Can I borrow that Ernie?

I’m always on the lookout for those new words and phrases which creep onto the political scene, especially when they are used as a way of trivializing misdeeds.
Kentucky Governor, Ernie Fletcher has recently introduced a gem with his; "noodling out of season."
Ernie used the term in a speech, sometime late in August, when he was “exercising the power conferred upon me by Section 77 of the Constitution of Kentucky to grant amnesty to all persons who might otherwise be charged with violating the merit system laws.”
Unfortunately for good old Ernie, the Grand Jury didn’t agree with that particular power and are investigating the charges anyway.
But you have to wonder if all this wasn’t just a failure to define the terms, a misunderstanding between Ernie and his henchmen.
Ernie thinks he knows what noodling is. He told us in that same speech:

“Noodling is the sport of catching fish with your bare hands rather than bothering to bait your hook.”

So, when his guys told him they were just off to do a bit of noodling Ernie thought they were heading down to the swamp for a bit of harmless R&R. He didn’t know they were going to fire a bunch of regular civil servants and replace them with folks whose primary qualification was being Ernie supporters.
Still believing that it was all just good clean fun, Ernie insisted;

“These folks who have been accused by Greg Stumbo (Kentucky Attorney General) are good people. Some have made mistakes because of inexperience, and a complicated, unclear merit law."

And as Ernie knows as a legislator, if a law is bad you just ignore it, like noodling out of season, and get on with life.
If that’s what he expects of his administration, and of the people of Kentucky, I suppose it makes the concept of a legislature a little redundant. In an odd sort of way, Ernie might be just getting down to the truth of the matter. Why complicate life with all this legislative stuff? Why not just get on and noodle (whichever interpretation) and share the plunder from the state coffers with your buddies? All these laws are so complicated and unnecessary.
But I think I might borrow noodling. I might just set up a noodling award to go with the Snouts in the Trough Award. Seeing as rules are irrelevant it shouldn’t be too hard to rearrange.