The high cost of campaigning has helped tighten the link between contributions and legislators.

But the larger question of possible links between political contributions and national security damage will be pursued by the Senate intelligence committee.

He did it by being more explicit than ever before about the connection between big contributions and what is euphemistically called "access."

"But there is no connection between contributions and the meeting," he said.

The link between large contributions and special treatment has always been part of politics.

That makes it impossible to study the link between contributions and legislation until after the session has ended.

As the system developed, the link between individual contributions and benefits was weakened.

All the features of the system which may lead to confusion between own resources and national contributions are highlighted.

Officials at the department said there was no connection between contributions and approvals.

Some of them clearly wanted to hide from the public just how unseemly the connection between contributions and influence can get.