from "What's The Worst That Could Happen?" (John Dortmunder, if you don't know the series, is a career burglar. Andy, here, is Andy Kelp, a friend and frequent partner. The books are laugh-out-loud hilarious.)
...before the lady with the bionic teeth said, 'And now the congressional update,'and then another nine minutes of posturing and flapdoodle from other active congresspeople before paydirt was finally struck: "Appearing before the subcommittee on entertainlment tax reform this morning will be media mogul Max Fairbanks, CEO of the giant entertainment and real estate conglomeratel..only by the removal of the WW2-era entertainment luxury tax will the American film and TV and multimedia industry be able to compete in the global markets of tomorrow, by producing the top-quality artistic and entertainment production which the industry, with a solid financial base, would be able to provide, were it not for this onerous tax."
'Whadaya bet,' Andy said, 'this station here is one of the things he owns?'
'Pass,' Dortmunder said.
...
'Here it is,' Andy said.
Dortmunder came over to look. 'And _another_ way to spell pack,' he said. 'These people must have all flunked English.'
'No, no, John,' Andy said. 'Don't you know what a PAC is? It's a legal bribe.'
'It's a what?'
'It's how Congress figured it out they could get bribed without anybody getting in trouble,' Andy explained. 'Like, for instance, say you wanted to give a congressman a bunch of money---'
'I don't.'
'Okay, but for instance. As a hypothetical. Say you got, oh, I don't know, some lumber, and you want to cut it down and you're not supposed to cut it down, but if you give this congressman some money they'll cut you a loophole. But if you just give him the money, flat out, boom, here's the money, chances are, he might go to jail and you could be embarrassed. So they invented these things, these PACs, the letters stand for something...'
'That's more than you can say for the congressmen.'
'Political Action Committee, that's what it is. You give the money to this committee, and _they_ give it to the congressman, and then it's legal.'
'They launder it,' Dortmunder suggested.
'Right. I think they learned it from some people in Columbia.'