I have lots of Republican friends, although many of them are not so prpud lately of their party affiliation. Its hard to talk to a die hard Republican about anything critical of the president or current governor. Any criticism, not matter how minor = engenders the same knee-jerk response  “but Bill Clinton did this, Clinton did that, what about Clinton?”  You know, just because someone in my party made an error, doesn’t mean that error should be reported. The sins of the past do not erase the sins of today. And besides, usually the conversation is more like, Me: Bush should have discouraged torture.  Republican Friend: Well, Clinton should have prevented 9/11.  These conversations bore me, so I avoid them.

But, sometimes it is useful to see how a leader’s predecessors handled a situation As the wingnuts are already screaming, it is well known that Clinton took about $190.000, in gifts when he left the White House.  I pulled some old articles about it, which I’ve put in the extended entry. The thurst is this – no rules were broken – no law was violated. Arkansas has its own versoin of ethics laws ( a version that seems to let Huckabee accept thousands and thousands worth of gitf with no reprocussions)  We need to judge our local politicians by local law – and not compare to our former presidents actions years ago.

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