Paying the Piper

Check out this morning's Buffalo News for a great editorial countering the idea that there are more important issues before the Legislature than campaign finance reform:

If he who pays the piper gets to call the tune, then the music in Albany is programmed primarily by those who give millions of dollars a year in campaign contributions to those who make our laws.

That's why all sorts of reforms - those opposed by big business, big labor, big medicine and big lawyers - never have a chance. And that is why Gov. Eliot L. Spitzer is correct when he says that the only chance for other reforms to take hold in New York State government is for the most important reform, campaign finance rules, to come first.