Ted Stevens Dies in Plane Crash

A couple of years ago, I wrote a lot about former Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens — his unsuccessful fight against ethics charges, his last election campaign and the protracted ballot counting in Alaska that left the outcome up in the air for a couple of weeks.

Stevens, of course, lost the 2008 election by nearly 4,000 votes and returned to Alaska, presumably to live out his days in retirement after serving in the Senate longer than any other Republican. And I haven't written about him since.

Even though he was 85 years old on the day Alaska finished counting its ballots, most people probably assumed his retirement would be a long one. He was elderly, but he was in good health and, the reasoning continued, there was no reason why anyone should think he would not be around for awhile.

But it was not to be.

He died during the night in a plane crash in his home state. As I write this, details are trickling in. At the moment, it appears that nine people were on board the plane and five, including Stevens, were killed. Former NASA administrator Sean O'Keefe also was on board the plane, but there has been no word yet about his fate.

In the wild and untamed regions of Alaska, about the only way to travel from one place to another, even in those few months of each year when snow is not on the ground, is by air. That's a fact of life. There are people in Alaska who make their living running air taxi services, and anyone who ever watched the TV series Northern Exposure in the 1990s knows how crucial air travel was in those days — and still is — for postal carriers.

And it's another fact of life that plane crashes happen in Alaska. I'm not talking about the huge jets that cross the globe routinely every day. I'm talking about small, private planes, and they go down for all sorts of reasons.

It is said that Stevens' plane was brought down by bad weather. Sometimes, I guess, the vast Alaskan horizon can play tricks on even the most experienced pilot. And not all the pilots who try to travel through portions of the state, much of it still frontier, are as experienced as they should be.

Alaskan plane crashes don't always take the lives of prominent people, but sometimes they do. Stevens and his first wife were in a plane crash in 1978. Stevens' wife was killed; he was injured. Six years earlier, Rep. Nick Begich, the father of the man who unseated Stevens in 2008, was killed along with House colleague Hale Boggs, who served on the Warren Commission that investigated the assassination of John F. Kennedy.

And, in what may have been the most notorious Alaskan plane crash, humorist Will Rogers was killed 75 years ago this Sunday.

Alaska is a rugged land. It took rugged people to settle it, but no one, no matter how rugged, can conquer it.

A plane ride in Alaska has never been routine, even if a skilled pilot could make it seem so. Stevens represented the state in the U.S. Senate for 40 years. In all those elections, he must have known the risks involved in statewide travel.

That is probably little comfort to Stevens' family on this day.

But that's the way it is.

Missouri's a Bellwether No More; Stevens Concedes

Today was one of those days for which the phrase "when hell freezes over" was created.

And, until this year, Missouri seemed to be the inspiration for the word "bellwether."

The last time Missouri voted for the losing candidate in a presidential election was 1956 — when the state supported Adlai Stevenson against President Dwight Eisenhower. And before that, you had to go back to the turn of the century to find the last time Missouri supported the losing candidate.

It only happens once in an average lifetime so if you have young children, they might live to see the next time that Missouri doesn't vote for the winner. But, unless you plan to live another 50 years or more, don't count on witnessing it yourself.

I don't know why Missouri didn't vote for Ike in 1956. The voters there supported him four years earlier, and he faced the same opponent in 1952. Perhaps the people of Missouri at that time were concerned about his age and the state of his health.

If that was the case, those concerns were not part of the equation half a century later. McCain is older than Eisenhower was, and he's had a couple of well-documented battles with cancer.

Anyway, today, more than two weeks after the election, Missouri was finally declared for McCain. The Republican nominee carried the state by 3,632 votes.

There was another "hell freezes over" moment today.

Republican Sen. Ted Stevens, who has represented Alaska in the U.S. Senate for four decades, issued a statement conceding to Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich.

"My staff and I stand willing to help [Begich] prepare for his new position," said Stevens' statement.

It's been more than 30 years since Alaska sent a Democrat to the U.S. Senate.

Two other Senate races remain unresolved — in Minnesota and Georgia. If Democrats prevail in both of them, the party will have its "filibuster-proof" majority.

A runoff is scheduled for Dec. 2 in Georgia. Former President Bill Clinton was in Atlanta to campaign for the Democratic candidate today.

And, in Minnesota, a state-mandated recount began today — but observers say it could continue until mid-December.

Stevens Looks Like a Goner

CNN hasn't made a projection yet — perhaps it will sometime this evening — but it's nearly 7:30 p.m. Central time (which means it's about 4:30 p.m. in Alaska), and, based on the latest news from Alaska, it looks like Sen. Ted Stevens' 40-year Senate career is coming to an end.

When the day began, Alaska still had approximately 24,000 ballots to count. As I write this, the Anchorage Daily News reports that election officials have counted roughly two-thirds of those ballots, and Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich's lead has grown from 1,022 votes when the day started to 2,374 votes.

If it's true that only about 8,000 votes remain to be counted, that means Stevens would have to receive about 5,200 of them to win the election.

In other words, a candidate who hasn't even received 50% of the nearly 300,000 votes that have been counted now must receive nearly two-thirds of the ballots that are left.

It's far from over, though.

"Today's count should pretty much decide the race," reports the Anchorage Daily News, "although there will be overseas absentees to count over the next couple days and a likely recount in early December."

But don't spend too much time pondering that word "recount." The "filibuster-proof" majority should remain a possibility.

"Since the state moved to mostly machine counting, recent Alaska recounts have resulted in little change in the final tally," writes the Daily News.

Incidentally ...

I know it's fashionable these days to blame anyone else for your loss at the ballot box.

But let's be clear about this. Stevens brought this defeat on himself.

There was nothing anyone — George W. Bush, John McCain, Sarah Palin, even Ronald Reagan himself — could do to prevent it.

Judgment Day

Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens turns 85 today.

And we've been assured that Alaska intends to finish counting the last 24,000 ballots from the general election today.

So Stevens' future truly hangs in the balance on his birthday.

November 18 has long been a judgment day.

In 1302, the pope proclaimed that "there is one holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, outside of which there is neither salvation nor remission of sins."

Talk about a judgment day.

In 1307, William Tell successfully shot an apple on his son's head. That may qualify as more of a leap of faith — at least on his son's part.

Nine years ago today, a dozen students were killed and more than two dozen students were injured when the traditional massive Aggie bonfire that was being constructed for the annual Texas-Texas A&M football game collapsed.

And 30 years ago today, Jim Jones led more than 900 members of his People's Temple to commit suicide in Jonestown, Guyana.

I will never forget that weekend. Nov. 18 was on a Saturday that year. I was a freshman in college, living on campus — blissfully unaware of things like the People's Temple.

In those days, I worked as a cashier at a self-service gas station as a way of paying for part of my living expenses. And I guess I must have been at work when Jones' followers were murdering the investigator, Congressman Leo Ryan (pictured at right), and members of his entourage and when, back at the compound, Jones told his congregation what had happened and urged them to drink the poisoned "Flavor-Aid."

I don't know when the news of what had happened in the jungle of South America reached North America. I just know that the first I heard of it was the following morning, when I went to the cafeteria for breakfast and found that someone had taped a message on the fruit punch dispenser: "Kool-Aid Courtesy of Jim Jones."

Most Americans had never heard of Jim Jones or the People's Temple on Nov. 18, 1978. But surveys showed that, by the following February, nearly 98% of Americans were familiar with what had happened at Jonestown.

I'm not sure how many of them ever knew — or remembered — the admonition that was posted in the pavilion where many of the bodies were found:

"Those Who Do Not Remember The Past Are Condemned To Repeat It."

Is The End in Sight for Stevens?

The Anchorage Daily News reports that there are 24,000 ballots left to be counted in the U.S. Senate race in Alaska. The state hopes to be finished counting those ballots on Tuesday.

Mark Begich, the Democrat who is hoping to replace Republican Sen. Ted Stevens, widened his lead on Friday — but his advantage is a mere 1,022 votes. There are still far too many ballots uncounted for Begich to claim victory.

Once those ballots are counted, more may be resolved than simply an election.

McClatchy Newspapers observed that this may have been "the worst weekend of [Stevens'] professional life."

The senator, says McClatchy, "faces only bleak prospects: maybe losing the U.S. Senate seat he has held for 40 years, and a secret vote by his colleagues on whether to oust him from the Senate's Republican conference."

Such a meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, but McClatchy suggests the vote may not take place that day because some senators are saying they want to wait for all the votes to be counted.

If Begich wins the election, any such action by the conference would be unnecessary.

Begich Takes Lead in Senate Race

The Anchorage Daily News cautions that Alaska must "count roughly 35,000 more ballots over the next week" — so, presumably, anything could still happen — but Democrat Mark Begich has taken the lead over Republican Ted Stevens by a little more than 800 votes in the Senate race.

The latest tally, which was reported at 7:30 a.m. (Eastern), showed Begich with 132,196 votes and Stevens with 131,382 votes.

That is where things stand after the state Division of Elections added roughly 60,000 "absentee, early and questioned" ballots to the total on Wednesday, the Daily News reports.

It appears that it will be next week — at the earliest — before the final result is known.

The Daily News quoted the state elections chief as saying that "most regional elections headquarters will count their remaining ballots on Friday. But the most populous region, based in Anchorage, won't count its ballots until either Monday or Wednesday."

Even so, a spokesperson for the Alaska Democratic Party told the newspaper that Begich's supporters are "cautiously optimistic" about the lead.

Alaska is one of three states with an as-yet unresolved Senate race. In each state, a Republican incumbent is seeking a new six-year term, and each one was leading after the votes were initially tabulated on Nov. 4.

If Democrats win all three seats, they can put together the three-fifths "filibuster-proof" majority they openly desired during the campaign.

Assuming that Begich is able to hold the lead, then, in order to reach the number Democrats desire, Al Franken must overtake Sen. Norm Coleman in the recount in the Minnesota race, and Jim Martin must win a Dec. 2 runoff with Sen. Saxby Chambliss in Georgia.

If Begich, Franken and Martin all emerge victorious, Democrats will need to keep independent Joe Lieberman and socialist Bernie Sanders in their caucus to achieve the three-fifths majority.

But if they fall short of their goal, Democrats will have to decide what they want to do about Lieberman, a former Democrat who has caucused with Senate Democrats for the last two years (allowing them to maintain a somewhat brittle majority) but supported Republican John McCain in the presidential race.

Politico.com reports that some Democrats in the Senate have been making behind-the-scenes efforts to permit him to keep the chairmanship of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.

An ironic angle to the story, write Ryan Grim and Martin Kady in Politico.com, is that Lieberman is backed by his home-state colleague, Chris Dodd. In the 2006 Senate election in Connecticut, Dodd supported Ned Lamont, who won the Democratic primary over Lieberman, forcing Lieberman to run (and eventually win) as an independent.

One Senate Democratic aide told Politico.com that Democrats "don’t want to start off a new era with retribution," but other Democrats apparently aren't as conciliatory.

The 2000 Democratic vice presidential nominee reportedly has told the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, that he will leave the Democratic caucus if he is stripped of his chairmanship.

Politico.com says "a number of options are being considered that would allow [Lieberman] to keep his chairmanship and remain in the caucus but still suffer some sort of penalty."

On that matter, John Nichols says, in his blog in The Nation, that it would be "smart politics" to keep Lieberman in the Democrats' caucus — for now.

Lieberman remains valuable to the Democrats, Nichols suggests, until such time as the three-fifths majority is no longer possible.

That would be the prudent thing to do. The fate of the "filibuster-proof" majority could be up in the air until nearly Christmas.

The Minneapolis Star Tribune reports that the recount in Minnesota could drag on until mid-December.

"Recount junkies will be able to view updates daily on a website the secretary of state's office will construct," the Star Tribune reports, "and all recounts will be conducted in public places."

Loose Ends

Votes are still being counted in the election, but we're almost through that process and most of the decisions have been made.

• This morning, Barack Obama is the president-elect of the United States. That much has not changed, nor will it change.
  
  Obama has about 11 weeks to prepare to take the oath of office on January 20. But he can begin to implement the promise of "change" almost immediately by naming his top advisers and his choices for his Cabinet — and conferring with them on the issues that deeply and directly affect Americans right now.
  
  Those who are tempted to sit back and smile with smug satisfaction over the election of a black man as president have missed the whole point.
  
  To his credit, Obama appears to see beyond the symbolic importance of the election. He "gets it" — or, at least, his words in his victory speech imply that he does.
  
  "This victory alone is not the change we seek," he said last night, "it is only the chance for us to make that change."
  
  True democracy guarantees the right to participate — not the right to succeed.


• Now that the votes have been cast — and most have been counted — can it honestly be said that it made a difference which candidate the Democrats nominated for president?
  
  In an election in which the Democrats appear to have won the White House by about 6-7 million votes and expanded their advantage in both the House and the Senate, did it matter whether a black man (Obama) — or a woman (Hillary Clinton) or an Hispanic (Bill Richardson) or a white Protestant (John Edwards) or a Catholic (the vice president-elect, Joe Biden) — occupied the top spot on the ballot?
  
  I'm inclined to say no — that, in 2008, it was much the same as it was in 1992. Perhaps, with the economic meltdown in September that was practically foretold the month before when job losses were one-fifth greater than expected and the creaking economy lurched toward collapse, it became a foregone conclusion that the Democrats would win.
  
  It's still the economy.
  
  And that always tends to favor Democrats.
  
  Was there anything John McCain or Sarah Palin could do to reverse the outcome?


• The Senate races have produced some astonishing results.
  
  As expected, the Democrats have made gains, and they will remain in the majority — whether independent Joe Lieberman and socialist Bernie Sanders caucus with them, as they have for the last two years, or not.
  
  But the oft-stated goal of achieving a "filibuster-proof" majority in the Senate appears to be out of reach now.
  
  None of the four races that I wrote about last night have been resolved yet, but it looks like the Republicans are leading in all of them, and only one — the race in Oregon — appears to have a significant number of votes still to count.
  
  Republican incumbents in Minnesota and Georgia may have survived by razor-thin margins — but Republican Sen. Norm Coleman may be facing a recount in Minnesota, and Sen. Saxby Chambliss may have been forced into a December runoff with his foe in Georgia.
  
  Alaska's Ted Stevens, who was convicted in his corruption trial last week, may have been re-elected, but it's not quite over.
  
  Late polls indicated that Stevens' opponent enjoyed a comfortable (for a Democrat) lead, but it's possible that, while the rest of the country was making history by electing a black president, Alaska voters may have made some history of their own.
  
  Even though Alaska's governor was not elected vice president, it is my understanding that this could be the first time in American history that a senator has been convicted in federal court and then re-elected by the voters of his state. With 99% of the precincts reporting in Alaska, Stevens leads by less than 4,000 votes.
  
  But, reports the Anchorage Daily News, "Still to be counted are roughly 40,000 absentee ballots, with more expected to arrive in the mail, as well as 9,000 uncounted early votes and thousands of questioned ballots. The state Elections Division has up to 15 days after the election to tally all the remaining ballots before finalizing the count."
  
  We may have to wait awhile longer before we know if Stevens has been returned to the Senate.
  
  Perhaps, in the final week of the campaign, Alaska's voters grew tired of being laughed at, had enough of seeing their governor ridiculed and then being told they couldn't re-elect an 84-year-old senator who had been convicted of corruption charges.
  
  So, perhaps, those voters have sent their own message of "Yes, we can."

The Ego Has Landed

Following his conviction in his corruption trial on Monday, Sen. Ted Stevens is due to resume his campaign for re-election in Alaska on Wednesday, reports the Anchorage Daily News.

Even though both of the candidates on the national Republican ticket, John McCain and Sarah Palin, called on Stevens to resign Tuesday.

"Stevens, 84, faces a challenge of historic proportions with just one week before the election," write Sean Cockerham and Don Hunter in the Daily News. "He'd be the first convicted U.S. senator ever elected, on appeal or not."

Due to the rather unorthodox nature of Stevens' race against Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich, voters can't be blamed for being unsure about a few things.

Tom Kizzia of the Daily News tried to anticipate and answer all of the readers' questions.

For example ...

1. Can Stevens run for re-election, even though he's been convicted of a crime? Yes.


2. If Stevens is re-elected, can he keep his Senate seat if he loses his appeal? That depends on his colleagues in the Senate.


3. If it is necessary to replace Stevens, how would his successor be chosen? That's uncertain because the law was changed twice in 2004 and, while the two laws agree to a point, there is some uncertainty about an interim appointment.

Stevens isn't due to be sentenced until January 26.

In his initial statements following his conviction, Stevens sounded like a man who believes the jury was a voting group that didn't get the message and he was trying, once again, to win the jurors over. He was angry, defiant, as he proclaimed, "I am innocent!"

"Uncle Ted" hasn't lost many votes over the years.

If Stevens believes he can pull it off on appeal by being the political infighter he's always been, who can blame him?

He has carefully cultivated an image of bringing home the bacon for his constituents, an image that may still play well in Alaska, with a weak economy and oil prices dropping dramatically in recent weeks.

Voters may conclude his seniority means economic clout for the state — and that may be especially true of Alaska natives, who represent about one-sixth of the state's population and depend on many of the projects Stevens has supported over the years.

Common sense would suggest that the voters would not send an 84-year-old man back to Washington for six years, especially since it's not even clear he would be allowed to remain in office a week after the next president is sworn in.

But stranger things have happened in American politics.

This May Be Premature ...

A few minutes ago, Colin Powell announced on "Meet the Press" that he will "be voting" for Barack Obama — which I presume is an endorsement.

At least, it's being treated as one by the media. And Powell isn't denying that, by telling everyone that he plans to vote for Obama, he is encouraging others to do so as well.

Powell also said he does not plan to campaign for Obama in the last two weeks of the campaign.

But, aside from Powell's endorsement, I now feel inclined to predict that the Obama-Biden ticket will win the election — for other reasons (which I'll get into in a few minutes).

What effect, if any, will Powell's endorsement have on the election?

Personally, I feel it will have very little impact on what voters choose to do.

Although I still say, as I did when Powell's planned appearance on the program was hitting the blogosphere a couple of days ago, that the relative value of his endorsement may hinge on what happens in Sen. Ted Stevens' corruption trial in Alaska.

As I mentioned on Friday, Powell recently testified on Stevens' behalf in court. Stevens took the stand in his own defense on Friday.

If a verdict is reached in the case before the election, it may produce an ironic twist. The credibility of a high-profile Republican's endorsement of a Democrat could depend on the vindication of another Republican.

And that leads me to a point that was raised in a segment that followed Powell's appearance this morning.

In a discussion of the electoral map and the shifts that have been occurring (according to the polls), it was observed that a key demographic for both Obama and John McCain is "older, white voters."

To political observers, it's not news that older, white voters represent a major demographic.

The entertainment media focus advertising dollars on goods and services for young consumers, but older voters are the ones who, historically, show up at the polls and vote.

In 2004, 54% of the voters who participated were 45 years of age or older, and the Republican ticket received a majority of the vote from all voters who were 30 or older.

(In 2004, voters in the 18-29 age group supported the Democrat, but they accounted for only 17% of the vote.)

Race will remain important at least until the election results are known, because we have no precedent for a national campaign in which one of the nominees is black. At this point, no one knows what white voters will do when they're alone in the polling booth.

It's clear that what white voters do is important.

In 2004, 77% of the voters who participated were white, and the Republicans received 58% of their ballots.

But if, as was suggested during the program, those voters are shifting their preference, that can affect the electoral map.

What is likely to make older voters change their preference?

• A poor economy. Older voters know — in a way that most young voters do not — that their time is limited. When the economy is bad and those who have retired or are nearing retirement see their investments lose significant portions of their value, that will affect how they vote.


• Integrity. Older voters are not as willing to gamble as young voters are. Much has been said of Obama's "rock star" appeal, but older voters understand that they're not choosing the next winner of "American Idol" on Nov. 4.
  
  And when most older voters act on a recommendation, they do so based, at least in part, on the trustworthiness of the adviser. What would a conviction of Stevens tell older voters about Powell's judgment?

Over the years, though, research has indicated that endorsements have relatively little influence on voter decisions. In my experience, they tend to confirm positions already being taken by the majority in a state or community.

For example, the newspaper in my home city, the Dallas Morning News, endorsed McCain's candidacy yesterday.

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"The last time the nation saw Washington make real progress on deficit reduction was the 1990s, when a Democrat controlled the White House and Republicans held Congress. True, Republicans failed to cover themselves in deficit-reduction glory when they held the executive and legislative branches, but we read that as an argument in favor of divided government."

The Dallas Morning News

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However, "there's little evidence," write Jay Parsons and Theodore Kim in today's Morning News, that North Texas Democrats will expand, in 2008, beyond their surprising sweep of Dallas County races two years ago and record voter turnout in the March primary.

One of the paper's sources speculates that it may be a decade or more before area Democrats are truly competitive with Republicans.

In a state like Texas, where no Democratic presidential nominee has won since Jimmy Carter carried it in 1976, how much influence does an endorsement of McCain have? Some endorsements, in places where the race is perceived to be much closer, may have more influence on the outcome.

But what I think will truly influence the outcome is something I was reading earlier this morning — before "Meet the Press" came on.

A couple of days ago, Charles Blow wrote, in the New York Times, that he sees no plausible scenario in which McCain can win the election — "[u]nless Barack Obama slips up, Jeremiah Wright shows up or a serious national security emergency flares up."

His logic is simple and compelling.

"The wayward wizards of Wall Street delivered the election to Obama by pushing the economy to the verge of collapse, forcing leery voters to choose between their pocketbooks and their prejudices," he writes.

"McCain delivered it to Obama with his reckless pick of Sarah Palin. That stunt made everything that followed feel like a stunt, tarnishing McCain’s reputation and damaging his credibility so that when he went negative it backfired. And, some radical rabble among McCain’s supporters delivered it to Obama by mistaking his political rallies for lynch mobs.

"This perfect storm of poor judgments has set the stage for an Obama victory. It’s over."

NOTE: I'm going to wait a little while longer — to see if Obama commits a major gaffe, Wright returns to the campaign discussion or another Osama bin Laden video message pops up — but right now I expect to post my final presidential election prediction, state by state, on Tuesday, Oct. 28.

What I can tell you is that I am inclined to believe Blow when he says the financial disaster has forced the fence straddlers to "choose between their pocketbooks and their prejudices" — and their choice is likely to be Obama.

I think the jury is still out on the Palin selection, although her candidacy has become as much a media joke as Dan Quayle's was 20 years ago.

But, in 1988, voters picked Bush in spite of his running mate. It also helped that the Reagan economy was doing all right at the time.

I'll say this about Powell's interview on "Meet the Press." It has taken far too long for anyone to say this about Muslims in America.

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"I’m also troubled by, not what Senator McCain says, but what members of the party say. And it is permitted to be said such things as, 'Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim.' Well, the correct answer is, he is not a Muslim, he’s a Christian. He’s always been a Christian. But the really right answer is, what if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer’s no, that’s not America. Is there something wrong with some 7-year-old Muslim American kid believing that he or she could be president? Yet, I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion, 'He’s a Muslim and he might be associated with terrorists.' This is not the way we should be doing it in America."

Colin Powell

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With 16 days left in the campaign, this election is taking on the look of a foregone conclusion. But it's not over quite yet.

It seems to me, though, that, for a party that has relied on the religious right to provide the winning margin in elections for nearly three decades, it's appropriate that victory this time may depend on divine intervention.

Will He or Won't He?

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The election of an African-American president “would be electrifying,” Powell told a George Washington University audience, "but at the same time [I have to] make a judgment here on which would be best for America."

CNN's Political Ticker

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Former Secretary of State Colin Powell is scheduled to appear on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday.

And there's a lot of talk about whether Powell will take the opportunity to endorse Barack Obama or John McCain.

Mike Allen speculates, on Politico.com, that Powell will endorse Obama's presidential campaign.

"The general’s camp is being coy about what he might or might not say on Sunday," Allen writes. "But some McCain advisers suspect, without being sure, that Powell will endorse Obama. 'It’s going to make a lot of news, and certainly be personally embarrassing for McCain,' a McCain official said. 'It comes at a time when we need momentum, and it would create momentum against us.'"

CNN's Alexander Mooney joins in with his speculation on Powell's intentions in CNN's Political Ticker blog.

Ann Althouse, a law professor and blogger, chimes in in her blog, "[W]hy else would they book him on the third-to-the-last show before the election?"

Well, NBC may want to get some insight from a former secretary of state about the world situation. The financial crisis has dominated news reports lately (and deservedly so), but the fighting goes on in Iraq and the problems with Iran and Korea — and other nations in the world — haven't gone away.

It's obvious that the next president will have to confront the financial crisis immediately, but he will also face an increasingly unpredictable international situation — especially in the Middle East.

Four years ago, Osama bin Laden caught nearly everyone by surprise by releasing a video taped message the weekend before the election.

In his message, bin Laden said he personally directed the Sept. 11 hijackers and said George W. Bush had been negligent prior to the attacks. Many pollsters reported that surveys indicated movement in Bush's direction after the video tape was aired.

Joseph Nye recalls, in the Financial Times, that bin Laden's 2004 message affected voters by reminding them of the Sept. 11 attacks.

Put in the context of the 2008 campaign, Nye writes, "Americans are transfixed by the aftermath of the September surprise in financial markets. Could there be a very different surprise coming in October?"

NBC may want to ask Powell what he believes the terrorist leader may do between now and the 2008 election. Will he do something similar in an attempt to influence the outcome?

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"There can be no doubt that Saddam Hussein has biological weapons and the capability to rapidly produce more, many more."

Colin Powell
Speech to the U.N. Security Council, Feb. 5, 2003

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Also, Powell has served the last three Republican presidents in high-profile positions, and he considered running against the last Democratic president — as a Republican.

All of which would make a Powell endorsement of Obama really big news.

But, beyond the 24-hour news cycle such an endorsement would surely dominate, how much value would it have?

I guess that may depend — at least in part — on the outcome of the corruption trial of Sen. Ted Stevens.

Just last week, Powell testified in court on Stevens' behalf, saying that the Alaska senator had a "sterling" character and was "a trusted individual whose word you could rely on."

If Stevens is acquitted before the election, Powell's endorsement might have some benefit for its recipient.

But if he is convicted — or if the trial is still being conducted when the voters go to the polls — Powell's endorsement might not mean much.

Personally, I can't see the man who urged the United Nations (and, in the process, persuaded millions of fence-sitting Americans) to support an invasion of Iraq choosing to endorse Obama.

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"I suffer no illusions about Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal man. A ruthless man. A man who butchers his own people to secure his own power. ... The world, and the Iraqi people, would be better off without him. But I also know that Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors ... and that in concert with the international community he can be contained until, in the way of all petty dictators, he falls away into the dustbin of history."

Illinois State Sen. Barack Obama
Oct. 2, 2002

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Nor, for that matter, can I see Obama, who has made a point of emphasizing his opposition to the war, welcoming Powell's endorsement.

Unless he does so (cynically) on racial grounds.

And, if that's the case, is it still off the table to discuss Obama's association with Rev. Jeremiah Wright?

Alaska's Senior Senator is Indicted

Ted Stevens has been in the Senate longer than any Republican who is currently serving in that exclusive body.

He took office on Christmas Eve 1968 — the Alaska governor appointed him to fill the unexpired term of the deceased Democratic incumbent. He ran for a full term on his own in 1972 and was elected.

Stevens has been there ever since.

In his last two elections, Stevens received 78% of the vote (in 2002) and 77% of the vote (in 1996). In fact, in Stevens' career as a senator, he has never received less than 66% of his state's votes.

When this election year began, it would have been hard to imagine any seat that was more secure for either party than Stevens' Senate seat appeared to be for the Republicans.

Granted, the Alaska voter pool isn't that big. In each of Stevens' last two elections, there were fewer than 250,000 Alaskans who participated.

In terms of geographical area, Alaska is the largest state, but its population ranks 47th.

In fact, if Alaska were a city, it would rank in the top 20 in total population — but just barely (slightly larger than Baltimore, slightly smaller than Charlotte, N.C.) — and you could almost squeeze two Alaskas into my home city of Dallas, Texas.

So it's fair to say that the Alaska voter pool is limited. It's Republican. It's conservative. It ought to be solidly in Stevens' corner — as it has been for four decades.

But, tonight, Stevens appears to be in trouble.

1. He's been indicted on seven counts of making false financial disclosure statements, reports the New York Times.
   
   It is alleged that Stevens concealed $250,000 in gifts (that's approximately $1.09 for every Alaskan who voted in the 2002 Senate race).


2. Like just about any other politician who finds himself in this kind of trouble, Stevens insists that he's innocent, says Politico.com.
   
   "Stevens, who was already facing a tough re-election campaign this fall, now finds his five-decade political career in serious jeopardy," writes Politico.
   
   I don't know how "tough" the campaign looked before. The Anchorage Daily News says the indictment has blown the Republican primary race "wide open" — and we're talking about a race Stevens was leading with 70% in the polls last week.


3. National Review was quick to join the chorus of those clamoring for Stevens' resignation.
   
   "Stevens is of course innocent until proven guilty of the crimes with which he is charged," wrote the Review. "But even if he committed no crime, the facts that have emerged over the course of the federal investigation into his personal finances are damning enough on their own. The indictment was just the last straw."

It's still hard to imagine Alaska electing a Democrat to fill Stevens' shoes in Washington. Alaska has earned its reputation for supporting Republicans — for president, for governor, for the Senate, for everything.

But 2008 may turn out to be the exception that proves the rule.