giuliani? The Giuliani who voted for George McGovern? The one who changed his registation to Republican one month after Reagan was elected? The one who endorsed Mario Cumomo as governor of NY? The one who now claims credit for the taxs which Pataki cut? The one who was supported by the New York Liberal Party? The one who nowdays is passing himself off as a true-blue Reagan Republican?

And Red, you scored an absolute bullseye about Darwinism, which Don in Arizona already remarked upon.

Bravo!

Red and all, they're unprepared to believe that a Baptist minister from Arkansas can be well read or intellectually sophisticated (like they are!) and hence they are overprepared to be embarrassed by any mention of Our Lord or evolution from such mouths. I think that's a large part of it. Also, they spend a lot of time around real liberals (unlike southernerners who don't teach in universities) and so are sort of afraid of looking like the liberal sterotype of a conservative. On the road, but will check in occasionally.

By the way, the forst two paragraphs of Huck's article in Foreign Affairs DOES show he needs to read Hamilton's Pacificus Essays. Also, was talking to a VERY intellectual conservative Catholic yesterday in Texas and she will never vote for Romney and is leaning Rudy because of thoughtfulness and authenticity.

...and rise