Free Mike Huckabee!

My colleague John Nolte has observed that former Gov. Mike Huckabee was “obviously trying to make a point about how Democrats view women,” not attacking women, in his recent comments to the Republican National Committee. National Review’s Charles C. W. Cooke documents just how mendacious the media’s lies about the statement have been, noting that Huckabee said exactly the opposite of the remarks that were attributed to him.

And yet the consensus among conservative commentators, including Nolte, Cooke, and Charles Krauthammer, is that Huckabee ought not to have spoken at all. The media agree–and take the point further, with NBC’s David Gregory suggesting to Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) Sunday morning that Republicans should not talk at all about “women, women’s health, women’s bodies and the role of the federal government related to those things.”

In other words: Republicans are not allowed to talk about women–even to defend them. An issue like abortion, which is fundamentally about the life of a gestating child and cannot avoid a discussion of women, is off the table, as is any discussion of the absurd Obamacare mandates that require men to carry maternity coverage. Conservatives want to avoid the topic for strategic reasons, and the media want us to avoid it for political ones.

With all due respect to my conservative colleagues (quite a lot), and all due respect to Gregory and his ilk (very little), Republicans should speak frankly about women’s issues and should resist the media straitjacket. In fact, we need more truth-telling of that sort–especially from people who hold no elected office and therefore have no constraints about whom they need to represent or impress. Huckabee was right–and did the country a favor.

America needs more political incorrectness. It is the only antidote to the untruths we are forced to swallow every day from our government and its water-carriers in the media. The whole exercise of taking offense at every little thing said by anyone grappling with the truth is tiresome and impoverishing. A political party that tells women to vote with their “lady parts” or as if they are having sex for the first time deserves ridicule.

The same holds for a variety of other topics about which the left constantly demands “conversation” while declaring certain truths off limits. A free people deserves–requires–a frank discussion. That does not mean we should say stupid things–e.g. “legitimate rape”–but we should not apologize for “binders full of women,” for progress that Republicans achieve for women that is more real than the left’s contrived rhetorical outrage.