Mike Huckabee thought that AIDS Research Received an Unfair Amount of Federal Money

[Zguy28]

Oh, quit getting your panties in a bunch junior.

[PeterMP]

No he hasnt and it's been covered ad nausium. It was a newsletter that contained writings of an aide that was pulled as soon as it was made known.

nice try with old news, try another tact that is actually factual next time.

Just last week he was asked about that incident and this was his short response:

"I didn't write it, I didn't state it. After 15 years it should be history." - Dec 06.2008 Stephanie Miller Show.

If he becomes a serious threat, then this will become an issue, which I guess it is so you can take that as a sign that people are starting to notice him. Do you not think that Bush had addressed his "youthfull" indescretions, Kerry his Congressional testimony and service record, and Romney and his religion before their Presidential election? If this is as minor as Paul seems to be spinning it, he should do a couple of things to get out in front of it now:

1. Release a copy of it to the press. Is their any indication of acknowldegement to other writers? Do the different pieces have "by-lines"?

2. Who was the writer, and when was he fired (was he fired before this became a campaign issue)?

3. What was done to correct and when (where their batches not sent out or was this an all at one mass mailing; was there a retraction sent out in the next newsletter)?

4. Release others to indicate this was a one time thing.

[Midnight Judges]

This thread is a partisan joke from the get go. And I'm not even voting for Huckabee. :doh:

If Huckabee gets the Republican nomination you will vote for him.

IMO, these quotes are very interesting. I like Huckabee as a person but his views are drastically different from my own. Seems to me these quotes could very well help him win votes from the Republican base, but they will doom him among the other 67% of the country.

The Ron Paul newsletter was interesting as well. Texas never ceases to astound

[Zguy28]

If Huckabee gets the Republican nomination you will vote for him.

That depends on who the Dem nominee is. If Edwards somehow gets it, I might vote for him instead.

[TrumanB]

If he becomes a serious threat, then this will become an issue, which I guess it is so you can take that as a sign that people are starting to notice him. Do you not think that Bush had addressed his "youthfull" indescretions, Kerry his Congressional testimony and service record, and Romney and his religion before their Presidential election? If this is as minor as Paul seems to be spinning it, he should do a couple of things to get out in front of it now:

1. Release a copy of it to the press. Is their any indication of acknowldegement to other writers? Do the different pieces have "by-lines"?

2. Who was the writer, and when was he fired (was he fired before this became a campaign issue)?

3. What was done to correct and when (where their batches not sent out or was this an all at one mass mailing; was there a retraction sent out in the next newsletter)?

4. Release others to indicate this was a one time thing.

There was no "pulling of the newsletter" as SnyderShrugged has indicated. It wasn't like Paul and his newsletter had a mass audience back in 1992, where everything he was writing or saying was being scrutinized. These remarks were not raised as an issue until 4 years after the newsletter was published, by Paul's oppenent for Congress in 1996. Paul has also refused to name the alleged ghostwriter.

I agree with you that Paul will have to address this issue again if he becomes a serious threat and wins the nomination. Not to worry though, since that will never happen.

[Zguy28]

Not to worry though, since that will never happen.

Ask Anthony Smith about that. :2cents:

[Predicto]

Ok, what I find weird about this is that, back then, Huckabee thought AIDS was a huge risk of becoming a catastrophic plague (hence the talk about quarantine) yet at the same time, he complained that we were spending too much money on the problem.

Either of those views are defendable, I guess, but they sure don't go together logically. The only way I can see to rationalize those two views is if you think it is going to be a horrible plague but you don't care that much about the people it is killing (because most of them got it from being gay, or at least promiscuous).

I don't see Huckabee as that kind of a thinker, so it confuses me.

ps - the idea that AIDS research got more money than cancer is a bit of a myth. We have been spending money studying cancer for a long time. When AIDS showed up, we didn't understand a thing about it, and it was suddenly killing a lot of people very quickly. A big boost in spending was clearly appropriate just to get a handle on the basics, the things that were already well understood in the cancer field.

[PeterMP]

Ok, what I find weird about this is that, back then, Huckabee thought AIDS was a huge risk of becoming a catastrophic plague (hence the talk about quarantine) yet at the same time, he complained that we were spending too much money on the problem.

Either of those views are defendable, I guess, but they sure don't go together logically. The only way I can see to rationalize those two views is if you think it is going to be a horrible plague but you don't care that much about the people it is killing (because most of them got it from being gay, or at least promiscuous).

I don't see Huckabee as that kind of a thinker, so it confuses me.

ps - the idea that AIDS research got more money than cancer is a bit of a myth. We have been spending money studying cancer for a long time. When AIDS showed up, we didn't understand a thing about it, and it was suddenly killing a lot of people very quickly. A big boost in spending was clearly appropriate just to get a handle on the basics, the things that were already well understood in the cancer field.

Funding in the sciences as always been skewed based on political movements. The AIDS/HIV case is no different. There was substantially more funding for HIV/AIDS well after it was well understood the risk of getting it if an individual takes fairly minimal precautions is pretty low, and on top of that, the funding was and is today I believe generally directed at finding a cure for it vs. a vaccine; essentially because the people that are politically motivated to push for an HIV/AIDS funding know or are people w/ the desease.

I'm not trying to bash anybody w/ this, but it is the truth. Until recently (and it still might be true), the same holds true for breast cancer vs. other forms of cancer research (e.g. prostate).

If you aren't happy w/ how much funds your particular desease of interst is getting, be more politically active.

[prophet]

I also think that foreign aid research gets unfair amount of federal funding