mike huckabee for president and be afraid of jade helm. the next candidate we are pretty sure who is going to announce on june 1st is rick perry. he made a little stab at trying to be the voice of reason on the jade helm issue. he is trying to be the voice of reason on this. watch how his handlers pull him away in the middle of his comments. >> texas monitoring the u.s. military? >> i am one of these guys, i think it is okay to question your government. i do it on a pretty regular basecy. the military is something else. i think our military is quite trust worthy. the civilian leadership, you can always question that but not the men and women -- >> governor perry, when should we expect an announcement? >> he has to go. stop talking. pity the poor republican politician who needs to figure out the appropriate line on this to avoid offending the base, which is upset about this matter, but also needing to not seem insane to the rest of the country. this is one of the issues that is hilarious to the rest of the real world and totally serious in

and mike huckabee is losing. wow, is he losing. that's ahead. but first a couple of holy mackerel stories in today's news. virginia governor bob mcdonnell took another step further down from the mantle of party potential savior. he doubled down on his latest public relations disaster backtrack. last night we reported his indirect, somewhat denial that he had instituted an essay question, a sort of literacy test for ex-felons trying to get their voting rights back in virginia. the denial sounded like this. >> there's no essay. we've asked for just a simple statement of what the person has done in order to be reintegrated into society. a little bit about their crime, what they've done to get back into society, any community activities, and we're still in the draft stages. and i just ask people to give us a few months. we're going to -- we haven't even announced a final process. >> we're still in the draft stages. no final process. give us a few months. this walk-back ran into evidence of governor mcdonnell's actions, which totally gave lie to that

mike huckabee's campaign manager is his daughter, sarah b. -- excuse me. sarah huckabee sanders. sadly, she also admitted to politico tonight amid these reports of senior staff leaving and salary cuts at the campaign, she admits to politico tonight, "obviously if we go to iowa and lose, well, frankly we probably won't keep going." so by the campaign's own admission it is win iowa or bust. for the mike huckabee for president campaign. which means among other things that wow, the mike huckabee combine plans on still existing for a few more weeks. through the first week of february at least. this is kind of one of the weird dynamics this year. in this race. nobody's quitting. we started off with a historically enormous, untenable 17-candidate republican field. we've still got 14 of them running all these months later. only three of them dropped out. three of them are gone. scott walker, rick perry, bobby jindal. three governors poofed. otherwise, they're all staying. even the ones who aren't really running by my contention. jim gilmore and george pataki. even the guy who flirts with

it seal like that would be a mike huckabee and ted cruz event. we knew they were both there yesterday. but in the end it ended up being just a mike huckabee thing because in part, ted cruz wabltd to go talk on the left to the reporters but guy in the red shirt would not let him pass. and it was this weird mystery. and we didn't know who that man in the red shirt was. all we knew was last night, because of the physical stand-off of red shirt guy and ted cruz, the getting out of jail moment looked like this. i will tell you again. we did not add the sound track here. they were playing this music out loud at the event. ♪ >> incidentally the band survivor is now upentity the use of "eye of the tiger" at that rally and they are considering a lawsuit. whether or not anybody gets sued for the epic sound track, there did end up being mike huckabee's moment. he got to be there making it look like he was the one springing her from jail. even though ted cruz had gone all the way to kentucky to be there, he was totally boxed out. it turns out the guy in th

just wait until it is president huckabee in a couple of years. >>> former arkansas governor, mike huckabee, did announce he is running again for president. there are so many contenders and potential contenders for the presidency on the republican side that we are going to get some kind of announcement about someone basically every day between now an the summer. on monday this week, we got ben carson announcing in the morning and carly fiorina announcing in the afternoon and then mike huckabee and then michigan governor, rick snyder would not run and that we might get rick santorum by the end of the month. the huckabee announcement provides a particularly good snapshot of something going on in republicanville that does not necessarily make sense in the rest of the country. but because it is going on in republicanville, it is going to be a national hum in the rest of our politics. just because republicans are into it if no one else understands it. here is how it goes. in conservative politics, one of mike huckabee's most potent allies has always been chuck norris. yes, chuck norris. he is no

four years ago huckabee won in polk county. it was his biggest margin in raw vote over mitt romney was in polk county there. and it's paul that's leading but i want to emphasize we're missing a ton of vote in polk county. we have places like dubuque county all the way on the mississippi river where we have yet to get any returns in but i can also tell you this. i told you about our modeling that the boiler room is doing first and third based on different models. there is a precinct model we do. there is a county model we do. based on those models, throwing out the entrance polls at this point, actually using the data that we have, 1.1% separates first and third. so unless something dramatic happens with some of this un -- this vote that we haven't seen come in, but in the way it's coming in it feels like it's a representative sample, we're going to be here a while, rachel. >> 1.1% between 1, 2, and 3. i will say in terms of those of us whose job it is to just make sense of what all of this means rather than just count it, i'm v

i think there were some hard feelings on the part of governor huckabee. i think people put that down. i think four years ago is a very long time ago in politics. >> did he lose political capital or potential political alliances in doing that in 2008 that might continue to reverberate? i'm trying to understand what might be the republican dynamics behind people still looking for more candidates who aren't mitt romney to try to displace him as the front-runner. >> i think all that is over today with governor christie getting out of the race. i think the field is the field we have now. think that the choice is the choice, you know, with the candidates that have been on the stage. you know, senator mccain and governor romney had a ferocious contest that went through the early part of the winter. but after, you know, senator mccain became the nominee, there was nothing that mitt romney didn't do, you know, to help john mccain. he was out there. he was raising money. he toured the country. he was one of the campaign's best surrogates. i think that went a long w

this huckabee media round, all under t under the guise of him writing a book. a columnist expressing concern for the atmosphere around the presidential nominating practice so far. "the washington post" george will gave a preview of his column on the subject to politico.com. here it is. he writes sensible americans must be detecting vibrations of weirdness emanating from people associated with the party. the most recent -- i don't think i can say that out loud. i will let you read it off the screen. the most recent. okay. all of this brings us to our question. now it is time for the cell phone. you ready? i've never done this before. i hope you do it right. today's question. what's more embarrassing. a, huckabee saying things about the president growing up in kenya, the natalie portman comments, or telling anyone offended to buy his book, or george will calling mike huckabee a something i am not going to say. which is more embarrassing? we're doing this for real. text a, b or c. i am supposed to say message and data rates may aplay. 622639. they say we will have

so when it comes to mike huckabee, tick-tock. up at the top of the ticket, this was a weekend of good news for ted cruz, particularly in iowa. but the biggest of the big stories continues to be mr. trump. correlation is not causation, and it may all be one big coincidence. but since mr. trump proposed to ban all muslims from entering the united states the news has been getting better and better and better for him. since his muslim ban proposal there have been three major national polls released, the monmouth poll, the nbc/"wall street journal" poll and the cbs/"new york times" poll. all three of those polls released since mr. trump proposed banning muslims from the country, all three of those polls show mr. trump's support going up. there have also been three major polls in iowa in that time. the des moines register poll, the fox news poll and the quinnipiac poll. even though ted cruz shows strength in those polls the fact remains that two of the three of those show donald trump's support going up since he proposed banning muslim

huckabee hosts and starred in it, governor huckabee's antiabortion dvd also features an activist that campaigns for pro choice rights. he has also interviewed her on his tv show and in 2011, they both worked on the personhood campaign in mississippi. you remember that, the ballot measure intended by its authors to ban some of the most popular forms of birth control, hormonal birth control and iuds, also in vitro fertilization, and all abortion. they were not shy about the fact they wanted to ban all abortions, including those by rape or incest. they campaigned on that measure. mike huckabee was a major spokesman and keynote speaker. the activist he featured iphis dvd, the one who changed rick perry and on his television show, she headlined a tour, and the tour was called "the conceived in rape" tour. that was part of the campaign for the personhood measure, not against it. the mississippi campaign prided itself on its mission to force rape victims and incest victims who became pregnant as a result of the crimes to bring the pregnancies to term against their will. as a rape victim or a

mike huckabee is killing it in the presidential polls right now. in the latest gallup poll out there, mike huckabee is right up at the top with jeb bush. among people who identify themselves as conservative republicans, he is far and away the leader at 54%. marco rubio is the next closest to him. and then there's the new cnn poll that matches republican candidates up with hillary clinton to see who would do the best in a head-to-head match-up. the front-runners are jeb bush and scott walker. they aren't formally declared as candidates yet, they're running hard, basking in mainstream press adulation. you know who outperforms them? mike huckabee. kentucky senator rand paul also does well in the cnn poll against hillary clinton. she beats him by less than she beats everybody else. rand paul is now expected to announce his presidential bid very soon on april 7th. we also got the exciting announcement today that an eccentric new york city real estate developer named donald trump is pretending harder than usual that he's going to run for president. he sa

by 2005, news made its way to mike huckabee in arkansas. arkansas under mike huckabee passes a law to require health insurance drug policy to cover contraception. like in arizona and new york and in the obama administration's original policy this year, churches are exempt but church affiliated hospitals and universities are not exempt. that's what mike huckabee signed into law in his state in 2005. stick a pin in that for mike huckabee for a second. we'll be back to that in just a moment. the year after mike huckabee does it, mitt romney signs the big massachusetts health care overhaul which reaffirmed that health insurance prescription plans must cover birth control. mitt romney signed that. he now calls essentially the same rule from the obama administration an assault on religion. it's his own policy. mike huckabee, former weight loss guru, no longer trying to hawk that, now he's just a fox news personality and he's trying now to set off a national campaign under the heading we are all catholics now basting the obama administration for a

and by all of that, we mean send mike huckabee a check. hit that giant button at the bottom of the screen, help fund the battle. preferably at the $2500 level, which is also known as "the mike huckabee special." act now, operators are standing by. seriously, operators are standing by. mike huckabee wants you to call this number, the number right there on your screen so he can repeal obama care. i was watching the mike huckabee "repeal obama care ads" today. and i dialled. here is what happens when you call. >> to ensure proper handling, this call may be recorded. >> hi, this is richard simmons, thank you for calling project >> yep, you call mike huckabee's repeal obama care number and what you get is richard simmons. you call mike huckabee to repeal obama care and you get the astonishing hair guy with the glittering suits who is ready to give you the body you have always dreamed of. mike huckabee has been working this scamming obama care idea for so long that the infomercial gods have recycled his number and given it to richard simmons, wh

a huckabee alert. i don't -- mike huckabee says he is not running. then he says good night. then a little piece of tape rolls of donald trump. obviously taped earlier. so responding or presponding to the news mike huckabee isn't running. we just learned. donald trump has reannounced by shouting. i don't know. i don't know. a little more than 36 hours later there was donald trump again announcing that he would not be running either to the surprise of absolutely no one other than to the mysterious people who vote in republican party straw polls this time of year. beyond republican candidates overtly saying they will not run, one other high profile republican candidate effectively took himself out of the running this weekend. >> i am not going to justify this. the attack on paul ryan. the support for an individual mandate in hilt -- health care. folks, don't ask me to explain this? there is no explanation. >> if you're trying to become the republican nominee for president, that is not the impression you are looking to make. that's how it's going for newt gingrich. whose candida

because mike huckabee is not all that relevant in the campaign. but for ted cruz, he can't really say he didn't know what was going on at that conference there and is a case to be made he should be ready to answer some real questions about it. even before they got 3% back on gas, all with no hoops to jump through, daniel, vandi, and sarah decided to use their bank americard cash rewards credit card to sweeten the holiday season. that's the spirit of rewarding connections. apply online or at a bank of america near you. apply online or at prge! a manufacturer. well that's why i dug this out for you. it's your grandpappy's hammer and he would have wanted you to have it. it meant a lot to him... yes, ge makes powerful machines. but i'll be writing the code that will allow those machines to share information with each other. i'll be changing the way the world works. (interrupting) you can't pick it up, can you? go ahead. he can't lift the hammer. it's okay though! you're going to change the world. ♪ how else do you think he gets around so fast? take

will having mike huckabee on tv repeal obama care? i'm checking with the constitution, but i don't think so. but mike huckabee would please like to stay on tv, if for no other reason than to keep asking for more of your money to help him stay on tv asking for more money. it is maybe inevitable that somebody is going to try to turn impotent political rage and ignorance into personal financial gain. it has been happening as long as there has been snake oil and hucksters, which is not the root word of mr. huckabee's name. i did check that. this isn't just some con man off the street. i mean mike huckabee, for whatever you think of him w, he came in second the last time the republicans nominated somebody for president. in the 2008 election, mike huckabee essentially came in second to john mccain. which is now the part where i tell you that the guy who came in second this year, the guy who came in second to mitt romney, where does he work now? he works at world net daily, which is admittedly hilarious, because it's a mad libs choose your o

after iowa, good-bye, mike huckabee. poof. today it was slightly more surprising news when we learned that we would also get to poof rand paul. it's interesting rand paul quit today because rand paul is not actually doing terribly in the grand scheme of things, at least he wasn't before he quit today. he's not doing well, but he wasn't actively on fire like mike huckabee was. for example, in this new ppp poll that we just got tonight, this exclusive poll that we got, first national poll taken since the iowa caucuses, rand paul comes in in that poll at 5%. not good. but it ties him for fifth place with john kasich and jeb bush. puts him well ahead of chris christie and carly fiorina and they're not quitting. but rand paul is quitting. one other reason it's surprising that rand paul is quitting is that he didn't do that badly specifically in iowa. rand paul got about 4.5% of the vote in iowa. that was good enough for a solo fifth-place finish. his campaign had said ahead of iowa that a top-five finish is all they were aiming for

and that is a pretty big change for huckabee. after all, just a few months ago, he asserted if republicans stopped standing their ground on conservative views, on same-sex marriage and abortion he might leave the party entirely. this week some tape from february resurfaced, in which huckabee joked about pretending to be transgender. >> now, i wish someone would have told me when i was in high school that i could have felt like a woman when it came time to take showers in p.e. i'm pretty sure i would have found my feminine side and said coach, i think i'd rather shower with the girls today. >> so even mike huckabee says he doesn't want to see socialist issues avoids in the party, even he is now taking a step back and biting his tongue on this topic. granted, not everyone is treating this with kid gloves. george pataki is not among the top tier of republican candidates in the field right now, but he is a moderate when it comes to cultural issues. and this week he was asked about those comments from huckabee back in february. >> are

unless you're one of the people for whom the earth shook in 2008 when mike huckabee won in iowa. nu polling from cnn and "time" magazine showing romney ahead in the race that will follow iowa, way ahead in the new hampshire primary that takes place a week after iowa on january 10th. quote, romney who owns a house in new hampshire earned 44% followed by mr. paul with 17%. if it's one of this year's huckabees who wins, a ron paul, a rick perry, a michele bachmann, a rick santorum. if one of this year's huckabees wins iowa and mitt romney wins new hampshire, everything will have gone according to plan. we'll be no closer to knowing who the republican nominee for president will be. the first race will be an open question politically, will be on the saturday january 1st contest in south carolina. >> you have to win south carolina. everyone who's won south carolina has been the nominee. every single one. >> iowa and new hampshire are fascinating to watch, but south carolina might really be the race to watch in terms of how things are going to go in this nominating process. mr. gingrich

if he'd maybe somehow been tricked by mike huckabee. mike huckabee giving him the business about his totally communist abortiony romney care health reform. so maybe he just felt pressured. we kept asking the romney campaign if he really meant it. if he really was for a 100%, no exception abortions ban, and banning the pill and banning in vitro fertilization and making miscarriages a site for a criminal investigation. but the romney campaign never returned our e-mails. other people asked him about it too. politico, says, for example that he would not respond to them when they asked about it. but now that the romney campaign realizes that this personhood thing is really unpopular, so unpopular that it lost in a landslide even in uber conservative mississippi, the romney campaign now telling politico that mr. romney is being falsely characterized as supporting the mississippi bill. see, clear as day, he doesn't support that thing that everybody hates. he just said that he would support it, absolutely. don't you see the difference? wow. joi