What is that SMELL?

I didn't think I'd be blogging this early in the week but I can't sit by and watch the news about the registering of Greg Curtis and Mark Walker as lobbyists without having a say.

The news of Mr. Walker becoming a lobbyist for the Legislature was covered pretty well in the Deseret News and the report concerning Greg Curtis is found in the Tribune.

Legislation that sets up ethical guidelines has been started and stopped and started and stopped over the past decade. The bills don't fail because there is no merit. They fail because the legislators themselves look around at each other and decide that they are all so principled that they don't need the guidelines.

Partly because of the scandals brought to light in the past year, there are several ethics bills being introduce again this year and most include a plank that restricts legislators from being employed as lobbyists for a year from the time they leave office. Federal law prohibits officials elected to the US Congress from lobbying for two years after they leave office. Even President Obama has decreed that members of his administration will not be allowed to lobby anytime during his term of office. Their leverage coming out of office is just too great.

Thank you, Doug Wright at KSL Radio, for highlighting the problems of the former Speaker of the House lobbying for big tobacco, just as the governor is proposing to raise tax on cigarettes. Does Mr. Curtis owe them more than he has been able to provide while in office?

The thought of Mr. Walker lobbying members of the legislature is especially troubling. He bargained a plea of guilty with the understanding that he would cooperate with prosecutors in charges against others in the legislature. How comfortable would you be, as a legislator, knowing that he only needs to say your name to the prosecuting attorney, or a news reporter, to end your career? Now there is a lobbyist with power!

Did I say "end your career"? Wait a minute, we don't have "professional polititians", right? All our legislators are laymen. That means they have regular jobs that they interrupt for public service. Legislators who find they cannot make a living in the real world after leaving office, and opt for lobbying the very folks they have been horse trading with, show the addicting power of political perks at the public trough.

Ethics reform is way over due!