Does this help or hurt Huckabee? I thought splitting the moderate vote might help him.

Yeah, my thoughts as well. But maybe everyone OUT makes those who are IN a little more interesting.

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He is no fool, who gives what he cannot keep, to gain what he cannot lose. -Jim Elliot

It helps. The rift between the Romney supporters and the Huckabee supporters was huge in 2008. It closed some in 2012 but the "old wounds" were still there. Many core Romney supporters hold Huckabee responsible for Mitt's loss in 2008 (which is largely true) and think Huck fought dirty (which has a certain "kettle" v. "pot" name calling problem). Nonetheless there was even a residual blaming of evangelicals for not getting behind Romney in 2012 in a timely enough fashion for him to wrap the nomination quickly and save his resources for the general election fight. Somehow, since Huckabee had a greater appeal to evangelicals in 2008, then the reluctance of evangelicals to rally to Romney early in 2012 (they did turn out and vote in the general) was part and parcel to the ill-will sown by Mike in 2008.

What all this history meant to 2016 was an almost certain collision between Huck and Romney supporters and a rupture of ALL the old woulds to the benefit of neither side nor the GOP.

While core Romney supporters will still be unlikely to be "early adopters" to a Huckaee run, they may not feel compelled to bring him down nor to refuse to rally to him should he prevail in the primaries.

The one "fly in the ointment" is whether Romney wants to play the role of elder statesman kingmaker. If so, there is no indication he would smile on Huckabee. Should Romney become a surrogate of a Walker, or Christie, or Rubio, the conflict among core supporters could happen anyway.

I'm glad for Romney, Huckabee, and the GOP that Romney bowed out. The stats related to winning the second time after losing the first are terrible.

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"As for us, our days of combat are over. Our swords are rust. Our guns will thunder no more. The vultures that once wheeled over our heads must be buried with their prey. Whatever of glory must be won in the council or the closet, never again in the field. I do not repine. We have shared the incommunicable experience of war; we have felt, we still feel, the passion of life to its top."

Oliver Wendell Holmes

While I agree that not having Romney in the race will avoid opening old wounds, part of me will miss the opportunity of savoring a Huckabee victory over Romney, the former nominee, in Iowa again, just to take him down a peg or two.

I understand the instinct. But losing a full White House run by 5 million votes takes you down more than a peg or two. There are very, very, few success stories about the men who have lost a full Presidential campaign. It's a pretty humiliating experience that tends to haunt men the rest of their lives. I wish Mitt well (especially if he stands aloof of the coming primary race - as he should and McCain largely did in 2012).

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"As for us, our days of combat are over. Our swords are rust. Our guns will thunder no more. The vultures that once wheeled over our heads must be buried with their prey. Whatever of glory must be won in the council or the closet, never again in the field. I do not repine. We have shared the incommunicable experience of war; we have felt, we still feel, the passion of life to its top."

Oliver Wendell Holmes

I appreciate your measured response on this. I do think Mitt is a decent man. But surely, Romney couldn't have been TOO humbled if he was seriously considering making another run. And if he's haunted, well at least he has his large, beautiful family and millions of dollars to comfort him. I hope you're right about him choosing to keep his distance from the '16 race.

I'm glad that Mitt is out. I didn't think that he would run in 2016. He's a good decent man, and I voted for him in 2012 in the general election, not the primary. I wanted him to beat Obama, but he lost in 2012 for the very reason that I opposed him in the primaries. He comes across as a plastic candidate that doesn't relate to normal people. Plus, being a Mormon, millions of Christians would rather not vote than vote for him.

A lot of people place an emotional attachment to their vote. Not me. I look at it as a logical choice between the candidates and who would do a better job, but most people are more emotional than me, and that fact has to be considered when picking a nominee.

Also, I run in evangelical Christian circles. I know them well and am one of them. Lots of people have major issues voting for a Mormon. I went round and round arguing with Romney supporters in 2008 about this, then again in 2012. They just would never get it. They insisted that Mormonism was a denomination of Christianity, when it clearly is not. It clearly disagrees with Christianity on core fundamental issues like the identity of Jesus, the Trinity, how one is saved, etc. They would never understand this and believed that Mormonism and Christianity were one and the same. There was such a disconnect on this. I honestly don't know 1 Christian who believes that Mormons are Christians. Mormonism not being Christian is mainstream and normal among orthodox/standard Christians. I couldn't believe that they didn't understand this.

Anyways, with Romney out, we don't have to worry about this. A lot of the hostility between Romney and Huckabee was religious and driven by that Christian/Mormon divide.

Mormon are not Christians; that is an easy point to accept. However, most Mormons have an ethical belief standard that is just as strong as many if not most Christians. Romney might not have been the vocal leader that a Huckabee is on the issues of life and marriage, but he would have been a much better moderate option than Christie and Bush imho. I think I would have rather had him in to help split that vote 3 ways with Walker/Kasich/etc as nwby governors running in another category, cruz/Lee/etc pulling from the tea party, paul in his own world, and Huckabee leading the social right by a mile. I know those aren't clear-cut lines, but the point is that Huckabee doesn't gain any of the Romney supporters.

Over at race 4 2016 there was a recent poll done. It was to rank the top 20 GOP contenders in order of preference. Huckabee finished a distant 11 (this is a moderate, huge Romney supporting site), BUT he finished 4th in total 1st place votes. He stands for something and when you do that you are often polarizing. He isn't anyones 2nd choice. He is the 1st choice of a lot of people and close to the last choice of many as well. It is likely going to be the hurdle he needs to get over the quickest: show people who support candidate X, Y, and Z, why they should choose Huckabee when their candidate falters or doesn't run at all.

My thinking is that those supporters of Cruz and Perry would be the two biggest camps we might gain from their defeat, but I am sure both of them are running so it may be too little too late; we shall see. But Perry is a multi-term southern governor, like Huckabee, and Cruz is a strong socon, like Huckabee.