Mike Huckabee Answers His Critics: I Can Beat Hillary

Dave Eberhart

Hillary Clinton will be tough to beat if she wins the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008, says Mike Huckabee — who insists he's the GOP candidate who can beat Hillary in the general election.

In an exclusive NewsMax interview, the former Arkansas governor said he's the Republican candidate with the truest consistent conservative credentials, someone who has never "flip-flopped" on important issues.

"I have nothing to explain," Huckabee says with confidence. "I'm comfortable in my own skin."

He said a centerpiece of his presidential campaign is a call for the implementation of the "fair tax" to replace the current federal tax system.

And as for his uphill battle to overtake the well-funded campaigns of Republican front-runners John McCain, Rudy Giuliani, and Mitt Romney, Huckabee said: "It shouldn't be about who can raise the most money."

The busy Huckabee, 51, chatted with NewsMax from New Hampshire, where he landed at 2:00 a.m. Friday morning.

The two-term governor says that over the years he got to know Hillary, the former first lady of Arkansas, very well and that she is as "focused" as she can be on 2008.

"I take little stock when folks say they hope she wins the nomination because that will make it easy for us to win the general election. I believe just the opposite — that she will be a formidable opponent. I've seen her in action."


'Broken' Tax System Needs Fixing

When asked if any particular experience on the campaign trail convinced Huckabee that he was right to be running for the White House, he pointed without hesitation to a middle-aged man he met while on the stump in New Hampshire. The man wanted to get his daughter through a good college and began working an extra job and saving — only to find the "taxman at his elbow, ready to frustrate his ambitions at every turn."

"That's when I knew I was right in my thinking that it's not going to take an adjustment here and a turn of the wrench there to fix the broken tax system."

The solution, he decided, wasn't to fix up the old sagging house but to tear it down and begin building again at the foundation. The key: the "fair tax."

Huckabee described his vision: "I want to completely eliminate all federal income and payroll taxes. And do I mean all — personal federal, corporate federal, gift, estate, capital gains, alternative minimum, Social Security, Medicare, self-employment. Instead we will have the fair tax, a simple tax based on wealth.

"The fair tax will replace the Internal Revenue Code with a consumption tax, like the taxes on retail sales 45 states and the District of Columbia have now. All of us will get a monthly rebate to reimburse us for taxes on purchases up to the poverty line, so that we're not taxed on necessities.

"We'll be taxed on what we decide to buy, not what we happen to earn. We won't be taxed on what we choose to save or the interest those savings earn. The tax will apply only to new goods, so we can reduce our taxes further by buying a used car or computer."

Huckabee acknowledges that a couple of the other GOP candidates are talking about such a plan, but he is the only one who has put it front and center.

On Saturday, candidate Giuliani was jeered by several dozen people at a campaign stop when he said he didn't think a fair tax is "realistic."


Ex-governor Responds to Critics

Huckabee is on the record more than once saying, "I'm proud of my record as a fiscal conservative." But by the end of his second term as Arkansas governor, critics like the watchdog group Club for Growth note, he had raised sales taxes 37 percent, fuel taxes 16 percent, and cigarettes taxes 103 percent.

But Huckabee told NewsMax that the picture being drawn is too simplistic.

He explained that with respect to the tax increases, a state Supreme Court decision required immediate additional spending on education. The ruling came at a time when he had already cut the state budget 11 percent, and the choice was between raising taxes to fund the court order or being in contempt of court.

When he became governor, Arkansas had some of the "worst highways in the nation," he said. Over 80 percent of voters supported a four cent tax on diesel fuel to fix the roads. Similarly, a 1/8-cent increase in the sales tax was approved by the voters to preserve their natural and cultural heritage.

Huckabee said that as governor he would have "violated his oath of office" if he had tried to thwart the will of these voters.

Recently, the National Review launched into Huckabee by charging that he was not the poster child for smaller government, citing the increase in state employees and spending during his tenure.

Once again, Huckabee explained the devil in the details.

With respect to the spending that he as governor had under his control — excluding federal pass-throughs and programs strictly controlled by the Democrat legislature — spending rose only about six-tenths of 1 percent a year during his 10 1/2-year tenure, he says.

As for the 20 percent growth in state employees during his tenure, Huckabee says he had no control over higher education and federally funded positions, "and when you remove those employees, the number of state employees increased 5.6 percent."


'No Negotiation' With Radical Islam

Leaving the past and addressing the future, NewsMax asked Huckabee if he has the mettle for the job of commander in chief.

Huckabee believes the premier virtue for the leader of the free world these dangerous days is a raw no-nonsense understanding of the immensity of the evil we are facing as a people and as a civilization: "This is not a typical geo-political war over boundaries, borders, or political bravado — it's a theological war with radical adherents to their religion who believe that their God has ordered them to purge earth of all that is not a part of their ‘pure' faith.

"There is no negotiation with those engaged in a theological war — it's naive and downright dangerous to believe they will leave us alone if we leave them alone. That's nonsense. They don't care if the war lasts 1,000 days or a 1,000 years — their goal is our annihilation and their supreme rule over the whole earth."

Curiously, the same candidate who utters these fighting words is always quick with his sense of humor.

When it was pointed out that another little-known Arkansas governor overcame great odds to win the presidency, Huckabee jokingly dismissed the comparison by noting that Bill Clinton was a Southern governor who played the saxophone, while Huckabee is a Southern governor who plays the bass guitar.

Huckabee also scored humorous points during a recent presidential debate when he compared Congress' out-of-control spending to Democratic candidate John Edwards' $400 haircut.

Huckabee spokeswoman Kirsten Fedewa said his campaign "seized the opportunity to raise money by asking supporters to contribute the amount of money they each pay for a haircut to the campaign. This effort raised $40,000."


Huckabee's 'Rocky' Campaign

Huckabee, who lost over 100 pounds after a wake-up-call diagnosis of looming diabetes, took some time off on the July Fourth holiday to run in an annual 5-kilometer race in Arkansas.

"It was the first race I ever ran after I got fit," he said. "It's become a personal tradition."

These days, the athletic and trim candidate participates in marathon races, but he recalls the old days when he would get winded and break an embarrassing sweat ascending the steps to the state capitol building. "I was always afraid that some reporters would catch me at the top of the steps panting and exhausted."

When Huckabee was introduced recently to the National Education Association's annual meeting at Philadelphia's Pennsylvania Convention Center, the theme from the movie "Rocky" reverberated through the hall. The classic boxing motion picture with Sylvester Stallone was set in the City of Brotherly Love.

"It was motivating," said Huckabee, who has had to work out as hard as the Rocky Balboa character to gain his new healthy persona and now sees himself in a long Rocky-like power jog to the White House.


Positive and Upbeat

"Since the governor isn't one of the ‘anointed' top-tier candidates, the campaign decided early on to place high priority on earned media to help him gain name ID and visibility," spokeswoman Fedewa confided.

That effort was evident on Monday, when he scheduled a guest appearance on NBC's "Today" show, a 10 a.m. Eastern appearance on NPR's "On Point" with Tom Ashbrook, a 9 p.m. guest spot on Fox News' "Hannity and Colmes," and a 10 p.m. appearance on Alan Colmes' nationally syndicated radio program.

Meanwhile, the candidate is starting to register in the polls and has emerged from the second tier pack as the potential comer. At the least he is talked about as a possible vice presidential candidate who could anchor a presidential candidate like Rudy Giuliani or Mitt Romney to the GOP's base in the South and among evangelicals.

In any case, Huckabee remains positive and upbeat. When asked what sets him apart from the GOP frontrunners, he says: "My experience has uniquely prepared me in that I understand the struggle of the average American because of my childhood and having been a pastor, dealing with people at every level of life, and my long tenure as a governor, having actually run a government and having a strong record on education, healthcare, the environment, economic development, and government reform."