On his weekly show this past Saturday, former Arkansas Governor, Mike Huckbee, announced he was leaving Fox News in order to explore a possible presidential run in 2016. With just under two years to go before we hit the polls to elect our next leader, why did he have to leave his job so early? Simple – money!
I’m not fan of Huckabee, but he does have the appeal and views that countless GOP voters really admire. I would venture to say if you put Huckabee, Ted Cruz and Jeb Bush in a room with a 1,000 voters who know nothing about each of the candidates, gave each 30 minutes to explain their positions and then let those voters vote, Huckabee would actually win and Jeb would come in third. But that scenario isn’t based in reality. In reality, the best one out of the three would be Jeb Bush, simply because he has the cash wagon necessary to win in our so-called democracy.
Huckabee faces a huge battle to even become important in the 2016 elections. In 2008 he had hardly no money going into Iowa. It was until that, that he was able to raise a little money. Of course since 2008 Fox News has given Huckabee a platform to gain more national recognition, including by those with the deep pockets, but I seriously doubt those pockets are even deep enough.
So just how bad are Huckabee’s odds? Here is an example:
“You’re going to need $150 million to win the nomination, and probably $75 million to get you through Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina,” Ed Rollins, a former Huckabee adviser, said in an interview. “That means 200 to 300 fundraising events and a vast, focused apparatus. Mike didn’t have that last time, and he still has to prove he can develop one.”
Huckabee’s challenge is one shared by an emerging faction of nearly a dozen Republicans — including Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana and former Hewlett-Packard chief executive Carly Fiorina — pondering how to mount bids that could be sustained beyond the race’s initial stages and compete with the fundraising prowess of more prominent potential contenders, such as former Florida governor Jeb Bush and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.
And as more candidates jump in to get the GOP nod in 2016, the money problems will continue to grow. Someone that might support Huckabee, could easily jump to Ted Cruz, if the Senator from crazyville decides to throw his hat in the ring. It’s something we have seen every Republican presidential primary this millennium – a rapidly growing field sucking money from other contenders, and 2016 will be no exception.
Honestly it has created a system where it’s not the best person for the job, but rather the best whore. Who can suck the most money out of the huge coffers out there? Who can suck up to the special interests of the richest donors? All these make elections more about the elite, than they do the people, or even the country, and our politicians know this. They rely on the huge numbers of people who will head to the poll and pick a name simply because it has an R or a D beside the name. And with no candidates appealing to a growing minority of our population, like Obama did, 2016 is lining up to be the election of big money. That alone should be enough to scare 99% of us.