The more we get to hear Huckabee---the more we understand that this candidate running on extreme religious fundamentals is unqualified to lead a cult
December 30, 2007

The more we get to hear Huckabee---the more we understand that this candidate running on extreme religious fundamentals is unqualified to lead a culture that is made up of many, many different belief systems, or none at all. Check out this clip from Meet The Press and watch his wingnuttia in action. It's a sight to behold. Please, pray for him. Think Progress and Page OneQ have more...(h/t Heather)

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MR. RUSSERT: But when you say aberrant or unnatural, do you believe you're born gay or you choose to be gay?

GOV. HUCKABEE: I don't know whether people are born that way. People who are gay say that they're born that way. But one thing I know, that the behavior one practices is a choice. We may have certain tendencies, but how we behave and how we carry out our behavior--but the important issue that I want to address, because I think when you bring up the faith question, Tim, I've been asked more about my faith than any person running for president. I'm OK with that.

MR. RUSSERT: But you said you would ban all abortions.

GOV. HUCKABEE: Well, that's not just because I'm a Christian, that's because I'm an American. Our founding fathers said that we're all created equal. I think every person has intrinsic worth and value...

MR. RUSSERT: But many Americans believe that that would be, that would be you imposing your faith belief...

UPDATE: Jane reports that Huckabee held a press conference today saying:

Huckabee just held a press conference where he announced that he made a negative ad against Romney -- Lord forgive him -- but at the last minute he decided to turn the other cheek and not broadcast it. But just to show he wasn't shittin' y'all, he decided to show it to a few of his closest friends at a press conference that included Tim Russert, Joe Klein, Barbara Comstock and a few hundred journalists and bloggers of varying degrees of noteriety.

Full transcript:

MR. RUSSERT: Peggy Noonan, a woman of faith who writes for The Wall Street Journal, said that sometimes it appears your philosophy is "This is what God wants," and that doesn't encourage discussion, it squelches it. And, and this is what you wrote in your book, "Kids Who Kill," in 1998: "It is now difficult to keep track of the vast array of publicly endorsed and institutionally supported aberrations--from homosexuality and pedophilia to sadomasochism and necrophilia." Why would you link homosexuality with sadomasochism, pedophilia and necrophilia?

GOV. HUCKABEE: Well, what I was pointing out is all of these are deviations from what has been the traditional concept of sexual behavior and men and women having children, raising those children in the context of a, of a traditional marriage and family. And, again, taken out of the larger context of that book, speaking about how so many of our social institutions have been broken down.

MR. RUSSERT: But do you think homosexuality is equivalent to pedophilia...

GOV. HUCKABEE: Oh, of course not.

MR. RUSSERT: ...or sadomasochism?

GOV. HUCKABEE: No, of course not. I didn't say...

MR. RUSSERT: But this is what concerns people. This, this is what you did say about homosexuality: "I feel homosexuality is an aberrant, unnatural and sinful lifestyle." That's millions of Americans.

GOV. HUCKABEE: Tim, understand, when a Christian speaks of sin, a Christian says all of us are sinners. I'm a sinner, everybody's a sinner. What one's sin is, means it's missing the mark. It's missing the bull's eye, the perfect point. I miss it every day; we all do. The perfection of God is seen in a marriage in which one man, one woman live together as a couple committed to each other as life partners. Now, even married couples don't do that perfectly, so sin is not some act of equating people with being murderers or rapists...

MR. RUSSERT: But when you say aberrant or unnatural, do you believe you're born gay or you choose to be gay?

GOV. HUCKABEE: I don't know whether people are born that way. People who are gay say that they're born that way. But one thing I know, that the behavior one practices is a choice. We may have certain tendencies, but how we behave and how we carry out our behavior--but the important issue that I want to address, because I think when you bring up the faith question, Tim, I've been asked more about my faith than any person running for president. I'm OK with that. I hope I've answered these questions very candidly and very honestly. I think it's important for us to talk about it. But the most important thing is to find out, does our faith influence our public policy and how? I've never tried to rewrite science textbooks. I've never tried to come out with some way of imposing a doctrinaire Christian perspective in a way that is really against the Constitution. I've never done that.

MR. RUSSERT: But you said you would ban all abortions.

GOV. HUCKABEE: Well, that's not just because I'm a Christian, that's because I'm an American. Our founding fathers said that we're all created equal. I think every person has intrinsic worth and value...

MR. RUSSERT: But many Americans believe that that would be, that would be you imposing your faith belief...

GOV. HUCKABEE: But, no. It's not a faith belief. It's deeper than that. It's a human belief. It goes to the heart of who we are as a civilization. If I believe that your intrinsic worth is not changed by your ancestry, your last name, by your IQ, by your abilities or disabilities, if I value your life and respect it with dignity and worth because it is human, then that's what draws me to the inescapable conclusion that I should be for the sanctity of every and each human life. That's why we go after that 12-year-old boy in the woods of North Carolina when he's lost, not because he has greater worth than someone else, but because we believe he has equal worth as everyone else. I like it that in this country we treat each other--at least we should--with that sense of equality. Our founding fathers penned that in the Declaration of Independence when they declared...

MR. RUSSERT: Some Americans believe that life does not begin at conception, and that it's...

GOV. HUCKABEE: Well, scientifically I think that's almost...

MR. RUSSERT: But...

GOV. HUCKABEE: ...a point that you couldn't argue. How, how could you say that life doesn't begin at conception...

MR. RUSSERT: Right. Do you respect that view?

GOV. HUCKABEE: ...biologically?

MR. RUSSERT: Do you respect that view?

GOV. HUCKABEE: I respect it as a view, but I don't think it has biological credibility.

MR. RUSSERT: And what would happen to doctors or women who participated in abortion?

GOV. HUCKABEE: It's always the, the point of trying to say, "Are you going to criminalize it?" That's not the issue....read on

MR. RUSSERT: Well, if it, if it's illegal, it would be.

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