Senator Stevens: Resign now

One of my least favorite--and there are so many to choose from--senators in Washington is Ted Stevens (R-AK). One of his best known projects was the "Bridge to Nowhere."

After a fatal Minnesota bridge collapse last year, John McCain used the example of the "Bridge to Nowhere" as an example of what is wrong with "business as usual" in Washington, as Alaska Report tells us:

Maybe, maybe the 200,000 people who cross that bridge every day would have been safer than spending 233 million of your tax dollars on a bridge in Alaska on an island with 50 people on it," he said, visibly upset. "What do you think we could have done with that $233 million that we spent to go to the bridge to nowhere - bridge to nowhere.

AP reports:

Sen. Ted Stevens, the longest-serving Republican senator and a figure in Alaska politics since before statehood, has been indicted on seven counts of falsely reporting hundreds of thousands of dollars in services he received from a company that helped renovate his home.

Stevens, 84, has been dogged by a federal investigation into whether he pushed for fishing legislation that also benefited his son, an Alaska lobbyist.

From May 1999 to August 2007, prosecutors said Stevens concealed "his continuing receipt of hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of things of value from a private corporation." The indictment released Tuesday said the items included: home improvements to his vacation home in Alaska, including a new first floor, garage, wraparound deck, plumbing, electrical wiring; as well as car exchanges, a Viking gas grill, furniture and tools.

With the understandable public focus on high energy prices, much attention has been paid to developing wind power. But in 2006, Stevens tag-teamed with Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA) in an attempt to block the proposed Cape Wind project in Nantucket Sound, near the Kennedy family compound in Hyannis Port.

By the way, what is Barack Obama's stand on Cape Wind? McCain supports it.

Stevens should resign from the Senate immediately. He is up for reelection, but the deadline for the indicted senator to remove his name from the Republican Primary ballot has passed. Alaskans need to have someone else represent them in Washington.

Buh-bye, Ted.

Technorati tags: wind renewable energy Massachusetts wind power elections McCain Republican Cape Wind Barack Obama Obama Ted Stevens Alaska corruption