Mike Huckabee Blames Connecticut School Massacre On “Removal Of God From Schools”

Former Arkansas Governor and Presidential candidate Mike Huckabee decided to turn the massacre for 20 children in to a rallying cry for the culture wars:

Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee (R) weighed in on the massacre at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn. on Friday, saying the crime was no surprise because we have “systematically removed God” from public schools.

“We ask why there is violence in our schools, but we have systematically removed God from our schools,” Huckabee said on Fox News. “Should we be so surprised that schools would become a place of carnage?”

This line of reasoning isn’t new for Huckabee.

Speaking about a mass shooting in Aurora, Colo. over the summer, the former GOP presidential candidate claimed that such violent episodes were a function of a nation suffering from the removal of religion from the public sphere.

“We don’t have a crime problem, a gun problem or even a violence problem. What we have is a sin problem,” Huckabee said on Fox News. “And since we’ve ordered God out of our schools, and communities, the military and public conversations, you know we really shouldn’t act so surprised … when all hell breaks loose.”

What an idiot.

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Doug Mataconis
About Doug Mataconis
Doug Mataconis held a B.A. in Political Science from Rutgers University and J.D. from George Mason University School of Law. He joined the staff of OTB in May 2010 and contributed a staggering 16,483 posts before his retirement in January 2020. He passed far too young in July 2021.

Comments

  1. Ben says:

    Hey Mike … fuck you.

  2. Eric the OTB Lurker says:

    “We don’t have a crime problem, a gun problem or even a violence problem. What we have is a sin problem,”

    Hmm… this sounds like a chicken or egg argument: Is it sin that makes you shoot 27 people, or is it shooting 27 people that makes it sin? Don’t they teach this stuff in preacher college?

    Oops, I forgot, per Fox News, it’s too soon to be talking about such weighty things so soon after an example of said weighty thing.

  3. Bleev K says:

    What a despicable human being.

  4. al-Ameda says:

    Every once in while Mike reveals his true self – this is one of those occasions.

    Folks, he’s not the airbrushed warm and fuzzy folksy guy he presents to us on a regular basis.

  5. michael reynolds says:

    It’s diversionary. He can’t have people blaming guns. So he blames the victims.

    The sickness at the heart of these people is nauseating when revealed.

  6. Bernieyeball says:

    Mike Huckabee March 2011:
    “I almost wish that there would be, like, a simultaneous telecast, and all Americans would be forced — forced at gunpoint no less — to listen to every David Barton message, and I think our country would be better for it. I wish it’d happen.”

  7. That Other Mike says:

    So until Tsar Nicholas comes along telling us about how he’d sell secularism short or some such crap, we’re basically all agreed that Mike Huckabee is a colossal douche?

  8. cd6 says:

    You cut off the second half of this POS’s quote where he claims God gets the credit for all the hugs and healing that happen afterwards.

    The world would be a better place without Huckabee and his ilk

  9. legion says:

    There was a thread a few weeks back where the subject of Jeff Goldstein of Protein Wisdom came up. I’m of the opinion that while he was once occasionally interesting to read, if only for decent snark, he’s lost his frigging mind of late. You think Huckabee’s a sh*tshow? This guy just wrote an article (sorry, not giving his sorry ass any more direct links) under the headline “Obama, silent about union violence in Michigan, immediately reacts to Connecticut school shooting”.

    There are a lot of people out there who need to have their balls kicked up into their chest cavities.

  10. JoshB says:

    Mike Huckabee is one shade away from Fred Phelps.

  11. Brummagem Joe says:

    What an idiot.

    And yet only recently this man was considered a serious contender for the Republican presidential nomination and remains a leader of the evangelical part of the alliance between plutocrats and preachers that constitutes today’s Republican party. It’s undoubtedly idiotic but no more so than the thousands of rationalisations and obfuscations from the gun lobby that are going to litter the internet for the next couple of weeks. Huckabee is just a bullhorn for a wider immorality that isn’t without its share of fellow travellers.

  12. Tsar Nicholas says:

    Don’t underestimate the cognitive dissonance of the evangelical right. At a core level guys like Huckabee really do wish for a sectarian government. Not only that but a Protestant government. Not only that but their specific version of Protestantism. Usually they’re able to keep a lid on it. Occasionally, however, it bubbles to the surface.

    In any case, what happened in Newtown has no larger meaning. It wasn’t “caused” by anything external to the killer’s own extraordinarily-severe mental illness.

    But unfortunately the demographics of the chattering classes are horrible and they simply won’t countenance not trying to score petty political points. The obsessive needs to push competing political agendas. The reactionary nature of the players. The combination of rabid sectarianism on one side with rabid secularism on the other side. The combination of lack of real educations and lack of real world experience. The lack of maturity that undercurrents it all. It all skews to the tail ends of the political bell curve. So there’s simply no way for the chattering classes to do anything here but to demagogue and to project their own issues and pet peeves. No way to have a rational discussion about it. Nature of the beast.

  13. Tillman says:

    Former Arkansas Governor and Presidential candidate Mike Huckabee decided to turn the massacre for 20 children in to a rallying cry for the culture wars.

    It’s a cultural issue. Gun culture is a thing, and its advocacy irrespective of other defects in the system (e.g. our shoddy mental healthcare institutions) has led to the crafting of laws that enable this sort of thing to happen. I’m not surprised it’s become a culture war issue.

    That said, I don’t know what the hell culture war Huckabee’s fighting.

  14. Argon says:

    *Sigh*
    Keep f**kng that chicken, Mike.

    No. It’s not about crappy services to manage the mentally ill. It’s not about ensuring that the right of firearm ownership comes with responsibility, like registration reviews (or making it easier to get a gun than to vote). It’s not about saying, ‘Hey, maybe some sorts of weapons should be scrutinized more heavily or be significantly monitored more heavily than others.

    No it’s because children don’t pray to Jesus enough in public schools. Or it’s because we don’t let enough people carry concealed weapons.

    Yeah, that must be it. If all you’ve got is a hammer, every problem looks like a f**ckin’ nail.

  15. Jay_Dubbs says:

    My first reaction upon hearing this yesterday:

    Exactly what caliber bullet does a Bible stop?

    (And I will wonder that in my church pew tomorrow morning too.)

  16. Brummagem Joe says:

    @Tillman:

    I’m not surprised it’s become a culture war issue.

    But who made it a culture war issue?…….God, guns, gays?

  17. rudderpedals says:

    Mike Huckabee represents the absolute worst that America has to offer. Will someone not rid us of this troublesome priest?

  18. labman57 says:

    The Huckster’s perception of God appears to be one of an ego-centric, malevolent, micro-managing sadist — somewhat akin to how many conservatives treat their wives.
    It’s rather disturbing that so many members of the Religious Right believe that the Christian view of God is a supreme entity that would gladly sit on the sidelines and watch innocent young children be murdered in order to make a political point.

    Curious. Some social conservatives claim that the tragedy could have been prevented if only religion was an integral component of the public school curriculum, while others insist that the mayhem would have been minimized if teachers were encouraged to keep loaded guns in their classrooms.

    It would seem as though Obama was right — right wingers do indeed cling to their Bibles and bullets, expecting God and guns to solve their problems.

  19. Argon says:

    I see that Brian Fischer of the ‘American Family Foundation’ also entered the fray with equally insane comments, suggesting the Christian god would’ve protected children (perhaps like a kevlar vest or perhaps by parting the parking lot and dropping would be mass murderers into a deep pit?).

    God protects the little children. Where was God when all this went down. Here’s the bottom line, God is not going to go where he is not wanted.

  20. Bernieyeball says:

    @Argon: This is no more outrageous than the belief that there are invisible Angels that protect children.
    Oh yeah? Where the hell were they yesterday?

  21. johnboy says:

    I think that we seem to have a quick kneejerk reaction to a statment like Huckabee’s, but maybe we should look a little deeper to understand what he is saying. The social fabirc of this nation is in tatters and turning to our Creator may be the only hope we have to right the ship and help ALL members of our society understand that problems are not solved by attacking the other guy – with guns, financial scams or stupid laws to restrict freedom in order to get everyone on the same level.

  22. deathcar2000 says:

    well there Johnboy, whose creator most the state force us to belive in. i guess maybe we can vote on which one and we’ll all send him ten percent of our income.

    All Hail Mighty Zenu Master of All Creation, Watcher of All That is Seen, Hear’r of All That is Wispered.

    yeah!

  23. Janet Cowling says:

    As a Christian I was in school when prayer was supposedly banned from school. It wasn’t, the only thing banned was reading a pre-written prayer that had no meaning to either the reader or the students. My own personal ability to pray at school or anywhere else never changed. As the Bible says I pray without ceasing. At my school a girl from the Methodist church read a prayer every morning while most students pretended to pray but studied instead. She read from a Methidost daily prayer booklet. Jesus said you are supposed to go into a room away from the crowd and pray privately and not in public like the hypocrits do. Fyi, the girl who read the devotional prayers killed herself wwith a gun a few years after graduation. So much for prayer in school.

  24. An Interested Party says:

    The social fabirc of this nation is in tatters and turning to our Creator may be the only hope we have to right the ship and help ALL members of our society understand that problems are not solved by attacking the other guy – with guns, financial scams or stupid laws to restrict freedom in order to get everyone on the same level.

    Treating others with respect rather than attacking them does not need the act of turning to any Creator to be successful…

  25. Jonathan says:

    Before you judge actually see and hear what he says before you judge. This post is actually unfactually. And the writer only heard what he wanted to hear. This is the name of the game folks misinformation.

  26. Ernieyeball says:

    @Jonathan: Go ahead Jonathan tell us all about the parts of this post that are unfactually. Please be specific.

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