The Disgustingly Dishonest Resanctification of St. Ted

Ted Stevens - primary night 2008.  The last picture I took of him

The recent release of more information and admonishments regarding the unprofessional conduct of prosecutors on the 2008 corruption trial of Sen. Ted Stevens has brought out a few instances of myth making by prominent figures in the Alaska media.  Two today struck me as inherently dishonest and at least as unprofessional as what the U.S. prosecutors have been accused of having done or not done.

Driving back from meetings in Palmer today, I caught Dave Stearin, not noted for his fact checking, spouting the following falsehood (hour 2, after 26:10), related to government misconduct:

If you're Ted Stevens, you're cast as some sort of criminal, and you're running for reelection under this incorrect cloud of corruption, you're ont reelected...


Of course, you pass away tragically in a plane crash - nothing to do, except maybe a little bit to do with the bungled prosecution - and I wouldn't even say bungled.  I would say trumped up prosecution. [emphasis added]

Dave, you piece of rightwing slime, Ted Stevens was killed in a plane crash on August 9, 2010, on his way to a place he had been many times before, doing something he loved passionately.  I wrote about it at the time, you dumb fuck.  Also, for your historically challenged moldy mind:

By tradition and by law, Congress recesses for the month of August.

That is from the web site of the U.S. Senate.  Had Stevens still been a member, he probably would have been fishing somewhere in Alaska.

Stearin is predictably dishonest.  It happens every day I listen to his program, which is not very often.

Far more disappointing was a comment by Amanda Coyne, in an article on the DOJ suspensions she penned today for The Alaska Dispatch:

Stevens had served Alaska for 40 years, making him the longest-serving Republican senator in history. He wielded tremendous power. He lost his seat because of the prosecution -- which came during an election year -- and Alaska arguably lost billions of dollars as a result.

OK, Amanda.  I'm game.  Name the so-called "arguable" projects that have cost us "billions."  I followed Sen. Stevens far longer than you did.  What were they?

Stearin is a serial liar, one of the job qualifications for being a daytime rightwing talk radio host anywhere in the USA.  If he wasn't a serial liar, he would be doing other work. 

Unfortunately, he's all but accusing the prosecutors - who do deserve rebuke - of murder.  Not just of Stevens, but of the others that perished that cloudy, dismal evening.

But Coyne is one of the most highly respected journalists in Alaska, and deservedly so. 

What is it about the memory and legacy of Ted Stevens that makes people jump the shark so easily when they genuflect about his so-called "legacy"?