FBI, IRS Raid Home of Sen. Ted Stevens

A while back we discussed the corruption investigation aimed at Alaska Sen. Ted "series of tubes" Stevens. A number of readers sent us word that the home of Sen. Stevens was raided earlier today by agents of the FBI and the IRS. The focus of the raid was a remodeling project at Stevens's home and the involvement of VECO, an oil company.

You explain technology to the masses...

...and this is the thanks you get.

Re:You explain technology to the masses...

Yeah, a perfectly good career down the tubes.

Burn in hell, Joe Sixpack.

Hey Ted

Just think of a men's Federal prison as a bunch of tubes.

Please don't joke about prison ass-rape.

I know a lot of people think it's a funny idea, but prison sodomy is actually not very funny at all. It can lead to the transmission of AIDS, HIV, or other diseases. It can lead to a destroyed psyche. There is, of course, the brutal physical damage it causes. So it's really not humorous at all.

Re:That's why its called Prison...

...soooo, a guy who steals a tv should be ass-raped for it?

Re:That's why its called Prison...

...soooo, a guy who steals a tv should be ass-raped for it?

As long as anybody who gets raped also gets a free TV, that's logical.

Re:That's why its called Prison...

I think it depends on what kind of person you want to come back from prison after his term is over. The way we generally do it, it is a wonder that the recividism rate is not much, much higher because the prisoners aren't rehabilitated much at all.

If you want a prisoner to come out who is neither predator nor preyed upon and who is ready to rejoin society in a responsible manner, then their prison sentences need to be spent in a way that furthers that goal. That means that their prison life needs to be as close to normal as possible. That includes education and job training to enable them to live productively on the outside.

I really don't think anyone should be released from jail or prison until they at least have a GED.

Make prison life reasonably normal instead of a concrete jungle with life threatening dangers at every turn and you will save a lot of money as well because of the reduction in the costs of keeping a prisoner there and because of a lower recividsm rate afterwards.

People are sent to prison as punishment, not for punishment.

Re:That's why its called Prison...

But jails are a private enterprise, and by lowering the recidivism rate, they are getting rid of their cash flow. The prisons aren't interested in rehabilitating people, and the health insurance companies aren't interested in providing health care. That's what happens when things that should be socially funded get turned into a money making scheme.

Re:Hey Ted

What's he done for your state other than spend decades loading down bills with pork barrel amendments that do nothing but funnel our tax dollars up to you in the form of subsidies for just living in Alaska? Oh yeah, he built his multi-million dollar bridge to an island with a total population of 40. He got the government to lighten up wildlife protection laws so big oil can drill holes all over your state, and he....well, what else *has* he done?

There is no logical reason he is the head of the telecommunications committee. One would think the head of a technologically based committee would at least understand the technology. Instead we get a corrupt old fool who can't even function as an effective mouthpiece for the various industries who pay to keep their parrot in power. So instead of a technologically advanced telecommunications infrastructure in this country we're stuck with crap like tubes & trucks analogies, Sen. Ted wanting to be able to port his landline # to his cell phone with the flip of a switch so he can answer calls to that number while riding his motorcycle and him calling for full internet filtering to ban child pornography so the kids don't get targeted by pedophiles.

Let's break those three gems from your corrupt hero, shall we?

No, the internet isn't a truck. It isn't a series of tubes, either. It's a distributed packet switched network. That's not too hard to say, now is it?

Who in the hell would ask for a landline switch so he could talk on his cell phone using his home number while riding his motorcycle? Last time I checked it took two hands to control a motorcycle...you know that whole steering, braking, throttle, and clutch system motorcycles have. Who cares if Teddy runs over a bunch of innocent kids as long as he can talk on his phone!

Speaking of those innocent kids, explain to me how blocking pictures of child pornography is going to keep predators from trying to solicit children online? The two items aren't directly related. There's also those sticky issues of a nationwide internet filter being both simultaneously uninforceable and UNCONSTITUIONAL. Of course the legality of the idea and the fact that it's been shot down on numerous other occasions (COPA I and II, anyone?) won't stop pork-barrel Ted from wasting our tax dollars in an ultimately failed attempt to get the thing to a vote.

And now, on top of this it turns out he got the square footage of his house doubled as a bribe from an oil industry insider who was convicted of bribing officials. Who cares about laws and regulations when it means a bigger rumpus room?!

Seriously, how can you respect that man? He's as corrupt as the day is long. Or, do you just respect the money he's been taking away from the national interest and funneling to you all these years?

Nice Line from Stevens

"As a practical matter, I will tell you. We paid every bill that was given to us," Stevens told reporters. "Every bill that was sent to us has been paid, personally, with our own money, and that's all there is to it. It's our own money."

My BS detector just went off the charts.

The obvious question is: What about the bills that weren't sent to you?
To me, that seems to be the heart of the investigation.

Re:Nice Line from Stevens

And here [talkingpointsmemo.com] is a nice video explaining the whole VECO scandal.

It doesn't look good for Ted.

Taxes

People in Alaksa don't pay taxes. The government PAYS people that live in Alaksa to live there. I'm moving to Alaksa, along with all the other losers.

I don't think I'll make it as far as Alaksa. Probably stop in British Columbia.

Seriously!

The government PAYS people that live in Alaksa to live there.

Seriously ?

Seriously.

The money collected from other sources (notably north slope oil pumping and transport) are far more than the state government needs for its own function.

Rather than finding new ways to waste it, the more-than-slightly libertarian-leaning politicians decided to do away with other taxes - notably income and property tax.

But they still had a big surplus. So they decided to distribute it to the citizens. Even a libertarian can support this as a move in the right direction, since most of the money comes from selling off a resource "owned in common by the citizens of the state". If the government sells it, the citizen-owners should each get their share of the proceeds, right?

Re:Taxes

The government doesn't "pay" us to live here (I live in Juneau, Alaska). The people receive a portion of the proceeds from the exploitation of our primary natural resource, oil; which is only fair, considering it's our resource.

But as an Inuit, don't you get upset that the other Americans call it "their" resource?

He's the victim.

You can't blame Ted Stevens here. If his understanding of federal corruption laws is anything like his understanding of Net Neutrality, he probably thought all those free upgrades to his house were perfectly legal.

/sarcasm

It's not a truck! ...

... It's a series of frauds!

Need to change campaign laws

The Ted Steven's type politician will not go away until campaign contributions are permitted only from registered voters from a candidate's district. I should be permitted to give money to only those candidates I am allowed to vote for.

how funny

They give the 2 republicans notice that they were under investigation, and then several weeks later do a "surprise" raid. What do you bet that all evidence had LONG disappeared. I would not be the least bit surprised to find out that the senator (and shortly the congressman), got notice of when and where the "surprise" raid would occur. Just imagine if they had done this with the Lousiana congressman jefferson. All that bribe money would have disappeared.

What we really need is to end "Politician"...

As a career choice. People who want to be in politics are probably the last people you want in charge. I say we double the pay for every single elected position in the country, halve the term periods, and appoint people (meeting certain criteria, 25 years old, HS diploma, US citizen) to every single position based on a lottery system at whatever level (local, state, federal) the position is for. Power corrupts, absolutely, and those seeking power are probably already corrupt. Things would be a lot more effective if average people whose friends and neighbors have a vested interest in whats going on were in power. And with shorter term limits, even if someone terrible got appointed, they wouldnt be there for long enough to do all the much damage. Not to mention they would probably focus more on the job at hand. How much time do politicos spend on their re-election campaigns vs actual work?

Re:Conspiracy nutjob Ron Paul was Re:Power corrupt

Yeah...damn the fact that he made his career as a successful doctor before his run in politics. Oh and there is that whole retired veteran thing...then there is that pesky business of being a fiscal conservative. But he says we hold some responsibility for the attacks (go read your history book please, we have been screwing with the governments of the middle east for AGES) and that criminal scum Ghouliani (worth $7k at divorce but $30 million after 9/11) says he hates America and receives rounds of applause from moron kneejerk "towelhead" hating nutjobs.

It is depressing to me that the media spins him as some psycho conspiracy nut and even more that people believe it. In the meantime we readily cheer on our warhawks who dodged the service and then vote for war, and then call those who served a full 20 cowards for voting against it.

Re:The same man...

"...the other would have connected a city of 300,000 people and skyrocketing property prices to a large area of undeveloped land."

I see. And this second bridge, unlike the first, is a not a bridge to "nowhere" because it connects to a large area of ...undeveloped, unoccupied land?

Thanks for clarifying.

We wouldn't want the real estate developers to have to finance their own development. Nosiree! That's what hard working american men and women are for... to finance real estate development that they'd never be able to afford themselves.

Go to hell, much? Thanks, bye.

Re:The same man...

The first transcontinental railroad was never a "railroad to nowhere". It was built twenty years after millions of people had already moved to the west coast of the United States.

Re:The same man...

Wait a minute. Why is it flamebait to declare that Republicans are opposed to taxes but still want to spend tax money on their pet projects. Am I wrong? Since WWII the U.S. debt has increased 3.2% per year under Democratic presidents and 9.7% per year under Republican administrations.

Re:The same man...

And by the way, do you know why it is going to cost $315 million for a bridge going across a 2000 ft waterway? Because the people didn't want it to affect cruise ships using the waterway (even though it would only cause them to go about 30 miles to circumnavigate the island) and because the planners refuse to use the shortest path to the airport. In any reasonable place they wouldn't decide to build a suspension bridge. They would use a truss bridge or a cantilever bridge with narrow spans for $5-$10 million and tell the damn cruise ships to go around. That is, unless the federal government was paying for it.

Re:News for Nerds?

So you're suggesting that it's illogical to support Al Gore but to condemn Ted Stevens? That's interesting.

On the one hand, you have an old, corrupt fool who doesn't even understand what the word "internet" means and on the other hand you have a guy who may reasonably be called one of the most visionary mainstream politicians of our time, given his proactive, leading-edge involvement in both the internet and environmental issues.

Thanks for getting that infamous Gore quote straight. Here's a little more info from Snopes:

It is true, though, that Gore was popularizing the term "information superhighway" in the early 1990s (although he did not, as is often claimed by others, coin the phrase himself) when few people outside academia or the computer/defense industries had heard of the Internet, and he sponsored the 1988 National High-Performance Computer Act (which established a national computing plan and helped link universities and libraries via a shared network) and cosponsored the Information Infrastructure and Technology Act of 1992 (which opened the Internet to commercial traffic).

I think the worst you can say about Gore's involvement with the internet is that he played an instrumental role in transforming it from an academic/military tool into the thing that you and I are arguing on right now. However you want to describe it, it's no small accomplishment.

Now compare that to Ted Stevens' accomplishments. ...chirp... ...chirp... ...chirp...

By the way, since Gore was "involved in plenty of scandals", you should have no problem citing them and recounting whether or not he was vindicated.