Bonnie Erbe of the Scripps Howard News Service has a column in the Evansville Courier Press on Mike Huckabee. She describes him as a knuckle dragger. The basis for this harsh assessment was his endorsement of Southern Baptist teachings about the role of women in marriage. Wives are to “graciously submit” to their husbands.
Says Erbe:
Husbands who believe they sacrificially “love and lead” their wives clearly do not view their wives as partners in life but as servants. Wives who “graciously submit” to their husbands are most often not submitting graciously, but because they have neither the economic wherewithal nor the education to be economically self-sufficient.
It is amazing how depending on your POV, things like this can seem barbaric or even romantic.
I remember reading Every Man a Tiger, a book by Tom Clancey and Chuck Horner about the air part of Gulf War I. At one point in the book, Horner is talking with one of the Arab Saudi princes about their policy towards women.
Horner talks about how distasteful things such as the wearing of veils and restricions on women are. The price responds with a very heartfelt description on how he views it has heaping praise on their women. He protects them, saves them from manual labor. Wearing the veil helps both men and women in his view. His brothers don’t have the temtaton to lust after his wife, and his wife doesn’t have to deal with all of these men whistleing and drooling over her.
I don’t agree with his view, but if you read the book sometime, you’ll see that the prince really thinks that the idea is wonderfully romantic. While it doesn’t say what his wife’s feelings are, some Arabic women have claimed to feel the same way.
My point is that some times, these guys really are not like the men from “The Stepford wives”. They’re not high-fiving each other, watching football while their wife submits to their evern whim. Sometimes even the women that are totally capable of being self-sufficent prefer this style of relationship.
If an individual woman truly prefers such an arrangement, then that’s fine. Huckabee is saying that “women” –as in, all of them– should (as in, “are expected to”) do this.
I hope the Republicans nominate this clown. Between his dangerous leniency toward a rapist, his total lack of knowledge of foreign policy, and his overarching fixation on the supernatural (we’ve had a guy like that for the last eight years, and hopefully have lost our taste for such things), this guy should be toast in the general election.
I’m pretty sure all of them except Ron Paul have -zero- chance of winning against most of the Democrats.
However, doesn’t everyone expect that everyone else should agree with their viewpoint? Sure, you can’t force people to think your way, but don’t most people feel like: “I think what I think, and you can think what you think, but I think you’re wrong.”
I don’t think Huckabee or even Republicans are exclusive in feeling that their way is the best way for everyone.
It’s one thing to say, “Well, everyone thinks they’re right.” But it is actually possible to see what their positions are, compare them to recent history, and make a judgment about whether those positions would be good or bad for the country.
Republicans have actually had a nice few years of governance to demonstrate whether their way is better. And the results are in. If greatly increased deficits, military quagmires (and expensive ones, to boot), top-to-bottom corruption and scandal (but no *heterosexual* blowjobs, thankfully), etc., are the desired functions of government, then I would say their way has been demonstrated to work better.
Yeah, can’t say I agree with his viewpoints on women. He would not like the fact that my favorite mentor in seminary (and still a great friend) is *gasp* a woman!
Jason, one of my parishioners at my first call worked as a diabetes specialist for two of King Fhad’s great-grandchildren in Saudi Arabia. She has some scary stories to tell about women being oppressed in that society. Of course they can’t see any other way of life. BTW she was in Saudi Arabia when 9/11 happened.
I wouldn’t say that I beleive in the “Supernatural,” T, but my primary expectation of any candidate is that they can lead our nation. Martin Luther himself said that God can work through even an ungodly man. I certainly don’t see Bush letting God work through him-and he claims to be a man of God. ‘Fraid I’d see the same thing with Huckabee. In fact it would be four more years of the same. (Dang, now I want to curl up in the fetal position and suck my thumb!)
Haven’t made up my mind on any of the candidates yet. Will get a better idea after Iowa in a few weeks. Have made up my mind who will not get my vote-and Huckabee is on that list.
I happened to hear Laura Ingraham,who is a spokesperson and former talk show host for social conservative issues warning that the ‘liberals’ are setting up Huckabee and Romney as the the two ‘religious’ candidates.
What seems significant to me is that evidently being identified as a ‘religious’ candidate is now a negative and part of the liberal political strategy.Suddenly,these social conservatives want to appear mainstream ,and that means not wearing one’s religion on one’s sleeve.Having Romney actually being challenged to explain the difference between Mormonism and Christianity would be deadly for the Christian right.Heaven forbid that a self-proclaimed religious candidate would ever have to ‘explain religion’ It’s easier to say what you aren’t and what the opposition is.