Huckabee is nowhere near being either a paleoconservative or a neoconservative. Not every conservative falls into one of these categories, in fact I'd say the vast majority don't. Many don't even consider neocons to be true conservatives.
Well, its all pretty relative, you know. Some people even consider Lieberman or Dodd to be neocons....but the point is right-on. Huckabee's election alignment will probably be a lot like McCain's...though it is likely that MO and NC would be switched for MT and AZ...a Huck-Bama matchup might look like a late 19th century map in reverse..
Here's an interesting analogue -- two Presidential elections a century apart. An odd coincidence is that Taft and Obama won their elections by roughly the same percentage of the electoral vote (66.5% Taft, 67.5% Obama):
(Electoral votes are shown for 2008)
Electoral votes
1908 2008
White -- did not vote (territories and the District of Columbia) 0 13 R/ 12 D
Blue -- Republican both years (Taft, McCain) 55 R 45 R
Red -- Democratic both years (Bryan, Obama) 46 D * 60 D*
Beige -- Maryland (split votes in 1908) 2R / 6D 10 D
Green -- Republican 1908, Democratic 2008 258 R 278 D
Orange -- Republican 1908, Democratic 2008 110 D 117 R
(NE-03 should register orange, and would except for a bug in the program)
* Acknowledges that Maryland split votes in 1908 and Nebraska split votes in 2008.
The States have truly flip-flopped in their electoral behavior. The States that Taft and Obama both won in 1908 and 2008 would have been enough to win for either Taft or Obama. Maryland split its votes in 1908 and not along any geographic lines even though the state gave a slight plurality to Taft.
Much has changed in electoral behavior since 1908:
1. Women have the vote (effectively a wash)
2. Blacks have the vote in practice throughout America as well as in theory
3. The Hispanic presence is much larger
4. Four states admitted since 1908 and DC now vote
5. Blacks have made a huge migration to the North and West
6. Blacks used to vote heavily for the Party of Lincoln and now vote heavily for the Party of LBJ
7. "Ethnic" whites (Irish, South- and East-Europeans)are no longer second-class citizens who at least have the vote
8. Formal education has expanded greatly as a norm
9. Huge re-apportionments in the vote have occurred
10. News media have expanded in methods and have become more sophisticated and diverse
11. Property qualifications and poll taxes for voting have been dropped
12. People aged 18-21 now have the vote
13. Gay rights are much more real
14. Technology of voting has changed
What hasn't changed?
1. State boundaries haven't changed
2. We still have the same Constitution with about ten amendments since then, two of which reverse each other (Prohibition)
3. The States still really elect the President, and the popular vote matters less (2000)
4. Most states vote on a winner-take-all basis
5. The potential for vote fraud by administrators remains
Most states still elect the President on the winner-take-all system
.... I figure that Hawaii (Asians didn't vote) and DC (Blacks then voted heavily for the Party of Lincoln) would have voted Republican in 1908 and Democratic in 2008, Arizona would have voted Democratic in 1908 and Republican in 2008, New Mexico would have voted Democratic in both years, and and would make no guess about Alaska, but that would in no way have changed things.
The 18-21 vote was enough to make a difference in only two states in 2008: Indiana and North Carolina. In this scheme, Obama really needed Indiana had he not been able to win 'only' states that voted for Taft -- unless one makes an allowance for the odd distribution of electoral votes in Maryland in 1908.
