NO HUCK TO BE – AT 10:07 P.M. ET:  Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee announced tonight that he will not be a candidate for the GOP presidential nomination.

Huck is gone.  So is Haley Barbour.  The GOP field narrows.  The party is waiting on Governor Mitch Daniels of Indiana to decide whether Mitch will pitch.  But polls are showing that even Republicans aren't very excited about the group of candidates whom The Great Mentioner has mentioned.

As we've argued here before, it's time for the GOP to think in unconventional terms, skip a generation and go to young dynamos like Marco Rubio.  True, some of the GOP probables might make fine presidents.  But you've got to get the job first, and they'll be running against one of the most effective campaigners of our time.  Who needs to be a good president when you can talk?  From Fox:

Mike Huckabee said Saturday there would be no sequel to his surprisingly strong 2008 White House bid, in which he won the Iowa Republican caucus and finished second in the primaries to Sen. John McCain.

"All the factors say go, but my heart says no," Huckabee, who was considered the GOP frontrunner in several national polls, said on his Fox News Channel show.

The show is normally prerecorded before it airs at 8pm, but Huckabee saved the last 10 minutes of tonight’s broadcast to make his announcement live.

"The past few months have been times of deep personal reflection," Huckabee said. "Even though I wasn't actively establishing a campaign organization or seeking financial support to run again, polls have consistently put me at or near the top to be the Republican nominee."

"But I know that under the best of circumstances, being President is a job that takes one to the limit of his or her human capacity," he continued. "I can't know or predict the future, but I know for now my answer is clear and firm: I will not seek the Republican nomination for President this year."

COMMENT:   I wonder whether there might be a revolt within the party, with a possible attempt to coalesce behind "someone else."  Who would that someone else be, besides Rubio or perhaps Paul Ryan?  I have no idea.  Some have mentioned Jeb Bush, who established a fine record as governor of Florida.  But I just can't see another Bush.  Amerida does not like dynasties.   Recall President Ted Kennedy or President Franklin D. Roosevelt Jr.

There has been mention of David Petraeus, but he will be newly installed as Obama's CIA director.   For him to run against his commander-in-chief would require some major policy split, and I don't see that happening. 

Republicans have a splendid chance next year, but a candidate with a pulse would help.

May 14, 2011