Faithful readers will recall my earlier posting on Louisville's wanna-be Mayor McCheese, Jim King. I recounted the dizzying array of emerging scandals surrounding King and King's blondie princess daughter: reality TV villainess and newbie judge (thanks to daddy's deep pockets) Katie King. Well, it's been a month or so, and silly me: King was just getting started with the shady behavior and questionable campaign financing, so I'm quickly falling behind in my quest to keep up with it all. In order to save time (and keep from reflexively vomiting onto my keyboard in the face of describing so much hot dirt) I'll just briefly list everything we have so far. Hopefully this will serve to both recap and get us all up to speed, so hold onto your horribly misguided expectations of gentlemanly Southern politicking, gentle readers:
- Gave daughter Katie King an "early inheritance" of $135,000 during her 2008 campaign for judge. King claimed ignorance when he was called on this ethically questionable maneuver.
- Sent an email out to local lawyers requesting that they grade Katie favorably on the upcoming ABA evaluation.
- Attempted to seal 1988 divorce records from the public, records which included allegations of physical and verbal abuse against his ex-wife.
- Allegedly manufactured a damaging mailer which attacked then-candidate for the 6th district metro council seat, Ken Herndon. The mailer was a Photoshopped image of Herndon's head atop the body of an, um, enthusiastic partaker of the Gay Pride Parade. Matt Conway, King's former chief of staff, went on record with the allegation, stating that he saw a copy of the mailer in King's office a week or so before it was mailed out.
- Unlawfully used the St. Xavier high school logo to insinuate their endorsement of his candidacy in emails inviting members of the St. X alumni mailing list to a fundraiser event for his campaign (that's the email pictured above). St. X ordered a cease and desist, threatening King with a lawsuit. King claimed it was all just a crazy mix-up and/or misunderstanding.
- Just before the fundraising quarter deadline, King "donated" $760,000 of his own money to his campaign in order to propel him past his rivals (who had thus far out-fundraised him), and to be able to say he had already raised $1 million.
- On Thursday Rep. Larry Clark filed a bill that would limit spending of gifts by candidates: "[the bill] would prohibit a candidate from spending large sums of money given by a parent--or anyone else--for the purpose of funding a political campaign." (J. Gerth, Courier-Journal). The bill is inspired solely by the ethical concerns raised in Princess's 2008 campaign.
Whew! Writing about King's ethical deviations is a lot like writing about current technologies: as soon as you finish it already seems outdated. I'm sure this list will all be old news by the time I sit down and read the local paper Monday morning.
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