http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/05/AR2006010501903.htmlexcerpt:
On an Oct. 15, 2003, CNBC broadcast, journalist Alan Murray asked Ed Gillespie, then chairman of the Republican National Committee, about fundraising by "people like Jack Abramoff, who represents Indian tribes here," and another lobbyist whose name I'll leave out because he has not been implicated in any scandals. "Are you going to sit here and tell us that their contributions to your party have nothing to do with their lobbying efforts in Washington?"
"I know Jack Abramoff," Gillespie replied. He mentioned the other lobbyist and insisted: "They are Republicans; they were Republicans before they were lobbyists. . . . I think they want to see a Republican reelected in the White House in 2004 more than anything."
<snip>
This careful judge of what it means to be an "honorable public servant" had reason to prefer the Bush administration's taste in appointees. After the 2000 election, Abramoff was named to the Bush transition team for the Interior Department, which regulates the Indian casinos that paid Abramoff his inflated fees.
"What the Republicans need is 50 Jack Abramoffs," his friend Grover Norquist told National Journal in 1995. "Then this becomes a different town." Norquist got his different town. It's why the place so badly needs cleaning up.
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