It often happens like this. You’re searching for something in particular, but during the search you run across really interesting things that you had long since forgotten.

That happened to me this morning. I was digging through files on an ancient hard drive looking for one particular thing, and kept finding gems worth sharing.

Here’s a good one–a long set of notes from an interview I did with Kirk Caldwell in June 2004.

At that time, Caldwell was a freshman state representative and had just wrapped up the second legislative session of his first 2-year term in elected office. I must have recorded the interview and later transcribed it.

We covered a lot of ground, and Caldwell was quite candid. We talked about the negative influence of money and elections, paths to reform, the internal dynamics of the legislature, and a range of related topics. Caldwell was, at that point in his career, a supporter of campaign finance reform. At issue was a bill to expand public financing of state and local elections, and Caldwell talked with me about the bill, the politics, and the need for reform.

My notes run on for 11 typewritten pages, but I think you’ll find them interesting reading.

Here’s one small excerpt.

I was able to track down the story that resulted from this and other interviews. Here’s a link to the story. It appeared in the July 21-27, 2004 edition of Honolulu Weekly (“Will elections ever be ‘clean’?“).