4 Reasons Why This Baptist Can't Vote for Huckabee

As a conservative Baptist Christian, I often hear that I "should" be supporting Mike Huckabee. Yet, I do not, and indeed I CANNOT in good conscience, as a Christian, support Mike Huckabee for the Republican nomination. Here are four of the reasons why, from a moral perspective, Mike Huckabee will NEVER get my vote.

His dishonesty: "Lying lips are abomination to the LORD: but they that deal truly are his delight." (Proverbs 12:22)

Mike Huckabee has repeatedly been caught being fast and loose with the truth. After the Iowa caucus, he was caught lying about having a theology degree which his campaign now admits he doesn't have.

Huckabee was also caught lying about the recent NIE report on Iran's nuclear program. Huckabee, who was completely unaware of the NIE report at the time it came out, tried to cover for his ignorance by claiming it had only come out a few hours before he was asked about it. In fact, it had been released a day and a half before he was queried - Mr. Huckabee was merely trying to cover up his lack of knowledge on this important issue.

Huckabee has claimed that 80% of Arkansas voters approved the gas and diesel fuel tax which he supported. In fact, this tax was not subject to voter approval - it was passed by the Arkansas legislature and signed into law by Governour Huckabee (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, 04/25/99). The voters never had a chance to approve or disapprove it.

Huckabee claimed that he released convicted rapist Wayne Dumont because of evidence that he was reformed, and that the Arkansas parole board went along with it happily. A member of that very parole board, however, has contradicted the Governour's testimony on this regard.

Mr. Huckabee claims to be tough on immigration, saying that he has signed a pledge to oppose illegal immigration and that he will deport all illegals. This is despite that fact that, while he was the Governour of Arkansas, he opposed every effort at enforcement of our immigration laws, and even told an interviewed in November 2007 that if voters are looking for the toughest guy on immigration, he's not their man

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Most recently, Huckabee's campaign has resorted to push-polling voters in South Carolina, claiming that Fred Thompson is in favour of partial birth abortion. That even a cursory examination of the votes in the Senate about partial birth abortion shows that Thompson voted pro-life every time demonstrates an added measure of desperation to Huckabee's already considerable reputation for dishonesty.

His hypocritical associations:"Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners." (I Corinthians 15:33)

While Huckabee claims to be the best candidate for Christians on the social issues we care about, this assertion is undercut by many questionable associations which he has formed over the years, especially during his campaign.

Huckabee, who portrays himself as the strongest candidate opposing the gay agenda, recently took on as a top advisor the journalist James Pinkerton. Pinkerton is on the record as saying that a gay Washington DC Republican politician is a "political hero" of his, and that gay Republicans need to be "unhampered" by, among other things, "homophobic zealots". Pinkerton has elsewhere been shown to be no friend to the social issues movement that Huckabee claims to be the standard-bearer for. His 1993 article entitled Conservatives: Don't Bash Gay Marriage makes an unconvincing case that gay marriage is actually "good" for the institution of marriage. In John S. Gardner's review of Pinkerton's 1996 book What Comes Next, Gardner notes about Pinkerton that,

"He enthusiastically supports the need to form as broad a political coalition as possible, observing the necessity of pushing areas of agreement such as "personal security" and "personal responsibility" to the top of the agenda of political concerns, and divisive issues like abortion and gay rights to the bottom."

Pinkerton has been a consistent voice within the Republican coalition towards "de-emphasising" the social issues that concern many Americans, and about which majorities agree with the conservative Christian position.

Of course, Huckabee is also on the record as saying that he would accept the support even of the Log Cabin Republicans, a gay Republican group that works to liberalise Republican policy-making on gay issues, if it would help him to win.

Of course, Huckabee's campaign is ran by Ed Rollins, a man who was overheard telling a subordinate to go negative in South Carolina, and even to "put some good in there if you have to, with the bad. Do what you gotta do." This would imply that Rollins, and presumably Huckabee, are fine with going negative and lying about other candidates if it will help Huckabee win.

Mr. Huckabee has also not been above taking money from organisations which support embryonic stem cell research, gun control, and "emergency contraception" (i.e. abortion in a bottle) - all things which Huckabee professes to oppose.

Mr. Huckabee appears to allow money and power to corrupt his convictions, leading him to associate with those whose influence he, as a Christian, should eschew.

He presents a bad testimony for Christianity: "Abstain from all appearance of evil." (I Thessalonians 5:22)

By having a record of untruths and questionable associates, Mike Huckabee presents a bad testimony for Christianity. His behaviour does nothing but cause others outside the faith to discount and avoid it. Mr. Huckabee, in his campaign and by his record, doesn't practice what he preaches when it comes to his Christianity. People can smell hypocrisy a mile away, and when you have a guy running for President who is a Baptist preacher and who wears his religious beliefs on his sleeve in the way that Huckabee does, he'd better keep his public life as straight-arrow as his private life.

Having campaign personnel who are willing to stoop to dirty tricks like push-polling and who undercut you on your (correct) social issues agenda presents confusion. Being caught in a number of public, bald-faced lies doesn't just tell people that you're campaign is suspect - it tells them that the religion you profess is also suspect, when that religion is seen to be such a large part of the makeup of your charactre and substance. And that suspicion is going to rub off onto all the rest of us who share the same profession of faith as you do.

He turns Christians into just another special interest group: "....for the children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light." (Luke 16:8b)

The implication in Mike Huckabee's claims to be the "Christian leader" in the race is that if you don't follow him, then you're not really a Christian. If you "care" about Christianity, then you'd better vote for Huckabee, otherwise you're working against God. In his attacks on Mitt Romney's religion before the Iowa caucus, Huckabee was playing the "religion card" to a T - Good Christians vote for Mike Huckabee, cultists vote for Romney. This is just one example of Huckabee's attempt to turn Christians into just another special interest group, voting as a bloc, following a leader who tells them what to think andhow to vote, rather than making an informed choice and voting accordingly.

When he is speaking about religion, Mike Huckabee often sounds Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton, except that he exploits the fears and concerns of his fellow Christians instead of African-Americans. And if you disagree, well, you just stepped off the reservation. This is an attitude which threatens to nullify the ability of Christians to participate reasonably in the political system of the United States. Instead of being encouraged to make informed choices, Christians are being told that you'd better vote for the Christian Candidate, or else you are a traitor to the cause of Jesus Christ. This sort of religious pandering is offensive and disgusting.

If their voice is to be heard and listened to, then Christians need to avoid demagogues like Mike Huckabee, and make informed decisions about political matterss. We cannot allow ourselves to be self-segregated into a political Christian ghetto by those claiming to speak for us. This means that sometimes, the best candidate for a Christian to choose is not the one who is most religious. Ronald Reagan was not very much of a church-going man, yet he was an infinitely better leader than the very religious but very inept Jimmy Carter. Likewise, in this primary season, there are other candidates, Fred Thompson first and foremost, who are much better than Huckabee on the issues of importance to conservative Christians. We cannot be gulled into supporting an inferior candidate just because he deals a religion card to us.