Governor's profile and presidential buzz boosted after envoy nod

Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr.'s national profile and presidential buzz received additional boosts this week, only days after he accepted the nomination to be ambassador to China.

The New Republic has an extensive profile of Huntsman in an article titled "Huntsman, Interrupted," posted Wednesday on its Web site, tnr.com, that provides a very comprehensive primer on a man who, despite the buzz surrounding him in political circles, was generally not well-known nationally. The article does not contain anything that hasn't been reported extensively in the local media, although much of it is likely new to the magazine's core audience of moderate-to-liberal Democrats.

In fact, probably the most potentially interesting thing to Utah readers is actually an error. The writer, Zvike Krieger, says Huntsman wants to "repeal" Utah's gay-marriage amendment as part of his support for civil unions.

Huntsman has maintained that he still supports the gay-marriage ban that voters approved in 2004 but does not think the amendment to the Utah Constitution also prohibited civil unions, the governor's spokeswoman, Lisa Roskelley, said.

Otherwise, Krieger treads familiar ground, covering everything from the governor's love of taco carts to his efforts to reform Utah liquor laws. There is also plenty of national political perspective, focusing on his well-chronicled fights with the more conservative wing of the Republican Party.

Also delving into the national GOP struggles is a Rolling Stone article, published in the current issue (May 28) and titled "The GOP Jihad." It quotes Huntsman criticizing both the conservative Republicans and, perhaps ironically, the foreign-policy efforts by President Barack Obama. He is especially critical of the activity toward China.

"There are a lot of pieces to the foreign-policy puzzle that have been left out so far. Our most important relationship in the world is China. There's nothing going on there right now. And what about trade? I haven't heard a thing about our trade agenda — it's been a complete blackout," he says in the article.

The article's author, Tim Dickinson, posted two blog entries this week at rollingstone.com that expanded slightly on the article. In one, Dickinson said he talked to Huntsman "barely three weeks ago," as a way of indicating how quickly the nomination for the ambassadorship came about. In another, he compliments Huntsman, saying that there was only one prospective presidential candidate who made any sense, "and Obama has just co-opted him."

Additionally, he said the nomination makes sense "both on policy and political levels" because it removes a potential "charismatic" challenger for 2012 and puts in an ambassador to China who speaks Mandarin and will focus on the trade agenda.

E-MAIL: jloftin@desnews.com