sen ted stevens

The whole investigation into the handling of the late Ted Stevens prosecution took a really interesting turn this weekend:

One of the prosecutors who handled the corruption trial of Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens committed suicide over the weekend, according to his lawyer.

Justice Department prosecutor Nicholas Marsh and five others have been the subject of an investigation by the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility over their handling of the Stevens case, which the Justice Department ultimately dropped amid charges the government did not properly share evidence with Stevens' defense attorneys. The judge in the Stevens case also ordered a special prosecutor to look into it.

Bob Luskin, an attorney for Marsh, told CNN Marsh killed himself but did not provide details. "It did seem he was overwhelmed by the emotional cost of this investigation," said Luskin. According to the attorney, Marsh was in his late 30s.

And for those that can’t remember before 2009, this case was handled by the Bush DOJ, a DOJ that had a lot of questionable practices and was accused of being “politicized”. The final report on this investigation should read like a John Grisham novel.

Poor Ted Stevens:

Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens dropped further behind Democrat Mark Begich in his re-election bid Tuesday as the convicted felon's 85th birthday became a grueling wait that could determine whether his decades-long hold on power is over.

The longest-serving Republican in the history of the Senate trailed the Anchorage mayor by 2,374 votes out of 290,198 counted as election officials continued tallying absentee and other ballots. Begich had led by about 1,000 votes before Tuesday's count.

Things are looking very good for Begich. Every time new numbers come out of Alaska, he moves further out in the lead.

Just now breaking on MSNBC. More as the details come out.

UPDATE 1:
The DOJ will be holding a news conference at 1:20pm est today to discuss the charges returned by the grand jury.

UPDATE 2 (and bumped)

A PDF of the indictment is available here. The news conference is just now starting (1/2 hour late).

Looks like the senior Republican in the Senate is in some big trouble.

When you think about last year's deadly hurricane season, you also must think about the environment. They do go hand in hand and we hear warnings all the time that our Earth is passing the point of no return. Global warming is a serious issue that requires serious actions.

So how does Senate address this serious issue? They do so by holding the results of global warming hostage. In exchange they want something that will also increase global warming and devastate our environment even more.

A last-minute deal to secure the vote of Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) on a $2.8 trillion budget plan has given new life to the Republican drive to open Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling.

The budget blueprint for fiscal 2007, which will begin in October, includes a $10 billion Gulf Coast restoration fund that would be financed from the leasing of arctic refuge drilling rights, revenue from new drilling in the Outer Continental Shelf of the Gulf of Mexico and further sales of the broadcast spectrum. With that provision in hand, Landrieu cast the only Democratic vote for the budget resolution, which squeaked through Thursday night, 51 to 49.