The Valenti influence.

• Author: Peters, Charles
• Position: Tilting at Windmills

It used to be that lobbyists were people who wished they were in the Congress or the White House, but had to take up lobbying because their side had lost an election. That began to change in the 90s. Steven Waldman, one of our alumni, was the first to notice that congressional staff members were devoting a lot of their time to angling for lobbying jobs. Now comes another Monthly alumnus, Slate's Timothy Noah, who reports that members themselves are getting into the act.

Recently, at a retirement party for the prominent lobbyist Hilary Rosen, Raps. Billy Tauzin and Mary Bonn sang "Who wants the job of Hilary Rosen? How...