The South Bend Tribune has an editorial chiding the Indiana General Assembly for failing to pass meaningful lobbyist disclosure rules and then complaining that anyone would think anything untoward was occurring. I’m not generally a fan of the “if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to worry about” line of reasoning; but, it makes more sense when it comes to public officials.
My brief (and probably naive) experience with the General Assembly led me to the impression that most of the influence of lobbyists came, not from quid pro quo transactions, but just from familiarity. Legislators have to be jack-of-all trades when it comes to the law, and when they need someone to educate them on the fly, the lobbyists is going to have expertise. And, while they can be expected to frame things in a light favorable to their client, the lobbyist who flat out lies to a legislator gets black listed pretty quickly.
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