Evan McMorris-Santoro August 1, 2011, 3:11 PM

Since she entered the presidential contest, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) has leaped up the polls and, wowed audiences, and dominated a nationally televised debate. She’s taken a strong stand on the central political issue of the day — the debt ceiling — drawn a frontrunner’s press attention.

Or, as Jon Huntsman puts it, she gets coverage because she’s pretty.

In a long story running in this week’s New York, Huntsman — who recently abandoned his lackluster Mr. Nice Guy campaign in favor of taking direct swipes at his opponents — suggested Bachmann, the only woman officially running for president, gets the attention she gets in part because she’s good-looking.

“She makes for good copy—and good photography,” Huntsman told New York’s John Heilemann. The quote came in the context of talk about Bachmann being “more an object of media fascination than a plausible nominee,” as Heilemann put it.

That may be true, but even Heilemann noted that Huntsman’s comments were “somewhat indelicate.” Especially when you consider that the uber-coiffed Huntsman gets plenty more national coverage than say Rick Santorum does, even though they poll about the same (read: near the bottom of the list.)

Whether or not Bachmann’s got what it takes to win the nomination is certainly in doubt — she has a very extreme record to contend with and making the leap from Representative to nominee is a hard one for any candidate. But there’s also no doubt many Republicans genuinely love her, and a lot of that comes from the fact that she won’t take the centrist positions a guy like Huntsman will.

The Bachmann campaign offered a “no comment” when asked about the quote by TPM.

Read the whole Heilemann piece here.

2012 Presidential Primaries, 2012 elections, Jon Huntsman, Michele Bachmann