Huckabee to try for president

Published 9:00 pm Sunday, January 28, 2007

WASHINGTON – Mike Huckabee, a former conservative governor from the largely Democratic state of Arkansas, is set to launch his bid today for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination, opening an exploratory committee to raise money.

Acknowledging that he will be a hard sell against better-known conservative candidates for the White House, Huckabee said Sunday that “America loves an underdog.”

He also pointed to his ability as a two-term governor to please liberals, noting that he raised taxes for education and poverty programs.

Huckabee sets out Tuesday and Wednesday to campaign in the early caucus state of Iowa. However, his staunch opposition to abortion and gay marriage could make it difficult for him to attract moderate voters nationally.

Nevertheless, the 51-year-old Huckabee, the first male in his family to make it through high school, hopes the public will view him as a self-made man against a slate of other presidential candidates – both Republican and Democratic – whom he characterized as wealthy, well-known and convinced they have a right to the White House.

“One of the reasons I’m running for president is because I think America needs folks who understand what it is to start at the bottom of the ladder and climb their way to the top,” he said in an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

“We’ve got a lot of people who are born on third base and think they’ve hit a triple.”

Huckabee’s long support of President Bush and the war in Iraq also could prove troublesome to his campaign.

On Sunday, he called it a “dangerous position” to oppose Bush on the war.

“It’s one thing to have a debate and a discussion about this strategy,” Huckabee said. “But to openly oppose, in essence, the strategy, I think that can be a very risky thing for our troops.”

He said he would not propose or support new taxes as president, unless “we’re in a situation where we are in a different level of war, where there is no other option.”

Recent polls on the race for the GOP nomination put former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani in the lead – although he has not declared his candidacy – with Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., close behind. Huckabee is well back in the field of potential candidates with just 1 percent of the respondents in most polls.

Huckabee was born in tiny Hope, Ark., also the hometown of former President Clinton, and was a Southern Baptist minister and lieutenant governor before he replaced a governor who resigned in 1996. He is perhaps best known for losing 100 pounds in two years.

Huckabee pushed tax increases for schools and new state insurance programs for poor children. He left office in January.

2008 presidential candidates so far

Democrats who are running