Dan Roberts at Between the Links had a wonderful, original idea. He has set up his own political action committee called Dan PAC. The purpose of the PAC, according to its filings with the Secretary of State’s office, is “to filter funds from controversial or unpopular groups to other PACs and candidates for the purpose of hiding the actual source of a candidate’s campaign money from voters.”

And since the Alabama Legislature failed again this year to pass meaningful PAC-to-PAC finance reform, the purpose of Dan PAC is perfectly legal. Of course, Roberts’ idea isn’t all that original. PACmeisters like Johnny Crawford, Rudolph Davidson, Joe Fine and Bob Geddie have been using their PACs to shuffle campaign money for years.

On his blog, Roberts writes:

“In keeping with the purpose, if any special interests want to use Dan PAC to filter funds to candidates that don’t want to be publicly associated with them, the PAC will be happy to comply as long as (a) it’s legal, which isn’t too difficult, (b) it doesn’t directly conflict with my unofficial purpose of electing a senator who will vote for the ban, and (c) I get to use 15% of the contribution for my unofficial purpose of electing a senator who will vote for the PAC-to-PAC ban.”

Of course, I hate Roberts for coming up with the idea first. Still, I might have to make a contribution.

— Kyle Whitmire