Citizens seek a say without 'pay to play'

[Algorem]

A BLADE INVESTIGATION: THE OHIO TRAIL

http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051102/NEWS09/511020403

By JIM TANKERSLEY and MIKE WILKINSON
BLADE STAFF WRITERS

When Steve Musgrave worked the radar in Vietnam, his destroyer escorted civilian boats through the Gulf of Tonkin. Officers warned the smaller craft to paddle slowly to avoid triggering deadly mines.

Mr. Musgrave, his body now worn by illness, has found navigating Congress a more difficult mission. He says he ran into a blockade trying to change a federal pension rule that has capsized his family below the poverty line.

Congressmen brushed him off. Ohio's U.S. senators didn't return his calls, and they ignored letters a state representative sent on his behalf.

Mr. Musgrave, 52, has never donated to a political candidate. He lives in Canton, miles away from two of President Bush's biggest fund-raisers, W.R. "Tim" Timken, Jr., and Walden O'Dell, whose companies have received nearly $300 million in federal government contracts and trade subsidies since 2001...


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