Jon Huntsman, seen here with Obama administration colleagues in 2009,
thinks his Republican competitors are "unelectable." (Photo: White House)
Jon Huntsman is positioning himself alongside
Karl Rove, warning against extremism in the Republican presidential primary. Huntsman let loose on ABC's
This Week,
saying "I think when you find yourself at an extreme end of the Republican Party, you make yourself unelectable."
In the general election: not wrong. In the primary election, in which he's currently a candidate: wrong.
He had specific issues with his opponents, as well:
Of Bachmann's pledge to drastically lower gas prices, Huntsman said she was pandering to tea party supporters.
"I just don’t know what world that comment would come from," he said. "You know, we live in the real world. It’s grounded in reality. And gas prices just aren’t going to rebound like that."
Asked about Perry's view that global warming is a "scientific theory that has not been proven," Huntsman said Perry was "on the wrong side of science and therefore in a losing position."
A losing position in the long run? Yes. A losing position in the immediate future, i.e. the Republican primary? Not so much. Similarly, Bachmann's pandering habit of living somewhere other than reality is not a bad approach to getting tea party votes.
Brian Knowlton at the New York Times posits that Huntsman may have learned a lesson from Tim Pawlenty's failure to take tough stands against other candidates. More likely, Huntsman is going after the support of Karl Rove and others in the GOP establishment who are becoming concerned that the tea party may actually take control of their party rather than accepting that their place is to be a front for said establishment.
But if Huntsman keeps this up, I may start believing that he's really in the race so that the Obama campaign can point to the extremism of the eventual nominee and say "see, even Republicans think this goes too far." Because this is clearly no way to win a Republican primary.