View from The Cocoon

Last night on NPR, Mike Huckabee told host Robert Siegel that he believed the Republican Party needed to move more towards social conservatism to survive. In discussing his new book, Do the Right Thing: Inside the Movement That's Bringing Common Sense Back to America, Huckabee said that the fiscal conservatives with libertarian attitudes on social issues were "faux cons." He singled out Mitt Romney as a classic example, whose views he said "represented a 180-degree turn" from views Romney had taken when running for Massachusetts governor.

Huckabee believes that the anti-gay, anti-abortion planks of the party can continue to be a winning strategy for the party. Well, maybe, if the goal is to turn the party into a 100% evangelical Christian and radical Catholic party. But Huckabee lives in a bubba-bubble. Attempting to turn New Testament theology into political power will further marginalize the Christianists and result in the eventual splintering of the Republican Party into at least two, perhaps three distinct segments: the radical theocons, the socially moderate low-tax corporate class, and perhaps a group that tries to take the best from both worlds.

It has been very enjoyable watching the wheels turn on this crippled party-wagon.