{"id":8343,"date":"2006-08-31T10:23:18","date_gmt":"2006-08-31T14:23:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/8343.html"},"modified":"2006-08-31T10:23:18","modified_gmt":"2006-08-31T14:23:18","slug":"bloggers-1-stevens-0","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/bloggers-1-stevens-0\/","title":{"rendered":"Bloggers 1, Stevens 0"},"content":{"rendered":"

Just to put a period on this week’s entertaining online whodunit, Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) finally acknowledged publicly yesterday that he put a hold on a bill to create a searchable database of government contracts. Bloggers, from both sides of the aisle, had narrowed the list of suspects to three, prompting the pork-loving Alaskan to fess up<\/a>.<\/p>\n

So, what’s the explanation behind the secret hold? I couldn’t make this<\/a> up if I tried.<\/p>\n

Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) held up a bill that would create a free, searchable database of government contracts and grants because he was worried about the proposal’s price tag, his spokesman told me this afternoon. Its cost has been estimated at $15 million.<\/p>\n

Stevens’ office has asked Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK), the sponsor of the bill, for “a cost-benefit analysis to make sure this does not create an extra layer of unnecessary bureaucracy,” spokesman Aaron Saunders said. The Senator “wanted to make sure that this wasn’t going to be a huge cost to the taxpayer and that it achieves the goal which the bill is meant to achieve.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Get that? Stevens is allegedly worried that creating a system of transparency and accountability to federal government spending might cost too much<\/i>. The same senator who demanded<\/a> a $200 million earmark for a “bridge to nowhere” — benefiting an Alaskan island populated by just 50 people — believes a $15 million project (spread out over four years) about government spending may be too expensive. Classic.<\/p>\n

Also keep in mind, as Paul Kiel noted<\/a>, that there were hearings on this project, which explored the costs of the database in some detail, but Stevens decided not to show up for the discussions. “If he had concerns, he should have addressed them in regular order rather than blocking something that will benefit millions of taxpayers,” Sen. Tom Coburn’s (R-Okla.) office said.<\/p>\n

Then there’s the small issue of giving credit where credit is due.
\n
\nAbout two hours after Paul Kiel and TPM Muckraker had received official confirmation from Stevens’ office, CNN claimed that it<\/i> had the scoop<\/a>. Fortunately, several outlets, including the LAT<\/a>, McClatchy<\/a> newspapers, and ABC<\/a> all credited the right source.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, what about the bill itself? Any chance the database can still get created before the end of the session?<\/p>\n

Congress returns from summer recess in less than a week at which time Sen. Coburn and other senators plan to push the bill by petitioning Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) for a roll call vote in order to override Stevens’ hold.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Stay tuned.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Just to put a period on this week’s entertaining online whodunit, Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) finally acknowledged publicly yesterday that he put a hold on a bill to create a searchable database of government contracts. Bloggers, from both sides of the aisle, had narrowed the list of suspects to three, prompting the pork-loving Alaskan to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8343","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8343","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8343"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8343\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}