While McSwain turned his energies to Northpoint, Wilkes amped up his lobbying expenditures, using his firm Group W Advisors to funnel funds through ASG--some $620,000 since 2002. Group W itself was a registered lobbyist hired almost exclusively by other Wilkes-run or -affiliated companies. Group W in turn contracted with ASG. "It's just creating another layer of difficulty for people to figure out who's doing what for how much on what issues," says Roberta Baskin of the Center for Public Integrity. Under ASG direction, Wilkes homed in on key legislators who, if greased properly, could make the contract-procurement process run smoothly. Former ARMPAC head Karl Gallant personally worked the Group W account for ASG, as did Tony Rudy.

Like Cunningham, DeLay flew three times on Wilkes's private plane, operated by Group W Transportation. In late 2005 Texas prosecutor Ronnie Earle subpoenaed records from three of Wilkes's companies that had given sizable contributions to DeLay's Texans for a Republican Majority. The PAC was key in DeLay's redistricting plan, which resulted in Republican victories in twenty-one of the state's thirty-two Congressional districts in 2004. Among the contributions: $15,000 from Wilkes's PerfectWave Technologies. According to the Houston Chronicle, Wilkes, his companies and his wife gave about $70,000 to DeLay's PACs. And it paid off. Shortly after Wilkes hired ASG, PerfectWave racked up $40 million in federal contracts (from 2003 to 2005). In late January Earle subpoenaed four people affiliated with the company as part of his investigation of DeLay.

Tracing the reach of Wilkes's political giving tree is no easy task. That's because a fair portion of Wilkes's donations are done through family members, employees and his shady network of what could only loosely be called "companies." Many perform no identifiable service other than giving the impression of being separate corporate entities. The websites are flimsy and amateurish, many of them sharing the same office address as the Wilkes Corporation. They have almost no presence on the Internet other than campaign finance records indicating serious donations to GOP candidates and causes. In addition to PerfectWave Technologies, the Wilkes empire includes: Pure Aqua Technologies, Acoustical Communication Systems, Mirror Labs, Optimum Composite Design, MailSafe and other "companies." Overwhelmingly, Wilkes's lobbying money went to one place--military contract lobbying. As veteran Washington reporter/blogger Josh Marshall put it, "Wilkes specialized in finding companies or products for which the DoD had little or no use and then lathering up a few members of Congress so they'd force the Pentagon to buy his junk."

While Cunningham has borne the brunt of this scandal, there are other prominent Republicans who deserve to be investigated--among them, DeLay's protégé Roy Blunt. According to Public Citizen, "Ten of Blunt's biggest contributors have hired [ASG] as their lobbying firm. The firm has been close to Blunt, as Blunt's committees have paid ASG $485,485 from 1999 to 2002 for fundraising and consulting services. ASG's clients, meanwhile, have funneled $581,866 into Blunt's committees since 1999." According to the group, Wilkes "has provided four subsidized trips to Blunt's PACs."

Another powerful Republican who has had questionable dealings with Wilkes is Duncan Hunter, chair of the House Armed Services Committee. He is from Wilkes's home base of San Diego and has admitted that he, along with Cunningham, pressed Pentagon officials in 1999 to redirect a $10 million contract to Wilkes's ADCS. Over the past decade, Wilkes, his associates and his company have given more than $40,000 to Hunter's campaign coffers. Meanwhile, another member of the House Republican leadership, John Doolittle of California, "helped steer defense funding" to PerfectWave, according to the Washington Post. The paper notes that the company's "officials and lobbyists helped raise at least $85,000" for Doolittle and his Leadership PAC from 2002 to 2005. Moreover, Doolittle's wife was employed by an organization set up by ASG founder Ed Buckham. According to the San Diego Union-Tribune,

Wilkes "befriended other legislators, too. He ran a hospitality suite, with several bedrooms, in Washington--first in the Watergate Hotel and then in the Westin Grand near Capitol Hill."

Among those who have taken serious money from Wilkes and his companies are Representative Jerry Lewis, head of the Appropriations Committee; Representative Jerry Weller and his PAC; and Senator Lindsey Graham. Since the Cunningham scandal broke, many Congress members have quietly given up Wilkes's money, some of them donating it to charities. So bold was Wilkes about his paymasters that, according to the Copley News Service, he had a vanity plate on his jet-black Hummer that read MIPR ME--"a reference to Military Interdepartmental Purchase Requests, which authorize funds in the Pentagon."

Like Abramoff, Wilkes and ASG are not anomalies in Washington. If anything, they are the prototypes for business as usual in the "revolutionary" years of the GOP-dominated Congress. It is of extraordinary significance that Wilkes was a major figure in George W. Bush's fundraising efforts and that ASG was founded and staffed by the inner circle of one of the most powerful politicians in recent history. It speaks volumes to how far and wide these investigations should extend. The new lobbying reform bandwagon circling Washington is like those rubber bracelets made popular by Lance Armstrong--soon everybody made one with their own meaning and by the end none of them meant anything. The recent "lobbying scandals" could spark the beginning of real reform, but that's highly unlikely. That would require tracing the vast network of conspirators to their new offices and titles, which would ultimately lead full circle, back to many of those responsible for heading the investigations--and their former chiefs of staff or their major campaign fundraisers.

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