Politics be damned.

This morning, a friend and I left real early to visit the Farmer's Market at the River Market in downtown Little Rock. Its a great place, with fantastic food, fantastic sights, incredible smells. It was a good morning.

At about 10:45, we took off walking, crossed the bridge, and headed up the River Trail towards Burns Park on the north shore. We had walked about three miles, and it was beginning to get very hot, when we met a man walking towards us. He had been running off in the distance, but he'd stopped to walk in the shade of Riverview Park.

We got close and realized....it was Governor Mike Huckabee.

He stopped and talked to us for a minute. We laughed about the heat - he told us he was on an 8-mile training run, but that he intended to walk a couple of miles of it today. We talked just a minute, and then went our separate ways.

I don't like his politics. I don't like his governorship. I still don't think I could ever vote for him.

But, I can't help but like him, Mike Huckabee, the man. He is sincere, and he has conviction. He was by himself, running in the middle of a hot Arkansas day in late June. He looked good. And, he stopped to talk to two fellow citizens. Not voters - citizens. Nobodies, really.

Politics be damned - I like him, and I have a hell of a lot of respect for him.

Matthew