socio-politics

Ted Stevens, a man who has been an Alaska senator almost for most of the time that it has been a state, was indicted yesterday for lying to federal investigators and failing to disclose hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribe money that he received from VECO, an oil contractor.  Alaskan congressman Don Young is also under investigation.

What frightens me most about this is not the corruption - I’m sure that he’s not the only politician that is currently in office to abuse power.  Most disturbing is the probability that there will not be adequate measures taken to ensure that this will not continue to happen with other politicians.  In all likelihood, Stevens will be convicted and will not be reelected, and everybody will forget about the whole situation.  What should be established is full disclosure of financial records for all members of one of the three branches of government - at the very least, this would act as a deterrent.

Politicians should not be protected as much as they are.  They have too much power, and it is too easy to abuse this power.  It makes me think of the Enron scandal - it was well acknowledged the members of both Clinton and Bush’s administrations were involved with the scandal, though  only the masterminds of the corporation were convicted - nobody put pressure on to find out more about the politicians that enabled the corruption to occur.

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