UM, WE ALREADY KNOW HUCKABEE'S REMARKS WEREN'T "OFF THE CUFF," RICK

Rick Santorum is misinformed:

Rick Santorum ... said Thursday that he thinks former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee's (R) headline-grabbing remarks about women's libidos was poorly worded because Huckabee speaks "off the cuff."

CNN's "Crossfire" host Stephanie Cutter asked Santorum whether he agreed that Democrats tell women "they cannot control their libido or their reproductive system without the help of government," as Huckabee told an audience at the Republican National Committee's winter meeting....

"I think Gov. Huckabee would probably have phrased it differently," he [said]. "Mike speaks off the cuff, as some of us are known to do, and probably would have chose different words to communicate that."

Sorry, but no. As Dave Weigel pointed out yesterday, Huckabee was repeating a canned line he'd used before:

Reporters were a little rattled by the line, but Huckabee's used it before -- he used it on the latest episode of his Sunday show.

The ridiculous claim that a pro-life position is a "war on women" is an insult to the millions of women who make extraordinary sacrifices for their children.

For Democrats to reduce women to beggars for cheap government funded birth control is demeaning to the women that I know who are far more complicated than their libido and the management of their reproductive system.

So it's a crowd-pleaser, if only to a select audience.

I'm not sure why it matters. Huckabee wasn't ambushed in a hallway and asked for a spontaneous comment -- he was delivering a speech. And if the controversial bits had been an improvisation on written remarks, so what? Wasn't Huckabee formerly a preacher by trade? The guy's been a preacher, a politician, and a TV and radio host -- how many more careers involving public speaking does he have to pursue before it's fair to hold him accountable for his own words? Whatever happened to personal responsibility, Rick?