So after years of battling with Grover Norquist, anti-tax commissar and administrator of The Pledge (the Americans for Tax Reform’s vow to oppose tax increases–as defined by Grover–which is submitted for subscription to virtually every office-holder in America), Mike Huckabee’s one-upped him. He still won’t sign Norquist’s pledge, but he’s taken his campaign platform planks and turned them into a “Pledge to the People.” Grover’s signed off on the tax plank as the functional equivalent of his own, and says “We are cool.”
I guess this gives Huck the tactical flexibility now to repulse other “pledge” demands–Jeb Bush has done so preemptively and categorically without self-administering any pledges–but it does somewhat limit his opportunity to flip-flop. It’s one thing to “change your mind.” It’s another altogether to violate a “pledge” that begins: “I pledge allegiance to God, the Constitution, and the citizens of the United States.”
