Huckabust

Des Moines

Just when you think the Republican presidential race can't get weirder...Mike Huckabee holds a press conference here to announce that he'd just made a last minute decision not to air a negative TV ad slamming Romney.

And then he airs the ad (Video courtesy of Mark Halperin who was setting in the row behund me). For the press corps--a gazillion cameras, nearly a hundred reporters, certainly more than Huckabee has ever seen in one place in his life. No doubt, you'll be seeing a lot of this ad--just like you saw a lot of first Swiftboard ad in 2004, which aired only a few times, but was repeatedly constantly--for free-on Fox News. When asked about the transparent cynicism of this ploy, Huckabee said, "Well, you can be cynical about this...but if we hadn't shown the ad, you would have said we didn't make it."

I don't think so. Not with all those monster oppo "Enough is Enough" charts surrounding Huckabee with facts and figures about Romney's alleged depravities--on taxes, abortion, immigration, guns and judicial appointments. (Huckabee's partially-birthed ad slags Romney for, among other things, offering a $50 co-pay for abortions in Massachusetts.)

That sound you hear rumbling out of Des Moines appears to be a monumental implosion.