Huckabee's Biblical Worldview

The atheist blogosphere really lit up over Romney's anti-atheist bigotry, but I think most of us would agree that Huckabee poses a far more serious threat. The AIDS story is getting attention in the mainstream media, but the blogosphere is already moving well beyond that to examine other evidence of Huckabee's theocratic striving. Before we leave the AIDS story behind, however, I want to highlight one point that has not been made often enough.

As a quick refresher, here is what Huckabee said in 1992:

If the federal government is truly serious about doing something with the AIDS virus, we need to take steps that would isolate the carriers of this plague.

It is difficult to understand the public policy towards AIDS. It is the first time in the history of civilization in which the carriers of a genuine plague have not been isolated from the general population, and in which this deadly disease for which there is no cure is being treated as a civil rights issue instead of the true health crisis it represents.

The outrage has focused on the suggestion that AIDS patients be isolated, although some have also highlighted the homophobic implications. These implications become even clearer when one considers that Huckabee also said the following in 1992:

I feel homosexuality is an aberrant, unnatural, and sinful lifestyle, and we now know it can pose a dangerous public health risk.

This is well placed outrage, and I'm not going to disagree that it is warranted (especially when he refuses to take any of it back). I just want to highlight something else that I do not think is receiving enough attention. Specifically, I want to focus is on Huckabee's repeated use of the word "plague." I do not see this as accidental but rather as evidence of the degree to which his thinking is dominated by a biblical worldview.

My initial reaction is that we have spent the last several years with a fundamentalist Christian in the White House and have witnessed the damage this has caused. Why we would even consider repeating this catastrophe is beyond me. But I also think that Huckabee, unlike Bush, is the real thing - the sort of dangerous theocrat that would bring us much closer to the very regimes we are now opposing in the Middle East. I think he means it when he claims to be influenced by his faith (video), and I am growing increasingly concerned by his popularity.

Tags: Huckabee, Christian extremist, Romney, bigotry, AIDS, theocracy, media, plague, homophobia, fundamentalist, politics, election 2008, 2008 election