The Star: "Shameful Maneuvers in Missouri House Would Wreck Ethics Reform"

From The Star's weekly "Capitol Watch": 

Unethical scheming on ethics reform

From Jefferson City comes word that leaders in the House are expected to pull a series of maneuvers that would essentially render an ethics reform bill meaningless.

Early in the session, a House committee passed a tough bill that would cap campaign contributions and ban political committees from transferring money to one another. But leaders apparently are preparing to strip those crucial provisions from the bill in such a way that they couldn’t even be discussed on the House floor.

That would be a cowardly disservice to the residents of Missouri. Enormous sums of money are received almost daily by candidates and party committees. The state’s permissive laws make it difficult to keep track of where donations wind up. A bill that doesn’t acknowledge those problems isn’t ethics reform but a whitewash.