Free Republic

After the events of Sept. 11, Al Gore must have hoped no one remembered. But someone did. On Sept. 20, 2001, the Boston Globe broke the story of how the so-called Gore Commission had failed in its mission to address airline safety. The Globe claimed this failure "represents the clearest recent public example of the success that airlines have long had in defeating calls for more oversight." The Globe traced that failure to a series of campaign donations from the airlines to the Democratic National Committee in 1996 in the wake of the crash of TWA Flight 800. Although on...

<p>In a blow to candidates seeking public campaign financing, a Supreme Judicial Court justice ruled yesterday that the court cannot order funding for the voter-approved Clean Elections Law without legislative action.</p> <p>The ruling, issued by Justice Martha B. Sosman, found that only the Legislature can appropriate funds from the state treasury under the Massachusetts Constitution. The SJC had previously raised the possibility of circumventing the House and Senate to fund candidates, but yesterday's ruling dashed that hope, at least for now.</p>