Mike Huckabee in 2007 Des Moines Register Republican debate
On Budget & Economy:
Do things differently so people need not sacrifice
Q: What sacrifices would you ask Americans to make to lower the country’s debt?A: Sometimes it’s not so much doing things so that people sacrifice; it’s doing them differently. Let me give you an example.
A lot of the federal budget goes to health care. We need to do what most American companies are finding works in reducing health care cost. That’s moving from the intervention-based health care model to a prevention-based.
Our current model is upside-down. We wait until people are catastrophically ill and then we spend the most expensive ways of trying to cure incurable diseases. If we would put the focus on prevention, we would find, like
American business is finding, that there really is savings if you kill the snake rather than just treat the snakebites, which is the way our current system is built.
Source: 2007 Des Moines Register Republican debate
Dec 12, 2007
On Education:
Education is a state issue, not a federal issue
The whole role of education is a state issue. It’s not really a federal issue. The worst thing that we can do is to shift more burden, more responsibility, more authority to the federal government when more of it needs to go to the states. The federal
government can play a pivotal role primarily in helping to make sure that the best practices working in the states are shared with states who are struggling. We have 6,000 kids every day drop out in the US. They drop out because they’re bored to death.
They’re in a 19th-century education system in a 21st-century world. If we really are serious, then we build a curriculum around their interests rather than just push them into something they don’t care. I’m a passionate, ardent supporter of having music
& art in every school for every student at every grade level because it’s not frivolous. If we don’t develop the right side of the brain with the same level of attention as we do the left, the logical side, we end up with an unbalanced, bored student.
Source: 2007 Des Moines Register Republican Debate
Dec 12, 2007
On Education:
FactCheck: AR improved test scores, but still below-average
Governors Huckabee & Romney both claimed to have the most impressive record on education. Romney claimed, “The kids in our state scored number one in all four measures on the national exams, and they did that because of Republican principles.”It’s tru
that Massachusetts school children scored first in the nation in the most recent NAEP tests, scoring a clean sweep among both 4th-graders and 8th-graders in math & reading. But MA also had ranked at or near the top before Romney took office, so he’s
straining the facts to attribute the success entirely to “Republican principles” and his leadership.
Arkansas consistently scored below the national average before Huckabee came along, and on most tests it still does. But on all four NAEP tests,
AR’s scores moved closer to the average during Huckabee’s time in office. Coming from below average to not-so-much-below average is significant. Whether that constitutes the “most impressive” record among GOP candidates, we’ll leave others to judge.
Source: FactCheck on 2007 Des Moines Register Republican debate
Dec 12, 2007
On Energy & Oil:
Biofuel mandates are not necessary
I am willing for us to make the decisions which will not necessarily create the mandates. One of the biggest energy users in the whole country is the US government. If the government commits to being the primary user of alternative forms of energy,
we have a market built in. Therefore, the big argument against having alternative energy is there’s no market for it. Let the government be a marketplace and we’ll create the kind of demand that lowers the price rather than raises the price.
Source: 2007 Des Moines Register Republican Debate
Dec 12, 2007
On Free Trade:
A free country must feed, fuel, & fight for itself
Q: Does our country’s financial situation creates a security risk?A: It’s most certainly a national security threat because a country can only be free if it can do three things.
- It has to be able to feed itself.
It has to be able to put food on the table for its own citizens.
- It’s got to be able to fuel itself. If it looks to somebody else for its energy needs, it’s only as free as those are willing for it to be.
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And it also has to be able to fight for itself. It’s got to be able to manufacture its own weapons of defense--tanks, airplanes, bullets and bombs.
When we start outsourcing everything and we are in that kind of a trade deficit,
then just remember, who feeds us, who fuels us and who helps us to fight, that’s to whom we are enslaved. So if we can’t do those three things, our national security is very much at risk.
Source: 2007 Des Moines Register Republican debate
Dec 12, 2007
On Government Reform:
Focus on uniting the country
Q: Your key focus areas? A: The first priority of the next president is to be a president of all the US. We’ve got to quit even fighting among ourselves as conservatives and as Republicans, and start putting the better interest of our nation.
If that doesn’t happen, we’ll get none of these things done. We’ve got to be the united people of the US, and a president has got to somehow remind us that we are a great, resilient nation that has to stick together to solve all of these problems.
Source: 2007 Des Moines Register Republican Debate
Dec 12, 2007
On Jobs:
Excessive taxes, red tape, and litigation cause job losses
When you have excessive taxation that penalizes the productivity of a company; you add to that excessive regulation, which means that you’ve got more red tape than is possible to get through. As president I can part the red tape. We’ve got too much
litigation. When a company goes into business, particularly small business, from which 80 percent of all American jobs come, most small business people can’t fight off the potential liabilities that they come from all of the lawsuits and litigation.
Source: 2007 Des Moines Register Republican Debate
Dec 12, 2007
On Principles & Values:
Treat others as you wish to be treated
You treat others as you wish to be treated. As it relates in health care, that means we recognize a person who is sick shouldn’t be treated differently than in poverty or who has extraordinary wealth; that we have some sense of balance in how we approach
that. Inasmuch as you’ve done it to the least of these, my brethren, you’ve done it unto me. What it really means is that all of us are created equal, endowed by our Creator with those rights--life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
You give education and health care, that you don’t have some that are more equal than others. So there has to be a sense in which you have opportunity, whether it’s through choice in charter schools, in the education field, you have a curriculum that
touches every child, not just a few; and in health care you don’t have a health care system, like Congress has, that is incredibly almost platinum, but there are a lot of Americans who can’t even go to the doctor and find out if they’re critically ill.
Source: 2007 Des Moines Register Republican Debate
Dec 12, 2007
On Tax Reform:
Support FairTax with a tax credit for the poor
Over 80 percent of the American people know that the tax code is irreparably broken. I would lead one to a FairTax, and that means that the rich people aren’t going to be made poor, but maybe the poor people could be made rich.
That ought to be the goal of any tax system--not to punish somebody, but to enable somebody so that they can have a part of the American dream. The FairTax does just that.
Source: 2007 Des Moines Register Republican Debate
Dec 12, 2007
Page last updated: Nov 30, 2018