during the Great Republican Hunt a few months ago, politicians were assumed to be corrupt if they had even the remotest connection to companies under suspicion, including stock ownership, or friends who worked for the companies.

That's your characterization of "the liberal mind" seasoned with a liberal (if you'll forgive the adjective) dash of rightist paranoia. Nobody's actually said that. Yet again, the issue with companies like Halliburton and Enron is the connection between insiders--company officers and directors--and the Bush Administration, as well as what current Bush officials did when they were insiders at companies that were the subject of scandals during their tenure. That's a lot more substantial than mere guilt-by-association. Gosh, could you be trying to deflect the issue with straw man arguments?

--Robert