Mike Huckabee just slammed McCain's decision to suspend his campaign and try to postpone the debate:
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee said Thursday that Sen. John McCain made a "huge mistake" by even discussing canceling the presidential debate with Sen. Barack Obama.
Huckabee said Thursday in Mobile that the people need to hear both candidates. He said that’s "far better than heading to Washington" to huddle with senators.
Huckabee said he still backs McCain’s candidacy, but said the Arizona senator should not have put his campaign on hold to deal with the financial crisis on Wall Street. He said a president must be prepared to "deal with the unexpected."
"You can’t just say, ‘World stop for a moment. I’m going to cancel everything,"‘ Huckabee said.
Ouch.
Imagine John Edwards or Hillary Clinton coming out and talking about Obama's huge mistake. Hasn't happened. For all the grief given to Hillary (by me, admittedly, at times), she's never made anything resembling this kind of statement.
This is division. This is discord.
Not only that, but Huckabee is using the Obama criticisms (which, not by coincidence, happen to be grounded in reality). John McCain can't even answer the phone at 4 PM, when he doesn't have anything else to do? How is he supposed to manage a crisis as Commander in Chief?
And, more disturbing for McCain, the state of Mississippi and its Republican politicians are in an uproar over this shenanigan.
Losing Huckabee? Losing Republicans in Mississippi?
It's getting ugly. And I haven't even brought up what McCain's gimmicks have done to the Dow today.
Update Just imagine, for a moment, that the shoe was on the other foot. Imagine Obama staging these theatrics. Imagine the Clintons condemning his actions. Imagine Obama tanking a bipartisan deal for a photo op and blowing up the Dow to save his poll ratings.
McCain forced the country to call his bluff. And he got caught with nothing.