Topic: Horowitz
In a Nov. 2 FrontPageMag column, Don Feder attacks Mike Huckabee for being too compassionate to be a conservative. Feder writes:
Eventually, all compassionate politicians get around to slobbering over violent felons. Huckabee is no exception. Wayne Dumond served seven years of a life plus-20-year sentence for the kidnapping/rape of a 17-year-old cheerleader. Dumond claims that while he was awaiting trial, men broke into his home and castrated him. Sadly, he survived.
Shortly after he became governor, Dumond's pardon application crossed Huckabee's desk.
While denying the pardon, Huckabee helped with the parole board by sending the rapist a personal letter disclosing, "My desire is that you be released from prison. I feel that parole is the best way for your reintroduction to society to take place." A 2002 article in the Arkansas Times reports Huckabee's staff worked behind the scenes to secure the rapist's release. Was Huckabee moved after looking into Dumond's eyes and seeing another of society's victims who was just following the American dream?
Ashley Stevens, who Dumond raped, told Huckabee, "If you ever let him out, he's going to do it again." Huckabee was unmoved, even when Stevens thrust her face inches from his and told him: "This is how close I was to Dumond's face for an hour. I'll never forget his face, and you'll never forget mine."
None of that dissuaded Mr. Compassion. Wouldn't you know it, the year after the parole board reintroduced Dumond into society, he moved to Missouri where he sexually assaulted and murdered a 39-year-old woman.
To this day, Huckabee is in a state of denial (unfortunately for him, not one of the early primary states) regarding his role in this tragedy, insisting, "My only official action was to deny his clemency."
Nowhere does Feder mention that the campaign to give Dumond clemency, which Huckabee ultimately supported (though he now denies it) was spearheaded by Feder's fellow conservatives. They wanted Dumond released as a way to attack Bill Clinton, who they claimed denied Dumond parole while Arkansas governor because Dumond's victim, Stevens, was a distant relative of Clinton. An entire wingnut book was written about the case; as we've noted, Newsmax defended Huckabee and attacked Clinton by using the case and attacked Stevens' testimony as unreliable. (This before Newsmax flip-flopped and used Dumond to attack Huckabee's "liberal policy of criminal pardons" earlier this year.)
So, rather than blaming Huckabee for Dumond's release and the subsequent murder he committed, Feder should instead be blaming his fellow conservatives who wanted Dumond released to make Clinton look bad.
