Here's a crazy thought that occurred to me this week. Observing the massive amount of genuine and deep-seated anger and resentment against McCain, I wonder how Romney's withdrawal will affect Huckabee and Paul. I don't think that anyone outside Paul's campaign actually believes he can compete since he has only managed to get to double digits in a handful of states (passing 20% only twice), so the fat lady is singing about him.
Huckabee is another story, however.
He'd been written off by most (myself included) as not having any broad appeal with GOP voters, but with Romney backing out, it leaves a monster-sized vacuum for someone to rally the huge base of angry conservatives. Could Huckabee do it, and suddenly catapult himself into contention with McCain?
As I've said before, he's a brilliant and inspirational speaker, and he would look good in any televised debate against anyone. Remember all the storylines about how Huckabee was the biggest surprise of Super Tuesday? He proved that he actually carries quite a bit of clout in the Southern states (winning six of them), which is a bastion of conservative strength, and came close (within 3%) to winning three more. Out of 22 states, and in a 3-way race, that's a legitimate contender, though McCain's delegate count is far greater at this point. But, the same questions about triangulation that applied to Romney just days ago now apply to Huckabee - with the third candidate out of the way, would Huckabee suddenly attract a whole lot more voters?
Given the potent rage directed at McCain, who knows?
Disillusioned Republicans (especially conservatives) now find themselves stuck between a rock and a hard place, with McCain on one side and a guaranteed Democrat President on the other. At this point, Huckabee is very much a dark horse, but he's still a horse in the race.
Also consider that the press about McCain's speech to the CPAC today -- even from conservatives -- has largely been about what he needs to say to appeal to the base that he's snubbed for years. The fact that he needs to fake it proves that he's not truly a conservative, underscoring what his base already knows. Huckabee, on the other hand, most definitely embodies many of the core conservative values, especially on social issues. He's saying all the right things right now on all the issues, but his weakness is that those things don't match his record. As evidenced by McCain's success in the past few days, though, many Republican voters don't seem too inclined to look hard at a candidate's record. Could Huckabee make use of this lack of accountability, too?
Finally, a local radio broadcaster recently talked about how the scale of the primaries is quite small compared to the number of people who will likely vote in the general election. That's a good point. So far, less than 25 million people have voted in all the primaries combined. Even if we double that number to consider the remaining primaries, the total is easily less than 50 million. However, in the 2004 general election, the total vote count was almost 125 million. That means that only about 40% of the people who will probably vote in November will also weigh in during the primaries. What will the remaining 60% of general election voters base their decision on in November? This radio broadcaster suggested that many of them would make a snap last-minute decision based on who looks good.
Huckabee can look good and sound good.
Could he actually have a chance in the general election? He would have to secure the nomination first, of course, but given the severity of the anti-McCain backlash, he could find himself as the new least bad choice, and he's maneuvered himself into second place with almost no campaign cash to this point. What if conservatives channeled their anti-McCain rage into support for Huckabee?
If Huckabee can harness these factoids in his favor, could he catapult himself back into the thick of the race?
It's just a thought. A crazy thought, to be sure, but isn't it interesting to think about? Can you imagine a scenario with the 'inevitable' candidates -- Clinton and McCain -- getting edged out by two relative newcomers -- Obama and Huckabee -- who both have questions about their policies but are both as smooth as silk?
There's my two cents.
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