Kevin Roberts: “I have just returned from the interment services for our colleague and our friend, the Senator from Alaska, Ted Stevens.…”

“I have just returned from the interment services for our colleague and our friend, the Senator from Alaska, Ted Stevens. I must say it should be pointed out that our Chaplain, Chaplain Black, gave a marvelous eulogy during the graveside services that was poignant, elegant, and I know in regard to helping the family with solace and poignancy, he had no equal. He simply was absolutely marvelous. He described Ted Stevens as a 'force of nature'--which I think was a rather appropriate description, depending on your description of a force of nature--and as a person who always made him laugh. Well, it is difficult to try to figure out how to eulogize a person of Ted's stature, someone who has done so many different things. So you have to sort of segment, it seems to me, your own personal relationship with Ted and do the best you can to grasp this unusual man and describe him. I was a Member of the House when I first met Ted Stevens. It was at a Republican retreat years ago. In expressing his opinion, he was obstreperous, if not outrageous, regardless of any other person's point of view. To say he was both unique and memorable is an understatement-- a force of nature, indeed, perhaps a wandering tornado, if you will, with a poststorm rainbow of ideas.”