Is it pay to play, of course it is, but what is the answer to stopping it? I'm beginning to fall into the group that thinks that publicly financed elections are the answer, because people who are willing to pay to get the chance to play are always going to find a way around current campaign laws. That's just the way it is.
For instance, in my field, we are only allowed to donate $1,000 to gubernatorial candidate and still do no bid state work, but although I have never looked into it, I'm sure there are ways around that similar to what these lawyers did to get work from the Attorney General's office.
If these campaigns were publicly financed, and a few states have already went to this, a lot of this type of corruption could be stopped. Simply electing honest people won't stop it because there is always going to be someone out there willing to take these funds and it's hard as hell to retain your office when you start out with your fundraising in the hole. Just ask Lee Fisher. From the Blade:
It was in the middle of Mr. Fisher's single term as attorney general that he decided it was "inappropriate and unwise" to solicit or accept campaign contributions from special counsel.
"The result was it became more difficult for me to raise money to defend my re-election in 1994. I believe that officeholders need to be focused not just on what is improper and illegal but to avoid the appearance of impropriety," he said in an interview last week.
I'm certainly not surprised that Petro and Montgomery engaged in pay to play, they are simply a product of the current republican culture of corruption that was built under Governor George Voinovich, speaking of which, how does he manage to keep his name out of this mess? I mean, think what you want about Bob Taft, but Voinovich built the machine.
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