We have to wonder, given 2nd District candidate John Frary’s disdain for filling out campaign paperwork, whether he would have accepted such sloppiness from his students.

Frary, a former college professor, has drawn threats of fines and criticism from the Federal Election Commission because he hasn’t provided bank account numbers, addresses and other detailed information required on FEC campaign forms. He’s dismissive of the scrutiny, suggesting that campaign laws are “devised to go after schemers in Chicago and Kansas City and Baltimore and Newark and other rich, lowly fields of political shenanigans.”

“I don’t suppose,” he said, “they’re really intended to go after obscure retired college professors, but such is the way of bureaucracies.”

Frary seems to suggest that shenanigans only happen in big cities. That’s not the case. Just look at former Lewiston Democrat William Walcott, now serving time in jail for campaign spending crimes.

The FEC rules apply in Kansas City just as they do in Farmington, Maine. They apply to college professors the same way they do lifelong politicians.

And, given that Frary has refused to provide information required by law to monitor money raised and spent by candidates, he is committing the very shenanigans campaign laws are devised to tamp.