Neil deMause has a column in the Villiage Voice about politics, the city of New York and the New York Yankees.

City documents newly uncovered by the Voice reveal that the New York Yankees billed city tax- payers hundreds of thousands of dollars for the salaries of team execs and high-powered consultants to lobby the city and state, thanks to the team’s sweetheart lease deal engineered by the Giuliani administration.

“You’ve created this weird circular situation where the city is, effectively, paying with taxpayer money to have itself lobbied for potentially more taxpayer money,” says Common Cause’s Megan Quattlebaum, one of several government watchdogs who were dumbfounded when the Voice told them last week about the deal. “Taxpayers would not be pleased at all to hear that the city is subsidizing someone to come back and hold their hand out to lobby for more.”

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Continue reading if you have the stomach for such things.