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Wednesday, August 30, 2006
Sen. Stevens, Come on Down!
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It's official - the secret hold on S. 2590 is none other than Sen. Ted "Series of Tubes" Stevens (R-AK). Sen. Stevens is the former chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee and all around Senate curmudgeon. What's interesting about the fact that Stevens put a hold on the bill is his rationale. According to Stevens' spokesman Aaron Saunders, the Senator is worried "that the bill would create more bureaucracy. He wants to see a cost-benefit analysis."
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Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK)
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That explanation seems unlikely given Stevens' track record. What is more likely is Stevens was trying to stick it to Coburn. Stevens is famous for a temper-tantrum he threw on the Senate floor last fall over what he considered was a "betrayal" by his colleagues. Stevens was angry at his fellow Senators - particularly Sen. Coburn (R-OK) - who refused to allow the "bridge to nowhere" earmark to remain in legislation after extensive negative publicity. Stevens even went so far as to say he would resign from the Senate and perhaps even "be taken out of here on a stretcher."
Stevens' office denies the hold was a secret, but you could have fooled me (and a number of highly trafficed blogs). Stevens apparently had objections to the bill for a while, but neglected to attend any of the hearings or markup of the legislation despite sitting on the committee of jurisdiction. How can this be seen as anything other that political payback? There's certainly more than one reason Sen. Stevens might be upset with his Oklahoma counterpart.
Posted by Adam Hughes
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