Mike Huckabee and the Republican YouTube Debate

After watching the Republican CNN/YouTube debate, I came away with the impression that Gov. Huckabee clearly won the debate, followed by John McCain with a close second.

I think Huckabee won by his intelligence, humor, wit, and his ability to connect with the audience. I think his victory was even widened by the poor performances of Romney and Thompson, and to some extent Giuliani.

Huckabee was immediately hit with the attack about giving children of illegal immigrants access to college scholarships. Huckabee's answer was clear -- we shouldn't punish children because of the parents' illegal behavior. Huckabee also made it clear that the kids had to perform with academic excellence, be drug free, and be outstanding students.

Mitt Romney seemed to come across as harsh and brazen in his attempt to pin Huckabee down. Calling them "illegal kids" seemed to rub me the wrong way. These kids are illegal only in the sense that their parents are screw-ups! So what.... we just leave the kids out to dry because their parents are law breakers? No -- Huckabee is right. We need these children to grow up to be productive tax payers, not tax takers!

Each candidate had an ad they submitted to the debate -- and oddly enough, Fred Thompson used his ad to simply attack Romney and Huckabee -- with nothing said of himself. Funny -- it just shows that his campaign is in desperate mode. Thompson seemed like through the whole debate he was unable to string together coherent thoughts. He definitely missed his cue cards tonight!

Huckabee also responded to a question about whether he believed the Bible -- every word in it. Of course, with Huckabee being a minister, he was able to answer the question in a far smoother manner than Giuliani or Romney. Huckabee said that he believes the Bible is God's message to us -- and said there are of course parts that are parables -- such as plucking out your eye. But on the whole, Huckabee said that yes he does believe the Bible is God's Word.

Romney answered the question by saying yes it is God's Word. But the unspoken thoughts were loud and clear I believe. Mitt Romney is a Mormon. So in addition to the Bible, he believes in the book of Mormonism, which is a document completely separate from the Bible, but claims to have the same authority as the Bible.

Regarding a question about space exploration, and whether or not the candidates would spend money on sending a man to mars, Huckabee said it's a wait-and-see type thing, but said if we do take the task on, a good first person to send there on a rocket is Hillary Clinton. I will second that. Hillary has views more in line with aliens anyway.

Overall, there was a lot of sparring between Romney and all the other candidates. Romney seemed to have a chip on his shoulder tonight. McCain seemed tough but just lacks the charisma, visible passion and charm. He's good, but he's not gonna win.

Huckabee definitely came out the best in this debate. His intelligence, speaking ability, and communication skills are that of a revolutionary candidate. He is inclusive, compassionate, and very gifted in many respects. Huckabee has the potential to carry his momentum on to a HUGE, historic victory for the nomination.

Huge, huge night for Mike Huckabee.

Huckabee's website is getting tons of traffic and donations. To join the donating, click here.

(p.s. Ron Paul was more irrelevant in this debate than ever before. He was just a punching bag for John McCain.)