Huckabee gets Hortoned

In 1998, Democratic Presidential candidate Michael Dukakis was hit hard by his opponent George H.W. Bush for the weekend furlough program Dukakis supported as Governor of Massachusetts. One of the people furloughed in that program was a man named Willie Horton.

On June 6, 1986, Horton was released for a weekend furlough. He didn't return to prison. Instead, he showed up in Oxon Hill, Maryland on April 3, 1987. On that day, Horton twice raped a woman after assaulting and gagging her fiancé.

Bush first mentioned Horton's name in a speech in June 1988. After that, Conservatives attacked Michael Dukakis mercilessly and forever blamed him for the actions of Willie Horton.

Pat Buchanan even credited the Willie Horton ads in bringing Conservatives to George H.W. Bush.

...he [George H.W. Bush] had a lot of support from conservatives. He beat Dukakis by running -- remember those ads, the flag thing, Willie Horton and all that? He hit all these themes that hit these people when he won....

...Willie Horton was, in fact, a big Massachusetts liberal, turning murderers loose on weekend passes. He`s nuts. If it would have been Charlie Manson, they would have said the same thing.

Last Sunday, a man named Maurice Clemmons allegedly killed four police officers Sunday near Tacoma, Washington. Clemmons was serving a 108-year sentence for several felonies in Arkansas back in 2000. That was the year then-Governor Mike Huckabee commuted his sentence down to 47 years. That reduction allowed Clemmons to seek parole.

This isn't the first time Huckabees actions have gotten him in hot water.

When he ran in 2008, Huckabee received much attention for having publicly supported and privately urged the release of convicted rapist Wayne Dumond. Dumond won parole in 1999, three years after Huckabee became governor and discussed the case at a private meeting with the parole board. Dumond then moved to Missouri, was charged with rape and murder, and died in prison before trial.

This is something Huckabee did quite often.

Bill Clinton, who served as governor of the state between 1979 and 1992, issued a total of 426 pardons and commutations, the Arkansas Leader pointed out in the middle of Huckabee’s tenure in 2004.

Republican Frank White and Democrat Jim Guy Tucker issued 39 and 42, respectively. By the end of his 10-and-a-half years as governor, Huckabee had issued 1,033.

As of 2004, Huckabee had issued more pardons than the leaders of six neighboring states combined -- Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Missouri -- in the preceding eight years.

It's not just the numbers that are interesting. It is the motivations.

Max Brantley, editor of the liberal alternative weekly Arkansas Times believes there was some politics in play.

Politics and connections figured in some cases, Brantley said. He said Huckabee went easy on people whose relatives or supporters had helped him politically, or because his actions would be seen as a repudiation of Democrat Bill Clinton, his predecessor. That was the case with Dumond, whose victim was a distant Clinton relative and whose cause was taken up by Clinton haters.

As does Joe Carter, a former Director of Research and Director of Rapid Response for Huckabee's presidential campaign.

After reviewing hundreds of cases and interviewing numerous people involved in the process, I concluded to my own satisfaction that the governor’s actions and judgment were generally defensible. Yet there remained about a half-dozen situations in which even after reviewing all of the information I was unpersuaded that justice had been served. Although I was sympathetic with some of the justifications offered for making the decisions, I found them inadequate for a number of reasons.

For example, in a number of the cases—and almost always in the most controversial requests for commutation—there was sense that the petitioners were attempting to redress injustices committed by the “Clinton machine.” The disdain for Bill and Hillary Clinton and their associates that peaked among conservatives in the early 1990s remains palpable among Republicans in Arkansas. Many of the petitioners and supporters of the commutations and pardons were truly convinced that they were simply rectifying injustices committed by the former Democratic governor and his cronies. (This was especially true in the infamous Wayne DuMond case where the victim was a second cousin of Bill Clinton.)

If you believe that the Clintons possess near mystical powers to control an entire state, then you might find this way of thinking persuasive. I do not. Yet I’m convinced that had it not been for abject hatred of the Clintons many of these cases would never have been considered worthy of the governor’s attention.

Never let it be said that Republicans don't hate Clintons.

Huckabee has apologized....sort of.

Initially, not at all.

On his radio show, Huckabee noted that there must have been a serious of failures which allowed this man to be free. He notably omitted his own part.

“Should he be found to be responsible for this horrible tragedy, it will be a series of failures in the criminal justice system in both Arkansas and Washington state,”

Later, Huckabee went on Bill O'Reilly's program and came a little bit cleaner.

"If I could have known nine years ago this guy was capable of something of this magnitude, obviously I would never have granted a commutation," he told Fox News Channel host Bill O'Reilly on Monday night. "It's sickening."...

..."That was the commutation," Huckabee told O'Reilly. "I'm responsible for that. And it's not something I'm happy about at this particular moment."

O'Reilly made it clear to Huckabee that it was not his fault:

Well, it's not your fault, Governor. I mean, look, you've got 1,200 of these cases a year. You gotta look at them. I'm not saying it's your fault. I don't think anyone watching thinks it's your fault.

I don't expect Huckabee to have incredible foresight and somehow know who would or wouldn't continue a heinous crime spree after an early release.

I do, however, wonder this: if it was not Huckabee's fault that Clemmons allegedly went on to kill four police officers after an early release...where is the line to start apologizing to Michael Dukakis?

Or will there be no apologies and instead we continue with the idiotic belief that only Liberals are "soft on crime" whereas Conservatives merely "make mistakes"?

Time will tell whether or not the mainstream GOP goes after Huckabee and uses this against him as they used Horton against Dukakis. But the first signs are already beginning to show.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, who some have named as a potential presidential candidate in 2012, has come forward and compared his record to Huckabee's.

Pawlenty said that he would not have granted clemency to Maurice Clemmons, who was suspected of fatally shooting four police officers in Washington state on Sunday before being shot and killed by police in Seattle Tuesday morning.

Asked by conservative radio host Laura Ingraham if he would have granted clemency under the same circumstances, Pawlenty replied, "No. On those facts, no, Laura, I would not."

He continued, "In Minnesota, I don't think I've ever voted for clemency. We've given out pardons for things after everybody has served out their term, but again, usually for more minor offenses. But clemency, certainly not. Commutation of sentence, certainly not."

Huckabee has recently hinted that he isn't sure whether or not he desires another run at the presidency. Should he decide to run, he should be prepared for the GOP to unleash the attack dogs and treat him as they did Dukakis. Even with excuses from Bill O'Reilly on his behalf, Huckabee won't be able to stand up to that kind of attacks from within his own party.