The Iowa caucuses are next week, and Peggy Noonan has a word for Iowans to consider before they select their candidates. Noonan thinks there are “reasonable” and “unreasonable” candidates on both the Democrat and Republican sides. She defines a “reasonable” candidate as follows: “a candidate who does not appear to be obviously insane. We’d like knowledge, judgment, a prudent understanding of the world and of the ways and histories of the men and women in it.”

George Will’s recent column about Mike Huckabee gives us some pertinent information as we size-up the race for the Republican nomination for president. Here’s a piece of George Will‘s broadside against Huckabee: “Huckabee’s campaign actually is . . . a comprehensive apostasy against core Republican beliefs.”

Jeffrey Bell writes in The Weekly Standard that social conservatism is far from being dead. In fact, he argues, it remains a potent force in American politics. He writes: “Social conservatism continues to exist as a mass movement that cares very much about its core beliefs. Supporters of this movement may have some unusually tough decisions to make in the 2008 presidential cycle, but anyone analyzing American politics under the premise that social conservatism will soon disappear–or that these days it amounts to little more than an eccentric sideshow–is very likely to be proved wrong

I might have titled this post “The Most Viable Candidate for President, Part 2” because it continues the theme of my earlier post about Mitt Romney. Pro-lifers must take very seriously the question of a candidate’s viability in a general election. It’s not enough to win the popularity contest among primary voters. The best candidate will be able to win the general election.

The editors of The National Review have decided to endorse Mitt Romney as their choice for the next president of the United States. They raise a number of issues in their editorial that I think all serious voters need to consider. But their stated criteria for endorsing a candidate is very clear: “Our guiding principle has always been to select the most conservative viable candidate.”

If you are a poll-watcher, then you know that Mike Huckabee has been steadily gaining on Mitt Romney in the polls in Iowa. In fact, one poll this week had him with a 3 point lead over Romney (though two other polls showed Romney leading Huckabee by 1 point). Well, something gigantic has just happened. The new Newsweek poll has Huckabee leading Romney by 22 points! The jump is so dramatic that one wonders if the poll is a fluke. That kind of margin just seems so unlikely, but there it is. Whether the big jump in poll numbers has something to do with Romney’s speech on religious liberty remains…

On Wednesday night, CNN hosted a “YouTube” debate for the Republican candidates for President. Questions came to the candidates from “ordinary” citizens who videoed themselves asking questions about the important issues of our time. Anderson Cooper hosted the event for CNN, and it came off without a hitch . . . until the post debate discussion.