Playing in the mud

All four major gubernatorial candidates want to overhaul Alabama's campaign finance laws, The Birmingham News reports today. All say they support strict limitations on lobbyists and money transfers among political action committees, with Republican contender Roy Moore adopting the hardest line by calling for total bans on contributions from lobbyists and PACs.

I've hammered Moore on a range of topics, but in fairness, he's the only one of the four who put his money where his mouth is on this issue by refusing all PAC donations. Gov. Bob Riley, for his part, tried to explain the disconnect between rhetoric and reality: "As long as that is the law, as long as that is the political situation in Alabama, we are going to go ahead and play it. But can we do a better job? Absolutely. Should we do a better job? Absolutely."