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Statements about AIDS and homosexuality from Arkansas Governor and Presidential contender Mike Huckabee have surfaced that may implode his booming Presidential campaign:

• “I feel homosexuality is an aberrant, unnatural, and sinful lifestyle, and we now know it can pose a dangerous public health risk…”

With regards to federal funding for AIDS research, Huckabee wrote:

• “In light of the extraordinary funds already being given for AIDS research, it does not seem that additional federal spending can be justified….”

• “An alternative would be to request that multimillionaire celebrities, such as Elizabeth Taylor, Madonna and others who are pushing for more AIDS funding be encouraged to give out of their own personal treasuries increased amounts for AIDS research.”

A southern Baptist minister Huckabee has been portrayed as a sunny and compassionate leader. The bloom may now be off THIS rose.

And, finally, Huckabee also supported the quarantine of AIDS patients:

• “If the federal government is truly serious about doing something with the AIDS virus, we need to take steps that would isolate the carriers of this plague…. It is difficult to understand the public policy towards AIDS. It is the first time in the history of civilization in which the carriers of a genuine plague have not been isolated from the general population, and in which this deadly disease for which there is no cure is being treated as a civil rights issue instead of the true health crisis it represents.”

The original AP piece quoted by the Politico above is here.

GOP voters do not need to support someone of such intolerance and out of the mainstream views. Mike Huckabee will NEVER be able to beat Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama.

Is the Huckaboom over?

Perhaps not in Iowa where he now has a commanding lead among Evangelical Christians but in other states…….YES.

Flap says Huckabee is DONE – PUT a FORK in HIM.

His “LIBERAL” tax policy in Arkansas, his numerous clemencies while Governor and the Wayne DuMond parole FLAP are more than enough, but this is END GAME.

Update:

So, how does Governor Huckabee reconcile this Flip-Flop?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8jT8L5hCSM&eurl=http://www.one.org/blog/2007/12/08/huckabee-goes-on-the-record/[/youtube]

Flap is positive he will be asked to repudiate these statements in tomorrow’s Miami Univision GOP debate.

Update #2:

Mike Huckabee’s response

Note Huckabee does not address his statements on homosexuality and most of his quoted statements . In other words, it is a HuckaDODGE.

Remembering:

As a candidate for a U.S. Senate seat in 1992, Huckabee answered 229 questions submitted to him by The Associated Press. Besides a quarantine, Huckabee suggested that Hollywood celebrities fund AIDS research from their own pockets, rather than federal health agencies.

“If the federal government is truly serious about doing something with the AIDS virus, we need to take steps that would isolate the carriers of this plague,” Huckabee wrote.

“It is difficult to understand the public policy towards AIDS. It is the first time in the history of civilization in which the carriers of a genuine plague have not been isolated from the general population, and in which this deadly disease for which there is no cure is being treated as a civil rights issue instead of the true health crisis it represents.”…

When Huckabee wrote his answers in 1992, it was common knowledge that AIDS could not be spread by casual contact. In late 1991, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said there were 195,718 AIDS patients in the country and that 126,159 people had died from the syndrome.

Update #3

Huckabee the Health Nanny

In 1992 Hucakbee supported an AIDS quarantine, despite the lack of any real public health justification for such a step. Today he supports a federal smoking ban in public places. This causes me to wonder: Is Huckabee willing to throw the idea of limited government out the window any time there is a plausible (or even not so plausible) public health argument for doing so?

Also, note in Huckabee’s statement above that he does not admit he was WRONG about calling for a quarantine of AIDS patients. He justifies it – albeit without a valid scientific rationale.

Damn, Huckabee is sounding more like Romney every day.

Update #4:

Hugh Hewitt has this RIGHT:

Even if the Newsweek poll noted below is close to accurate (and Dan Riehl among others has big questions), both of these stories are significant momentum killers as they display a general election vulnerability that makes it almost impossible to imagine an already improbable victory by Huckabee over either Senator Clinton or Obama. I expect Huckabee will have to address both stories asap and in detail.

Well, Hugh, Huckabee has responded but did not address the issues. His general election vulnerabilities are STARK.

Update #5

Disingenuous indeed. In 1992, we in the dental profession had for many years understood the transmission routes of HIV/AIDS infection. The Kimberly Bergalis case was in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s – NOT as late as 1992 when Mike Huckabee answered the questionnaire. Moreover, C. Everett Koop issued his Surgeon General’s report in 1986.

Here is the 1986 information:

United States. Public Health Service. Office of the Surgeon General. “Surgeon General’s Report on Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome.” United States. Public Health Service. Office of the Surgeon General, [October 1986]. Brochure. Official Report. 19 Images.

So, why did Huckabee advocate quarantine in 1992?

Was Mike Huckabee ignorant of the facts (like the Iran NIE ) or grossly negligent in applying them? Or was he playing to homosexual fears and anti-homosexual bigotry for political advantage?

Update #6

Mike Huckabee responds in more depth here.  Read the whole thing.

On homosexuality: “I think people have a right to live anyway they want to, but if asked specifically do I believe that it is a normal behavior, I’ve said all along that I don’t, that I think that it is behavior that is outside the boundaries of the man-woman relationship that is traditional marriage.”

Asked if he thinks homosexuality is sinful, he said, “Well I believe it would be — just like lying is sinful and stealing is sinful. There are a lot of things that are sinful. It doesn’t mean that a person is a horrible person. It means that they engage in behavior that is outside the norms of those boundaries of our traditional view of what’s right and what’s wrong. So, I think that anybody who has, maybe a traditional worldview of sexuality would classify that as an unusual behavior that is not traditional and that would be outside those bounds.”

Asked about saying that there were public health concerns with homosexuality, and he said, “There are a lot of obvious changes in what we understand about the transmission today that we didn’t understand in 1992, and I think that’s part of the whole issue here. For someone to dig out that 229 question questionnaire, that’s going to happen. There’ll probably be some more stuff that’ll be dug up before now, and that’s fine. The one thing that I feel like is important to note is you stick by what you said, and I’m not going to go around changing my opinion on everything.”

In other words, he sticks by his 1992 statements – which are out of the mainstream and would lead to a devastating general election loss to Hillary or Obama.

Mike Huckabee is NOT ready for prime time – nor will he EVER be.

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