Check out this “Potpouri” item on the editorial page of the Charleston Gazette, February 25, 2008:

“A Sunday article tallied $2 billion that Attorney General Darrell McGraw has won in consumer lawsuits and turned over to the state treasury for the Legislature to spend. Is it odd that the state Chamber of Commerce is paying hundreds of thousands for statewide TV ads denouncing McGraw because one settlement - the $10 million OxyContin verdict - required the attorney general alone to disburse the funds to public programs?”

The Gazette should deliver the truth to readers about the OxyContin settlement: that the plaintiff-state agencies McGraw himself named to the suit should be reimbursed for their damages. Any lawyer, including McGraw, is obligated to represent his or her clients and compensate them for their court awards. Nowhere did the court direct McGraw to convert the settlement dollars into what is basically his own political slush fund.

The Gazette rationale for McGraw could be extrapolated to all of us as follows: don’t pay your taxes this year. After all, when you consider how much you paid the IRS before, just forget it. Spend what you owe on whatever.

It’s time we started watching out for the public’s money.

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