One "Huck" of a Candidate

by Guy Amisano, Steuben YRs

It has been a long and winding road to the 2008 Republican Presidential nomination, one which has not yet been fully traversed. As we in New York prepare to cast our ballots on February 5th, the time seems to be appropriate for a review of the nomination race as it has developed so far and as it is likely to develop going forward.

By 2006, a consensus seemed to have developed among the political punditry that the nomination would be contested between a couple of Republicans whom social conservatives may have some reservations about supporting wholeheartedly.

One candidate, however, did emerge from the contenders who has supported many issues important to social conservatives consistently throughout his career; this is former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee.

Though deviating from the conservative line on economic and foreign policy issues, Huckabee has impeccable credentials as a social conservative. Buoyed by strong debate performances and the support of Evangelical Protestants, Huckabee won more votes than the much better financed Romney in the Iowa Caucuses. This disrupted Romney’s strategy of leveraging wins in the early states of Iowa and New Hampshire to capture the nomination.

Further, McCain was able to claim the New Hampshire primary in large part by taking advantage of Romney’s loss of momentum in Iowa.

In my view, the Republican contest will soon prove to be a two-man race between Huckabee and McCain. Romney needs to win Michigan to resurrect his campaign, but I don’t believe that is likely to happen considering the negative momentum working against him after performing below expectations in Iowa and New Hampshire.

One-time frontrunner Giuliani paid little heed to early states while focusing on larger and later-voting states, and this strategy seems to have doomed him. Giuliani must win Florida to stay in the race, but he may be unable to do that after losing primary contests leading up to Florida. Fred Thompson needs to win South Carolina, which figures to be a friendly Southern state, but he has polled so low recently that a win in any state seems improbable.

That leaves Huckabee and McCain. I expect that McCain will win Michigan and then face a battle with Huckabee in Evangelical-rich South Carolina.

If McCain wins Michigan and South Carolina, I believe the nomination is his. If Huckabee wins South Carolina, then I expect that Huckabee will also win Florida and he will be a slight front-runner over McCain going into “Tsunami Tuesday” on February 5th.