This is all correct. The issue is that we've gotten in the mode of not prosecuting our political enemies once they're out of office. That's actually a very important political precedent that has largely served us well. The peaceful transfer of power from the Federalists to the Democratic-Republicans was a huge deal in 1800 and it guaranteed that subsequent transitions (mostly) followed the same model. The problem is, there were no tripwires: what was too far for a president to go? Ford pardoned Nixon, which may have been the right move at the time (I'm mixed), but it became mixed up with the peaceful transfer of power tradition and basically was interpreted as a free pass.

I think we may be about to see the the end of the tradition of get out of jail free cards for former presidents, but I don't know what the long term consequences will be.