Pete Kott Trial - Underlying Stories 3

The first underlying stories post outlined some of the possible stories underlying what we see in court that might help me understand thngs. In that I did an overview of the lawyers' stories. The second focused on the cultural stories, particularly what I characterized as a clash between pre-modern, tribal values versus modern, rational values that were apparent.

In this one I'm going to explore a couple stories that could possible shed light on the defendant Pete Kott.

Story 1: The Player - But Poker, not Chess

On Day 11 of the trial (Thursday, September 20) Kott took the stand in the afternoon and his attorney Mr. Wendt asked him about his career. When he started talking about the legislature, his eyes lit up and he started talking with a passion he hadn't shown before. He'd finally found his calling. He took great pleasure, he said, working with his fellow legislators, with the administration. Ramona Barnes took him under her wing and eventually introduced him to Bill Allen.

When Wendt and Kott were going through the legislative history of the PPT bill, Kott seemed to get into his professor role and was explaining the ins and outs of how to get things done in the legislature to the jury. He was articulate and spoke easily of the various strategies one could use to block or move a bill along.

On Friday, still talking about the PPT bill. Wendt and Kott's sentences seemed to run together. Kott is trying to keep the tax at 20%. Rep. Kelly introduced an amendment to raise the tax to 22.5. Then Kott made an amendment to the amendment.

K: You take advantage of any opportunity to get what you want.
W: Sounds like a chess game.
K: Classic chess game.

Kott was smiling now, clearly feeling good about how he had pulled this amendment off.

And I got to thinking about this. It was clear that this was the part that Kott loved - the wheeling and dealing, the strategies, the moves and feints, the game of legislating. It was the chess game he enjoyed. Sure, there were some issues he was interested in - labor issues and natural resource development he told us. His father had worked in a GM factory in Michigan, and Kott himself did briefly before he joined the Air Force, so that support for labor is easy to understand. There wasn't much beyond a love of hunting and fishing in his background though that gave us a hint about the source of his interest in natural resource development prior to his hooking up with Allen.

But the more I thought about it, the less apt the chess metaphor seemed. I wish Goeke had asked Kott if he even plays chess. Poker seems a much better metaphor. But talking about chess was a good move on Wendt's part. Chess is much classier, a smart man's game. In chess, except for white's opening advantage, both players start out equal and everything is in the open. You win on pure skill - being able to see four or five or more moves ahead. But in poker, like in the legislative games Kott described, you can have more players and they begin with unequal hands. Some of your cards are hidden, and deceit is required to win; it's even admired. I mentioned this to a legislative staffer I know and he replied, "And Pete was in the regular Wednesday night poker game in Juneau."

The idea that Kott's love of the legislature comes from the fun of 'playing the game' seems consistent with what we saw and heard. Certainly the tapes revealed lots of back room planning on how to keep the 20% tax rate. Kott seemed terribly proud when he told Allen and Smith of tricking Harvard grad Ethan Berkowitz. (In court he acknowledged that he hadn't.) Kott didn't have a vision of programs he wanted to promote in the legislature. Kott liked the play of the game. While one can say passing PPT at 20% was a vision, it was the oil producers' and Allen's vision that was handed off to Kott. And Kott liked the challenge of getting it through for them.

Oh, my staffer friend also mentioned that at the Wednesday night poker games the word was the lobbyists came with lots of cash and they never seemed to be able to win. Do poker winnings from lobbyists have to be listed with the APOC?


Story 2: Kott's Need for Approval Got Him Into Trouble

This story is pieced together from what I heard in court and from a comment by Fred Dyson outside the courtroom. In this story, Kott has such a strong need for approval from a father figure, that he was willing to do whatever it took to please Bill Allen and, his sidekick, Rick Smith (as Kott's chief of staff described him). So carrying their water in the legislature was one way he could please them, telling them what they wanted to hear while hanging out with them and getting drunk were others. Kott did tell us one of the things he and Allen had in common was "he was by himself. So was I." So both, in this story needed each other.

This could be the story the defense will give us in the closing. Kott was caught up in a bad environment. Staffer Ohmer, who articulated Kott's drinking problem also said that the Veco Suite 604 was called the Animal House and it was where people drank, smoked, swore, and watched Gavel to Gavel. Ohmer told us she had two bosses. The one on the tape was only around after a few drinks, drinks he felt he had to accept to please his buddies in the Animal House. The real Kott was the one in front of them in court. The real Kott wouldn't have done so much drinking if he hadn't fallen under the aura of this Uncle Bill father figure.

To a certain degree it makes sense and probably does explain his dependence on Uncle Bill. And as someone from an economically humble background, being around all the money in the Allen entourage was probably mesmerizing. And Allen was a man who came from even more humble beginnings than Kott. What a role model!

But blaming the environment is the sort of story that is more consistent with Democratic ideology than Republican. According to the Alaska Republican Party Platform Republicans believe

The values that strengthen our nation are family, faith, personal responsibility and accountability