The Curious Case of Anti-Tax-Fairness Lobbyists.

Carla Axtman

It is an odd and curious duality: the lobbyist who doubles as an anti-tax-fairness advocate. On one hand there's the individual whose day job is to cruise the halls of the various legislative offices with a hand out, looking to score some government cash for the pet project, idea, notion, etc. for whom they represent. Then there's the night job: the metaphorical caped crusader who snags media face time in order to stoke up anti-government teabaggers and squelch government's ability to get the revenue the day-job-lobbyist says they must have.

One such Two-Faced character is Dick Armey, leader of Freedomworks:

Led by former Republican leader Dick Armey, the conservative group FreedomWorks has attacked the Washington establishment this year, challenging bailouts, health care legislation and other policies that violate the group's free-market ideology.

But for more than six years, FreedomWorks' own chairman flourished at the heart of that establishment, earning $750,000 a year to lobby for banks, green-energy producers and companies trying to shape the stimulus package that FreedomWorks opposed.

Armey recently left his lobbying day-job with DLA Piper, a lobbying firm that had Armey advocating for such anti-Freedomworks things like legislation to create a trust fund for people that suffered from asbestos poisoning. At the same time, Armey was cutting radio ads for Freedomworks asking folks to call senators to oppose it.

Oregon has an interestingly similar dynamic. Lobbyists Mark Nelson and Pat McCormick both have clients who lobby for public funds. The goofily and dubiously named Oregonians Against Job-Killing Taxes are being funded by a number of entities that go to the legislature asking for financial love, most noteably Associated Oregon Industries and Associated General Contractors, who as I understand it lobbied for the gas tax.

I'm curious if our legislators who did the right thing in voting for the corporate tax increase and the personal income tax increase are watching how ballsy these guys are. They're completely willing to show up at the legislator's office begging for help--but as soon as the session is over, rush to the arms of their other lover in a duplicitous Armey-style affair worthy of a bad beach novel.

When session begins anew next year, will they welcome back their cheating paramours like a battered spouse who doesn't leave the bad (and dangerous) relationship?

By Carla Axtman Nov. 11, 2009