Questioning both Stevenses on fishery bill
Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Ted Stevens has stuck some pork into a key spending bill concerning Alaskan fisheries. Considering that the senator's son, Alaska state Sen. Ben Stevens, has a financial interest in two of them takes the pork to the level of what appears to me to be corruption and conspiracy to commit fraud.
Old Mr. Stevens says the pork will "rationalize the Bering Sea crab fisheries." Apparently he is trying to use Congress to make a law so that local fishermen sell 90 percent of their catch of certain crab species to officially designated processors. Compare that to a law that would allow only Wal-Mart to sell you pants, while Kroeger's or CVS were the only officially sanctioned market for Band-Aids. The Justice Department calls it "anticompetitive." Some of my neighbors call it stealing. It is opposed by fishermen who want less government interference. Young Stevens, a former crab fisherman, is a paid consultant for a trade association of crab processors. Old Stevens and Little Stevens have actually admitted talking about the arrangement before the bills were corrupted. Young Stevens claims not to have been lobbying, he was just talking to his daddy. Old Stevens just happen to be performing the work necessary to plug this rotten little plum into our legal system.
The bill claims to "promote economic development in the Aleutian Island fishing community of Adak." It gives exclusive pollock fishing rights in an area off the Aleutian Islands to a single corporation which boasts Young Stevens as one of the board of directors for one of its subsidiaries.
Adak used to be home to 6,000 people. Then the military packed up and left, and less than 300 stare out at the empty ocean. It seems Young Stevens and Old Stevens are using the Congress of the United States of America to attempt to gain control of billions of dollars in fishing rights for themselves, their friends and family members.
The bill is supposed to "extend the time periods" for local fisherman (most of whom moved in from outside or who work for company boats out of Australia, Korea, China or Russia) to define what is called "essential fish habitat." What it does is cut off federal funds for the identification and designation of commercial fisheries. Areas important to the Pacific salmon and tuna fisheries.
Check out the focus of their attention at: http://www.adakisland.com/
Of course you would think centuries of experience with the fruitful north Atlantic and the tragic loss of productivity it has suffered would have been lesson enough. We are not talking about people that think about nation. We are talking about people that stuff their pockets with money. We are, in my opinion, talking about Old Senator Stevens and Young Senator Stevens. Like father, like son.
Alfred Brock
Canton, Mich.