Sen. Williams, the Senate president, admits it is illegal for Republican legislators to take this cash directly from lobbyists. But he says it's OK if lobbyists or their clients launder it by dumping it into something called Republican Party of Kentucky Senate Trust. Why? Because that trust (wink, wink) is run by party officials, not by senators themselves.
If the Courier Journal is so offended by money in politics -- or perhaps they are just upset that none of it ever buys ads on their pages anymore? -- they should lobby to change the laws, rather than complain about people they hate following the existing ones.
The dead-tree media is going to have to find more creativity than this if they are to have any hope of survival in the brave, new online world. Perhaps we could investigate the real reason so many papers hate Attorney General nominee Stan Lee so much. If you don't know, it is because Lee has a strong idea to post legal notices on the internet which current law dictates must be printed in newspapers at taxpayer expense.
