Now in a sane world, this would be front page news in every paper, even if the gravy train ended at the door to Baucus' office. Unfortunately, it doesn't end there at all. Baucus has managed to, in the parlance of our times, spread the wealth around quite a bit.

Baucus has mastered the art of getting special interests to donate to his Glacier leadership political action committee, which he has used to help out colleagues. Of the $1.4 million collected in the 2007-08 cycle, Glacier PAC handed out $196,000 to federal candidates, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

But why stop there? Obviously feeling no pressure from the press or from constituents as the dollars roll in, Baucus has taken things to levels approaching parody, hosting a summer camp for lobbyists. At "Camp Baucus," he collects checks from his lobbyist friends, in return for access to...uh...you know, some really great fly fishing.

Lobbyists and political supporters will get their chance to cast fishing lines and drive golf balls with the Senate's top tax writer at his Fly-Fishing & Golfing in Big Sky event. The cost is $2,500 per person, $5,000 for a political action committee. And for the same price, more fun lies ahead at Camp Baucus, the summer camp he holds for friends and their families in his home state between July 31 and Aug. 2.

Sounds like a blast! Nevermind the fact that the decisions Baucus makes as head of the Finance Committee will affect millions of Americans on matters of life and death. Baucus' explanations for all of this are pure comedy (emphasis mine):

Baucus brushed aside the criticism. "There's no problem. I've been doing these events for more than 10 years," he said. Baucus said he did not know how many contributors would be attending.

And on the donations in general:

Baucus, who chairs the Senate Finance Committee, which is drafting a major health care reform bill this month, insists that this cascade of money is not unduly influencing his work.

Of course, it might be unfair to single out Baucus. Earlier I wrote a diary on the extent to which Tom Daschle, former Senate majority leader and the Dem "point man" on health care reform, has traveled the country giving speeches and collecting millions from the industry. And of course, Daschle's partner in bipartisanship? Former Viagra spokesman Bob Dole.

A recent AP article examined recently released records in which Senators disclosed their financial interests and those of their spouses, and found numerous ties to the health care industry among both Dems and Repubs.

Members of both parties have industry connections, including Democrats Jay Rockefeller and Tom Harkin, in addition to Dodd, and Republicans Tom Coburn, Judd Gregg, John Kyl and Orrin Hatch, financial reports showed Friday.

It's nice to see Senators still making use of the time-tested practice of using your wife as a proxy for pay offs, as Chris Dodd has seemingly done:

Jackie Clegg Dodd, wife of the Connecticut Democrat, is on the boards of Javelin Pharmaceuticals Inc., Cardiome Pharma Corp., Brookdale Senior Living and Pear Tree Pharmaceuticals. Other publicly available documents show Mrs. Dodd last year was one of the most highly compensated non-employee members of the Javelin Pharmaceuticals Inc. board, on which she has served since 2004. She earned $32,000 in fees and $109,587 in stock option awards last year, according to the company's SEC filings.

When called out on this, Dodd offers us more comedy, albeit not quite at the Baucus level:

Bryan DeAngelis, Dodd's spokesman, said, "Jackie Clegg Dodd's career is her own; absolutely independent of Senator Dodd, as it was when they married 10 years ago. The senator has worked to reform our health care system for decades, and nothing about his wife's career is relevant at all to his leadership of that effort."

Among other highlights from the AP report:

Rockefeller, D-W.Va., reported $15,001 to $50,000 in capital gains for his wife from the sale of a stake in Athenahealth Inc., a business services company that helps medical providers with billing and clinical operations. ... Gregg, R-N.H., disclosed $250,001 to $500,000 in drug maker Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. stock and $1,000 to $15,000 each in stock in pharmaceutical companies Merck & Co. and Pfizer, the Johnson & Johnson health care products company and Agilent Technologies, which is involved in the biomedical industry.

The takeaway from all of this to me is that arguing the health care debate on ideological grounds is a red herring. You can argue ideology, make calls and point to polls, but at the end of the day it's all going to be meaningless next to a (daily) $1500 check.

Independent/ libertarian-leaning talk show host Dan Carlin absolutely nails this issue in his latest show, "A Conflict of Interest."

He points out that what we are dealing with in terms of Baucus, Grassley, Dodd and others, isn't just "special interest influence." It's corruption, pure and simple. And we would clearly not tolerate it in, say, a Supreme Court case, where a Justice who had ANY financial ties to a case would be forced to recuse themselves. Why then do we tolerate this from our legislative representatives, who play a much more direct role in creating the regulations that shape peoples' lives?

And more importantly, how can we expect to get any kind of decent outcome, when these incentives are in place?