Justin Wax from the Tennessean supported Huckabee, even to the point of sending him an early campaign contribution.  But then he started learning the facts:

I was completely shocked when I read an Arkansas Leader article stating Huckabee issued more than 700 commutations and pardons during his tenure, more than Arkansas’ six neighboring states combined. I was even more repulsed when I learned the list of pardons and commutations included convicted murderers and rapists.

As a fiscal conservative, I was annoyed with Huckabee’s protectionist-sounding rhetoric and particularly his name-calling, labeling the conservative group Club for Growth, the "Club for Greed." His immigration policies as governor also gave me cause for concern, but I pushed all of Huckabee’s faults to the back of my mind, instead choosing to dwell on his pro-life record and position on the war. However, when I studied the Wayne Dumond story and Huckabee’s "desire" to see the convicted rapist released into society, alarm bells went off. After reading the Arkansas Leader article on Huckabee’s shocking propensity to side with convicted murderers and rapists over victims, I meekly pulled off my Huckabee bumper stickers.

Wax then lists his problems with the rest of the "conservative" candidates:

• I weeded out Giuliani because of his lack of integrity (multiple adulteries) and for his abortion, gun control and immigration policies.
• I never seriously considered Paul either due to his naivety on national security, specifically his anti-war rhetoric and his kooky ideas to abolish the CIA and FBI.
• But [McCain] alienated social conservatives by championing campaign finance "reform," and he kicked conservatives down the road on judges with his gang of 14 "grand compromise."
• With Mitt, I have no idea what I’m getting because he had a history of running on one platform and embracing another once he entered office. Mitt’s positions also seem more political than principled.

As nice a summation as I have seen, although I have problems with McCain that aren’t listed, primarily the fact that he hates both the First and Second amendments.

Now go read Wax’s excellent reasoning as to why Thompson is his choice for president. Money quote:

Thompson "hands down" possesses excellent judgment, and he will win because he is the most reliable, consistent, principled conservative in this race. Unleash the Fredmentum.

Nice.

The Washington Post addresses some of the tales that politicians tell:

Mitt Romney says he "saw" his father "march" with Martin Luther King Jr. Rudolph W. Giuliani claims that he is one of the "five best-known Americans in the world." According to John McCain, the Constitution established the United States as a "Christian nation." Ron Paul believes that a "NAFTA superhighway" is being planned to link Mexico with Canada and undermine U.S. sovereignty.

On the other side of the political divide, Sen. Barrack Obama says there are more young black males in prison than in college. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton claims she has a "definitive timetable" for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq. John Edwards insists that NAFTA — the North American Free Trade Agreement — has cost Americans "millions of jobs." Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. boasts about his experience negotiating an arms-control treaty with Leonid Brezhnev.

All those claims, made over the past four months as part of the presidential campaign, are demonstrably false. . . .

When a candidate is caught making a clearly false statement, embarrassment or ridicule often ensues — and over time a reputation can form. But the electoral rewards derived from stretching the truth or distorting a rival’s record just as frequently outweigh the fleeting political costs.

One would hope that the political cost of telling a lie would be long term and the electoral rewards would be fleeting.

On the good side, however, WaPo also says that blogs, YouTube, information databases such as LexisNexis, and the 24-hour news cycle has resulted in mistakes and inaccuracies (and outright lies) are being identified quicker than ever. The most recent example is Huckabee’s claim that "we have more Pakistani illegals coming across our border than all other nationalities except those immediately south of the border."

Billionaire Steve Forbes told the Boston Herald that Rudy Giuliani is a better bet to win the presidential election than Mitt Romney:

“Rudy Giuliani puts every single blue state into play,” Forbes told the Herald. “He puts everything in play and that’s the way a Republican can win. The problem with Mitt Romney is he doesn’t put any blue states into play. He’d have trouble in Massachusetts.”

The problem with that line of thinking, of course, is that while the Republican Party may win the White House, American conservatives will lose. And you have to ask yourself, after eight years of leadership under the faux-conservative leadership of George W. Bush can conservatives risk another four (or eight) under a liberal like Giuliani?

Journalist Deroy Murdock observes that:

• Thanks to Huckabee’s hikes on sales, gasoline, cigarette and other levies, Arkansas’ average tax burden expanded 47 percent on his watch.
• Under Romney, the Tax Foundation’s ranking of Massachusetts’ business friendliness slid from 26th to 37th in America. Meanwhile, Massachusetts’ tax burden swelled 10.8 percent.

Murdock, of course, is trying to make the case for Giuliani.

Rumor has it that the thought of raising taxes once lingered in Rudy’s mind overnight. When Rudy finally noticed what his brain was doing, he got so mad that he thimply thlapped himthelf thilly. Which explains why he supports other notions like taking away our guns.

According to ABC News and USA Today, Fred Thompson is the best candidate for me to support. At least their Match-o-Matic thinks so after it asked me all of eleven questions.

Of course, as you can see from the checkmarks and x’s we only only agreed on six of eleven issues (55%!). But that’s better than Rudy or Ronnie. But why would ABC/USA Today put Ron Paul as my third choice when I agreed with him exactly the same number of times I agreed with Rudy (45%)? It didn’t ask me to rate the importance of the question, so perhaps a little media bias is at work here?

And where the heck is Duncan Hunter? He strikes me as a Fred Thompson that isn’t famous and that actually has military experience.

The mayor who tried to sue gun manufacturers out of existence, supported draconian gun control laws as recently as 2004 and once said the NRA was an "extremist" organization. Now, as a Republican presidential candidate, Rudy Giuliani claims a change of heart:

He no longer argues, as gun control advocates do, that the right to bear arms applies only to the rights of states to maintain citizen militias. He now says that right also applies to individuals as well, and he cites the court ruling, Parker v. District of Columbia, that said the Second Amendment gives citizens the right to own handguns.

In the 1990s, he lobbied Congress to ban assault weapons. Now, aides have said it’s not clear he would support such a ban.

"Not clear"? What’s not clear is what Rudy would do as president. Oh wait, yes it is. He would back an assault weapons ban, just as his liberal heart has directed him to do in the past.

So Mitt handily wins the Iowa GOP straw poll. Of course, fellow front-runners Rudy Giuliani, John McCain, and Fred Thompson didn’t even bother to participate. And Mitt spent two million dollars on television ads alone, far outpacing anyone else.

On Politics does a cost-benefit analysis of the Iowa straw poll:

• Third-place finisher Sam Brownback says he spent about $325,000 to win his 2,192 votes. That’s $148.27 for each vote.
• Second-place finisher Mike Huckabee spent about $150,000 and received 2,587 votes. That’s $57.98 per vote.
• Winner Mitt Romney has not said how much he spent. The reporting in this Washington Post article suggests at least $2 million and possibly more than twice that much. Assuming $2 million for 4,516 votes, that’s $442.87 per vote. But it could top $1,000.

More than a thousand dollars a vote? Do we really want someone who throws money around like that to be in charge of our tax dollars?

On the other hand, what kind of guy do we want? Laura Ingraham ponders that question as she notes that Huckabee is a really nice guy, but:

Which brings me to the question: Do we really want a nice president? I kind of want a mean, tough S.O.B at this point — who can cut the legs out from underneath the Dems and the dinosaur media who are invested in America’s defeat. Someone who seems pleasant on the surface but who knows how to send in the daisy-cutters when al Qaeda or Taliban thugs are sleeping.

Evidently Ms. Ingraham isn’t the only one that feels that way. Byron York notes that fourth-place Tancredo received the biggest applause of all the candidates:

The unexpected thing was that Tancredo’s applause-getter wasn’t about immigration. Instead, Tancredo told the story of Danny Dietz, a Navy SEAL who was killed in Afghanistan in circumstances Tancredo blamed on restrictive rules of engagement. “When I am president, I will never, ever, ever send anyone into harm’s way with a CYA memo drafted by a Pentagon lawyer,” Tancredo told the crowd. “The only rule of engagement I’m going to have in a Tancredo administration is this: We win, you lose!”

Right on, Tancredo! I’d have applauded too.

While Huckabee’s second place finish was a surprise, so was Ron Paul’s fifth place. Blog Critics exclaims:

Wow. He’s not polling under 1% anymore, now is he? Everyone is just going to have to come to terms with the fact that Ron Paul really does have a significant base of support, as evidenced by his impressive fund-raising and his strong online presence. He won’t win the nomination, of course, but I do expect him to be the last candidate to concede, and to give one helluva interesting speech at the GOP Convention (assuming they let him come within 100 meters of a microphone).

In spite of some very dedicated Fred Heads, Fred Thompson garnered only 1% of the vote. Still, he hasn’t even announced or started marketing himself, yet he came in ahead of well-known candidates John McCain and Rudy Giuliani. Barely, but that’s got to mean something.

(Jeez, McCain came in behind Duncan Hunter. Who’s he?) 

Fred won in one way: Tommy Thompson said that he would quit the race if he didn’t come in first or second — and he finished in sixth place. If he keeps his promise, this should put a stake in the heart of his campaign. So when Fred Thompson announces and starts running in earnest, voters won’t be confused by having two Thompsons to try and keep straight.

But the real question is, “So what?” Captain Morrissey thinks that the low turnout is meaningless (there were 40% fewer votes than the one in 1999).

Personally, I think a poll that is mainly a fund-raising event for the GOP party in Iowa and that is held this far in advance of the primaries is fairly meaningless. On the other hand, W won the ’99 Iowa GOP straw poll with about the same percentage as Mitt did today, so maybe it means something after all.

Nah.

Forbes polled voting age Americans and asked them to match attributes to presidential candidates:

It’s not clear how “activist” might describe a president. Presumably, all holders of that office would pursue their own agendas vigorously. But it does seem to indicate a perception among voters as to how engaged in important issues a candidate is, rather than simply issuing position papers or repeating a canned stump speech. At the same time, however, Gore also happens to be rated as the most boring candidate of both parties.

There’s more information at the link, but here’s the high-level data:

McCain’s Straight Talk Express seems to be going in reverse. Only 8% of likely Republican voters in Nevada support him, according to the most recent Mason-Dixon poll.

Even worse, he is also polling in single digits in two key early-voting states: 6% in Iowa and 7% in South Carolina.

If he fails to pump up his fundraising and continues to poll badly, rumor has it that McCain could pull out of race by autumn.

It’s a little early to count him out, but the writing seems to be on the wall. According to Mason-Dixon:

• Republicans
  • Fred Thompson, 25 percent
  • Mitt Romney, 20 percent
  • Rudy Giuliani, 17 percent
  • John McCain, 8 percent
• Democrats
  • Hillary Clinton, 39 percent
  • Barack Obama, 17 percent
  • John Edwards, 12 percent

Expect Edwards to be declared unelectable now that his wife, Elizabeth Edwards, has come out in support of gay marriage.

You have to admit, Rudy is doing pretty good for a guy whose South Carolina campaign chairman was indicted for possession of cocaine with intent to distribute last week.

And you have to give Fred Thompson props for running the most effective non-campaign in history.

It has begun.

A couple of weeks ago I received my first invitation for the presidential 2008 election season, an email from the “webteam” for the Join Rudy 2008 campaign. 

As part of the website’s launch, we are trying to reach out to friends online and across the “blogosphere.” It is important to us that the web community knows that we intend to be an active and contributing presence to the intellectual debate and discussion that occurs on the web.

I’ll be looking forward to “intellectual debate and discussion”, especially as it centers around Rudy’s abhorrent record on the Second Amendment.

If you support a gun-grabbing RINO, go download a banner or make a donation, or both. As for me, I think I’ll wait for more debate and clarification.