Sunday, November 25, 2007

Huckabee Hounds Mormon Mitt

For today's dip into the Old or Mainstream Media, we'll go to the Washington Post & its story on Tax Hike Mike pulling up to Mittens' station wagon, hoping that damn dog isn't still tied to the roof. The suddenness of Huck's Iowa surge past the other Republican toads & weasels has been a surprise to all.
Even Huckabee appears to have been caught unprepared by the sudden turn of events. His Iowa state director is in Costa Rica hunting snakes over the Thanksgiving weekend and will not return to the state until tomorrow. On Friday afternoon, Huckabee's Iowa headquarters at the corner of Locust and 6th in downtown Des Moines was locked and deserted.
Think he was hunting snakes for some good ol' time Bible-based snake-handling? 'Cause really, what's the challenge in shooting a dumb old snake just lying on the ground waiting for the sun to warm it up? Are there no snakes in Iowa to kill?

Looks like the Hound will be getting it from both sides of the Republican party, the stupidity wing & the insanity wing.
With just a few weeks remaining before the Iowa caucuses, Huckabee is frantically trying to organize his supporters in the Hawkeye State. They include a network of evangelical Christians who like Huckabee's antiabortion, anti-same-sex marriage rhetoric, home-school activists who appreciate the work he did for their cause in Arkansas, gun-rights groups, and advocates of replacing the income tax with a national sales tax, an idea that Huckabee has championed.

His political enemies -- no shortage of whom have popped up in recent days -- have gone on the offensive, accusing Huckabee of numerous tax increases, ethics violations and an ill-advised pardon. The Club for Growth, a conservative anti-tax group in Washington, has all but turned itself into an anti-Huckabee machine. The Eagle Forum's Phyllis Schlafly charges that Huckabee "destroyed the conservative movement in Arkansas."
Good thing to destroy, & a swell person to piss off, but he still doesn't have our vote.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Increasingly, Mike Huckabee has the look of leadership. Huckabee's ardent support for the FairTax sets him apart from all other viable presidential candidates.

The FairTax Act of 2007 (HR 25/ S 1025) represents a prospective power shift of massive proportions in America. It lays out a practical ideal of voluntary payment of taxes, based on a substantial level of taxpayer choice that the plan affords. Since FairTax untaxes basic necessities (up to socially-accepted poverty-level spending), what is taxed is marginal, and/or desired or preferred, on a broader base of retail products and services. This is to say that the taxpayer may, under the FairTax, choose to purchase used products and avoid paying the tax. And, to the extent desired, the taxpayer may choose to self-perform certain services rather than pay for them. This will stimulate do-it-yourself education, improve citizens' self-reliance; indeed the FairTax represents the possibility of ushering in a new can-do, citizen psychology that would accrue to greater demands for government accountability - truly, a socio-cultural sea change, or - better - a restoration of a freeholder mindset on account that politicians could no longer directly grab dollars from paychecks, nor could they grap operating capital from businesses.

Government is the "necessary glue" that enables the social fabric to cohere. It does this by effecting "rules" that ostensibly provide members with equitable access to wealth and resources. It also must provide ostensibly equitable enforcement of those rules in order to mitigate threats to the social fabric. It is unrealistic to believe that the structures of a national government can be supported on donations, thus the need for taxes. Naysayers love to characterize anything purporting to be a "fair tax" as an oxymoron - but it is not true. The idea of fairness has to do with equitable sharing in the cost by all members who depend upon the social fabric for food, shelter, clothing and post-necessity economic enterprise. And, because of the shift of power from politicians and special interests under an enacted FairTax, the elected will find it more difficult to both enlarge government, and implement any dual system of taxation. FairTax strategist, Dennis Calabrese, discusses how the FairTax repeals the income tax, how it does away with the IRS, and how it addresses other aspects of frequent concern to skeptics.

The FairTax has a much greater opportunity for success to operate as a "self-regulating" mechanism because of increased visibility. One finds that the current system, ostensibly regulated by the Internal Revenue Code, is in fact poorly regulated because of continually increasing complexity (the effect of tax favors from politicians, through lobbyists, to favored corporations and other special interests) stemming from the desire by those holding government position to steer public behavior using tax code "carrots." We have seen how 100 years of this type of behavior has eroded the Nation's currency and the purchasing power of working family incomes. "Visionist," Tom Frey believes the current tax system will simply collapse; and economist Laurence Kotlikoff heralds - short of enactment of FairTax (or an otherwise unlikely change in spending habits) - the U.S. will shortly face an irrevocable economic breakdown. (Kotlikoff believes that passage of the FairTax can stave off the economic ruin we're facing, but would be surprised to see it happen.)

Frey and Kotlikoff may be right on both counts, and we may not be able to successfully evoke change; but shall we not try?

Mike Huckabee believes we should.


(Permission granted to republish, in whole or part. -Ian)

M. Bouffant said...

The Editor Responds:

Oh great, now the Huckheads are becoming as irksome as the Paulistas. Although this guy sounds more like a "fair tax" fan than a Huckleberry hound. As far as we're concerned, any one w/ more money than we have had better hand it over. That pretty much includes everybody. Hand it over!!

Anonymous said...

ROFL! Yeah, tis sad how victims start acclimating to their abusers. But, hey, you'll find your way - hopefully, before the economy has crashed, and your savings is devalued, you'll have the "aha experience" and join FairTax.org to become a part of the solution.