July 29, 2008 12:10 PM

They Sell Out Cheaply

Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska, the longest serving Republican senator, was indicted today on seven criminal counts. At the heart of the indictment is his acceptance and concealment of several hundred thousand dollars worth of home renovations on his house in the Alaskan skiing town of Girdwood. Last summer, in the middle of a family vacation, I took the time to check out the renovations first hand.

What always stuns me is just how little it costs to bribe some elected officials. For hundreds of thousands and never more than a few million, they use earmarks and other ways of steering literally billions of dollars public money to corrupt contractors. The rate of return is enormous, and easily explains why earmarks and corruption have been growing so rapidly.