Is "Old-School Conservatism" a Dying Breed?

I'm a conservative. Or so I thought.

I listened to Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and the likes.

Didn't really care much about any of the candidates running for president. I guess I figured it didn't matter since whoever had the most fame and wealth would get chosen on the Republican side by the Washington elites anyway, so my opinion didn't really matter. I would vote for the Republicrat who was chosen because I didn't want to vote for the Democrat chosen by the other side.

But then along came Mike Huckabee. Something about him struck a chord with me. Yes he's a Christian, but that wasn't really it. Yes, he's a good communicator, but there was still more to it than that. Yes, he is pro-life, pro-family, but supposedly all the others are too.

Lately I've been realizing what it is about Huckabee that I like--and I feel the same thing is what is drawing people towards Senator Obama as well--he's unique, not from Washington and he's not clouded by the rhetoric that is in a constant battle there.

So there it is... a streak of libertarianism is running through my blood. When Rush Limbaugh started attacking Huckabee, I forsook Limbaugh. There was something about Huckabee and the momentum that built around his campaign that caused me to forget some of my former hard-line conservative stances and look beyond some things that I previously disagreed with Huckabee (such as ever raising taxes even if the people approve of it).

I want to believe these conservatives; I want to think that Rush is right and that lowering taxes and decreasing the involvement of government is always a good thing. But Huckabee's support of policies like the FairTax, and a constitutional amendment protecting marriage are really attractive to me. Doesn't eliminating a huge overbearing part of government called the IRS line up directly with the conservative principles of the government not being so deeply involved in my life by taking out their portion of my paycheck before I even see it? I also feel that Huckabee could actually get things done. The more Mitt Romney talks, the less I like him. The opposite is true with Huckabee. The more he talks the more my like and respect for him grow.

Huckabee may not be a Rush Limbaugh conservative or a Reagan conservative in the strictest sense of their definitions. But Huckabee understands the most important aspects of conservatism (freedom of religion, the original intent of the Founding Fathers, etc). He wants to turn health care back over to the individual and return the power of what taxes people pay back to the taxpayer. He makes an awful lot of sense if you ask me.

Huckabee is a conservative. A common sense conservative that realizes that ideologies only work in a perfect world and they're just guidelines for operating Government.

Huck gets it.