Thu Feb 09 2012

Rhonda Chriss Lokeman

Ted's most excellent misadventures
August 4, 2007

When the feds raided the Alaska home of Sen. Ted Stevens, perhaps no one was more surprised than the U.S. senator himself. Fifteen federal agents showed up.

            Not cool at all, given all Stevens has done for Big Oil and Bush-Cheney Inc.

            The Republican lawmaker's coziness with energy execs is exceeded only by the vice president's. To be caught in a federal criminal probe involving Alaska lawmakers and VECO Corp., must have caught Stevens off guard. In the Senate, Stevens is the patron saint of Big Oil.

            Remember when Dick Cheney made a big executive-privilege stink to protect his oil industry cronies from public scrutiny? Cheney believes the public doesn't have a right to know who is helping to shape U.S. energy policy.

            Stevens would agree, although he never really hid his chumminess with Big Oil. He walked the walk and talked the talk.

            In 2005, he brusquely kept Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell and other senators from having oil executives sworn in before testimony on Capitol Hill. Execs from Exxon, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Shell and BP were called to answer to a Senate committee about high profits versus high fuel costs for consumers.

            Washington state's Cantwell wanted the executives to do what others have done when they have testified on Capitol Hill. But Stevens pulled rank as chair of the powerful Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee. Not on his watch would these VIPPs (very important petroleum providers) be made to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help them God.

            If secret dealings with energy execs were good enough for One-Beer Dick, you'd think they would be good enough for Senator Ted, one of the Bushvolk's apparatchiks.

            That's probably what Ted Stevens thought, too.

            But the recent raid of his home by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Internal Revenue Service -- as part of a larger criminal probe involving Alaskan lawmakers -- proved otherwise.

            Stevens hasn't been charged with a crime, but this is not the sort of inconvenience one would expect to be directed at a person responsible for helping the oil industry receive billions of dollars in tax breaks from Congress.

            The federal probe had hit close to home earlier when it ensnared Stevens' son, Alaska state Sen. Ben Stevens. But when the feds came back, they actually came to the elder Stevens' home. The Justice Department is investigating how Stevens' property doubled in size and whether there is a VECO connection.

            No way did Ted Stevens see this coming.

            This was the reward he got for making Alaska the leading state in the nation in per capita federal funding, much of it from the energy industry?

            This was his reward for calling Cantwell a "bad apple in the basket''?

            This is his thanks for keeping a straight face when he equated denials of drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge with denials of aid for Katrina victims?

            Though a lesser player in the Bush administration's oilogopoly, Ted Stevens does have the distinction of being the longest-serving Republican in Senate history. He fully and shamelessly supported the Bushvolk agenda of needlessly and ridiculously enriching the oil barons at the expense of taxpayers. Remember the bridge to nowhere?

            If anyone should have immunity from persecution and prosecution for oily dealings, he should, right?

            Stevens' response to the government's recent search and seizure of his manse was out of character. Typically he would rant, rave and intimidate. He demurred instead.

            "I continue to believe this investigation should proceed to its conclusion without any appearance that I have attempted to influence its outcome,'' he said.

            Sounds a bit like Duke Cunningham before the fall.

            Some might find a similar fate for Stevens to be "most excellent.'' That "bad apple'' in Washington who believes in good government, for one.

            Rhonda Chriss Lokeman (lokeman@kcstar.com) is a columnist for The Kansas City Star. To find out more about Rhonda Chriss Lokeman and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com. COPYRIGHT 2007 CREATORS SYNDICATE INC.

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Rhonda Chriss Lokeman

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September 9, 2007

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"Forbidden channel"
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"More crony baloney"
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