Friday, December 07, 2007

It Is Happening Again

News of a recent poll showing Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee moving into second place in the race for the Republican presidential nomination (nationwide, not just in Iowa) have me very worried.

Why? Because his image is that of a very pleasant, likable guy with a deep Christian faith that informs his politics. Remind you of anyone? (As TV's Craig Ferguson would say.) I see far too much George Bush in Mike Huckabee for my liking. His reliance on faith is troubling -- not because he calls on it for personal spiritual support, but because it informs his policy decisions. As he says on his web site: "My faith doesn't influence my decisions, it drives them. I don't separate my faith from my personal and professional lives." So how is a man who believes in biblical inerrancy and doesn't believe in evolution, preferring instead to hold the view that dinosaurs and man walked the earth together, going to lead the scientific efforts required to advance our society? How can a man who believes that allowing same-sex civil unions will lead to the end of civilization be expected to protect the civil rights that are at the core of this country's greatness. The right is having a wonderful time talking about how the founders were men of faith and built a country based on their faith. But when it came time to write the Declaration of Independence, the FIRST self-evident truth was that "all men are created equal." What happened to that?

Huckabee scares me because he has the support of that rabid 20-25% base of delusional evangelicals, people who will vote for him no matter what, as long as he keeps up the bible-thumping -- plus the support of people who just think he's a nice guy. This man could win, and America could spiral down even further into irrational policies based on a childish faith in an unseen being. We must call our own OWN power to save us -- not some imaginary god.

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