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Alabama Attorney General Luther Strange

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Luther Strange stood before a crowd of Republicans in Enterprise, Ala., to blast the incumbent in the office he sought, Attorney General Troy King, who had gotten entangled with a casino being built there called Country Crossings.

"Our attorney general cannot participate in that case because he went to that guy and asked him for a favor," Strange said. "That is unacceptable. How can the people of Alabama have confidence that their laws are going to be enforced if their own attorney general cannot participate because of an ethical lapse?"

Before the somewhat skeptical crowd, Strange seemed a bit defensive but he was nonetheless adamant: An attorney general shouldn't create needless conflicts of interest for himself. The people of Alabama have to come first, he argued, just like Bill Pryor had put Alabama first, and Jeff Sessions before him.

"You've got to have the sense to know that you can't get yourself in that kind of position. Why would you allow that?" Strange said. "You are being asked to rule on things. You are being asked to represent the people of the entire state of Alabama. That's the problem."

That was in 2009, before Strange successfully primaried King to take his office. Eight years later, Strange is the one who needs that sort of talking-to.

Strange didn't put Alabama first, but rather his own personal political ambitions.

Strange didn't avoid conflicts of interest, but created the greatest imaginable.

And worse than King, when he did have a conflict of interest, he didn't withdraw from the case. Instead he tainted it.

Luther Strange campaigned for office on the promise that he'd clean up Montgomery. Instead, he left a bigger mess for someone else to tidy up.

Here's what we now know for a fact: The Alabama Attorney General's office has been investigating Gov. Robert Bentley. A special grand jury convened in Montgomery has heard testimony from witnesses, including the governor himself, and for at least some of that testimony, Strange was there with his subordinates, in that room.

But when it became clear Jeff Session would soon join the Trump administration, leaving a vacancy in the United States Senate, Strange suddenly got coy, playing games and parsing his words.

At first, Strange said he wouldn't seek the appointment from Bentley.

Then he interviewed with Bentley for the appointment, which looked a lot like seeking it.

Then he said in public speeches that his office never said there was a Bentley investigation.

Finally, when Bentley gave him the appointment, Strange said that there had been "misconceptions" of a Bentley investigation.

"We have never said -- and I want to make this clear-- we have never said in our office that we are investigating the governor," Strange said. "I think it's unfair to him and unfair to the process that it's been reported out there."

But let's clear up the misconception. There was an investigation. There is an investigation, still. Those reports of that investigation were accurate.

And while he was the head of that investigation, Strange solicited a favor from the target of that investigation.

Troy King never went that far.

Maybe Strange thought he could put it all in the rearview mirror as he high-tailed it to his new job in Washington, complements of Bentley, but his successor proved to be far more ethical and by-the-book.

At his swearing in on Monday, Attorney General Steve Marshall said that he would confer with staff prosecutors and, if indeed a Bentley investigation were ongoing, he would recuse himself, since he was, after all, another Bentley appointee.

On Tuesday, Marshall met with those prosecutors.

On Wednesday, Marshall recused himself and, in a press release, confirmed that there was an investigation of Bentley. Marshall appointed former Montgomery District Attorney Ellen Brooks to lead the investigation in his place.

That's what Strange should have done a long time ago. But don't take it from me. Take it from Luther Strange -- just the one from 2009, not that guy representing Alabama in the United States Senate today.