Yesterday, Think Progress noted that in the wake of the charges against Ted Stevens having been dropped, the Alaska GOP had called on Senator Begich to resign to allow for a new election.

The Alaska Republican Party further believes that current Senator Mark Begich should resign his position to allow for a new, special election, so Alaskans may have the chance to vote for a Senator without the improper influence of the corrupt Department of Justice.

Turns out, Sarah Palin concurs.

Gov. Sarah Palin on Thursday echoed a call from the Alaska Republican Party for U.S. Sen. Mark Begich to resign after the Justice Department asked a judge to toss out corruption charges against former Sen. Ted Stevens.

"I absolutely agree," Palin responded in an e-mail Thursday to the Daily News-Miner.

She said Begich should step down and a special election should be held to fill the seat.

"Come to find out, (the Department of Justice) is now revealing (Stevens) should not have been found guilty," she said. "This drastic change in circumstances, wherein truth is finally being revealed, leads me to support the call for a special, fair election -- free from the improper influence of a conviction that DOJ now tells us was improper."

I know it's becoming pretty standard for Republicans to claim election results that don't favor them are invalid, but this is pretty crazy stuff, even for Palin. Hell even Don Young is making sense.

Young dismissed those demands, calling them "a lot of noise."

"Sen. Begich, in all due respect, won the race," he said. "There is no other recourse. He has taken office, he is now the new senator."

Something else Young said gives a clue as to why Palin may have decided to show just where her allegiances lie:

Now that the corruption case against former Sen. Ted Stevens has been dropped, Alaska Rep. Don Young wants Stevens to run for governor -- a move that would set up a Republican primary between the veteran lawmaker and Sarah Palin, if she decides to seek a second term in 2010.

"Personally I'd like to see him run for governor, and that's my personal feeling," Young told the Alaska Public Radio Network on Thursday. "So, we'll see what happens down the line. He probably won't, but I think that would be a great way to cap off a great career as being the governor of the state of Alaska."

If you'll recall, Palin threw Young under the bus last year, endorsing his primary challenger and then refusing to support his bid for re-election. Now, payback's a bitch. Between Young's victory last year and the charges having been dropped against Stevens, things just aren't going Palin's way. You gotta think Palin intends to run for re-election next year, so that she can run for president as a sitting governor. The potential for that re-election to be a shaky one just made 2010 a little more interesting.

There's more...

It's now official, incumbent Alaska Congressman Don Young (R-corruption) has won his primary battle over Lt. Governor Sean Parnell by 304 votes and will in fact be on the ballot in November. Parnell has announced will not seek a recount.

Parnell said in a statement Thursday that he trusts the state Division of Elections' original count and does not want to waste more taxpayer money.

"If I thought there was anything wrong, inappropriate or unprofessional about the way this election tally was conducted, I would not only call for a recount, I would demand one. But that is not the case here," Parnell stated. "While a recount could change the outcome of this exceedingly close election -- normal human error being what it is -- such a result is unlikely. As such, I do not believe it justifies an expenditure of taxpayer funds."

This is excellent news for the Democratic nominee, Ethan Berkowitz, who has been polling better against Young than he has against Parnell. Just check out the new DailyKos/Research 2000 numbers:

Research 2000 for Daily Kos. 9/15-17. Likely voters. MoE 4% (7/14-16 results)

Young (R) 39 (40)
Berkowitz (D) 53 (51)

Parnell (R) 43
Berkowitz (D) 48

Thanks, Alaska!

The primary was on August 26, a few days before Sarah Palin was tapped to be McCain's running mate, so one wonders what might have happened if it had been a few days later. Parnell is Palin's Lt. Governor after all, as well as her hand-picked challenger to Young, so was in a unique position to take advantage of Palin mania, although looking at those poll numbers, it's amazing just how not a factor Palin has been in the race. But now, Parnell is in the interesting position of possibly inheriting the governorship if Palin-McCain...er...McCain/Palin were somehow able to pull off a ridiculous victory, a fact that no doubt has played into Parnell's decision to concede.

If you'd like to find out more about Berkowitz, check out his website HERE and if you're in the LA area, he's having a small dollar fundraiser tonight that I'm going to, details at the Facebook Event page.

Update [2008-9-19 10:8:27 by Todd Beeton]:This video is hilarious. Once again Sarah Palin -- here in her Sean Hannity interview -- takes credit for having "killed" the bridge to nowhere and notice whom she blames the bridge on:

I think I ruffled some feathers there also with our congressman who had been requesting that bridge for so many years.

"Congressman?" Interesting, no mention of the not so distinguished senator from Alaska who had taken a leadership role -- to put it lightly -- when it came to trying to get that bridge built.

The money -- championed by Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, the powerful head of the Senate Appropriations Committee -- was earmarked to help construct a bridge between Ketchikan and Gravina Island in the Alaskan Inland Passage in the southeastern corner of the state. A ferry boat now provides transportation between the two points. [...]

Stevens had argued that the bridges were needed to spur economic development on Gravina Island and in Knik. The proposed Gravina Island bridge is not a "bridge to nowhere," Stevens said Wednesday; "it's the bridge to the future."

Don Young, meet bus.

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Tuesday was primary day in Alaska and, well, there was a little event going on that diverted our attention, so I wanted to give an update of Tuesday's results.

• On the House side, Alaska House Minority Leader Ethan Berkowitz easily dispatched Diane Benson in the Democratic primary. Whom he will challenge in November, however, is still uncertain and won't be decided for a few weeks.

  In the primary for the state's lone House seat, [GOP incumbent Don] Young led Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell by 152 votes, or 0.16 percent, with 99 percent of precincts reporting Wednesday. [...]

  "We're not going to finish counting absentee and [provisional] ballots until Sept. 5," said Gail Fenumiai, director of the state Division of Elections. "We have thousands of absentee ballots to be counted."

  Once the counting is finished, she said, a state board will spend seven to 10 days reviewing the results, a step that is part of every contest, regardless of the margin. The results will be officially certified by Sept. 16 or 17. Only then can the loser request a full recount, which would take at least a few days to complete.

  Considering the recent polling, we should hope that Swing State Project is right when they project the absentee ballots to expand Young's lead but interestingly, they're also reporting that Young has refused to rule out running as an independent if he loses.

• On the Senate side, Road to 60 candidate Mark Begich officially became the Democratic nominee for the Senate from Alaska and indicted incumbent Ted Stevens became -- for now -- the Republican nominee having won 63% of the vote among a 7 candidate field.

  Considering Begich is up 18% in the Pollster trend estimate, it's possible that Stevens will be pressured out of the race, which would mean the Alaska Republican Party would get to choose a replacement candidate, so it's important to continue to support Mark Begich over at our Road To 60 ActBlue page.

There's more...

I may get some hits for this diary, but it is heartfelt and sincere, and since it shares a heartfelt and sincere position with Jon Soltz of VoteVets.org, I feel good about it. I want to urge my fellow progressives to pull all stops out for Diane Benson, running for Congress in Alaska. Of all the candidates I have ever met, she is quite possibly the best. But precisely because she is from a working class, Native American background and has not been a part of the political game, she is the longshot, grassroots candidate. But from the point of view of the working class, our soldiers and veterans, she is one of the best candidates to come around in a very, very long time. If Diane Benson is the next Representative from Alaska, America will have a great deal to be proud of.

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Diane Benson, 2006 Democratic challenger to Alaska Congressman Don Young (she garnered 40% of the vote), commissioned a poll of the state (601 RVs, Oct. 27-11/2, MOE +/-4.9%) and the results are extremely encouraging for both Benson and her primary rival, Alaska House Minority Leader Ethan Berkowitz.

From Swing State Project:

Diane Benson (D): 45.3%
Don Young (R-inc): 36.7%
Undecided: 15.6%

Ethan Berkowitz (D): 49.7%
Don Young (R-inc): 35.1%
Undecided: 13.8%

Diane Benson (D): 45.0%
Gabriella LeDoux (R): 12.3%
Undecided: 38.2%

Ethan Berkowitz (D): 49.0%
Gabriella LeDoux (R):  13.8%
Undecided: 32.9%

You thought an incumbent below 50% was bad, this guy can't even rally 40%. Could Alaska have finally become fed up with corruption of its federal officials? TPM Muckraker takes us on a Don Young corruption trip down memory lane.

The feds are chasing Young for his ties to the corrupt oil company Veco (among other things), and he's already blown $450,000 in campaign funds on criminal defense lawyers. But it looks like investigators pulled out all the stops.

FBI agents recorded former Veco president Rick Smith's phone calls with Young, the AP reports today. In September, the AP reported that Veco's CEO Bill Allen had recorded his calls with Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK).

The Justice Department is investigating whether an Alaska oil contractor used golf tournaments to funnel cash to Rep. Don Young, people close to the corruption investigation said.... [T]he events at the Moose Run Golf Course just outside Anchorage were informal and the prizes were cash. There is no record of them on the campaign or personal financial reports that federal lawmakers are required to file.

And the list goes on.

As the noose begins to tighten and as more poll numbers showing Young vulnerable emerge, a Young retirement becomes more and more likely. Certainly Young is on everyone'sretirement watch lists but it's interesting to note that here the Democrats trounce the untainted Republican running against Young for the nomination. Is this really the state of Alaska's Republican bench? Assuming Young is the nominee, though, Charlie Cook calls the race to represent this extremely Republican state (PVI R+14) as "Leans Republican," one step removed from "Toss-up."

Who'll be running as the Republican nominee isn't the only uncertainty, of course. As for the race between the Democrats, Berkowitz currently leads Benson by about 8% with more than a 1/3 of Alaska voters undecided. No doubt we can expect AK-AL to be the home of one of the tighter primary and general election races in the country next year.

There's more...