Will Jesus make a comeback in 2012?
Mike Huckabee brings the Good News to L.A.
Last Thursday, the day President Obama was also in L.A., scoring a 26 share on The Tonight Show, Mike Huckabee confidently strummed his electric bass at the Angelus Temple in Echo Park. A light show worthy of a central European rave erupted around him as 2,500 evangelical Christians hollered at the Lord.
“Sweet home Alabama, where the skies are so blue,” sang David Hanley, the frontman of the Temple’s 15-member Christian rock ensemble.
It’s not often a Republican presiden-tial primary runner-up sits in for a jam session. But Huckabee is no run-of-the-mill candidate. His self-deprecating humor and occasional frankness about conservatives make him a welcome guest on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, and therefore perhaps the churchgoing right-winger whom left-wingers love most. An accomplished musician, Huckabee and his band, Capitol Offense, have played jazz clubs in New Orleans and two inaugural balls; their name isn’t just a pun: the band actually supports the death penalty.
Huckabee has the hanging jowls of an old man with high political ambitions. His round body says “father figure,” and he bounces – gently – on his knees as he plays.
Since his primary loss to John McCain, though, Huckabee has been anything but gentle. His eponymous Fox weekend talk show has captured first-place ratings. That and his spotlit performances in Echo Park and in churches throughout the country suggest Huckabee never stopped running after last summer’s loss, that he’s still running, this time against the presumptive Democrat nominee for the 2012 election.
If he is, he’s counting on Jesus. Occupying a full row in front of Huckabee was the visiting contingent from Bacon Heights Baptist Church in Lubbock, Texas – travelling Huckabee groupies, perhaps. Pink-skinned and wearing pink-and-turquoise polo shirts, their hair oiled, bleached and permed, they clapped along to the music. They’d have fit right in at Hooters in Huntington Beach, but they looked out of place in Echo Park.
After “Sweet Home Alabama,” the house lights came up and the musicians left the stage to Huckabee. He set his bass aside and leaned into the microphone.
“Old lady asked me once” – and here he stepped forward, cocking his head to impersonate an old lady and assuming an exaggerated Arkansas accent – “‘Yew one of them narrow-minded Baptists that think only Baptists is getting into heaven?’ And I said, ‘No, ma’am. I’m narrower than that: I don’t think all the Baptists are gettin’ in.’”
The crowd guffawed.
“Let me tell you something,” Huckabee said, “heaven isn’t for good people. Heaven is for perfect people. When you get there – if you get there – you’re gonna be surprised by some of the people you see. And you’re gonna be surprised by some of the people you don’t see.”
He leaned forward.
“Some people you were sure were getting in won’t,” he said.
Huckabee honed his enviable oratory skills over many years as a young preacher in Arkansas. His sermonizing catapulted him to a 12-year run as governor of that state, from 1996 to 2007. His speech is folksier than that of his likely opponent, and he knows how to speak to people who believe in the literal truth of the Bible, up to and including the part where the Antichrist plunges the planet into economic and political turmoil and then Jesus returns for a thousand-year reign.
Huckabee spoke about faith. His talk was more remarkable for what it did not mention – the failing economy, wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, or the presence of his potential 2012 political rival across town. He concluded his brief sermon by asking the congregation to come to the Lord.
“Lord, I am a sinner,” he said, while a woman played softly on an electric keyboard behind him. “Lord, I can’t do it on my own.”
Huckabee left the stage and man calling himself Preacher Matt took his place.
“I was almost brought to tears to watch one of probably the top five political leaders in America stand up here and ask us to come to Jesus,” Preacher Matt said. “I know a lot of you came in here and expected to hear a lot of political stuff, but he just preached Jesus.”
Christians loitering outside later agreed with Preacher Matt. “He just preached straight Jesus, didn’t say any of that political stuff,” a woman named Nicole said approvingly. She had never heard of Huckabee before.
One congregant wasn’t yet ready to Like Mike in ’12. “I usually vote Republican,” said Lakewood resident Kevin Horton, an African-American Realtor dressed in his Thursday-evening finest. “But I went the other way this time. We’ll see.”
Published: 03/25/2009
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yup-just what we need in the US - an open faith in God, now more than ever!
Practical atheism has brought our country moral chaos, lack of respect for others, and loss of freedoms. Gov. Huckabee is real - if he were not, he would pretend the Christian message with one group and deny it with another group; he would try to portray two different images, one in front of believers and one for agnostics. But he brings a message of love for all people, and the hope our country desperately needs now...in Jesus Christ, God's Son.
The Founders of this country were not atheists or agnostics; they believed that freedom of religion (not from religion) is the basis for all other freedoms. They did not select a religion for everyone. However, the Constitution was based on Christian principles that endure. Remarkably, we have enjoyed unprecedented freedoms in America for over two centuries because of - not a theocracy - but leaders who made decisions grounded in Judeo-Christian principles. Law and order. Freedom with restraint.
Yup- just what we need in the US- a hidden theocracy running things even more than they do now.