Saturday, December 24, 2005

Culture of corruption in Kentucky

What is it with Kentucky? They seem to have cornered the market in crony corruption. You have a Republican governor who pardons his entire administration before the investigation into their corruption is completed. He alleges the investigation is paralyzing the government's work and that the investigation is -- stop me if you've heard this before -- a partisan witch hunt by a Democratic prosecutor.

Then you got your highpowered Republican Congressman from Kentucky who routinely trades multi-million dollar Homeland Security contracts for PAC money and promises from the vendors to relocate their manufacturing facilities to his district. He claims there's absolutely no connection between the hundreds of thousands he got in campaign donations and the subsequent awarding of the contracts. The WaPo chronicles the long string of miraculous con-incidences at the link. (That was a typo but I'm leaving it in - it seems to fit)

Did I mention he's a 13-term congressman and after 25 years has reached a high level of power, especially as the first chairman of the Appropriations homeland security subcommittee. Notice a pattern here? This is what happens when politicking becomes a career instead of a public service. Maybe it's time to start talking about term limits.
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