Sure looks that way -- and raises some serious issues regarding this most ethical, most transparent administration in history.

Not long after President Barack Obama’s historic 2008 victory, Jay Carney left his perch as TIME magazine’s Washington bureau chief to work for the incoming administration. But Carney, who started a new job as press secretary this week, continued reaping payments from the struggling magazine, collecting $270,000 in 2009, according to a newly released disclosure form.

Carney’s personal financial disclosure statement, released by the White House Monday evening, shows that in 2009 TIME paid him a $58,000 bonus — for work he did in 2008, when he helped direct the magazine’s coverage of the presidential campaign — as well as a $212,000 severance payment.

Now maybe this is nothing -- but a senior aide to one of the top two members of the executive branch drawing a six-figure check from a major multi-national company while working for the federal government sure does give off the appearance (not to mention the stench) of impropriety. But then again, so do a lot of Obama Administration senior appointments -- heck, we've got top economic advisors who are tax cheats, so why not a press secretary who continued to take cash from a press publication?