Mike Huckabee: Five Books He Recommends.
Posted by David Shedlock at 3:04 am

“How many a man has dated a new era in his life from the reading of a book.”

(Henry David Thoreau, Walden)

The Browser asks people in the news to recommend five books on given topics. Three prominent Republicans have been interviewed for the site, including[1] Mitch Daniels on Libertarianism and Karl Rove on Compassionate Conservatism.

Because Mike Huckabee recently wrote a book called Simple Government, he was asked to recommend books on the topic of Simple Governance. Three the former pastor and governor selected were by Christian philosophers: C.S. Lewis, Francis Schaeffer, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

Schaeffer’s book Whatever Happened to the Human Race?[2] (and film of the same name) helped substantiate Governor Huckabee’s principled and unwavering opposition to abortion. I am convinced that Governor Huckabee would rather lose an election than to budge one inch on the murder of unborn children. You cannot compromise on life and expect that the other two foundational rights of our republic will be upheld, for once a government or its citizens can deny you the former right, the other two (liberty and the pursuit of happiness, i.e., property rights) become meaningless.

Huckabee said the book solidified his view that “the uniqueness of the United States and its Declaration of Independence was that all of us were created equal, the concept that one’s last name or personal wealth or occupation or ancestry did not make one person more valuable than another person.…That the child with Down’s syndrome had worth and value and we should not discount the worth of that child and say, well, this kid plays baseball really well, he’s worth more than the kid who can’t swing the bat.

The C. S Lewis book Huckabee chose (The Problem of Pain) helps us understand the balanced view Huckabee on the health care debate, and Social Security. Lewis said that Pain is not in itself evil, but a part of life. There is no perfection in this life, no life without pain. It is what we learn from our pain that is most important, including patience and compassion for the pain of others. Huckabee adds “The point being that you have to remember there is a human being behind every decision you make.”

Bonhoeffer (in The Cost of Discipleship) wrote about the call of sacrifice of self[3], comfort, and life, for the truth of God’s Word, and love of Christ. He famously wrote “when Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.” Pastor

Huckabee recalls the day he announced to his previously segregated Baptist church that a young black man was seeking to have fellowship with them and that if the young man was not made to feel welcome in the church, that Huckabee would himself would find another place to pastor.

These three books by Christian philosophers indicate Huckabee’s preference for theology which encourages more than private devotion, rather a daily life lived for Christ in the world.

The other two books recommended by Governor Huckabee were the best-selling self-help book How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie and a more recent book entitled How Democracies Perish by Jean-François Revel.

Carnegie’s book helped Huckabee to understand the importance of reaching out to help the governed rather than the governing while not showing preference to Wall Street over Main Street. The Revel book probably typifies Huckabee’s view of welfare[4], personal responsibility and the role of the federal government:

Revel’s “whole point was that democracies perish when people recognise (sic) their ability to get something at others’ expense, and when they continue to accelerate in that direction, there comes a point at which that society collapses.”

Thanks to David Shedlock for positive posts about the Governor.


I like Huck's taste in books!

Really like C.S. Lewis. I liked his book, The Screwtape Letters too.
Here is one of my favorite C.S. Lewis quotes:

C.S. Lewis:
"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience."

From which of his books is this quote?

I've read quite a lot of books by C.S.Lewis and also by Francis Schaeffer. Both are outstanding.

another good quote By C. S. Lewis:
It is easy to think the State has a lot of different objects -- military, political, economic, and what not. But in a way things are much simpler than that. The State exists simply to promote and to protect the ordinary happiness of human beings in this life. A husband and wife chatting over a fire, a couple of friends having a game of darts in a pub, a man reading a book in his own room or digging in his own garden -- that is what the State is there for. And unless they are helping to increase and prolong and protect such moments, all the laws, parliaments, armies, courts, police, economics, etc., are simply a waste of time.


another good quote By C. S. Lewis:
'Useful,' and 'necessity' was always 'the tyrant's plea'.

another good quote By C. S. Lewis:
For who can endure a doctrine which would allow only dentists to say whether our teeth were aching, only cobblers to say whether our shoes hurt us, and only governments to tell us whether we were being well governed?

These are great books that Gov. Huckabee chose. I have read the Francis Schaeffer book, as well as seen the videos by the same name. In fact, during my younger days, several of Schaeffer's books were very influential.