A Utah state of mind.

I don't think a Republican can win the nomination, let alone the presidency, without Evangelical support so I was a bit clueless as to why Huntsman would stick his neck out like this. Polling at barely 2%, Huntsman clearly has little to lose but his comments seem to be endearing him more to left-leaning pundits than to his own base. In fact, I only saw this because it was retweeted by Roger Ebert who I doubt will be voting in the primaries next year.

I thought for a second that Huntsman might be angling for an Obama VP spot (similar to the rumors that Kerry was courting McCain in 2004). For a brief span, Huntsman encapsulated all of his tweets in quotation marks which made everything he wrote tinged with sarcasm -- like he was spouting off Republican talking points to appeal to his base but keeping his fingers crossed behind his back for the Moderates in the room.

But on further reflection I realized there is no way a potential lame-duck president without an obvious successor would give such a prized position to the opposing party.

Furthermore, before more liberals start swooning over Huntsman's "reasonable" positions, I think they should start investigating his fiscal ideas. While Huntsman seems to be surrendering a few fronts on the culture wars, his opinions on tax reform are quite conservative. I had no idea Utah had implemented a Flat Tax until I heard Huntsman speak on ABC this morning. A little investigating uncovered this little nugget on in a Salt Lake tribune op-ed:

According to this report, the state ran a near $400 million revenue\expenditure deficit in fiscal 2008, followed by two $1 billion deficits in fiscal 2009 and 2010.

So what is Huntsman's endgame here? Simply carving a losing niche? Surely these comments aren't going to endear him for a VP spot from the Republican frontrunners.

Any ideas from the Utah crowd?