{"id":9907,"date":"2011-06-01T11:38:05","date_gmt":"2011-06-01T15:38:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/?p=9907"},"modified":"2011-06-01T11:38:05","modified_gmt":"2011-06-01T15:38:05","slug":"huntsman-sounds-like-the-gipper-governs-like-a-maverick","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/9907\/huntsman-sounds-like-the-gipper-governs-like-a-maverick\/","title":{"rendered":"Huntsman Sounds Like the Gipper, Governs Like a Maverick"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you like Ronald Reagan and Barry Goldwater you\u2019ll love Jon Huntsman\u2019s opinion piece<\/a> in today\u2019s Wall Street Journal<\/em>.\u00a0 Sounding themes of economic growth, fiscal responsibility, and balanced budgets as the key to a prosperous future Huntsman even borrows the Gipper\u2019s famous \u201ctime for choosing\u201d phrase to headline his column.\u00a0 Heck, the former Republican governor of Utah and ambassador to China even praises Rep. Paul Ryan\u2019s \u201cPath to Prosperity\u201d budget resolution.<\/p>\n

One problem: Jon Huntsman isn\u2019t the reincarnation of Ronald Reagan.\u00a0 Rather, he\u2019s a slicker, more polished version of John McCain.\u00a0 In a word, he\u2019s a maverick whose method of policymaking is open to whatever the political consensus of the moment requires.\u00a0 As I wrote for CFIF this week<\/a>, Huntsman is attracting the same kind of \u201cprogressive\u201d Republicans that flocked to McCain\u2019s failed presidential bids.<\/p>\n

For all his red meat economic rhetoric in today\u2019s column, Huntsman can\u2019t hide from his past support for President Barack Obama\u2019s stimulus spending<\/a>, growth in (state) government<\/a>, cap-and-trade<\/a>, and state-run health care<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Back in 2005 as governor, Huntsman gave a summary of his approach to illegal immigration that can be used as a window into how he governs in general: “I want to be a catalyst and report good ideas that will lead to a philosophy. That’s what we need first and foremost.”<\/a><\/p>\n

Wrong.\u00a0 In the Age of Obama, conservatives aren\u2019t looking for a presidential candidate that formulates his governing philosophy on the fly.\u00a0 Think about this: If this is the way Huntsman thinks of his job as an executive, is it too much of a leap to assume that this is the kind of ad hoc philosophizing he\u2019ll look for in judicial nominations?\u00a0 Haven\u2019t we had enough of judicial activists making up the law as they go along, rewriting the Constitution so that it fits whatever facts are in play?<\/p>\n

Yet that is exactly what Huntsman\u2019s \u201creport good ideas that will lead to a philosophy\u201d statement suggests.\u00a0 We\u2019ve seen the kind of cognitive dissonance that Republicans like John McCain truck in when their policy positions are not tethered to conservative principles.\u00a0 Huntsman is right in his economic prescriptions, but what conservative isn\u2019t these days?\u00a0 The real question is whether he\u2019ll be right dealing with future problems that require him to use his first principles, whatever those are.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you like Ronald Reagan and Barry Goldwater you\u2019ll love Jon Huntsman\u2019s opinion piece in today\u2019s Wall Street Journal.\u00a0 Sounding themes of economic growth, fiscal responsibility, and balanced budgets as the key to a prosperous future Huntsman even borrows the Gipper\u2019s famous \u201ctime for choosing\u201d phrase to headline his column.\u00a0 Heck, the former Republican governor […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[914,2740,928,721,2652,2609,802,740,456,858],"class_list":["post-9907","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-posts","tag-2012-presidential-election","tag-barry-goldwater","tag-conservative","tag-john-mccain","tag-jon-huntsman","tag-path-to-prosperity","tag-paul-ryan","tag-progressive","tag-ronald-reagan","tag-utah"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9907","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9907"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9907\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9909,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9907\/revisions\/9909"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9907"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9907"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9907"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}