We all know there are three branches of government – executive, legislative and judicial – and the checks and balances attached to all three.

When I began covering the Idaho Legislature in the ‘80s (no, not the 1880s), there was a fourth branch that arguably had more power than the other three. There were no real checks and balances, only human bobbleheads that seemed to go along with everything this group wanted.

I’m referring, of course, to the Idaho Association of Commerce and Industry. Democrats, who were upset about the Legislature’s tilt toward business interests, suggested that Republicans were “in the pockets” of IACI. Greg Casey, a retired businessman who was the IACI president at the time, remembers being referred to by then-Democratic Gov. Cecil Andrus as “a Republican hack”/Chuck Malloy, Idaho Business Weekly. More here.