Over at National Review Online, former intern and current Weekly Standard reporter Matthrew Continetti talks about his new book, The K Street Gang: The Rise and Fall of the Republican Machine, released today from Doubleday. We don't agree with him on campaign finance reform solutions...but we sure do agree with him on the need for them.

Continetti writes and talks about the culture of corruption in Washington:

"Google is not a conventional company. We do not intend to become one," company founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin said when they announced the innovative IPO auction almost two years ago. Yet they are employing the same tactics that corporate behemoths use to influence legislation--hiring lobbyists and spreading around campaign cash.

Read David Donnelly's op-ed in CNET.com (also posted below) on how Google is playing politics as usual in our nation’s capitol.

Tom DeLay is defiant in the face of criticism and scandal, writes George Will in today's Washington Post. We knew that, but it's still interesting to read just how defiant he is.

"I'm very proud of [the K Street Project]," he told Will, of the plan he fashioned after the GOP takeover in the mid-1990s to bully Washington trade associations and lobbying firms to hire Republicans and get rid of Democrats.

First, there's Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA), who said on ABC News this morning:

"I think [DeLay] has to come forward and lay out what he did and why he did it and let the people then judge for themselves," said Santorum, chairman of the Senate Republican Conference.