Mike Huckabee Defends ‘Merry Christmas’ Ad, Says Cross Imagery is Incidental
Dec. 18: The TV ad features former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee in a red sweater in front of what appears to be a white cross and Christmas tree. (Huckabee for President, Inc.)
In a new television ad debuting Tuesday in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee does the unthinkable - he wishes early voters “Merry Christmas.”
Wearing a red sweater and standing before a glowing Christmas tree as “Silent Night” plays in the background, the former Arkansas governor asks viewers if they’re “about worn out of all the television commercials you’ve been seeing, mostly about politics.”
Behind Huckabee appears to be a white cross, which may be intersecting shelf lines or a window pane and slowly moves to the right on the screen until it’s behind his head.
But the ordained Baptist minister, who has been riding a wave of evangelical support with his open religious appeals, said Tuesday that it’s just a bookshelf and defended the ad.
“If we are so politically correct in this country that a person can’t say ‘enough of the nonsense with the political attack ads could we pause for a few days and say Merry Christmas to each other,’ then we’re really, really in trouble as a country,” Huckabee said, speaking in Houston, Texas.
Click here to watch the ad titled, “What Really Matters”
In the ad, Huckabee says, “At this time of year, sometimes it’s nice to pull aside from all of that and remember that what really matters is the celebration of the birth of Christ.”
“I hope you and your family have a magnificent Christmas season. God bless you and Merry Christmas.”
Will Mike Huckabee’s new TV ad where he mentions Christ by name and displays imagery of the cross help him or hurt him?
Have no effect (16%)
Hurt him (8%)
Loading …Catholic League president Bill Donahue said Huckabee went beyond wishing people a joyous holiday. Donahue said he was especially disturbed by the cross-like image created in the background of the ad, saying he believed it was a subliminal message.
“What he’s trying to say to the evangelicals in western Iowa (is): I’m the real thing,” Donahue said Tuesday on Fox News Channel’s “Fox and Friends. “You know what, sell yourself on your issues, not on what your religion is.”
Huckabee said the bookshelf is “nothing more than a bookshelf” and shrugged off the controversy: “I will confess this: If you play the spot backwards it says, ‘Paul is dead. Paul is dead.”‘
He was joking about the Beatles’ recording of “The White Album” and the urban legend that if a portion of the album is played backwards, the words “Paul is dead” is heard, a reference to the very much alive Paul McCartney.
Meanwhile, rival Mitt Romney launched a new TV ad yesterday slamming Huckabee, the ex-Arkansas governor, for commuting the sentences of 1,033 criminals - including 12 convicted murderers. “Huckabee granted more clemencies than the previous three governors combined,” says the 30-second Romney attack ad.
“The difference between us is that I did something he never had to do. I carried out the death penalty 16 times, more than any other governor in my state’s history,” Huckabee told reporters in Los Angeles before attending a Beverly Hills fundraiser. “That’s hardly soft on crime when you make that tough decision and actually carry it out.”
Romney’s state of Massachusetts does not have capital punishment.
The Romney-Huckabee spat continued throughout the day Tuesday.
“Interestingly, Mr. Romney has commended President Bush for the pardon of Scooter Libby, yet he brags that he never gave one as governor,” Huckabee said in Houston.
Returning fire in Columbia, S.C., Romney reiterated that Huckabee is “liberal” on crime and immigration.
Asked about the Christmas ad, Romney said, “We recognize the diversity of faith and we unite over our commitment to religious liberty, and I hope Governor Huckabee, like all of us, is supportive to the diversity of faith and the liberty to worship God as they choose, and I trust that he and the other candidates will do just that.”
Not surprisingly, Huckabee sounded Monday as if he wanted to declare a holiday truce among the Republican presidential contenders.
“I think the country could use a little good will and peace on earth a little more than they can some tit for tat in the political arena,” Huckabee said.
FOX News’ Carl Cameron, Serafin Gomez and Shushannah Walshe, and The New York Post and Associated Press contributed to this report.
WOW!!!! At 13 seconds into the ad, do a screen cap. If you perform a mirror image on the cap, flip it upside-down, then take the top left corner and fold it over into the shape of a paper air-plane you’ll see a hidden message which is an upside-down, reversed image of the birth-mark on the forehead of none other than the former Soviet Union leader Mikhail Gorbachev which incidentally has been proven by scientists to be the literal, incarnate, physical manifestation of the numbers 666.
There’s something really creepy going on here!!!
This is why we should all be voting for Ron Paul and Mitt Romney. Yeah, never mind their record. Don’t listen to all of the conspiracy theorist claims on Paul and never mind the fact that Romney is actually a humanoid robotic manikin that is actually operated by the Ron Paul campaign.
Oh, wait…CRAP, Art Bell is back on the radio. I gotta go!!!
HUCKABEE FOR PRESIDENT 2008
I had been talking to so many people that this country has reached a point where everyone in our government needs to be booted out and to reinstall actual humans. These people are killing us as a nation and most Americans are sick to death of it. Most of us decided we were going to write in Jesus Christ as our choice to prove how sick of it we were and to make it known there was simply no one running who was worth voting for.
After reading this I have decided to further investigate Mr. Huckabee. Maybe there is hope after all. It is always darkest before the dawn ~ maybe Mr. Huckabee has a bit of the Light of God in him. So far, he’s the only one with an ant’s chance in hell of winning my vote!
“Show me one candidate who does not have something in the closet, anybody.
I don’t think you’ll find one. So what do we do? Pick the lessor of the evils.”
His name is Ron Paul…google him
This guy is a tool and a liar!
Look at the extra lighting on the shelf and the way they frame his face around it and make it fade behind him…it’s obviously staged!
man, what cynics. what you don’t realize is that this is who mike huckabee is, and that he’s just being sincere when he wishes everybody a “magnificent christmas”. it’s as simple as that. he’s trying to instill some warmth and friendliness into what is a cold and divisive political process. if any of the rest of the candidates had half a brain, they’d do the same thing. but they don’t and they don’t, because they’re not genuine. they’re all cynics like the rest of you guys and as such have to overthink everything and assign ulterior motives to everything. this commercial is exactly why mike huckabee would be better than the rest of them at president. because he’s genuine and he cares.
What a joke this huckster is! He wants peace and goodwill after he tried to sabotage the other candidates? Now that his numbers are up he doesn’t want anyone to question his record as we move into the final stretchh in Iowa? We cannot take another dishonest President like Bill Clinton was!
Are you guys for real?
1) It’s a bookshelf, there’s no doubt about that, if that’s an attempt at something subliminal, then it’s a terrible attempt. All of us can make any shape out of things in our home.
2) Why is it okay for Gov. Romney to give a ‘My religion shapes everything’ speech, and not for Gov. Huckabee ? I don’t believe this is the first time he has said how important his faith is to him, but then again so have Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, guess they’re trying to appeal to the right-wing religious voters too right?
3) THIS IS A FREE COUNTRY!!! If Gov. Huckabee believes that his faith will appeal to voters, then fine! If a Muslim candidate expressed the same and came on and wished every Muslim a happy Rahmadan, and someone criticized him, we’d have protest in the streets! This is a Judeo-Christian nation, always has been, even George Washington made religion a ‘centerpiece’ of his presidency(don’t believe me? Read his farewell speech). If you don’t like it, MOVE TO EUROPE!
Some people in this country need to take a chill pill….or more….
Huckabee is definitely a class act and has my vote. He is the most Presidential of any candidate on either side. It’s also nice to have someone for a change that has real morals and has lived them.
I as an Evangelical Christian have a way to test the candidate,
this is how, I let the Spirit of the Lord Gide me, and at the end I make my choice.
It is to early to choose the candidate. for the Repuplicans.
Wake up people!!! This is not just good-ol-nice-guy Huckabee trying to wish everybody a merry Christmas. This is obviously politically motivated and trying to appeal to the Evangelicals based on Religion. Take a look at these
Prior Iowa Ad: “Faith doesn’t just influence me, it really defines me”
Huckabee’s recent comments: “Don’t Mormons believe that Jesus and Satan are brothers?”
This ad: “what really matters is the celebration of the birth of Christ”
What he is saying are all great things. But realize that he’s not saying this to wish everybody a merry Christmas in the early voting state of Iowa. This is his effort to win Christian voters away from Romney. If you think it’s ok for Huckabee to run on his religion, fine. That’s ok. But realize what is going on. He is trying to use religion to his advantage against Romney.