Mike Huckabee said Saturday there would be no sequel to his surprisingly strong 2008 White House bid, in which he won the Iowa Republican caucus and finished second in the primaries to Sen. John McCain.
“All the factors say go, but my heart says no,” Huckabee, who was considered the GOP frontrunner in several national polls, said on his Fox News Channel show.
Before his announcement Saturday night, Huckabee hadn’t shared his decision with his closest advisers.
Many of those advisers predicted Huckabee wouldn’t run.
Ed Rollins, who was Huckabee’s national campaign chairman for the 2008 campaign, said he expected this decision after Huckabee had broken off communications with him about a week ago.
But as late as Saturday morning, Huckabee wouldn’t tip his hand even when asked about Rollin’s statement.
“I haven’t even told my executive producer of the show tonight what the decision is,” Huckabee said on “Fox and Friends.”
“That’s kind of refreshing because for the last several months they’ve all known,” he said when asked about predictions by political insiders that he wouldn’t run. “They’ve either known for sure that I was or for sure that I wasn’t, when even I wasn’t sure. Now that I’m sure they admit they don’t know.”
In the end, Huckabee decided that he didn’t want to abandon the media empire that he has built since his failed presidential bid four years ago. In addition to his TV show, Huckabee hosts a nationally syndicated radio program, gives paid speeches around the country and has even launched a series of animated videos for children on American history.
The talk show is the centerpiece of Huckabee’s enterprises, which have made the one-time Baptist preacher from Hope, Ark., and 10-year governor a wealthy man with a $2.2 million beachfront home under construction in Florida. Huckabee, 55, and his wife moved their residency and voter registration to the state last year.
(READ MORE: Fox News)
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The battle for Iowa and South Carolina is now official…
Good news for Tim Pawlenty and Mitch Daniels.
This article reports, in part: “In the end, Huckabee decided that he didn’t want to abandon the media empire that he has built since his failed presidential bid four years ago. In addition to his TV show, Huckabee hosts a nationally syndicated radio program, gives paid speeches around the country and has even launched a series of animated videos for children on American history.”
In other words, Preacher Mike Huckabee is making too much money in the private sector to consider running for president. I respect his decision and do not feel in any way that he should sacrifice his preferred way of life to suffer the tasks of becoming and, if successful, being the president of the US.
The Congress, taxpayers and the general public should consider whether the president’s salary, $400,000, plus the use of houses in downtown Washington and secluded woods in Maryland, plus the use of a jet, helicopter and armored limosine, and the use of a considerable staff of servants and bodyguards, is too low. Mr. Huckabee hinted that he’s making much more money just for yacking on TV and in front of friendly crowds. What economic incentives would he, or anyone else, have to take on the burden of being the president of the US?
In fact, the incumbent president must be asking himself how much bigger the book deal will be if he leaves the White House in 2013 than if he tries and succeeds in staying until 2017? And he is probably wondering about the speaking fees he could collect as a private citizen after a single term as president. It’s probably better money than he’d be making in his second term. The speaking fees, as I understand it, typically include free round-trip transportation on a private jet, so he has basically the same perqs.
No wonder the field of presidential candidates is full of losers. The job is overrated. Sarah Palin got it right when she dumped her Alaska Governor gig halfway through her first term. She’s making more money yacking on TV, and in front of friendly crowds, and pedalling someone else’s books with her name as author, than she could ever have made if she served out her full term in that frozen oil patch way up north.
The biggest winner of course is Mitt Romney.
Heartbroken am I
For my hopes did just die
That Mike Dale would run
And become the one
To take over the reins
From Barack Hussein
Now I with great pain watch the drama
As fools try to wrest from Obama
The office so great
But from ’09 did deteriorate
To a shell of its former state
Mike Huckabee’s charm and charisma
Could have pulled us from a situation so dismal
Ergo his decision today
Did on me cold water spray
And therefore I do feel abysmal
May a new man arise and restore
Godliness and man’s rights to the fore
And then we shall proclaim
With no sense of disdain
“Freedom forever more!”
(Of course, Mashiach should come before then…)
nfgo3:
The Congress, taxpayers and the general public should consider whether the president’s salary, $400,000, plus the use of houses in downtown Washington and secluded woods in Maryland, plus the use of a jet, helicopter and armored limosine, and the use of a considerable staff of servants and bodyguards, is too low. Mr. Huckabee hinted that he’s making much more money just for yacking on TV and in front of friendly crowds. What economic incentives would he, or anyone else, have to take on the burden of being the president of the US?
There is the possibility, though unfortunately they are a rare species, that a person will take on a governmental office solely to serve the people. It is sad that such people hardly exist. But they used to.
In a historical example, the Continental Congress chose George Washington as its main general because he was wealthy, as they could not pay him.
there is only 1 person who can save this country..
MITCH DANIELS
So Huchaphoney isnt running. BIG DEAL!! Get some more RINOs out of the way and lets get some real conservatism going already.
Do you believe Obama took the job because it paid so well? The official salary and perks are the least of the reasons to want to be president (IMHO). What about power? Egocentricity? Being the “leader of the free world”? Being able to take a once strong, democratic, economically healthy country and hasten its decline into a weak, socialist, broke one? And if a president is a front for a foreign power (my favorite conspiracy theory), they are certainly not doing it for the salary. Infiltrate from the best seat in the (H)ouse!
Go, Allen West!!!!
No. 7: I’m with you. Get a Republican candidate who has absolutely no appeal to anyone who is not a right-wing Republican. Otherwise, the Republican-weakened economy will seriously hamper President Obama’s chances for reelection.