The possibility of prosecution continues to hang over Gen. David Petraeus, whom federal prosecutors appear prepared to indict on charges that he leaked classified information to his biographer, Paula Broadwell.

There is a strong stench of politics surrounding the whole Petraeus scandal. Sen. John McCain has suggested that the Obama administration has used the threat of prosecution to silence Petraeus. Others on the opposite side of the aisle argue that the charges should be dropped and that it is time to move on. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, for example, a Democrat who has clashed often with Petraeus both when he served this country in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as when she served on the Senate Intelligence Committee and he led the Central Intelligence Agency, has said that Petraeus has “suffered enough” and that he should not be prosecuted.

Papers have come down on both sides of the issue. Here is a defense by Jack Shafer, Politico’s senior media writer, and here is a Boston Globe editorial calling for no special treatment for the retired general.

While McCain may be right that irregularities in the investigation of Petraeus should be addressed, and while suspicion of politicization is warranted after the manner in which the Obama administration apparently used the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to go after critics, it is also true that military rank does not put its holder above the law. Quite the contrary; those with higher rank should be fully accountable for their actions, be they security violations, sexual violations, alcohol violations, or other infractions or crimes.

The charges against Petraeus—unlike the charges levied by political activists who demand prosecution of former President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, or my AEI colleague John Yoo—do not rest on the criminalization of the policy debate, but rather on specific alleged crimes. Many have been charged over the years with illicit possession of classified material and lost security clearance, jobs, or both, and some have even been sentenced to prison, though many ended up not serving time. When rank is factored in, perhaps the best corollary case would be that of former Clinton-era National Security Advisor Sandy Berger who stole documents from the National Archives presumably to protect his own image or the reputation of President Bill Clinton and walked away with a large fine.

Not all crimes are the same. There’s a difference between speeding and first degree murder. No one is accusing Petraeus of being Bradley Manning or Edward Snowden. Nor does Petraeus’s alleged betrayal of his commitment to protect classified material rise even to the level of Sandy Berger, but that’s an issue to debate during the penalty phase of any prosecution, not reason to drop prosecution in the first place. If Petraeus is found guilty, then perhaps the judge can assess his record, the egregiousness of any leak of classified material, and fine him one dollar.

Make no mistake. While I have had my policy disputes with Gen. David Petraeus—and have received faxed missives in response by one of his underlings and angry objections from another—Petraeus is a hero, who has served his country well. Nothing will detract from that and political and policy disputes matter not an iota. That said, while it’s long past time to have honest debates about over-classification as well as the criminalization of policy debate, neither of these nor prior service are reasons to sacrifice the notion that all Americans should be equal under the law.