Good news for Republicans! Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) Indicted
WASHINGTON (CNN) — Sen. Ted Stevens declared his innocence Tuesday after his indictment on charges that he concealed hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of gifts and services from a company in his home state.
“My public service began when I served in World War II. It saddens me to learn that these charges have been brought against me. … I am innocent of these charges and intend to prove that,” Stevens said in a statement released by his office.
In the indictment, Stevens is charged with lying about receiving gifts worth more than $250,000 from Veco, an Alaska-based energy company on whose behalf he intervened in Washington.
Nice use of the WWII card by Stevens. That’s not gonna fly. It didn’t work for another corrupt GOP member of congress, the legendary Vietnam fighter pilot Duke Cunningham.
This guy is the poster child for a GOP that has gone off the rails since the 1994 “revolution”. Arrogant. Entitled. Proud of his wasteful spending. In short, he’s part of the problem.
On the plus side, he did provide some high comedy, with his unforgettable description of the Internet,
“It’s a series of tubes!”
As Bruce McQuain said at QandO,
Frankly, we need to see a few more of these arrogant yahoos who abuse their power and the intent of their office to be frog marched off to jail. And Stevens will be a nice start.
Good riddance to Ted Stevens. The GOP, and the senate, are better off without him.
UPDATE: Eagle eyed Jake Tapper at ABC News has highlighted his favorite nugget in the Stevens indictment,
But my favorite detail from the indictment — in the Spring of 1999, the indictment alleges, the CEO of oil services company VECO, Bill Allen, traded Stevens a brand new 1999 Land Rover Discovery, worth about $44,000, for Stevens’ 1964 1/2 Ford Mustang and $5,000.
Stevens’ Mustang was at the time worth less than $20,000, the indictment says.