Huckabee Blasts McCain for Supporting $700B Bailout

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee took shots at former presidential primary rival John McCain on Thursday, blaming McCain's actions during the economic meltdown last fall for his general election loss to Barack Obama.

When McCain suspended his campaign last September and flew back to Washington to deal with the financial crisis, he "meekly" joined Obama and voted for the $700 billion Wall Street bailout, Huckabee said.

McCain should have offered a "true, authentic conservative choice rather than a big government echo with a weak 'me too' way of doing things," he said. "We missed our chance."

The FOX News host urged fiscal and social conservatives to come together for and be "competent conservatives" for the future of the party.

"Let's stir up things up, let's make some waves, let's change this country. Because if we don't, there may not be another generation left to get the job done," he said.

He also attributed November's humiliating defeat to Republicans abandoning their principals.

"The fortunes of social conservatives and fiscal conservatives are interwoven. Let's not have a divorce. Let's have a reconciliation," he said. "We didn't lose because of social conservatives. We lost because we wanted somehow to be the party that forgot what we stood for," he said.

Huckabee also did some MSNBC bashing, referring to the cable network as the "Oh God Channel" or the "MSBS channel" for the way Chris Matthews reacted to Bobby Jindal's speech Tuesday night.

FOX News' Bonney Kapp contributed to this report.