Give Hope a Second Chance?

Last night, I had the opportunity to attend a cocktail party for Mike Huckabee, outgoing Arkansas Governor, on the first day of his unemployment.  It was officially a celebration of the publication of his 5th book, From Hope To Higher Ground, but there was nonetheless a palpable sense of candidacy to the man.

There were 40 or so folks in attendance, and before he spoke, Huckabee made the rounds chatting it up one-on-one and creating eBay merchandise lovely mementos by signing copies of his book.  When he did speak, he brought his A game.  His comments were so packed with stumpworthy metaphors, inspiring turns of phrase, and laugh out loud punchlines that I considered sacrificing civility and hauling out my Blackberry to notepad them down.  I didn't, so the bad news is the following recollections are just that, and subject to the whimsy and approximations of my medium-term memory.  The good news is I didn't get heaved out for being so ghastly as to start fiddling with my phone during his comments, meaning I got to continue receiving them.  So while none of this is verbatim, there is at least a fair amount of this.

Huckabee described himself as a "true conservative", but not one who's angry at everyone over it (I wasn't sure if this was a throwaway comment or a barb at a particular GOP candidate, but he doesn't seem given to throwaway comments and he's used that line before).  On the state of Republican politics, he told a story of a pet food mogul, browbeating his employees.  "Who's got the best supply chain in the industry?"  "We do, Sir!"  "Who's got the best marketing?"  "We do!"  and so on.  When asked, then, why their business is performing so poorly, a lone voice offers, "Because the dogs won't eat the stuff!"  He likened that product deficiency to the stuff the GOP is pouring in voters' food dishes.  Mega folksy points went on the board at that point, as one could hear the ahhs and mms from the crowd when the metaphor struck home.

The longest string of interruptions for laughter came about when he started talking about competing with India and China for cheap labor (surprising indeed, as I just nearly fell asleep typing such a dull sentence).  We shouldn't be so worried about competing for cheap labor, he argued, but rather trying to create a new economy based on creativity.  He repeatedly stressed the importance of promoting arts and music in childhood education, noting that music instruction is shown to correlate with higher math and quantitative abilities.  Given a guitar by his parents as a boy, he lamented the fact that he never did become a Beatle.  Though he did get to pardon Keith Richards recently.

A big, maybe slightly nervous laugh erupted.  I don't think most people knew whether or not he was joking (I certainly didn't), as some have criticized Huckabee for overusing his powers of commutation.  But it wasn't a joke (which of course made the rest of the story all the more amusing).  He launched into a very serviceable Keith Richards impression, now playing both parts in the recalled conversation, which ended with Huckabee - in one of his last acts as Governor - pardoning Richards for an ancient traffic ticket he'd picked up in Arkansas.  Asked why he'd extend the favor to Richards and not someone else, his answer was simple and candid: "He can play the guitar better than they can."

As the title of his book nudges, Huckabee grew up in Hope, Arkansas, noted wellspring of modern American Presidents.  In addition to birthplace, Huckabee and Clinton share the distinction of being the only two Arkansas Governors to chair the National Governors Association (not to mention their musical proclivities).

If the sting of the most recent Hope-spawn unleashed upon the U.S. has faded sufficiently by 2008, Huckabee appears eager to leverage the brand.  His overall message is singularly, nearly deafeningly, about hope and optimism.  In what I'd wager will become an oft-returned-to framework, Huckabee discussed America being tired of horizontal politics (who's left vs. who's right) and hungering for vertical politics (those who look up vs. those who look down).

Both of them being popular Governors, I continue not to trouble myself with much thought toward candidates other than Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee as truly viable top-of-the-ticket hopefuls.  McCain, Giuliani, Gingrich, Brownback, Hunter, etc. should all help to shape the debate and one or more could be viable VP picks, but each seems to have at least one deal breaker when it comes to the top spot.

In addition to being a political executive by trade, a mighty good speaker with a solid backstory, and someone who can play the Reaganesque optimism tune convincingly, Huckabee is certainly nothing if not a practiced campaigner.  He's waged 5 statewide campaigns since 1992, 4 of them in the span of just 7 years, given the strange series of musical chairs that began when Clinton was elected President and ended when his Lieutenant Jim Tucker resigned as Governor following his Whitewater conviction.

From what I know of it, Huckabee's fiscal record is mixed.  In Cato's and Club for Growth's opinions, the record is worse than mixed.  It's downright bad.  And those are groups I'm loathe to quibble with.  But Arkansas is weird, just like any state is weird.  Given the rest of Huckabee's admirable CV, I'm willing to reserve judgment on just how pro-growth or anti-growth he is until he formally declares and goes on the record about things like the estate tax, the 2003 investment income tax cuts, personal income tax rates, corporate income tax rates, entitlement spending, earmarks, price controls, protectionism, and all the rest of it.  I'd like to believe (and until I hear otherwise, I'm choosing to believe) that his metaphor about the American people no longer eating the dog food coming from the Republican Party refers to the spendocracy that has festered under the GOP's watch and that his calling them out on it portends a newly federally focused Mike Huckabee, who will favor us all with savory pro-growth fiscal rhetoric at every turn.  Time will tell.

As to whether he's considering a 2008 Presidential bid, Huckabee offered to let the book be his bellwether.  If it sells millions of copies, he'll likely run.  If it becomes "bonfire fodder", this might be the last time we'll see him.