E-mail a friendMike Huckabee
airdate September 4, 2008
Mike Huckabee was one of Arkansas' longest serving governors. The ordained Baptist minister is a staunch health care advocate, who created a model program for providing health insurance for children. He's also had his own health challenges. Diagnosed with diabetes in '03, he lost more than 110 pounds. He's written several books, including the soon to be published Do the Right Thing. Huckabee was a GOP presidential candidate during the '08 election primary season and, for a while, was rumored to be on McCain's short list for VP
Former White House hopeful shares words of advice he had for McCain and what he thought of Gov. Palin’s convention speech. (1:19)
Full interview. (7:39)
Mike Huckabee
Tavis: John McCain making his case tonight, accepting his party's nomination here in St. Paul in the finale of this 2008 Republican National Convention. So the calendar says September 4th, which means we are now just two months away from what very well may be one of the most anticipated and closest presidential elections in all of U.S. history.
Pleased to be joined here in St. Paul tonight with a man who mounted his own bid for the White House, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee. Governor, as always, good to see you.
Mike Huckabee: Great to see you, Tavis. What an honor to be back.
Tavis: Glad to have you on the program. Let me start by asking how it felt for you to be at that podium after months and months of campaigning and the other guy ends up getting the nomination?
Huckabee: That's the way it turned out, and if I couldn't be there I can't think of anybody else that ran this year on our side that I'd rather see than John McCain. In fact, I opened up by saying I was out there campaigning for my second choice, and that really represents how I felt. John McCain's a great American, an honorable man, a man of great integrity, terrific personal record, not only of his service as a prisoner of war, but in the United States Senate.
And agree with him or not, here's a guy that wakes up every day not saying, "Okay, what does 'The New York Times' tell me I need to believe and go out and do?" He says, "My conscience tells me what I'm going to do," and that's what he does, even if it's unpopular. That's great.
Tavis: We're watching b-roll as we speak now of John McCain speaking at the podium earlier tonight. I was a little concerned for him, as I was, quite frankly, for our friend Bill Clinton last week in Denver, because Hillary put it on him the night before.
Huckabee: That's right.
Tavis: She was so incandescent in her presentation; I actually worried about this guy, who's pretty good at giving speeches.
Huckabee: He's great.
Tavis: And Governor Palin was so good here this week I didn't know if John McCain had it in him to not fall on his face.
Huckabee: I talked to Senator McCain this morning, we visited by phone. And I told him, I said, "You've got a pretty steep hill to climb here tonight." He laughed and I said, "I know you can do it, but I tell you, I'm praying for you, because I'd hate to follow Sarah Palin." She literally nailed it last night.
The expectations for her were relatively low. People didn't know, they were thinking she's going to come out there and be like the deer in the headlights. No, she was more like the hunter after the deer. (Laughter)
Tavis: To your point, do you think - I raised this question last night on this program - do you think she went a little too far in her pricking, in her aggression - and I can play this a thousand different ways, but give me your take on it.
Huckabee: I don't think so, because she had to show last night that she was tough enough. The rub on her was going to be she's inexperienced, she's never been on a stage, she can't handle the pressure and she can't go on the attack, which is one of the things that a vice president candidate is expected to do.
If there were any doubts about that, she just put them aside. They may have to say hold them back a little bit here - down, down - but they're not going to have to say sic 'em, because she's obviously ready to go do that, and she proved that last night.
Tavis: I wonder if we are witnessing here the American public being snookered once again by the media, and here's what I mean by that. I recall a few years ago - not that long ago - when a guy named Al Gore was expected to be the better debater, knows the issues much better, knows how to communicate much better.
This other guy is splitting verbs and busting infinitives and dangling participles all over the place; this guy ends up being president for eight years. The articulate guy; Nobel Peace Prize. Not a bad consolation prize, but my point is you don't have to be a Mike Huckabee, you don't have to be a Barack Obama to make the case.
I wonder whether or not the bar is so low for John McCain that he just runs all over I between now and November?
Huckabee: What he's got to do is be John McCain. If he tries to be a great orator, he will fail because that's not who he is. But he's a great guy to have the conversation with the community. His town hall concept is where he's most comfortable. That's why he's doing what he's doing right now.
He's doing these town halls, even his speech tonight is really more of a town hall picture. And I think that as long as he stays within his comfort zone, being himself, he's fine.
Tavis: How do you think this argument of experience or lack thereof on Governor Palin's part is going to play between now and November?
Huckabee: I think it's a huge mistake to go there. First of all, if you look at her record she's a person who has worked her way through the ranks. What's wrong with being a person involved because you love your kids and said, "I'm going to join the PTA?" Or looking at junk going on in your city and saying, "I'm going to run for the city council."
Hey, look at a mayor that needs to be replaced and beating him, and eventually saying, "I'm going to challenge the incumbent governor in my own state, beat him in a primary and govern my state and do it," and do it effectively and successfully so that even overwhelmingly the Democrats in her state support her.
That's pretty bold. She's got the kind of experience that one needs to have. Harry Truman had been a haberdasher and been in city government, and people said the same thing about him. History now says he's one of the best presidents we ever had.
Tavis: The media already chirping about the fact - I've been watching it all throughout the day - everybody chirping - not just chirping; complaining, in fact, about the reality of her, at this point at least, not getting out to the media. So there is this drumbeat now starting to build that she's got to make herself accessible. Your take on that?
Huckabee: They're right. She's going to have to go out and do the press conferences and sit down for the hard interviews. She's going to have to do everything from the "Meet the Press" type of environment to the Chris Wallace interviews that she's going to have to experience.
They're going to want to get her. In fact, because she's put the sword out there and said, "Come and take me," the attacks that were on her in the first few days were some of the worst I've ever seen. I don't think the media has ever misbehaved like they have in attacking her daughter. That was just disgusting.
Let me said, in fairness, Barack Obama was one of the first people to come out, get flat-footed and say, "That's over the line; don't do it." And I appreciated and respected that, and I thought he showed more class than the media did.
Tavis: How do you run a - you've done this a couple of times in your career, as I recall - how do you run a gangsta woman, be aggressive, but not have the media or your opponents, for that matter, call you sexist?
Huckabee: You basically need to play defense, not offense. And by that I mean you make sure that the opponent draws first blood. Now if the opponent -
Tavis: Well, she did that already. (Laughs)
Huckabee: Oh, she's done that. But once you've been cut and you're bleeding, you have a chance to defend yourself. But if you go out and draw first blood, people will see that as being a bully. So she's got to be careful not to draw more blood than she wants to experience back, but those who will attack her, if they take the first shot, they will do so at their own peril because they're going to come across like Rick Lazio did with Hillary Clinton in that infamous scene in the debate.
And she can't afford - or rather, her opponent, Barack Obama or Joe Biden, can't afford to be seen in that way.
Tavis: I guess this is the ultimate question, then: Did your party, did the GOP accomplish the task at hand this week, never mind how bumpy this convention started out because of that hurricane?
Huckabee: They did more than accomplish the task. I'll be honest with you, Tavis. A week ago I was really not all that optimistic about where this thing was headed, and I'll tell you why. People were thinking that John McCain might pick Joe Lieberman. Good man. Fine for the Cabinet, but it would have been a disaster had he picked him for the vice presidency.
Sarah Palin shocked everybody, then made everybody nervous, and now she's gotten everybody energized. This is a party that has coalesced and has electrified over not only her selection but now her performance. They see in her somebody that represents that small town America that really is the heart and soul of the Republican Party.
It's not the rich guys on Wall Street. It's the shopkeepers, and Sarah Palin is the only person running on either ticket, quite frankly, that's ever signed the front side of a paycheck for somebody operating a small business.
Tavis: You ran a great campaign, you were always kind to make yourself available to us throughout the process, including coming to our debate last year at Morgan State. So thank you again for being here tonight.
Huckabee: Always my pleasure, Tavis, thank you.
Tavis: Appreciate you. Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas.
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