Mike Huckabee in State of Florida Archives
On Budget & Economy:
Stimulus plan is $150B from China, to spend on Chinese goods
Q: What do you think of the president’s economic stimulus plan to send out 116 million checks to American homes?A: In talking about the stimulus package, one of the concerns that I have is that we’ll probably end up borrowing this $150 billion from th
Chinese. And when we get those rebate checks, most people are going to go out and buy stuff that’s been imported from China. I have to wonder whose economy is going to be stimulated the most by the package. And I’m grateful that something is being done.
Source: 2008 GOP debate in Boca Raton Florida
Jan 24, 2008
On Families & Children:
Understand the totality of the American family
If you talk to the people at the bottom of the economy, the people who are handling the bags, the people who are serving the food, you get a very different picture, because their health care costs are up dramatically. The cost to educate their children
are up. The cost of their fuel has way outstripped any wage increase they’ve had. Now, often we hear people talk about trickle-down economics, that if you have a wonderful surge in the economy that it eventually works it way down to all sectors.
But there’s another issue, too: there is a trickle-up impact when the economy begins to go sour. And if you pay attention to the people who are the single moms and the working people who barely get from paycheck to paycheck, you’d find out
months in advance that this economy was headed for a downward turn. What people need in the president, is somebody who understands the totality of the American family and not just the folks at the top.
Source: 2008 GOP debate in Boca Raton Florida
Jan 24, 2008
On Principles & Values:
Ought to be able to respect people who don’t have any faith
We ought to be able to respect people who don’t have any faith. I don’t feel like a person has to share my faith to share my love of this country. If a person hates me because of my faith, I’m not sure if they understand what it means to truly
be an American, where we can live with each other no matter how different our faith is. Faith has been an important part of who this country is. Most Americans believe in God. If you want a president that doesn’t, you’ll have to pick somebody else.
Source: 2008 GOP debate in Boca Raton Florida
Jan 24, 2008
On Principles & Values:
People should deal with the use of faith in my campaign
Q: A Bush administration official said that, quote, your use of faith in your campaign gave him a “queasy feeling.” Your response?A: I would say that would be his problem, not mine. My faith does not give me a queasy feeling; it gives me a solid core
from which I’m able to live every day. I don’t wake up every day and have to look at a poll to decide what I believe. My faith grounds me. It gives me some sense of direction and purpose. I don’t try to impose it on other people, and
I certainly would never use the auspices of government to try to push my faith. But for me to run from it? Impossible. It’s who I am. If it gives some people a queasy feeling, then they’ll have to deal with it.
The fact is, this country has always been a country where people were able to respect people who had faith.
Source: 2008 GOP debate in Boca Raton Florida
Jan 24, 2008
On Social Security:
Will try to fix Social Security with FairTax
We’re in trouble is because we have a smaller group of people paying into the Social Security system, fewer wage earners, more Americans getting their wealth from dividends and from investments. I’m a strong supporter of the Fair Tax is that you
suddenly have a different funding stream for Social Security. It comes out of the general fund. So you now have a more reliable, a more stable and a much broader funding system that will supply Social Security.
Source: 2008 GOP debate in Boca Raton Florida
Jan 24, 2008
On Tax Reform:
FairTax will tax the average American much less
Q: How does that help the 93 percent of Americans who are paying 15% or less right now?A: They’re not paying 15 percent; that’s in their visible tax in the terms of the takeout from their checks. When you include the built-in tax, the embedded tax
in the products we buy that corporations build in, the average American is paying 33% in his or her taxes. It would be a dramatic difference if the taxpayers got to choose the taxes, which they would do under the FairTax.
Source: 2008 GOP debate in Boca Raton Florida
Jan 24, 2008
On Tax Reform:
FairTax and its prebate untax the poor and the elderly
People would love to see the IRS abolished. The harder you work, the more you earn, the more the IRS and the government wants from you. What the FairTax does is says, we want you to earn; we want you to save and we want you to buy things and sell things
and make a profit. It goes to the common sense of the idea that we should encourage people to work and get something for it. A lot of people have never read the entire FairTax because when I first heard about the FairTax, the consumption tax, quite
frankly it sounds like it would be oppressive and regressive to the poor. The poor come out best of all because of the provision in the FairTax called the prebate in which every American, each month, is given the amount of the FairTax back up to the
level of poverty. Everybody gets it, not just those under the level of poverty. It actually untaxes the poor, untaxes the elderly. It makes sure that we don’t end up paying taxes on groceries and medicine and the basic necessities of life.
Source: 2008 GOP debate in Boca Raton Florida
Jan 24, 2008
On Tax Reform:
FactCheck: To be revenue-neutral, FairTax raises some taxes
In a lengthy exchange, Huckabee praised the FairTax, saying: “For each third of the economy, there is a benefit, about a 14% benefit for those at the bottom; those in the middle, about a 7%; even those at the very top end of the economy end up with about
a 5% benefit.”Huckabee’s claim that everyone will pay less is a fantasy. The FairTax claims to be revenue neutral. That means that it has to collect the same $2.4 trillion that the current system collects. And remember that the
FairTax replaces corporate income and payroll taxes. That means that individuals have to pony up to replace those in addition to replacing the sums collected via personal income and payroll taxes.
So Huckabee is suggesting that the
FairTax will generate exactly the same revenue while collecting nothing from corporations and still costing everyone less than they are currently paying. We certainly hope Huckabee has a barrel of magic pixie dust buried somewhere.
Source: FactCheck.org on 2008 GOP debate in Boca Raton Florida
Jan 24, 2008
On Tax Reform:
FactCheck: FairTax does not bring underground into economy
Huckabee said about the FairTax, “Everybody gets in the economy--no more underground economy. Drug dealers, prostitutes, pimps, gamblers, non-Republicans--all of those people out there will be paying taxes. Nobody’s working under the table.”
Huckabee’s suggestion that the FairTax will end the underground economy is highly unlikely. It’s true that pimps and drug dealers will now be taxed when they spend their earnings. But will they really charge johns and junkies sales tax on their purchases
It’s a better deal for the person buying the sex or drugs, and a worse deal for the person selling it.
In fact, far from ending the underground economy, there is a real possibility that the FairTax will feed it growth hormones.
There would probably be two prices--one you can pay with a check or credit card that includes the FairTax and one you can pay in cash & save 23%. Because there would no longer be any audits of income, tracing such tax evasion would be extremely difficult
Source: FactCheck.org on 2008 GOP debate in Boca Raton Florida
Jan 24, 2008
On Technology:
$150B for highway infrastructure is better stimulus package
If we’re going to spend $150 billion [as in Bush’s economic stimulus package], I’d like to suggest that maybe we add two lanes of highway from Bangor all the way to Miami on I-95. A third of the United States population lives within 100 miles of that.
This nation’s infrastructure is falling apart. And if we built those lanes of highways--with American labor, American steel, American concrete--I believe it would do more to stimulate the economy. And the reason
I say that is because when we were going through a recession in my state, we were in the middle of a billion-dollar highway construction program that brought about 40,000 jobs and brought a billion dollars of capital into the economy.
That’s a long- term stimulus package that I think would have more impact on the American long-term future. And it would keep social capital from being wasted, fuel wasted. A lot of people sit around in traffic every day, and we’ve done nothing about it.
Source: 2008 GOP debate in Boca Raton Florida
Jan 24, 2008
On War & Peace:
Failing to find the WMDs doesn’t mean they weren’t there
Q: Was the war worth the price in blood & treasure?A: I supported Bush when he led us into this. We owe him our thanks that he had the courage to recognize a potential of weapons of mass destruction, and whether than wait until we had another
attack, he went and made sure that it wasn’t going to happen from Saddam Hussein. Everybody can say we didn’t find the weapons. It doesn’t mean they weren’t there. Just because you didn’t find every Easter egg didn’t mean that it wasn’t planted.
Source: 2008 GOP debate in Boca Raton Florida
Jan 24, 2008
On Budget & Economy:
To reduce spending, get rid of IRS & revamp DHS
Q: What are the top three federal programs you would reduce in size in order to decrease spending?A: The first thing that I would get rid of would be the Internal Revenue Service.
Secondly, I agree we need to revamp [the Department of] Homeland Security. It’s a mess, and we have a real problem with the way that it’s currently structured.
Source: 2007 GOP YouTube debate in St. Petersburg, Florida
Nov 28, 2007
On Principles & Values:
Jesus was too smart to ever run for public office
Q: The death penalty, what would Jesus do?A: I believe there is a place for a death penalty. Some crimes are so heinous, that the only response that we, as a civilized nation, have for a most uncivil action is not only to try to deter that person
from ever committing that crime again, but also as a warning to others that some crimes are beyond any capacity for us to fix.
Q: But what would Jesus do?
A: Jesus was too smart to ever run for public office. That’s what Jesus would do.
Source: 2007 GOP YouTube debate in St. Petersburg, Florida
Nov 28, 2007
On Principles & Values:
I believe the Bible is the word of revelation
Q: Do you believe every word of this book [The Holy Bible]?A: Sure. I believe the Bible is exactly what it is. It’s the word of revelation to us from God himself.
I don’t fully comprehend and understand [it all], because the Bible is a revelation of an infinite god, and no finite person is ever going to fully understand it. If they do, their god is too small.
Source: 2007 GOP YouTube debate in St. Petersburg, Florida
Nov 28, 2007
On Foreign Policy:
Law of the Sea Treaty gives away our sovereignty
There’s nothing funny about Hillary Clinton being president. Let me tell you why. If she’s president, taxes go up, health care becomes the domain of the government, spending goes out of control, our military loses its morale, and
I’m not sure we’ll have the courage and the will and the resolve to fight the greatest threat this country’s ever faced in Islamofascism. We’ll sign crazy bills like the Law of the Sea Treaty and give away our sovereignty.
Source: 2007 GOP primary debate in Orlando, Florida
Oct 21, 2007
On Health Care:
We don’t have a healthcare system; it’s a healthcare maze
We don’t have a health care system. We have a health care maze. And we don’t have a health care crisis. We have a health crisis. 80% of the $2 trillion we spend on health care in this country is spent on chronic disease.
If we don’t change the health of this nation by focusing on prevention, we’re never going to catch up with the costs no matter what plan we have. The reality is it’s a health crisis, and
I would further say that one of the challenges we face is that a lot of the Democrats want to turn it over to the government, while the Republicans want to turn it over completely to the private insurance companies.
I think the better idea is to turn it over to each individual consumer and let him or her make that choice. I trust me a lot more than I trust government or a lot more than I trust the insurance companies.
Source: 2007 GOP primary debate in Orlando, Florida
Oct 21, 2007
On Social Security:
Personalization of retirement funds, not privatization
Q: What’s your Social Security plan?A: The president had the right idea, but he used the wrong word. When he used the word privatization, it scared the daylights out of a lot of people.
Q: Well, he didn’t. He used the word private accounts.
A: Well, but it scared the daylights out of people because they’re thinking Enron and WorldCom, and that that’s where their money would go. The right word is personalization. Empower individuals to have a greater say over their money.
And that’s what it is. Keep the government from robbing the trust funds, which is something that, if it was done in the private sector, would get a guy in jail. One thing, when people reach retirement age, if they really have enough retirement benefits,
they don’t need Social Security for the long term, give them the option of one-time buyout, or the opportunity to purchase an annuity, with their funds, tax-free, that frees up the long-term obligation of the government.
Source: 2007 GOP primary debate in Orlando, Florida
Oct 21, 2007
Page last updated: Jan 28, 2021