Giving Goes Both Ways for Huckabee

For Mike Huckabee, the season of giving lasts all year long, Politico reports. An analysis of records from Huckabee's tenure as Arkansas governor showed that he accepted more than 90 gifts  from 21 Arkansans he later appointed to state posts. And those people kept giving: they contributed more than $161,000 to the Huckabee campaign, Politico finds. A Huckabee attorney called the correlation "a coincidence."

Many of the appointments were to unpaid boards and commissions, but the gifts added up: in one year they amounted to more than $112,000—nearly double his $67,000 state salary, the analysis shows. While there's no concrete proof of quid pro quo, the Arkansas Ethics Commission twice accused Huckabee of breaking rules. The governor also received expensive clothes, furniture, free scuba-diving lessons for his wife, and the use of a pair of boats. (More Mike Huckabee stories.)