Front page on the Huffington Post right now is this piece by Public Campaign's Nancy Watzman about the video question on Fair and Clean Elections which we posted to 10Questions and which is steadily climbing the list.

Bundling goes beyond the Beltway. This story in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, which features commentary from Public Campaign's Nick Nyhart looks at the end run around contribution limits by one very wealthy supporter of St. Louis mayor Francis Slay.

An Illinois pension scandal that touched Barack Obama via a political supporter of his may also touch Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign as this AP story reveals. The article quotes Public Campaign's David Donnelly on the liability candidates face by having to recruit big donors who may have backgrounds that can cast aspersion on the campaign.

Senator and presidential candidate Barack Obama pledged he wouldn't take money from federal lobbyists in his bid for the White House, a promise that puts him in a tough spot: just who qualifies as a lobbyist, and what qualifies as lobbyist money? Moreover, with the fundraising wars just beginning, how do you mount a serious campaign for the Presidency while promising to change the system?

Support for full public financing of elections comes from quite different parts of the blogosphere today: first, Armstrong Williams writing on Townhall argues "Clean campaigns will reduce the power of elites by ending the new arms race for money, and bring back the soul of democracy by increasing the power of the people." Byron Williams, in his piece on Huffington Post,<

William Safire used his New York Times Magazine "On Language" column on Sunday to trace the evolution of the word "bundling" all the way from Dutch teenagers to George Bush, citing Public Campaign's Rick Bielke on the first use of the term to refer to the practice of skirting campaign contribution limits by getting big donors to solicit money from friends and associates for their candidate of choice.

The Post-Tribune in Gary, Indiana joins the growing list of newspapers expressing support for the Fair Elections Now Act introduced last week in the Senate. They conclude that by raising the profile of voters in elections and reducing the influence of special interest money: "The proposal would go a long way toward eliminating the Jack Abramoffs of the world and take the constraints off congressmen who feel indebted to their financiers."

Homestate newspapers of both Senator Richard Durbin (D-IL) and Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA) covered their introduction of the Fair Elections Now Act yesterday.

What are we really fighting for when we embark on campaign finance reform? Mark Schmitt, of the New American Foundation and The Decembrist, opens an engaging dialogue on TPM Cafe urging reform-minded folks to not get bogged down in the details of campaign finance and to keep our eyes on the ball: using policy (like Clean Elections) to create opportunities for more people to become involved in politics and spark social change.

You may be familiar with the work of Jim Hightower, a writer, commentator and co-editor of The Hightower Lowdown. Hightower is a longtime proponent of Clean Elections, and in this article featured on AlterNet he paints a vivid contrast between the pay-to-play political culture of Washington, DC and the voter-driven politics of empowerment working in cities and states with Clean Elections.