Washington Post columnist David Broder says the Republicans should nominate John McCain as president and Mike Huckabee as vice president because both men are principled.

What kind of principles does it take for a man to embrace someone who launched personal attacks - all lies - against him in the 2000 presidential campaign? What kind of principles does it take to accept an illegal, immoral war based on lies and corruption and become George Bush's biggest cheerleader?

And don't even get us started on Huckabee. Maybe Broder needs to get off the campaign trail and do a bit of good, old-fashioned investigative reporting.

If this is the best Broder can come up with, he must have a pretty dim view of this country.

If the Republican Party really wanted to hold on to the White House in 2009, it's pretty clear what it would do. It would grit its teeth, swallow its doubts and nominate a ticket of John McCain for president and Mike Huckabee for vice president -- and president-in-waiting.

Those two are far from front-runners. They trail Mitt Romney in Iowa and New Hampshire and lag behind Rudy Giuliani in national surveys of Republican voters. But, in a series of debates, including last week's CNN-YouTube extravaganza, McCain and Huckabee have been notable for their clarity, character and, yes, simple humanity.

From everything I have heard on the campaign trail, it's obvious that they are the pair who have earned the widest respect among the eight Republican candidates themselves. McCain is the eldest and the most honored, not only for what he endured as a Vietnam prisoner of war but as a principled battler for what he considers essential on Iraq and other national security issues.