Mike Huckabee: “Faith doesn’t influence me, it really defines me.”

Lowell comments: John and I both think this Huckabee ad crosses a line. The candidate begins by stating that his faith “defines” him, which is well and good, I suppose; but then the ad goes on with “Christian Leader” as its first super, followed by video excerpts from his speeches, addressing hot-button “values voter” issues. My own view is that Huck sees Iowa as a chance to slingshot himself into pre-eminence as the “conservative values candidate.” If he beats Romney there after a late entry into the race and spending comparatively little money, Romney will be wounded and Huck has a claim to the mantle of the leader of values voters (read, conservative religious voters). So if Huck is clearly making a push: If he can attract enough Evangelicals to vote for him, he might just win. So he’s openly running as the “faith” candidate. It appears to me that he is speaking a lot of code while he’s doing it.

John adds his thoughts: Marc Ambinder quotes a Salon interview with Huckabee and flat out says it:

What Gov. Huckabee is telling Salon’s Michael Scherer is that Romney’s religion can be a criteria by which people judge him, and that he believes that Romney ought to be subjected to questions about the content of his religious faith — questions that Huckabee asserts have not been asked before.

Now watch the ad a third time.

A stout defense of Huckabee would point out that, with the media so obsessed about Romney’s religion, any mention of Huckabee of his own faith — a faith which, by all accounts, is central to his politics and morality — would be illegitimate. Clearly, Huckabee has every right to try to win over voters on account of his evangelical background. In doing so, he challenges the consensus view that certain attributes, like religion, ought not matter. Of course, Huckabee is saying, they matter, and to pretend otherwise is foolish.

Is Huckabee playing the Mormon card, even unwittingly? Hard to say. His campaign says absolutely not. And intent matters, of course. But this being a postmodern political world, so does reception: it depends on the extent to which the targets of his television ad are aware that Romney is Mormon and are prone to object to it.

“Unwittingly”?!? — “Reception matters”?!?!?!? – “are aware” – ?!?!?!?!? – PLEASE! The whole country knows Romney is a Mormon unless they simply are NOT paying attention. And as THE EVANGELICAL here, I can tell you everybody is getting the context here and seeing the religion card played. It’s not necessarily in the sound bite – it is in that “Christian Leader” graphic. As Dean Barnett points out:

What takes this spot into unexplored territory is the fact that the term “Christian Leader” pops up during this seemingly shopworn attack. Was the term “Christian Leader” supposed to draw a contrast between Huckabee and another candidate, maybe the Mormon one he was referencing when the term swept onto the screen?

What’s most disturbing about this spot is it hits the Mormon angle with the same kind of elusive slickness that John Edwards used to go after Dick Cheney’s daughter. The Huckabee campaign has the same kind of plausible deniability with this ad that Edwards had after his debate with Cheney.

Did Dean just say “slick”? Oh yes he did – say hello to the new man from Hope.

This thing really does defy the limits of a reasonable invocation of religion in politics. Huckabee is very specific, and he implicitly calls the faith of other candidates into question with that “defines me” crack. This language is very common in certain creedal Christian circles. There is no question what is being said here – NONE.