Huckabee is a Fiscal Conservative

*I wrote the following little blurb on Huck's Army and a few other blogs.  I'm going to copy it here followed by a Newsmax article that gets a bit more into the details.

I am not a social conservative champion. I am a fiscal conservative and I support Governor Huckabee.

Anybody who wants to eliminate the income tax, payroll tax, corporate tax, dividends tax, capital gains tax, alternative minimum tax, and the estate tax is not a fiscal liberal.

Anybody who wants to publish on the internet every check written out of the United States Treasury for scrutiny by the people is not a fiscal liberal.

Anybody who supports personal accounts for social security is not a fiscal liberal.

Anybody who understands that spending $100 now preventatively to save $30,000 in future healthcare costs is not a fiscal liberal.

Anybody who understands that if by raising one tax, you can simplify the system, make it more efficient, and lower or eliminate other taxes is not a fiscal liberal.

That last point is a big one, because that is what the Cato’s and Club for Growths don’t understand. For example, Gov Sanford of SC championed a half cent sales tax increase, but in doing so nearly cut my home property tax bill in half. Now, tourists to Charleston and Myrtle Beach, etc are helping to pay for schools and it doesn’t just fall on the elderly couple who has seen their property value triple over the last couple of decades and their taxes go up as a result.

The whole story is sometimes necessary. People are sadly blindly following a group, in Club for Growth’s case, that is running a campaign against Huckabee funded by a political rival of Huckabee’s in Arkansas.  It’s just a personal feud, facts be darned. Huckabee is an articulate fiscal conservative and one who understands that it’s sometimes more complex than just “cutting everything”.  Makes a great soundbyte, but isn’t always the best policy on the ground.

Now a more in depth look.  Thanks to Mommahawk from OK on Huck's Army for posting this.

Ex-governor Responds to Critics

Huckabee is on the record more than once saying, "I'm proud of my record as a fiscal conservative." But by the end of his second term as Arkansas governor, critics like the watchdog group Club for Growth note, he had raised sales taxes 37 percent, fuel taxes 16 percent, and cigarettes taxes 103 percent.

But Huckabee told NewsMax that the picture being drawn is too simplistic.

He explained that with respect to the tax increases, a state Supreme Court decision required immediate additional spending on education. The ruling came at a time when he had already cut the state budget 11 percent, and the choice was between raising taxes to fund the court order or being in contempt of court.

When he became governor, Arkansas had some of the "worst highways in the nation," he said. Over 80 percent of voters supported a four cent tax on diesel fuel to fix the roads. Similarly, a 1/8-cent increase in the sales tax was approved by the voters to preserve their natural and cultural heritage.

Huckabee said that as governor he would have "violated his oath of office" if he had tried to thwart the will of these voters.

Recently, the National Review launched into Huckabee by charging that he was not the poster child for smaller government, citing the increase in state employees and spending during his tenure.

Once again, Huckabee explained the devil in the details.

With respect to the spending that he as governor had under his control — excluding federal pass-throughs and programs strictly controlled by the Democrat legislature — spending rose only about six-tenths of 1 percent a year during his 10 1/2-year tenure, he says.

As for the 20 percent growth in state employees during his tenure, Huckabee says he had no control over higher education and federally funded positions, "and when you remove those employees, the number of state employees increased 5.6 percent."

Read the entire article here:   Link