When most of us were having a lazy Sunday morning after Thanksgiving, Mike Huckabee was seeing his presidential dream evaporate.

That's when a gunman walked into a cafe in Lakewood, Washington, and killed four police officers who were having a cup of coffee, laptops open.

The suspect, Maurice Clemmons, was granted clemency by Huckabee in 2000, when Huckabee was governor of Arkansas. If Clemmons turns out to be the killer — he's the only suspect so far — Republican primary voters in 2012 surely won't forget that Huckabee set in motion the parole from a 95-year sentence that put Clemmons back on the street. Huckabee's justification at the time: Clemmons was just 17 when he committed a series of violent crimes, including aggravated robbery and theft.

Huckabee's penchant for listening to appeals from prisoners who had found Jesus and repented became an issue briefly during his presidential bid, when questions arose about his role in approving the release of a convicted rapist, Wayne Dumond, who went on to rape again, and to murder that victim. Huckabee tried to shift blame to the parole board, but his fingerprints were all over the release.

As governor, Huckabee granted more than 1,000 clemencies during 10 years, more than double the number granted by his three predecessors over 17 years, and more than in six neighboring states combined. That's a lot of forgiveness.

As he did with Dumond, Huckabee is trying to spread responsibility for Clemmons' release. Sunday on his Web site, Huckabee wrote that if Clemmons shot those police officers, it would be "the result of a series of failures in the criminal justice system."

True, and his would be the biggest, the one that set off the rest, a failure no Republican presidential aspirant can endure. Being governor is one of the better preparations for running for president. Granting parole is one of the worst.

Story after story ran about Texas Gov. George W. Bush being the killingest chief executive in the country. Among Republicans, 80 percent of whom support the death penalty, leading the country in executions was a feather in Bush's cap. The only paroles you hear about are the ones that go bad, as presidential candidate Michael Dukakis found out with Willie Horton.

Bill Clinton wasn't going to make a similar mistake. In spite of an outcry about sending a functionally retarded man to the death chamber, Clinton flew home to affirm the execution of Ricky Ray Rector. His need to show he was tough on crime overcame any reservations about killing someone incapable of understanding what was happening. As Rector was led to the death chamber, he asked a guard to save his slice of pecan pie "for later."

Tough scrutiny never caught up with Huckabee in the 2008 primaries. His image as the folksy, Bible-quoting conservative with a heart held. This obscured the picture drawn by the Arkansas Democrat Gazette, of a pol with flexible positions and an expansive definition of official expenses.

In office, Huckabee set up a nonprofit entity so he could give paid "inspirational" speeches without having to disclose who paid him.

He used the operating account for the governor's mansion for personal expenses, charging the public for dry cleaning, a doghouse and meals. He paid himself (as a media consultant) and the babysitter (as a babysitter) out of campaign funds.

On the way out the door, in the tradition of the Clintons, the Huckabees tried to claim furniture from the governor's mansion as their own. When that didn't work, they set up a bridal registry for gifts for their new home.

Bad facts teach gross lessons: If you aspire to higher office, never let anyone go, execute those on death row and don't look back. It will be too bad if that's what Huckabee comes to stand for.

Margaret Carlson is a Bloomberg News columnist. The opinions expressed are her own.