Follow the money

Via the Carpetbagger:

For about a decade, the lobbying industry assumed Republicans would be in the majority indefinitely, so it had a very strong incentive to avoid GOP punishment and go along with the scam. Now, however, the same lobbying industry isn't so sure about the Republicans' grip on power.



Washington lobbying firms, trade associations and corporate offices are moving to hire more well-connected Democrats in response to rising prospects that the opposition party will wrest control of at least one chamber of Congress from Republicans in the November elections.

In what lobbyists are calling a harbinger of possible upheaval on Capitol Hill, many who make a living influencing government have gone from mostly shunning Democrats to aggressively recruiting them as lobbyists over the past six months or so.

"We've seen a noticeable shift," said Beth Solomon, director of the Washington office of Christian & Timbers, an executive search firm that helps to place senior lobbyists and trade association heads.


The fear of GOP reprisals is apparently gone. Such a "shift" was almost unthinkable just a few years ago.

Are we witnessing the beginning of a stampede?