Taking a stance for a friend

You know things are grim when Larry Craig shows up to lend moral support during your corruption trial.

Oh Sen. Stevens, you old coot. Remember when you threatened to quit Congress if the senate took away your $400 million bridge for 50 people? Or the time you called the internet a "series of tubes"?

We're gonna miss you, you lovable ol' curmudgeon, you! (fn1)

(fn1) Fun fact: The first summer that I was a Senate Page I got coffee for Sen. Stevens. I remember it well because it should have taken about 2 minutes but the coffee corner in the Minority Leader's office (This would have been Senator Dole's -- Bob Dole, that is -- office) was out of cups. So I then had to track down some cups which involved a lengthy search through the basement of the capitol.(fn2) By the time I had tracked down some cups and gotten a fresh batch of coffee made the whole thing had taken like 20 minutes or more. I was worried I was going to get chewed out when I finally showed up with the coffee but he had totally forgotten he even asked for it. Someday maybe I'll tell you about the time Strom Thurmond took me to the Senate dining room for ice cream and gave me a long talk about the many positive qualities of South Carolinian peanuts.(fn3)

(fn2) The basement of the capital is a strange and wonderful place. There are tunnels that go practically everywhere. And by everywhere I really, honestly mean everywhere. It would surprise me not at all if some of them led to different continents or time periods a la the weirder reaches of the Dharma Initiative in Lost.

(fn3) Jesse Helms, by contrast, was convinced that there was no better peanut to be found than that of North Carolina. He didn't give me ice cream, though, so I'm a South Carolina peanut man to this day.