Huckabee: Palin will have to answer for this move in 2012

Appearing on Fox News Sunday, Mike Huckabee and Karl Rove both questioned Sarah Palin's resignation.

Rove said it had left GOP insiders "a little perplexed" and wondered how this would protect her family, if that's what motivated her.

Mike Huckabee took a tougher tact than he had soon after Palin's announcement, arguing that politics in Arkansas is just as tough to take as politics in Alaska, and that Palin will have to answer for her move in 2012.

.... in a primary this is going to be an issue she'll have to face. Will she be able to withstand the pressure?

.... the experience I had in Arkansas politics is far more brutal than running for President.

Another key exchange between Wallace and Huckabee:

CHRIS WALLACE: Governor Huckabee, look, almost every politician is on the firing line. You may not have been to the degree as Governor of Arkansas that Sarah Palin was, once she achieved national prominence, but what about this argument "I'm doing this for my state because the attacks against me are getting in the way"?

MIKE HUCKABEE: Well, if that had been the case for me, I'd have quit about my first month, because I was a Republican governor in a state where 89% of my legislature were Democrats.

I had constant ethics complaints filed against me, even by newspaper editors. And a lot of it was because if they can't attack you on policy, they absolutely bombard you with personal attacks and keep you tied up in court.... Arkansas was a tough political environment, period -- even tougher for a Republican.

And one of the things you have to do is just decide "look, they're not gonna chase me out".... the danger that Sarah Palin faces, and let me be very quick to tell you -- in the way of full disclosure -- I am a Sarah Palin fan. I like her personally. I like her points of view. I think she's right on the issues. The challenge that she's going to have is that there will be people who say "Well, look if they chase you out of this, it won't get any easier for you at other levels of the stage."