Herman Cain aide Mark Block isn't just the smoking star of a bizarre campaign ad;

his nonprofit organization may have illegally underwritten the early days of the Cain campaign.

Herman Cain aide Mark Block isn't just the smoking star of a bizarre campaign ad;

his nonprofit organization may have illegally underwritten the early days of the Cain campaign.

A more detailed checking account says the Cain campaign owed nearly $15,000 for an "Atlanta invoice," about $17,000 for chartered flight service and $5,000 for travel and meetings in Iowa, Las Vegas, Houston, Dallas and Louisiana. The document says the Cain campaign had been billed $3,700 for iPads purchased on Jan. 4. A series of small-ticket items for travel and expenses by Block are listed as "not billed to FOH but due from them."

Herman Cain's campaign may be raising $5 million per month now, but things weren't always so flush. Back in February and March, Prosperity USA, a nonprofit organization run by top Cain aides Smokin' Mark Block and Linda Hansen, provided start-up funding for Cain's campaign, thereports:

This would be totally illegal, of course, and, making things worse:

It is not known if Cain's election fund eventually paid back Prosperity USA, which now appears defunct. The candidate's federal election filings make no mention of the debt, and the figures in the documents don't match payments made by the candidate's campaign.

One question implied by the Journal Sentinel report is whether Prosperity USA was in fact founded as the precursor to a Cain campaign: Block founded the organization just last year and in the brief window of time between its founding and when Cain became a candidate, it was paying costs associated with his travel to give speeches to conservative groups and to meet with conservative funders like David Koch.

Though sexual harassment allegations against Cain will dominate today's news cycle, this story is going to be another gift that keeps on giving for Cain's opponents and a media that thrives on scandal.