What better example of a profile primary than Huckabee's recent 11-page spread in The New York Times Magazine? Zev Chafets, the author, does an interesting job defining Huckabee. As a New Yorker, my strongest memory after reading it was the fact that Huckabee chose to eat at Olive Garden when visiting with the writer in Manhattan. Chafets writes, "I had offered to take him anywhere he wanted and then vetoed his first choice, T.G.I.Friday's." Huckabee orders soup and a salad and seems to spend a large part of the interview playing with his croutons. I am sure that the Gang of 500 will pick up on this as well. My question is whether America can take a candidate seriously when he visits Manhattan and chooses to eat at a chain. If he wants to appeal to more than the Midwestern voter, why not choose a pizza place or a deli? Is this a case of Huckabee being too humble and "small-town" for his own good?
The rest of the article is also interesting. Chafets's writing shows that he is slightly skeptical of this "dark horse" candidate. At one point, Chafets talks to Huckabee about foreign affairs and gets an interesting response. Chafets writes:
At lunch, when I asked him who influences his thinking on foreign affairs, he mentioned Thomas Friedman, the New York Times columnist, and Frank Gaffney, a neoconservative and the founder of a research group called the Center for Security Policy. This is like taking travel advice from Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf, but the governor seemed unaware of the incongruity.
The article is humorous at times, as both quotes illustrate, which allowed me to enjoyably read the entire 11 pages. It is obvious, however, that Huckabee will have to continue to work if he wants to be taken seriously. His rise to the top of the polls is not enough to counter his age and experience.
My Mac won't let me hyperlink but this should work:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/12/magazine/16huckabee.html?ex=1355461200&en=e8ee2a8545fa9f6f&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink
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