MR. RUSSERT: You said this to the Des Moines Register: “Let’s face it. In our lifetimes, we’ve seen our country go from ‘Leave it to Beaver’ to ‘Beavis and Butt-head,’ from Barney Fife to Barney Frank.” Why, why include Barney Frank, a gay congressman, in that reference?
GOV. HUCKABEE: I think it was a matter of a rhetorical device to talk about the different cultural shift that we have, and it wasn’t any particular attempt to be derisive of him. But, but there has been a huge cultural shift in this country, Tim. And I think that’s why many Americans are seeking leadership that has a positive and optimistic spirit, that wants to take this nation—what I call vertical politics rather than horizontal.
I just completed a book in which I talk about the difference between horizontal politics, where everything is left or right, everything is liberal or conservative, everything is Democrat or Republican. I think the American people are hungry for vertical politics, where we have leaders who lift us up rather than those who tear us down.
MR. RUSSERT: But some would suggest by including Barny Frank in that reference you are tearing a gay man down. You’re against gay marriage, you’re against gay civil unions. Is—do you have a problem with gay people?
GOV. HUCKABEE: No. I have a problem with changing institutions that have served us. And I, I think I would rather characterize not what I’m against, but what I’m for. Before we change the definition of marriage to mean something different, I think our real focus ought to be on trying to strengthen heterosexual marriages because half of them are ending in divorce. That’s a real problem in this country. There are a lot of kids who are growing up in a very, very confused and conflicted world because—not because we have same-sex marriage, but because we’re seeing a real failure in the tradition heterosexual marriage. That’s where our focus needs to be. Because if we want to end poverty, get a kid through high school, let him grow up in a stable, two-parent home and make sure that that child doesn’t have a child before he’s 21 and has a full-time job. That’s a 93 percent chance that child will never grow up in a single day of poverty if those are the criteria.
MR. RUSSERT: Should...
GOV. HUCKABEE: So we ought to be working more to build strong families rather than just to create new versions of them.
MR. RUSSERT: Should gay couples be allowed to adopt children?
GOV. HUCKABEE: That’s a question that, that I think, again, goes back to the heart of what’s best for the child. Unfortunately, so much of this argument has been framed about what, what the same-sex couple wants. But the real question needs to be child-focused, not couple-focused. And, Tim, that’s true for whether the couple is same-sex or whether they’re heterosexual. In our state, as in most, the criteria for adoption is always what’s in the best interest of the child. That ought to be what’s front and center.
MR. RUSSERT: So is it in the interest—best interest of the child to have a gay, gay parents?
GOV. HUCKABEE: That’s a question I’m not sure that, that we have a positive answer to. And until we absolutely could say it, then, then I—I’m always hesitant to change those institutions.
MR. RUSSERT: Do you believe that you’re born gay or you choose to be gay?
GOV. HUCKABEE: I don’t honestly know. I really don’t. I think there are—there are people who would argue vociferously on both sides of that. But I think that the point is, people are, are who they want to be, and we should respect them for that. But when they want to change the institutions that’ve governed our society for all the years of recorded human history, then that’s a serious change of, of culture that we, we don’t just make readily or, or hurriedly. It has to be done with some, some deep thought.
Saturday, February 03, 2007
Mike Huckabee (Part 4): Gay Rights
Mike Huckabee has begun his presidential campaign. He presented himself well promoting his book on "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" (see it here). What do you think of his candidacy? Here is his response to questions from Tim Russert on Meet the Press regarding gay rights:
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2 comments:
As an Arkansan and a former state employee, I can speak of Mike Huckabee's style of governance. He was given to flashes of grace, occasional touches of courage, all with an undertone of bitterness. Everything seemed to be done with an edginess as if he expected it to bite him back. He hid his expenses from the public with such jealousy that even if there were no impropriety, it was difficult not to harbor the suspicion. At the end of his term he destroyed the hard drives of his office computers, which was not unusual, but he also destroyed the drives of the state police headquarters which would contain the records of his use of the state airplanes, which had been sought in an FOIA suit because it was suspected he had been using them for purposes unrelated to state business. Also, early in his term, he fired his chief administrator, a woman who had worked for him in his ministry before he became governor, and whom he had previously given outstanding reviews, because she would not agree to his personal use of mansion funds. When he was minister and making the rules, she obeyed him, but when he no longer made all the rules she had to follow, he fired her for her honesty. He gave her such a bad recommendation that supervisors in my agency were afraid to hire her even though she was the most qualified candidate. I worked in personnel and received phone calls from at least two supervisors on this subject, and I saw her applications cross my desk for at least two years.
cordin to gordon,
You are a pantload of poo. Huckabee was a great Governor and he is a good, Christian man. Take your fear and hate elsewhere.
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