The Tesche Report...I mean "Response"

Once again, per ADN's Alaska Politics Blog:

ALLAN TESCHE PRESS STATEMENT

Anchorage, March 5, 2008 - On March 3rd, on KTUU Channel 2, Dan Coffey made the following statement concerning the ongoing controversy over the taped message Coffey left on my message machine February 12th.

“What I did was shot my mouth off, what he (Tesche) did was a crime”.

Dan Coffey is attempting to deflect any responsibility for his behavior away from himself, by making baseless allegations about the appropriateness and legality of my actions. I did not choose to be put in this position, he put me in it through his negligence, and now blames me. I resent this, and feel I have no choice now but to speak out.

The message in question was left on my machine on Feb 12th. My wife and I did not listen to the message for the first time until Feb 16th. When I first heard the message, I thought it was a joke. It quickly became apparent that it was much more serious than that.

After a couple of days of consideration, I decided that the appropriate action, given the potentially unethical and illegal behavior that was being discussed in the tape, was to release the recording to both the APOC and the FBI. And I also decided, given the public nature of politics, to release the recording to the press, because I felt there is always a right for the public to know what their elected officials are saying when they are discussing public business. To have failed in either of these actions would have rendered me complicit in the inappropriateness of their behavior.

The conversation in the recording between Coffey and Starr was not private. It ceased to be private when Coffey, through his own negligence, unwittingly made it public. Any suggestion by Coffey that my actions were illegal is outrageous and potentially libelous. He either needs to pursue charges against me if he can find a lawyer to take the case, or he needs to withdraw and retract these accusations.

Dan Coffey is blaming everyone else but himself. He should note that in cases where inappropriate behavior is uncovered, those who fare best are those who accept responsibility, acknowledge their behavior and apologize to those they have harmed.

All I can say is GO ALLAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

If you want to discover where Alaska's "Deliverance" crowd hangs out, check out some of the comments over on that blog post. When I'm reading some folks posts *coughlABRADORcough* I swear that I can hear "Dueling Banjos" in the background.