BS: Senator Ted Stevens (1923-2010)

Subject: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 31 Jul 07 - 07:21 PM

If he hadn't built a bridge to nowhere, he might have gotten away!

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: kendall
Date: 31 Jul 07 - 08:39 PM

Good riddence to this crook

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Ebbie
Date: 31 Jul 07 - 08:42 PM

A house of cards in shambles

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Rapparee
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 09:29 AM

Another case, it appears, of "They'll never catch ME!!"

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: saulgoldie
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 11:30 AM

Reminder: He is not proven guilty yet. He is only "under suspicion." We ALL want the presumption of innocence until proven guilty, don't we? BTW, I am a flaming progressive, and no particular friend to the slimeball.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Bill D
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 11:41 AM

In some places, being a slimeball and taking bribes is about the only way to GET power. Stevens survived the same way some did in Chicago and Columbia...by handing out largess to enough folks to overcome the stink of his methods.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: PoppaGator
Date: 01 Aug 07 - 03:01 PM

This asshole is the single greatest enemy in Congress of Gulf Coast citizens still trying to recover from that nasty storm two years ago. Whatever happens to him, he probably deserves worse.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: robomatic
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 01:37 AM

Now, Now, Poppagator, you gotta admit when a lot of folks live in cheap housing ignoring the fact they are slam plunked down in the middle of a big ol' bowl next to the biggest river in the United States and on a coastline subject to regular visitations by wind, rain, and hurricane, wallllll.....

it's kinda reminiskent of a lot of good ol' Northern folk who are plunked down, with knowledge, on a coastline subject to earthquake and tsunami.

So please cut down ol' temper tantrum Ted a nice ol' slice o' Louisiana slack.

robo

(who shurely hopes he merits a FEMA trailer when his turn comes)

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Alaska Mike
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 10:07 AM

I'm sure Bush will pardon him if they ever find him guilty of his many crimes. I wonder if they will remove his name from the "Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport". When I first heard that they had named the airport after him I was thrilled. I thought it meant he had died.

Mike

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Ebbie
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 03:16 PM

lol, MIke.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: robomatic
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 04:17 PM

I just call it the "T S Anchorage International Airport"

I'm still unclear on who had the chutzpah to name it after him. It's prolly the same crowd who want to re-name Washington after Reagon. I'm already pretty clear on the chutzpah of ol' Ted himself.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Deckman
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 05:11 PM

I've been watching this scandel build for months now. I know some of the charactors involved. To me, the sad part of this horror story is that it could, can, and WILL happen anywhere. ANYWHERE, that is, you have those unbelievable amounts of money around. In this case, it is OIL. Once those amount of dollars start to flow, graft, cooruption, bribary, thievery, cover ups, lies, etc., all start to happen. Like it or not, it's human nature.

Who was it that said, "If you're poor, you must be honest. Because no dishonest man will ever stay poor!" ? CHEERS, Bob

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 02 Aug 07 - 07:24 PM

It makes me mad every time I go to Washington to have to land at the Reagan International Airport. One time I went to Baltimore instead.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: emjay
Date: 03 Aug 07 - 02:55 PM

One thing I hope does come out of this, that they change the name of the airport. I wasn't surprised when his son came under investigation, I wasn't surprised at some of the other state legislators. We knew some of that stuff was going on, but like a lot of people, I thought Ted was too smart to do those things or to be caught.
A former US Attorney, also a Republican, has made some interesting comments about ongoing investigations and those still to come. Approval of those search warrants, he said, was not granted on mere suspicions and rumors, and had to have come from the very top.
No matter what is found or not found, Stevens did not avoid the appearance of evil when oil field services company Veco had a hand in the remodel of his home. Veco is not likely to have had a thing to do with remodeling my house nor Alaska Mike's nor Ebbie's nor any of the other Alaskans who post on Mudcat. Whatever they did, whether it was only receiving bills and passing them on to the Senator and his wife or actually contributing financially to the remodeling, it was more than should have been done for a sitting US Senator in a position to help the company.
Now, since this is Mudcat, there must be a song in this?

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 03 Aug 07 - 03:10 PM

emnay: What would be a good name for the song?

             "How Cheap They Sell Out For"
             "Global Warming at the Stevens'"
             "I Built a Bridge to Nowhere and Lost My Way"
             "What's the FBI Doing in My Sock Drawer"
             "Angry Brown Bears Change My 1040 Form"

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Aug 07 - 03:11 PM

Call it National Airport or George Washingon National.

only an ass would try to make you say Reagan.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Ebbie
Date: 03 Aug 07 - 03:25 PM

Stevens has a cute out: I paid every bill I was given.

Doesn't address the bills that VECO paid, huh.

As for the man being too smart to do it or to be caught, the arrogance of his, Don Young and Frank Murkowski (before his fall) dictates their belief that nobody is as smart as they are.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: emjay
Date: 03 Aug 07 - 03:38 PM

To rigind\slinger:
All those names work, but I think I like What's the FBI doing in my sock drawer...possibilities
Or How Cheap they sell out for or How cheaply they sell out
or who knew you could buy your own senator for the change on the dresser?
Those bridges are a sore spot.

Yeah, none of them are quite so smart as they think they are.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: GUEST, Ebbie
Date: 03 Aug 07 - 04:14 PM

Actually, those bridges haven't been built.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 03 Aug 07 - 04:25 PM

Maybe it's not too late to stop them. Make sure they are designed like the one in Minnesota.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 03 Aug 07 - 04:29 PM

By the way, did anybody look into who owns the property on the other side of the bridge?

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Deckman
Date: 03 Aug 07 - 04:33 PM

"Up North is a senator named Ted,
Who thinks we've all been misslead,
   Why, I'd have to be daft
   Before I'd take graft
If you'll excuse me, I'll now go to bed!" (bad, bad, Bob)

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: GUEST, Ebbie
Date: 03 Aug 07 - 05:24 PM

I don't know who lives on the other end of the proposed Knik Arm bridge (I do know that a pretty good case could be made for this particular bridge) but former Governor Frank Murkowski has ties to the Southeast Alaska Gravina Island proposal. They may have given up on that bridge since we have a new governor but they are now feverishly working on bringing about a three-mile road on Gravina that is projected to cost 8 million plus per mile. And they can NOT make a good case for it.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 03 Aug 07 - 05:36 PM

Ebbie - It sounds like a title search is in order.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: PoppaGator
Date: 03 Aug 07 - 05:53 PM

robomatic:

Sorry for the belated response ~ I haven't checked this thread (or anyting in BS section) for a few days.

You say you "hope [to] merit a FEMA trailer when [your] turn comes," and I appreciate that you're joking, but perhaps you haven't heard the latest FEMA-trailer news, which would certainly give you reason to hesitate:

The travel trailers distributed by FEMA as temporary housing have been found to contain dangerously high levels of formalydehyde. These units were never designed for continued human habitation round the clock, day and and day out, for month and months, now going on two years. Presumably, when used for the occasional vacation trip, the risk of formaldehyde poisoning is minimal, but among the Gulf Coast population risiding full-time in these trailers, there has been an epidemic of mysterious illnesses, including cancer, and at least one death.

It has come to light that FEMA administrators became aware of a potential problem well over a year ago, but federal lawyers (i.e., the Cheney/Bush Justice Department) insisted that no public disclosure be made. Apparently, if people learned about the danger, they might demand safer housing and/or sue for damages. Avoiding any risk to administration policies and policymakers was apparently more importnat than alleviating the risk to citizens' lives and health.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: emjay
Date: 03 Aug 07 - 07:05 PM

I wouldn't make a case for either of those bridges, though it is wrong to call them bridges to nowhere. The Knik Arm bridge supposedly connects the Matanuska-Susitna valleys with Anchorage but probably more correctly opens up land for development, but would not make it any easier for a lot of us to get to Anchorage. Better would be an efficient mass transportation system.
Yep, look at who owns the land. We like to feather our own nests.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Deckman
Date: 03 Aug 07 - 07:11 PM

Yep ... as they say: "Birds of a feather flock together" or is it "Birds of flock, feather together?" I get soooo confused. Actually, if you play with letters a little, you could say something a little stronger, and more profane, but I won't go there! CHEERS, Bob

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 04 Aug 07 - 09:22 PM

"We like to feather our own nests."


                  But sometimes elected public officials like to feather their own nests more than the rest of us.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Alaska Mike
Date: 05 Aug 07 - 12:13 PM

I have to drive from Anchorage to Point Mackenzie periodically as part of my job. To drive from downtown Anchorage (where one end of the bridge would be) to Pt Mackenzie now is about a 3 hour trip even though you can see the place right across the inlet. The available land has all been sold years ago. It was offered in 600 acre lots in order to keep small investors out of the windfall when the bridge gets built.

Most of the land was bought by wealthy investors who could afford to wait until Ted pushed through an appropriation of Federal money. Once the taxpayers build the bridge, the land will go up in value by hundreds of times what they bought it for. Instead of a three hour drive, the commute would be about 20 minutes. Nice waterfront lots, beautiful views of the mountains, short drive to the city, what more could you want.

Mike

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Deckman
Date: 05 Aug 07 - 12:17 PM

The ONLY thing I could ask for is ... a cut of the action! Bob

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 05 Aug 07 - 01:22 PM

"what more could you want."


          To be one of the original investors with a U.S. Senator in my pocket, I suppose.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: pdq
Date: 05 Aug 07 - 01:27 PM

It's probably OK to bend the rules a bit if you have good reasons to do so:


{shortened by me}

"The fight for Alaska statehood became Stevens' principal work at Interior. "He did all the work on statehood," Roger Ernst later said of Stevens. "He wrote 90 percent of all the speeches. Statehood was his main project." A sign on Stevens' door proclaimed his office "Alaskan Headquarters" and Stevens became known at the Department of the Interior as "Mr. Alaska."

President Eisenhower, a Republican, regarded Alaska as too large and sparsely populated to be economically self-sufficient as a state, and furthermore saw statehood as an obstacle to effective defense of Alaska should the Soviet Union seek to invade it. Eisenhower was especially worried about the sparsely populated areas of northern and western Alaska. In March 1954, he had drawn a line on a map indicating his opinion of the portions of Alaska which he felt ought to remain in federal hands even if Alaska were granted statehood.

Stevens worked with (the) chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to create a compromise that would address Eisenhower's concerns. Their work concentrated on refining the line on the map that Eisenhower had drawn in 1954, which became known as the PYK Line after three rivers - the Porcupine, Yukon, and Kuskokwim - whose courses defined much of the line. The PYK Line was the basis for Section 10 of the Alaska Statehood Act, which Stevens wrote. Under Section 10, the land north and west of the PYK Line — which included the entirety of Alaska's North Slope, the Seward Peninsula, most of the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta, the western portions of the Alaska Peninsula, and the Aleutian and Pribilof Islands — would be part of the new state, but the President would be granted emergency powers to establish special national defense withdrawals in those areas if deemed necessary. "It's still in the law but it's never been exercised," Stevens later recollected. "Now that the problem with Russia is gone, it's surplusage. But it is a special law that only applies to Alaska."

Stevens also took part - illegally - in lobbying for the statehood bill, working closely with the Alaska Statehood Committee from his office at Interior. Stevens hired Margaret Atwood, daughter of Anchorage Times publisher Robert Atwood, who was chairman of the Alaska Statehood Committee, to work with him in the Interior Department. "We were violating the law," Stevens told a researcher in an October 1977 oral history interview for the Eisenhower Library. "[W]e were lobbying from the executive branch, and there's been a statute against that for a long time.... We more or less, I would say, masterminded the House and Senate attack from the executive branch."Stevens and the younger Atwood created file cards on members of Congress based on "whether they were Rotarians or Kiwanians or Catholics or Baptists and veterans or loggers, the whole thing," Stevens said in the 1977 interview. "And we'd assigned these Alaskans to go talk to individual members of the Senate and split them down on the basis of people that had something in common with them."The lobbying campaign extended to presidential press conferences. "We set Ike up quite often at press conferences by planting questions about Alaska statehood," Stevens said in the 1977 interview. "We never let a press conference go by without getting someone to try to ask him about statehood." Newspapers were also a targeted, according to Stevens. "We planted editorials in weeklies and dailies and newspapers in the district of people we thought were opposed to us or states where they were opposed to us so that suddenly they were thinking twice about opposing us."

The Alaska Statehood Act became law with Eisenhower's signature on July 7, 1958, and Alaska formally was admitted to statehood on January 3, 1959, when Eisenhower signed the Alaska Statehood Proclamation."   {Wiki}

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: robomatic
Date: 05 Aug 07 - 05:20 PM

In downtown Anchorage, A and C streets, main drags into town from the South, turn into, or share their names, with the term "Eisenhower Corridor" which was superimposed over the more common street names, I heard due to the obstreperous pesterings of some ancient buddy of Ike, who indeed signed Alaska into Statehood which became legal in 1959 as the 49th State in the Union. Schools in the Continental US for as much as twenty years after the event maintained their classroom 48 star flags as battalions of mathematicians went to the mats to determine how many rows and columns it would take to line up 50 stars on the blue field of the flag. They at last solved it when IBM was able to sell the government a computer a quarter the size of the pentagon. Since that time, the prospect of an additional State coming into the fold keeps them up at night, figuring how to make 51 stars fit in some nice kind of rectangle (3 rows of 17 would use up the whole top part of the flag) I think they are waiting for two stars to come in at once, which is what we call the "Two State Solution."

The Alaska Statehood Monument is just a block down from where I work, it consists of a gruntled President Eisenhower, cut off at the thighs, with an unfurled scroll over one shoulder and a vaguely constipated look as he tries to ignore the GIANT EAGLE STANDING ON HIS NECK.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Ebbie
Date: 05 Aug 07 - 06:31 PM

"Schools in the Continental US for as much as twenty years after the event maintained their classroom 48 star flags as battalions of mathematicians went to the mats to determine how many rows and columns it would take to line up 50 stars on the blue field of the flag."

robomatic, I think you are mistaken.

Go to

The Designer of Flags

and you'll see that even the 50-star flag design was ready *before* Alaska and Hawaii were accepted as states. Alaska flew its 49-star for only a short time because Hawaii became a state just a year later.

I lived in Oregon at the time and I remember when the new flags came on.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: pdq
Date: 05 Aug 07 - 08:17 PM

robomatic,

Your link shows the Alaska Statehood Monument not to be very flattering. Perhaps the thing does not photograph well. Perhaps eagles have become boring through overuse in patriotic venues.

Maybe we should replace the statue portion with a Benny Bufano bear. May I suggest the followong:

                                  more like it

Also, I hope you are not sugesting that the shortcomings of the memorial are president Eisenhower's since a memorialusually requires that the person be dead at the time of construction.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 05 Aug 07 - 11:54 PM

"...Stevens hired Margaret Atwood,"

             A famous name in literary circles; any relation?


    '"Stevens and the younger Atwood created file cards on members of Congress based on "whether they were Rotarians or Kiwanians or Catholics or Baptists and veterans or loggers, the whole thing,"'


                      Sounds like J. Edgar Hoover.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: robomatic
Date: 06 Aug 07 - 12:21 AM

Sounds like smart politics.

Ebbie: Maybe it was going to school in parsimonious Puritanical New England, but most of our classroom flags had 48 States. (I suspect the one that flew outside the school had the updated number)

It's the 49 State flags that I've never seen.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Ebbie
Date: 06 Aug 07 - 12:24 AM

Pretty much all I know about the Atwoods is that Robert Atwood was the publisher of the Anchorage Times, a newspaper; Evangeline Atwood, his wife was a published writer. They are both dead. But they were known as a politically conservative family.

A gossipy tidbit: The current corruption scandal and investigation in Alaska involves a man who was the most recent publisher of Atwood's Times segment, Bill Allen of VECO. Allen and his business have pleaded guilty to bribing a number of Alaska's legislators.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 06 Aug 07 - 09:46 PM

It's kind of like capturing the radio station in a banana republic. But the newspaper before you get ready to rip off the public, then you can control the local dialogue anyway. Too bad it went national.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Ebbie
Date: 07 Aug 07 - 12:19 AM

lol Robo, there are a lot of 49-star flags in Alaska. The house museum (The House of Wickersham) where I lived and worked for years has two of them, alone. Ruth Allman, Judge Wickersham's wife's niece and the one who saved the House used to fly one of them outside the house. Couldn't do that nowadays. They'd be flying down the street with a passerby, I suspect.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 07 Aug 07 - 07:07 PM

I don't recall ever seeing a 49 star flag. They way I remember it, it seemed like Alaska and Hawaii became states at the same time.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Ebbie
Date: 07 Aug 07 - 07:14 PM

Alaska statehood: January 3, 1959
Hawaii statehood: August 21, 1959

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 07 Aug 07 - 09:59 PM

In any event, it seems like they were both states by the time Francis Gary Powers got shot down over the Soviet Union.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Ebbie
Date: 07 Aug 07 - 10:20 PM

Huh? Powers was shot down in 1960 - but the relevance?

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: robomatic
Date: 08 Aug 07 - 02:39 AM

EIGHT STARS OF GOLD ON A FIELD OF BLUE............

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 08 Aug 07 - 07:54 AM

"Huh? Powers was shot down in 1960 - but the relevance?"


               Only context. Sorry, I was pretty young at the time and I guess I was just thinking out loud.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Ebbie
Date: 08 Aug 07 - 12:30 PM

Alasks's flag. May it mean to you...

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 08 Aug 07 - 02:34 PM

Are we talking about Alaska's state flag, or the 49 star flag, or...? And not being an Alaskan, I'm not sure...

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Ebbie
Date: 08 Aug 07 - 03:00 PM

Alaska's state song, Riginslinger. It's fun, and rather moving, to sing.

Eight stars of gold on a field of blue -
Alaska's flag. May it mean to you
The blue of the sea, the evening sky,
The mountain lakes, and the flow'rs nearby;
The gold of the early sourdough's dreams,
The precious gold of the hills and streams;
The brilliant stars in the northern sky,
The "Bear" - the "Dipper" - and, shining high,
The great North Star with its steady light,
Over land and sea a beacon bright.
Alaska's flag - to Alaskans dear,
The simple flag of a last frontier.

Subject: RE: BS: Senator Ted Stevens
From: Riginslinger
Date: 08 Aug 07 - 03:52 PM

Very nice. Thanks. I'll print it out.

            Of course, now, instead of sourdoughs you've got Ted Stevens.