Sorenson or his company, Grassroots Strategy, allegedly were paid $7,500 a month through C&M Strategies, a Colorado-based company run by Bachmann fundraiser Guy Short, who was serving as the campaign’s national political director.

Bachmann’s campaign acknowledged the restrictions Sorenson faced in an October 27, 2011, press release, two months before the Iowa Caucuses, where she finished sixth and dropped out: “Sorenson is serving in a full-time role but state Senate rules preclude lawmakers from being paid by the campaign.” But according to Parrish, Sorenson was instead paid indirectly through C&M Strategies. Such an arrangement could potentially skirt Iowa ethics rules designed to avoid conflicts of interest between state officials and candidates in the first-in-the-nation presidential caucuses.

Michele Bachmann approved unethical payments to her former Iowa campaign chair, her former chief of staff said in an affidavit. Kent Sorenson was Bachmann's Iowa chair until he decamped to support Ron Paul right before the caucuses; as a state senator he was ethically barred from accepting campaign money, but the Bachmann campaign found a way around that And Bachmann knew about the payments, her former chief of staff Andy Parrish is saying. Oh, he's covering his own ass, saying in the affidavit that "She, like the rest of us, understood from Senator Sorenson that it did not run afoul of any Iowa Senate ethics rules. We relied on his representations in this regard." But, uhh:In other words, the question is basically whether they laundered the money clean enough for Iowa's requirements. Of course, C&M Strategies is a whole other bag of unethical worms, since C&M's Guy Short was working on Bachmann's campaign while also being paid by her PAC, which, again, is not allowed

Keeping track of Michele Bachmann's ethics problems is almost as difficult as making sense of her crazy ideas, and political ethics enforcement is never as swift or firm as you might want. But with her former aides (and the word "former" comes up a lot when talking about Bachmann's staff, as does the word "disgruntled") willing to rat her out, she's got to be getting nervous.