Mike Huckabee and the Evolving Blood-Sport of Pious One- Upmanship

Watching Mike Huckabee's warm new campaign ad this morning on MSNBC's marvelously hallucinatory Morning Joe at 6:30 a.m., I was filled with a warm feeling of my own as he talked about Christmas being about Jesus. A warm feeling, which I recognized not so much as comfort but rather as dread, much in the same way Stevie Smith knew the difference between waving and drowning. Tis' is the season of God again in America, and separation of church and state is starting to look like a quaint and earnest old trope, impractical and meant only to be tacitly ignored especially on the unpaved road to the White House.

Joe Scarborough and Mika Brehzinski were roaring with delighted, awed laughter at the sheer end-run chutzpah of the thing. Morning Joe, no ideologue he, declared Iowa "over", in one fell swoop. Huckabee, with his Christmas spot, had sewed up the GOP spot there. Joe is probably dead-right. The evolving blood-sport of ecclesiastical one-upsmanship evokes nothing so much as a steeplechase on the backs of brightly-colored and intricately carved horses of the apocalypse.

The famously de-fatted governor, posed in front of a bookcase lit precisely like a cross in an Andres Serano piece, and wearing a sensible red sweater right out of the Alan Alda collection, earnestly offered a bromide about relief from political ads (but maybe not so much relief from the sly suggestion that your opponent's cult believes that the devil is Jesus's older brother). And a Merry Christmas to you too, Governor.

The spot is a semiotician's treasure trove of cracker-barrel passive-aggression; a sort of "bring it on, why don't you?" to the other GOP candidates, just daring them to back-talk him in what is shaping up to be the most God-drenched fight for primacy since the Huguenots and the Catholics went at it in 16th Century France.

Mika and Joe, who have a great martini-less Thin Man routine going for so early in the day, could not stop giggling. Scarborough correctly assessed that the creators of the spot were begging for someone to come swinging at that 'tar baby'. "Another Republican candidate or a Christopher Hitchens, a Dershowitz..."

Maybe they are all too smart for that. Unlike me. I felt chilly, and not because of the magnificent frozen weather in my little village. No, because watching Huckabee I thought of Aaron Altman, the great, perspiring fictional conscience of Broadcast News, when he proposed that the bland and warm and home spun-newscaster Bill Hurt was the devil. Altman, played gorgeously by Albert Brooks says, " What do you think the Devil is going to look like if he's around? Nobody is going to be taken in if he has a long, red, pointy tail. No. I'm semi-serious here. He will look attractive and he will be nice and helpful and he will get a job where he influences a great God-fearing nation and he will never do an evil thing... he will just bit by little bit lower standards where they are important."

He might also prevaricate on evolution, winking at creationists, thereby willingly aiding and abetting the witch-hunts being conducted against educators to this day, as in the case of Christine Castillo Comer, former science director in the curriculum division of the Texas Education Agency, who was fired for merely emailing colleagues notice of a upcoming talk by Barbara Forrest, co-author of the book Creationism's Trojan Horse: The Wedge of Intelligent Design.

He might suggest that AIDS patients need to be quarantined, then backpedal by saying that little was known about the disease when he said that (a claim only the ignorant and bigoted can reasonably make), and that homosexuality is STILL a sin. He might do so while proposing a more reasonable tax policy towards the poor, and that people from South of the Border have rights too. He might even suggest that his own party's prosecution of the war is less than competent.

It's a very sophisticated form of give-and-take populism, wrapped in the soothing and reasonable tone of a preacher from the heartland, and as authentic, frankly, as a heterosexual Liberace doing Rachmaninoff in Vegas. Doesn't matter, he's doing great. He's doin' great. He seems like a Capra movie, a snow-cone, cotton-candy, your old uncle Mike, Willy Wonka after the hijera, and the guy on the porch of the old country store... all wrapped up into one. The perfect candidate for a party with a massive, disfiguring, self-induced identity crisis.

The man has thirty-one percent of the GOP support in Iowa right now. Evangelicals are literally in heaven. (A sentence I love to write for so many reasons.) For believers in Iowa, marriage and family are the God-made issues being finally thrust to the fore as never before. They got their man. They got their man. This as Giuliani sinks in New Hampshire and Florida begins to smile wide for Mike.

And OF COURSE the old-guard Wall Street "so-last-century" GOP establishment power base is nervous. They courted the real deal, and now they GOT a LIVE one. The GOP elders now simply make mistakes for a living, especially when it comes to who has God's ear. (Not to mention the economy.) All that golf and scotch. All those tartan pants. All that scheming. They sold their party in bits and pieces like bankrupt suburbanites at a yard sale, and they sold it mostly to evangelists and hate mongers so they could strengthen the base.

They grinned at their less-hip allies at the Prayer Breakfasts, and they smirked, because it didn't get in the way of free-market pollution of the environment or rapacious corporate profit-making. God was just as good a reason as oil in the neocon handbook for transforming global power. Perhaps much in the same way that they did not see the brave bearded Muhajadeen transforming into the less admirable Taliban, maybe they didn't see far enough down the road they hoed to imagine a cracker-barrel preacher-governor who might tax the rich and open the borders and embarrass them.

The famously hierarchal GOP is cracking apart from Huckabee-ism. Well, the old bosses brought it on themselves, and, as the sign on the wall says in the lesser stores : You Break it, You Buy it." I hope Huckabee is their guy. "Maybe McCain will stay alive long enough to pick up the pieces of this Republican mess, but what will THAT look like?," I thought, still half-asleep, as the spot went on. I watched again - they kept running the spot, laughing all the way (hoo-ho-ho).

"At this time of year", Huckabee says, looking into the camera, "it only matters that we celebrate the birth of Christ." No it doesn't. What matters is figuring out how not to blow up the entire Middle East as we plan our (SLOW, RESPONSIBLE) egress from Iraq.

What matters are seven million uninsured children, an economy in shivery recession, and the shock of global warming, not wearing God on your sleeve for votes. That's why I shudder at Mike Huckabee's earnest wish that we have a wonderful Christmas. He is frightening, especially at 6:30 a.m. He wasn't speaking to me with his cross/bookshelf-lit homily. (Well, in all fairness, nobody is, I know that. ) People think Huckabee likes people. I say he seems to like people the way that Amway salesmen do. The way that the saved do. In other words, with all respect, I don't buy it.

Random thought: I know a gay born-again guy in Gotham (there are many), who prays after he has sex with his long-term boyfriend; he prays afterwards because he knows he's saved but his boyfriend is going to hell, and prays because he is sad. That's how I think Huckabee likes me. Thanks but no thanks, sir. I'll take my chances with a cold martini, the saw about glass houses and stones, Jiminy Cricket's brilliant exhortation to "let your conscience be your guide", Do Unto Others, loyalty to my friends and the First Amendment -- the only Golden Rules you need, in my opinion.

I have nothing against religion at all. I think kids in particular should learn all about them, and find God wherever they see kindness and strength. But the minute it is pushed in my face, I get squeamish, having seen far too many brutal works done in its name.

By the way - the God squad isn't only working the Republican side of the street. Just yesterday I watched the stomach-turning and rather surprising spectacle of the (previously) admirable Bob Kerrey slyly offering up the opinion that Barack Obama's madrassa schooling is a "tremendous asset". Never mind that Obama never had any madrassa schooling, let alone some post-Islamic conversion to Christianity. It is a reminder that the road to the White House must take us through many swampy paths of faux piety, wherein all will be stained. (Note to Hillary camp: when you set out once honorable attack-dogs, do please remember Michael Vick. Remember also, that as frightening as a candidate bathed in real piety, equally unpalatable is one who sometimes cynically conveys that she believes in nothing as much as her own rise to power.) But it's that time of year, and everything is getting nuts.

I am afraid that if Mike Huckabee keeps going up in the numbers for South Carolina and Florida, let alone New Hampshire, it won't be looking a lot like Christmas for long - it'll be looking like the Kulturekampf that this country has been edging towards for the last three decades. The evangelists want that fight because they think people like me will high tail it to Nova Scotia, Paris, and London with our 'fancy scarves and arty glasses' (to steal a culturally anxious New York Times phrase about striking writers).

Never gonna happen. Note to Huckabees: This land is our land too, boys.

(PS - thanks to those who corrected my woeful misattribution of "Not Waving..." from Bishop to Smith.)

Comments

[Dave24]

Jon: good article but verbose and a little dense. Also: "brightly-colored" - you don't need a hyphen following an adverb. When you're writing at this level, you should know this shit.

If the constitution were running against the bible for the presidency, I'm nauseated over the probable winner.

[julianne]

They say that her hands were reaching out as if she was begging for mercy when they found the body of the woman who was tortured, raped, and murdered. Huckabee let the killer go while keeping thousands of Arkansas citizens locked down for smoking or selling pot in one of the most vicous penal systems in the Western World. They said his decision had something to do with some people who ""hated" Bill Clinton. Clinton was Attorney General of Arkansas before he became David Rockefeller's sock puppet yet they called Bill a liberal. Arkansas is a beautiful state but culturally and politically it is a grotesque people-as-property, BigMan, prison building shithole.

[zendem1]

Huckleberry and Ed Rollins are going to run a Bush 2000 campaign. He's going to talk about the environment, and senior citizens health care woes, and "bringing people together." And he'll limit the amount of press coverage, except for the informal back-slappin' "I'm-just-­a-good-ole­-boy-type of crap in the back of the plane.The MSM will eat it up too, especially when Huckles talks about his favorite Stones record. Huckles will talk about all that stuff and if he's elected, he'll do exaclty what the chimp did. He'll expand the powers of the President, maintain a military presence in the Middle east and cut taxes for the top 10%. Then after the Nazis take back the Senate, he'll give them Social Security all wrapped up in a nice big bow. And let's not even talk about his Supreme Court appointments.

[Wilburrr]

heh heh.... hehhehheh.­.... he said, "evolving"

-Beavis

[k8k9]

It scares the s**t out of me that no one has called Huckabee on his blatant dismissal of the principle of “separation of church and state.” It’s a smack in the face of the rest of us who may not happen to believe in Christ. It’s a smack in the face for a lot of reasons. And this is someone who says he can represent the People?

[dgrffy]

I have no problem with people who have no religion. But the minute they start pushing it in my face that any proud display or discussion of my faith is pushing it in their face, I get squeamish, having seen far too many non-religious states who used such early attempts at censorship to eventually eradicate religion entirely through oppression, terror, and the massacre of millions.

[mamacat]

If the right wing press hates him so much, maybe he isn't so bad after all. At least he isn't just about the money, and it seems like he actually cares about things like truth and ethics. I'm not saying I'd choose him over one of the dems, but he can't be all bad if the neo-cons hate him.

[sharon40]

The Huckabee ad pales in comparison to the new McCain ad. Check it out - we have become a nation of idiots.

[dgrffy]

I'm loving this guy Huckabee. It's been a long time since someone rose steadily - without the dreaded millions at the hands of the front runners - that he has been attacked daily, called everything from the Devil to Hitler, from a Communist, Socialist, Fundamentalist, religious fanatic, soft on crime...Ge­eesh. He's got everything wrong with him! He must really, really have folks scared. I think, because at the end, he really isn't that scary after all. And for a political world used to 'My guy (or gal) is our savior, and that guy (or gal) is Satan incarnate!', a person who isn't like that scares us to death.

[talkstocoyotes]

*** Y'know, in some small way I would love to see what would happen if the wall of separation were to be voted away by congress, signed into law by Huckabee and ratified by 2/3 of the states. The fight would be tremendous on all sides. Does anyone think that guns would come out? Would "god squads" start hitting the streets looking for non-Christians to kill? ***

I've often asked people who talk about how the US is a "Christian nation" what sort of specifics they think that should include. In their dream theocracy, could non-Christians vote? Could they hold public office? Could they teach in public schools? Would there even *be* any public schools? (I think we all know the answer to that one.) Could women vote and hold credit in their own names, and would it be legal to deny a woman a job just because of her gender? How about gay people? Do those of us with attics and basements need to start fixing them up to hide our gay friends in -- at least those of us who want to be Righteous Gentiles instead of Good Germans?

Of course, these questions never get answered, just responded to. The most frequent response is a recommendation to spend more time reading "The Word of God."

This particular Thanksgiving, one thing I thanked the Deity for is that I wised up and left Christianity before the GOP, with the enthusiastic support of American voters, turned it out as a political whore.

[delicado]

Is everyone forgetting that Huckabee trained to be a preacher, and also became a governor, with 16 ethical complaints against him and a $1,000.00 fine. Look at the actors and actresses of today. How many parts do they play? Huckabee trained to be a preacher, but only learned the style, in my estimation, if he had so many ethics complaints. Why does he play dirty in re: to Romney. Of course, it was just a slip, he must have read somewhere in his training about the devil. Everyone likes to listen to a home-town sort of guy, but can you really believe that he will help this country, with his lack of knowledge about NIE, foreign news, etc. We need a person who will be in our employ and work for ours and our country's benefit, to restore our country to be a country that is run per the Constitution with separation of church and state and the Rule of Law.

[epotruchyeahright]

Y'know, in some small way I would love to see what would happen if the wall of separation were to be voted away by congress, signed into law by Huckabee and ratified by 2/3 of the states. The fight would be tremendous on all sides. Does anyone think that guns would come out? Would "god squads" start hitting the streets looking for non-Christians to kill? I wonder if Christians in this country, particularly the evangelicals, would use the opportunity to be intolerant, coercive, violent, and murderous against those who disagreed with them. Would they pass discrimination laws to permit employers to hire or fire on the basis of religion? Would they pass laws requiring prayer in public schools, bible study in public schools? Would they outlaw Islam, or Buddhism, or Judaism? I wonder if any writer's attempted to speculate on this for a movie script or a book. I didn't read the Left Behind books, but was anything like that in there?

[DoubleD277]

Is it wrong of me to root for Romney? If he wins the Red nomination (red scare?) and Hillary hangs on to win the Blue nom, what do you think a Huckabee v. Clinton matchup would look like? Not pretty, methinks. Not pretty at all. Think Reagan v. Mondale. This would be a bloodletting. Clinton and camp, one of the most robotic and well-organized and connected campaigns in recent memory, would terrorize the minister from the Heartland. Is it wrong, after so much angst and loss to hope for this for the Democrats? A revenge? I think it is, and yet, I still find myself smiling at the thought of it. Let the Republican party have their phony God-mongering. It will do them in this time.

[moonstone]

As a devout Christian, I have forbade the inner corridors of my mind to be snared by fundamentalists and evangelists whose zeal is contrary to my beliefs as to what is best for Christianity and what is best for America
as espoused by Huckabee and others of the same mold.
More ever I have also shown disdain at the arrogance of special interests who continually lobby their beliefs upon the rest of us by trampling upon our the core values of our culture; by constantly trying to dismantle our cherished institutions and demanding special dispensation to please their special interests such as espoused by purported intellectuals such as Derkowitz
and others.
I believe my kids should should start school 15 minutes early for prayer in accordance to their beliefs.
I believe Christmas is Christmas and not 'Holidays' as advocated by many. After all, I will not start lobbying that Ramadan should be called 'Holidays' in order to please any culture and no religion should enjoy special rights and privileges at the expense of other religions.
Therefore, it is not surprising to me to see this aura of invincibility is under under attack by the thriving Christian Fundamentalists whose Town Crier boldly announces 'enough is enough' and they demand an end to the incessant barrage of attacks upon Christianity.
There is no doubt America's haven is best for freedom of religion (but not necessarily freedom from religion)
and no religion condones 'flag wavers' from any other religion. America's bastion of beliefs is showing cracks in its infrastructure which should ultimately be ameliorated else alarming consequences could effect all of us. After all, there have been 14,500 wars in this planet for the sakes of religion and there is no end in sight! Yes, and unequivocally, 'God Bless America!'.

[isis]

Not waving but drowning--love that reference.
Ironically just today someone from another country gave me a tip on what country I would enjoy and find gainful employment in if I needed to flee.