Former U.S. Sen. Alan Simpson, whose biography is called “Shooting from the Lip,” gave a crowd of about 150 people gathered at the Billings Public Library on Thursday a good dose of just how the book got that name.
Simpson, a Wyoming Republican, led the panel “Knowledge is Power,” which explored the influence of money in politics. He was joined by Anthony Johnstone, an associate professor at the University of Montana School of Law, and Edwin Bender, who founded the National Institute of Money in State Politics, in the first Royal Johnson forum, sponsored by the library foundation.
“Nowadays, you can get money anonymously from political action committees that you don’t even know about,” Simpson said. “It’s appalling and disgusting, and the American people are fed up. They think corruption is the act of the day.”