There is a piece in the Chicago Tribune today about Mike Huckabee's fiscal record:

Mike Huckabee was an early signer of the Republicans' no-tax-hikes pledge, and he's campaigning for the Republican presidential nomination by touting the 90 different taxes he cut as the governor of Arkansas.

He doesn't mention how, during his 10-and-a-half years as governor, he presided over $505 million worth of tax increases. Sales taxes were raised. So were gasoline taxes, and the per-capita tax burden on the state's residents grew by about 50 percent.

"He always talked against taxes, but he wanted all these spending programs," former Democratic state Rep. Boyd Hickinbotham said. "So he'd treat taxes like a rotten egg. He'd hold his nose, but he liked being able to spend the money."

FactCheck.org has also done some research on Huckabee's fiscal record. Their conclusion? Let's just say he isn't being honest:

The former Arkansas governor is fond of saying – in debates, on his Web site and in that Nov. 18 Fox News interview – that he cut taxes "almost 94 times in my state." (On his site, he rounds up to "nearly 100 times," adding that he saved "the people of Arkansas almost $380 million.")

That turns out to be far from the whole story. The Arkansas Department of Finance and Administration found that 90 tax cuts were enacted in legislative sessions from 1997 through 2005, while Huckabee was governor, and those cuts reduced tax revenues by $378 million. But Huckabee fails to mention the 21 tax increases that occurred under his watch and that raised revenues by substantially more. The total net tax increase under Huckabee's tenure was an estimated $505.1 million, says the Department of Finance and Administration's Whitney McLaughlin, adding that the figure has been adjusted for inflation.

Andrew Sullivan often uses a quote from Margaret Thatcher that the definition of a socialist is someone who is good at spending other people's money, though he is often referring to George W. Bush when saying it. I think that it's self-evident that given his record on taxes and spending that Mike Huckabee fits the same mold.

I just can't vote for any ticket with Tax Hike Mike.