Sarah Palin's Less Government In Action

Sarah Palin raised taxes on oil companies then agrees with Sean Hannity that the country is headed towards socialism.

Palin: We are the only state with a negative tax rate where we don't have any income, sales or property tax statewide, and yes we have a share of our oil resource revenue that goes back to the people that own the resources. Imagine that.

Hannity: And it went up higher since you've been the governor and you negotiated with the oil companies. That all went up so people get a bigger check.

Palin: There was a corrupt tax system up there and we had a couple of lawmakers end up in jail because of the tax system that was adopted so we cleaned it up and said we wanted a fair and equitable share of the resources that we own, and the people will share in those resource revenues that are derived.

Hannity and Palin are bragging about raising taxes on oil companies and Obama is cutting taxes on the middle class and poor. In 2008, Alaska was ranked first in pork spending. Alaska has no state taxes because of shitty infrastructure and a low population.

Federal funding for Alaska's road and bridge system under TEA-21 was about $314 million in fiscal year 2002.
55% of Alaska's major roads are in poor or mediocre condition.
30% of Alaska's bridges are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete.
13% of Alaska's urban freeways are congested.
Vehicle travel on Alaska's highways increased by 17 percent from 1991 to 2001. Alaska's population grew by 15 percent between 1990 and 2001.
Driving on roads in need of repair costs Alaska's motorists $81 million a year in extra vehicle repairs and operating costs - $177 per motorist.
8% of municipal solid waste is recycled in Alaska.
69% of Alaska's schools have at least one inadequate building feature.
80% of Alaska's schools have at least one unsatisfactory environmental condition.
Alaska's drinking water infrastructure need is $585.2 million over the next 20 years.
Alaska's wastewater infrastructure need is $648 million.
The rehabilitation cost for Alaska's most critical dams is estimated at $7.3 million.

Those Ted Stevens pork dollars weren't to better the quality of living in Alaska. However, a airplane did get painted to look like a fish.

Bye Bye Ted

Ted Stevens has lost his Senate seat.

The longest-serving Republican in the history of the Senate trailed Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich by 3,724 votes after Tuesday's count.

That's an insurmountable lead with only about 2,500 overseas ballots left to be counted.

Stevens, who turned 85 Tuesday, also revealed that he will not ask President George W. Bush to give him a pardon for his seven felony convictions.

Republcans are happy that they won't have to deal with Stevens coming back to the Senate.

Quote of the Day

"I’ve never told people who I have voted for before because I see that as a very precious freedom in our country. Free and fair and uh – elections allow us to cast a secret ballot behind the voting booth curtain so that’s the way I’m going to keep it."

Sarah Palin, after being asked if she will vote for Ted Stevens.

Quote of the Day

I have great respect for the Senator. He needs to be heard across America. His voice, his experience, his passion needs to be heard across America--so that Alaska can contribute more."

Sarah Palin

Ted Stevens was convicted today of on all five counts. Stevens knew the gifts (aka bribes) he was taking were illegal.

Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), it turns out, was prescient. Here's what he said two years ago in a secretly recorded phone conversation with Bill Allen, his longtime friend (whom he now may wish he had never met): "The worst that can happen to us is we run up a bunch of legal fees, and might lose and we might have to pay a fine, might have to serve some time in jail. I hope to Christ it never gets to that.... I don't think we have done anything wrong."

Ted Stevens Spends Your Tax Dollars

Ted Stevens secured $29 million in federal funding to the Alaska Fisheries Marketing Board. $500,000 of that money went to airbrush an Alaska Airlines to look like a salmon.

The fishy paint job was done on a grand scale, company spokesmen said. A team of 30 painters and airbrush artists used more than 140 gallons of paint and took 24 days to render the lifelike chinook -- triple the time normally needed to coat an airliner.

"There's no question, at least in my mind, that this is the finest airline art ever conceived," said Bill MacKay, the company's Anchorage-based senior vice president. "People will just be amazed at the detail."

You may be wondering what exactly is the Alaska Fisheries Marketing Board. The members of the board were Stevens and his son Ben. The earmarked money went to Ben's clients. Lindsay Beyerstein blogs about the corrupt the AFMB setup.

The AFMB also gave $300,000 to Arctic Paws, a dog treat company owned by Duane Gibson, a former Stevens aide who went on to work for Jack Abramoff.

My question is how did Stevens get away with this for long?

Talking Point To Nowhere

"We need to come to the defense of Southeast Alaska when proposals are on the table like the bridge, and not allow the spinmeisters to turn this project or any other into something that's so negative."

Sarah Palin August 2006, on supporting the Bridge to Nowhere.

Astute political observers know that Sarah Palin was for Ted Stevens Bridge to Nowhere. Palin even held a joint press conference with Stevens. Palin made it clear that she would support Stevens during the criminal investigation. The Caucus reports Palin has finally dropped her bogus talking point that she was against the Bridge to Nowhere.

When she landed in Fairbanks in her home state on Wednesday night, though, the bridge was notably absent from an (otherwise mostly similar) speech she made inside an airplane hangar before her homestate crowd.

The campaign is playing off Palin's omission as a time saving measure. Perhaps the Palin people can explain the omission of the video of Ted Stevens endorsing Palin. The Palin people took the video off the Governor campaign web site.