Today's Huckabee alert: Son is a dog strangling airline terrorist

The latest edition of Newsweek reports that Mike Huckabee's son could be, uh, shall we say, a negative. In the article "A Son’s Past Deeds Come Back To Bite Huckabee," Newsweek reports on

allegations that one of his sons was involved in the hanging of a stray dog at a Boy Scout camp in 1998. The incident led to the dismissal of David Huckabee, then 17, from his job as a counselor at Camp Pioneer in Hatfield, Ark.

But wait -- there's more! Apparently the Huckster leaned on authorities who were investigating the charges, successfully getting them to drop the investigation despite several witness accounts.

It also prompted the local prosecuting attorney— bombarded with complaints generated by a national animal-rights group—to write a letter to the Arkansas state police seeking help investigating whether David and another teenager had violated state animal-cruelty laws. The state police never granted the request, and no charges were ever filed. But John Bailey, then the director of Arkansas's state police, tells NEWSWEEK that Governor Huckabee's chief of staff and personal lawyer both leaned on him to write a letter officially denying the local prosecutor's request. Bailey, a career officer who had been appointed chief by Huckabee's Democratic predecessor, said he viewed the lawyer's intervention as improper and terminated the conversation. Seven months later, he was called into Huckabee's office and fired. "I've lost confidence in your ability to do your job," Bailey says Huckabee told him. One reason Huckabee cited was "I couldn't get you to help me with my son when I had that problem," according to Bailey.

Huckabee Junior's most recent troubles were in April of this year, when he attempted to take a 40-caliber Glock pistol in his black carry-on bag, along with 8 live rounds in the gun and a nine-round clip in the bag onto a plane. Mike Huckabee himself explained that his son:

grabbed the bag on the way to the airport and didn't realize the gun was inside

And come on now, who hasn't done that?