While running for president a few years ago, a feat he may repeat for the 2012 campaign, Republican Mike Huckabee proposed a bold open-government idea: publish every federal government expenditure online within 24 hours.

 

Such a plan for transparency would lead one to assume that the former governor of Arkansas is sincere about sharing information with the general public.

 

Perhaps not.

 

As reported by Siddhartha Mahanta in Mother Jones, Huckabee made sure immediately following his departure from the governor’s office that his staff destroyed 12 years of records pertaining to his tenure. Phone logs, travel records, calendars, and emails were erased from administration computers—and Huckabee’s people had the hard drives of almost 100 computers “crushed,” leaving behind an enormous hole of knowledge about what transpired under his leadership. The state of Arkansas had to spend $335,000 to replace the destroyed hard drives and computers.

 

Speculation about what Huckabee was trying to hide is wide-ranging. During his tenure he faced numerous ethics complaints relating to use of state funds for personal expenses and failure to report gifts and outside income. Huckabee was also embarrassed when he agreed to an early release of convicted serial rapist Wayne Dumond, who, once back out in the world, raped and murdered at least one more woman.

 

Huckabee’s office did donate selected papers from his gubernatorial years to his alma mater, Ouachita Baptist University, but university officials say the records won’t be made accessible to the public until after the 2012 election.

-David Wallechinsky, Noel Brinkerhoff

 

Huckabee Hearts Secrecy (by Siddhartha Mahanta, Mother Jones)

The Tale of the Tapes (by David Koon, Arkansas Times)