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In the immediate future, Ted’s on the ballot, the election is a week away, and he’s claiming he’s really innocent.
It is highly unlikely that Ted-the-Felon will spend any time in prison. There were enough potential prosecutorial errors that he’ll likely get an appeal, and they’ll ask for a long court date. If the conviction stands at that point, Ted would probably be 86, and I don’t know of a case where someone gets incarcerated for white collar crime at that age. Sometimes you may see a case of an elderly person getting arrested and “taken to jail”, but those are normally local jail cases, not prison cases, and the term is a matter of hours or days. And of course, a crime-against-a-person, like murder, would be different. But hey, this is a transformational year, so the possibility of jail time is probably 5%.
Another option is a Bush pardon. Maybe house arrest. But the immediate question is whether or not he gets re-elected, and, if so, does he get to hold his Senate seat.
There was a real dearth of chatter last night. Remember when this all started, Ted asked his colleagues to ride it out with him, he was innocent. According to Politico, the Senate ethics committee won’t do anything until the case plays out. Now, THAT Senate won’t be the same Senate that would make the decision in January, but it’s still a clubby place. Harry Reid has left any current decision to the Republicans, and Mitch McConnell is wont to take any action at all. Daniel Inouye still believes Ted is innocent. It would take a 2/3 vote to oust him.
About the only statement was from Spunky who did NOT say whether she’d be voting for him.
In the DCW survey, 50% of you felt that Stevens would be found guilty, and that Begich would win the seat. So what do you think now? (Sorry about that last choice, but it is an option…)
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