Over the weekend, Jon Huntsman said this:

The minute that the Republican Party becomes the party - the anti-science party, we have a huge problem. We lose a whole lot of people who would otherwise allow us to win the election in 2012. When we take a position that isn't willing to embrace evolution, when we take a position that basically runs counter to what 98 of 100 climate scientists have said, what the National Academy of Science - Sciences has said about what is causing climate change and man's contribution to it, I think we find ourselves on the wrong side of science, and, therefore, in a losing position.

Huntsman also went ballistic on his fellow Republican presidential candidates, calling them "fringe" candidates who have "zero substance." Do I think this helps Huntsman in the upcoming primaries? No, I don't. But I tell you this: In my ideal world, Jon Huntsman would be the Republican candidate for president in 2012, and there would be substantive debate about the things that matter along the way, providing Americans with a real choice for president in November.

The vision that Huntsman has for America—one in which Americans are free to live their lives the way they want, in which everyone has a shot at prosperity, in which government is there to help us out when we run out of choices—should be the baseline, the American concept that every candidate believes in. The argument should come in how we reach that goal. Every other Republican candidate is abandoning their responsibility to the country by arguing that baseline concept; they want to give us an every-man-for-himself America—and in a reasonable world, they would be the fringe candidates. I'm not saying I'd vote for Huntsman, but I do think that Huntsman would make Obama a better, and more Democratic, candidate.