The Wrong Reverend Huckabee

Originally posted at The Right Scoop.

Scoop linked to a Ron Radosh piece yesterday at PJ Media about Mike Huckabee’s disgraceful interview with Oliver Stone and Peter Kuznick. Both Ron and Scoop point out the problem with Huckabee allowing Stone and Kuznick on the show without challenging any of their assertions.

Stone and Kuznick have a television program whose theme is, “Communism has gotten a bad rap; Why more Americans should denounce their country.” Don’t believe me?

Huckabee’s segment begins with Stone saying, “Napoleon once said that history is a pack of lies, agreed upon. Well, I’m not sure but I believe history does have a meaning, does have a purpose, and a pattern to be found. And I wanted, with my colleagues, to make a film to tell the American story in a way that it has never been told before.”

Kuznick is a history professor at American University, apparently the keeper of decades of vast knowledge that has never, ever been told in the history of the nation, and he, along with Stone are going to enlighten us with this new interpretation of history which should be called, “Tripping the light fantastical world, Soviet-style.”

KUZNICK: We’re telling the way the United States came to be the dominate force in the world. I like to quote Samuel Huntington who said, “The west won the war, not because of the dominance of their ideas or values or religion, but by the superiority of its application of organized violence. Westerners often forget that fact, non-westerners never do.” We argue that there are libraries full of books that extol America’s virtues, and that’s not our purpose here. But what we are trying to do is talk about the mistakes America has made over the years in order to get that discussion out there in order to avoid the same in the future.

After that barf-worthy commentary, Huckabee calmly asks if we should have intervened in the Second World War to stop the Holocaust.

The interview is maddening, but it is not surprising. Huckabee’s radio show was launched by John Dickey, COO of Cumulus, to directly oppose Rush Limbaugh when it was believed Limbaugh was in a weakened position after the Sandra Fluke commentary. Huckabee and Dickey pushed, “More Conversation, Less Confrontation,” and the former governor said from the get-go that, “I’m going to treat every guest with respect and civility. Nobody is going to come on and get into a shouting match with me. That’s just not my style.”

Wouldn’t it be a good idea to at least respectfully disagree though? But we are asking too much from Huckabee, who, while running for President in 2008, referred to the Constitution as “a living and breathing document.”

The reason so many have raised eyebrows at this particular interview is because this television series is an attempt to paint the US as the bad guy, a war-monger, oppressor, with all the self-righteous vilification energy of John F. Kerry. It is alarming to those on the right who defend America. In fact, not only did Mike Huckabee not defend America, he launched on the Republicans.

Let me just add, you know I think some of the challenges that we’ve seen, that the Republicans have failed, miserably, is that they have been very vitriolic and we shouldn’t have welfare for these poor people, and all these food stamps, but then they’ll turn around and give welfare for some of these corporations who are mismanaged into the ground, by some of these people who’ve jumped from the burning wreckage with billion-dollar bonuses. And I think you’ve addressed that in the film, as well as in the book, is that correct Oliver?

If you are feeling sick, you aren’t alone.

Does ‘less confrontation’ wash with the words, failed, miserably, vitriolic, and burning wreckage? How about the facts of what Huckabee gifted the commies on his program? I say gifted because I’m sure it made the two very happy and comfortable to hear the gov faithfully tow their reasoning. Could Huckabee cite a Republican who ever said we shouldn’t have welfare for poor people? We just had a Presidential nominee who saved mismanaged companies via a private firm, yet he contends Republicans are giving billion dollar bonuses to white-collar felons! A billion-dollar bonus? Really? I guess it’s say-anything-time at friend-the-lefties camp.

Through sheer dedication to principle, the intrepid reporter Huckabee has uncovered that the film is also in book form. Thank God.

I said this behavior of Huckabee’s is not surprising, though. While defending Obama’s Reverend Wright, Huckabee said, “Sermons, after all, are rarely written word for word by pastors like Rev. Wright, who are delivering them extemporaneously, and caught up in the emotion of the moment. There are things that sometimes get said, that if you put them on paper and looked at them in print, you’d say ‘Well, I didn’t mean to say it quite like that.’”

Really? God damn America was just a slip of the tongue? Maybe he meant to say God Bless America? Did Mike Huckabee write his own questions for this interview? What kind of emotion was the governor feeling when he lied about every Republican that ever ran for office? How’s this looking in print, Huck?

Is it clear yet to everyone that Huckabee isn’t a conservative? Not convinced yet? Here is the close of the interview.

HUCKABEE: Peter, is there one great lesson, I mean, you have many great lessons in this 10-part series, but is there one big theme you wish Americans, when they watch the film or read the book would glean from it? What’s the takeaway?

KUZNICK: Well, first of all, the need for nuclear abolition, but even more broadly, the need for the United States to be part of the world. The United States can’t set itself off as the lone power, the hegemon, the exceptional nation, the indispensible nation, the United States has to become part of the world community, and we have to find ways to solve some of these problems, without the military, without the use of arms. We have too much of a knee-jerk, kind of militaristic response, and our culture is pervaded by that. I think what we need to do is to start to see ourselves as part of the world, and start to find other ways.

Governor Huckabee wants us to buy the book and listen to the propaganda and try to find some common ground. No wonder he gets so angry when people call him a huckster. It’s true.

In trying to seek a middle road, Huckabee will not call out what is right and what is wrong when talking to the left because he feels that would be an unnecessary confrontation. He may think he is being gracious host, yielding points from his side, but he uses their perception of Republicans as fact. The visual that conjures during this interview is of Huckabee throwing his coat over a puddle so the commies can stay dry, and then just laying down prostrate, handing them his wallet and car keys, crying, “don’t hurt me.”

But pointing out what is right and wrong is not confrontation, any more than stopping a child from burning himself. If you see a toddler reaching for a cup of hot coffee above his head, do you confront the situation, or do you just want to see what happens? Is your inner monologue saying, “Gee, that kid is going to burn himself if he mishandles that coffee cup, but since he has the idea that he wants it, I shouldn’t pre-judge the outcome, I prefer not to have a confrontation, I suppose there are lots of possibilities on what the outcome could be, there is no reason I should speak up.” Or, do you do what is necessary to stop dangerous things from happening, especially when you have the power to do so?

But there is more of Huckabee to see here. The whole exchange is about the confrontational disposition (in Stone and Kuznick’s view) of America. It appears Huckabee’s thoughts on non-confrontation expands from talk radio to national security. Huck agrees without objection to Stone and Kuznick’s rewrite of history. He belongs on MSNBC, not conservative talk radio.