Customer Reviews

Character IS the Issue: How People with Integrity Can Revolutionize America

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Arkansas' current Governor Mike Huckabee is certainly not politically correct. He is a man of integrity, convictions, patriotism, Christianity, and honesty-quite a departure from his two most recent predecessors.

The bulk of this disquisition concerns the attempted hijacking of his first inauguration. The convicted Governor Jim Guy Tucker changed his mind about resigning less than ten minutes before Lieutenant Governor Huckabee was to be sworn in. The State Constitutional Crisis was quickly thwarted by the united outrage of Arkansas' heavily Democratic controlled legislature.

In relating this tale of public servants putting their honor above their party, Huckabee does not descant on the obvious irony. In this scenario it was the Democratic Party and Arkansas politicians who saw their duty and boldly threatened an expeditious impeachment proceeding to restrain a law breaking chief executive. Not too many years later the National Democratic Party abnegated its duty when an Arkansas-bred Chief Executive contemptuously subjected the country to a Constitutional Crises.

The governor devotes less time to several other segments of his public life and includes a few biographical sketches. Whatever the subject, he displays a trenchant mind and a true dedication to serving mankind. It is not difficult to see why he was previously very successful as a minister. In addition to the clergy and politics, he may also have a calling as an author. Like his second book "Kids Who Kill," I read this one all the way through in less than 24 hours.

Of the countless political books and memoirs I have read in over 25 years in political affairs Governor Mike Huckabee's book, "CHARACTER IS THE ISSUE" is the most refreshing,outstanding and wonderful political memoir I have read.

Governor Huckabee's book should be read be all who seek and want leaders with integrity,honor and principle.

President John F. Kennedy wrote that great historic book "PROFILES IN COURAGE" --- Governor Huckabee of Arkansas is truly a 'profile in courage and integrity' !

God bless Governor Huckabee of Arkansas.

-------------------------------------------------- Visit my website: POLITICS INTERNATIONAL --------------------------------------------------

Provided insight to our Governor's life and the character that powers his decisions and actions. He gave me a view to segments of his life and a look at his family. I found the speeches to be motivating and exciting. I enjoyed the book. It was easy to read and moved along very quickly.

A sobering expose' of sordid Arkansas politics as seen from the eyes of a Baptist preacher turned Governor of Arkansas. Mike Huckabee is a known quantity, a splendid man of character. Gov. Huckabee sought to serve his fellow man from a larger pulpit; politics. On the journey to the Statehouse he exposes all of the "characters" masquerading as public servants and himself proves that "Character Is the Issue"!

Governor Huckabee exposes the cruel and inappropriate behavior that faced him as he moved into the Lt. Governor's Office, and then the Governor's Office. It provides true insight into the evil spirited Jim Guy Tucker, and the true nature of the rivalrous relationship of Tucker and Clinton.

Governor Huckabee is a fine Christian man, a natural-born leader, and an individual of great decisiveness and courage. He knows what to do and when to do it. This book is an excellent leadership book, and well worth the time.

Despite Reverend Huckabee's carefully polished air of humility, this book is a testament to his own ego, magnifying Arkansas Governor Jim Guy Tucker's indecision, following his criminal conviction about when and how to resign, into "arguably the greatest constitutional crisis in Arkansas history." (p.13). Never mind his state's secession from the union in May of 1861, the post-war Reconstruction, or that its defiance of federal orders to desegregate in 1957 forced President Eisenhower to send in paratroops. (See Zev Chavets, "The Huckabee Factor," New York Times Magazine, Dec. 16, 2007).

Huckabee would have us believe that he saved his state from the greatest crisis it ever faced - by insisting that Tucker should hand the reigns of power to him. The truth is that the Democratic Attorney General, and Democratic leaders in the Arkansas legislature deserve most of the credit for Tucker's resignation - not Huckabee, the Republican Lieutenant Governor.

Though Huckabee portrays himself as a humble, kind, good man, moreover, I think this book shows him to be something else entirely, as he lashes out against Democrats, liberal Christians, and homosexuals, characterizing them as un-American.

Huckabee derides Democrats, for example, as the party of "gay rights supporters, and others who ignore the bedrock tenets of biblical integrity and long-cherished American traditions." (p.50). Gay bashing, I guess, is a long-cherished American tradition for Huckabee's ilk.

Reverend Huckabee even suggests that good Christians cannot be Democrats. He recounts a specific exchange with a fellow Southern Baptist in the early 1990s, when told a churchgoing woman "I also find it curious that we should share the same spiritual roots but that you would believe that men marrying men would be acceptable." (p.54). When she objected, Huckabee insisted: "Your party is advocating that." (p.54). He then "mentioned a couple of other issues that were in the Democratic platform of 1992." (p.54).

In truth, the Democrats' 1992 platform said nothing at all about marriage between two men. But Huckabee doesn't let the truth get in the way of his homophobic rhetoric.

Huckabee makes it very clear that he detests homosexuals and opposes equal protection of the law for gay and lesbian citizens. "Public debate today is filled with arguments that, not long ago, would have been dismissed as ridiculous and insupportable," says Huckabee. (p.98). "Consider homosexuality, for instance," Huckabee continues, "until recently, who would have dared to suggest that the practice should be accepted on equal footing with heterosexuality, to be thought of as a personal decision and nothing more?" (p.98).

My gay and lesbian friends tell me that their sexual orientation is part of who they are, not some decision they made. I believe them. Which, of course, means that Mike Huckabee condemns my friends for who they are, insisting that they should be denied equal protection of the law merely because they are gay.

Democrats come under fire, then, as un-American when they advocate civil rights for all.

But homosexuals and Democrats are not the only threats to Huckabee's America. Reverend Huckabee also places "liberalism" in a category that he designates "cancers to the Christian faith." (p.74). Huckabee brags that during his presidency of the Arkansas Baptist State Convention he oversaw "a dramatic change" in the organization, as liberals were run out of leadership positions and replaced with conservatives. (p.46-47). Huckabee clearly regards religious liberals as an enemy to his faith - a cancer on the body of Christ.

But Huckabee's primary concern appears to be with using the government to impose his own views concerning biblical law. Since 1968, writes Huckabee, "we have lived in the age of the birth control pill, free love, gay sex, the drug culture, and reckless disregard for standards." (p.127). "No longer do we live by the standards of God," Huckabee complains. (p.127).

Would Huckabee really outlaw the birth-control pill and gay sex, given the chance?

His hostility to homosexuals, at least, is striking. "As forces began chipping away at America's public sense of morality," Huckabee writes, "people became increasingly bold about their lifestyles." (p.128). "Gays proudly came out of the closet." (p.128).

Huckabee obviously wants to shove them back in the closet. Or does he want to put them in jail? Or, given his exgtremist interpretations of biblical law, even worse?

Huckabee sure comes across as a nice guy on television. It was hard not to like him when he appeared on "The Colbert Report." But when you look deeper, you find that Huckabee's politics amount to a politics of division, mean-spirited bigotry, and even hate.


Eric Alan Isaacson

P.S.: Before you buy "Character is the Issue," please note that Huckabee republished its text in 2007 under a new title, Character Makes a Difference: Where I'm From, Where I've Been, and What I Believe, adding three chapters, each of them recycled from his year 2000 book Living Beyond Your Lifetime: How to be Intentional About the Legacy You Leave. Also, before you write evangelical Christians off as bigots, do check out Jimmy Carter's Our Endangered Values: America's Moral Crisis.