Huckabee’s Boyhood Heroes: Jesus, Elvis and ... FDR?

Wed, September 03, 2008 - 8:42 PM

The crowd loves Mike Huckabee. This is, at heart, a socially conservative crowd, an evangelical crowd, and he was the first choice of many of these voters. And he was by far the best speaker in the Republican field this time, a former pastor who can really string words together.

Huckabee was pretty much the only Republican on the trail talking about economic hardship experienced by working class American families. And true to form, he was pretty much the only one here acknowledging the flagging economy, however indirectly.

Seeing how much the conservative wing freaks out as he walks on stage, I’m struck with this thought: if Huckabee were a woman, he’d probably be giving the last major speech tonight, instead of warming up for Sarah Palin.

A bunch of funny lines in the speech, but my favorite moment was when Huckabee said that in his hometown of Hope, Ark., growing up, the three heroes in town were Jesus (crowd: Yeah!), Elvis (crowd: uh-huh, yeah-yeah, hey-hey), and FDR (crowd: um, yeah?). The liberal big government icon, FDR. Polite awkward laughter. Almost as funny as Joe Lieberman praising Bill Clinton at a GOP convention last night.

--Sean Mussenden