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WASHINGTON (AP) ― While the revolving door between lawmakers and lobbyists has recently been slowed a bit, Senate DFL candidate Al Franken wants to bolt it shut.
  
"In Washington, they debate whether former members of Congress should wait one year or two years before they can become registered lobbyists," he asks in a TV ad which began airing this week. "How about never?" He says if elected, he'll fight for a law that permanently bans ex-lawmakers from becoming lobbyists.
  
Under an ethics law passed last year, former senators and high-ranking executive branch officials have to wait two years before lobbying Congress (the "cooling off" period for former House members remained one year).
  
Franken, who is challenging Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., says in the ad that hundreds of former members of Congress lobby for "big oil and special interests. No wonder gas is at four dollars a gallon."
  
Several former Minnesota members of Congress have gone on to become lobbyists, such as former Sen. Dave Durenberger and former Rep. Vin Weber, both Republicans, and Gerry Sikorski, a Democrat.
  
Meanwhile, Coleman unveiled a new TV ad Friday touting his accomplishments as senator and St. Paul mayor -- from uncovering wasteful government spending through the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations to bringing a National Hockey League team back to Minnesota. The ad is set to begin airing this weekend.
  
Franken's proposal is the same one made by former Rep. Mark Kennedy, R-Minn., when he ran for Senate in 2006. Kennedy's proposal went nowhere in Congress, and he lost the race to Democrat Amy Klobuchar.
  
In a telephone interview Friday, Franken said he was aware of Kennedy's plan but wasn't basing his on it.
  
"No, I've had this for a while myself," he said.
  
What's the connection between lobbyists and $4-a-gallon gas?
  
"It's the revolving door," Franken responded, "that members can go to Washington and know that they sort of have a golden parachute at the end, which is to lobby, say, for an oil company, or energy."
  
That could make them less likely to vote to investigate Wall Street speculators driving up the price of oil, Franken said, or price gouging by oil companies.
  
"Then, instead of moving back to where you're from, they stay in Washington and become lobbyists," Franken said. "We need people who are going to stay connected to the people back home -- and not become part of this culture. We need to break this special interest stranglehold on Washington, and that will help the middle class in Minnesota."
  
Kennedy was out of the country and unavailable for comment, but in a 2006 interview with The Associated Press he made a similar argument: "I think part of the temptations are whatever your possible future life might be. We need to be attracting folks to Congress with real-life experience, with real-life experience to go back to."
  
In a statement, Coleman campaign spokesman Luke Friedrich said: "The senator does not believe spending any more time debating rules about former members of Congress becoming lobbyists is a productive way to address energy prices. Last year, Congress overwhelmingly passed a new law governing these bans with bipartisan support."
  
Friedrich said that instead, Franken should support efforts such as expanding offshore drilling, opposing gas tax increases and increasing nuclear energy sources. Franken has called for ending subsidies for large oil companies and for a so-called windfall tax on oil profits that would go back toward research into alternative fuels.
  
Franken's lobbyist proposal received a cool response from the Washington watchdog group Center for Public Integrity. The group's executive director, Bill Buzenberg, called it a "stunt," even though he agreed with the goal.
  
"Is there a huge problem? Yes," said Buzenberg. "Will this likely pass the Congress? I kind of doubt it."
  
Franken said he was surprised by that reaction.
  
"I like the Center for Public Integrity," he said, "but I think we're going to see a huge change in Washington with President (Barack) Obama, and a lot of new members of Congress, and I do think this has a good chance of passing."
  
Neither campaign would divulge the cost of their respective ad buys. Franken's campaign said its ad was a "multi-week, multi-market, six-figure buy," while Coleman's said its was a "significant, six-figure statewide ad buy."
  
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Norm Coleman was born in New York City in 1949. Al Franken was born in New York City in 1951.

(© 2009 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)