Huck: Conservatives 'heartless'

Mike Huckabee is campaigning for the GOP running-mate spot, and muddying the waters:

The greatest threat to classic Republicanism is not liberalism; it's this new brand of libertarianism, which is social liberalism and economic conservatism, but it's a heartless, callous, soulless type of economic conservatism because it says "look, we want to cut taxes and eliminate government. If it means that
elderly people don't get their Medicare drugs, so be it. If it means little kids
go without education and healthcare, so be it." Well, that might be a quote pure
economic conservative message, but it's not an American message.

Huckabee is so wrong in so many ways. First, he absurdly suggests a conflict between "classic Republicanism" and limited government. Conservatives don't want to "eliminate government"; we want to eliminate unconstitutional government, i.e., the federal Nanny State bureaucracy, womb-to-tomb Welfare State entitlements, and so forth.

Huck is wrong on the specifics. Medicare is an LBJ-era "Great Society" program, one that didn't even exist until 1965. How is opposition to Medicare Part D thus incompatible with "classic
Republicanism"? Why didn't Goldwater or Reagan push to provide taxpayer-funded prescription drugs for senior citizens?

Considering that John McCain has frankly confessed to being an economic ignoramus, Huckabee's own contempt for economic conservatism makes him a likely choice for the No. 2 spot.