So Long Uncle Ted

Wednesday, November 19th, 2008

Convicted felon, Ted “Uncle Ted” Stevens, R-Alaska has lost his re-election bid to Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich. (Source) This win, moves the Democrats incrementally closer to the magic number of 60, a filibuster proof majority. Two more senate seats are still undecided, and the Dems have a 56 to 40 lead over the Republicans and with two Independents who caucus with them, their total is 58.

One of those independents, Joe Lieberman got to keep his gavel in the Homeland Security Committee, so he will continue to caucus with the Democrats, though there is still much anger on the left towards him.

The remaining two races from the 2008 general election are in Georgia and Minnesota. In Georgia incumbent Saxby Chambliss failed to get over 50% of the vote, so an automatic run-off election was triggered by state law. The Democrats feel that their candidate Jim Martin has a real shot in the run-off election, and he’s being supported by party luminaries Bill Clinton and Al Gore traveling to Georgia to campaign for him. Additionally immediately after the presidential campaign was concluded all 25 Georgia field offices of the Obama campaign were converted to Martin offices. (Source)

In Minnesota Norm Coleman was the apparent winner by 215 votes, but an automatic re-count begins today of all 2.9 million votes. The recount is triggered when a candidate leads by less than 1/2 of 1 percent after all votes are tallied. Additionally Al Franken is challenging the vote totals in 49 of Minnesota’s 87 counties saying that many votes were excluded that should not have been. (Source)

Franken has a good chance with his appeal to count improperly excluded votes, since Minnesota election law favors voter intent over machine readability. That means that as many as 24,000 votes that did not register for the senate, could be re-tabulated.

Coleman’s campaign contends that those 24,000 people voted for president, but did not take a stand on the senate race. (Source)

Tags: Al Franken, Al Gore, Bill Clinton, Filibuster, Jim Martin, Mark Begich, Norm Coleman, Saxby Chambliss, Senate Race, Ted Stevens
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Sen. Ted “Tubes” Stevens Bringing Trouble for GOP

Tuesday, July 29th, 2008

Disgraced Alaskan Senator Ted “Series of Tubes” Stevens has been formally indicted, and faces serious jail time, for taking $250,000 in graft gifts from Big Oil and not reporting it.

The 84 year old Senator, the longest serving Republican in history, faces serious charges:

The indictment charges Stevens with failing to report on his financial disclosure forms $250,000 in “things of value” including remodeling work on his home, a Viking grill and a sweetheart deal on a Land Rover.

The indictment further alleges that “during the same time he was concealing his continued receipt of these things of value from VECO and [VECO executive Bill J.] Allen,” that Stevens “received solicitations for official actions from Allen and other VECO employees, and that Sen. Stevens used his position and office on behalf of VECO during that same time period.”

In exchange, according to the indictment, the oil services company asked Stevens for help with company projects in Pakistan and Russia, as well as a National Science Foundation grant to a VECO subsidiary. - Source

But the trouble with Ted extends beyond Alaska, into the GOP congressional campaign, and possibly even McCain’s presidential aspirations.

“This is very bad for the party,” a retiring Senate Republican told Politico as news of Ted Stevens’ indictment echoed across Capitol Hill on Tuesday. “The timing on this couldn’t be worse.” - Source

Tags: Alaska, Corruption, Graft, Republicans, Ted Stevens
Posted in Election 08, Politics | No Comments »