AK-SEN: Palin (R) 56, Stevens (R) 32
Lesson for the Children: Corruption Doesn't Pay
By Adam C Posted in 2008 — Comments (17) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Chief Senate Porker Ted Stevens (R-AK) is slowly succumbing to his fate as a porker. Pokers are corruption. They use public moneys for private gain. And in Sen. Stevens case, it is likely going to remove him from Congress. (Unlike say, Rep. Jefferson (D-LA) who is still in Congress despite having $90,000 of bribe money in his freezer.)
The real question is how is Stevens going to leave. He could announce that he is not seeking re-election in 2008, he could lose in 2008, or could resign in disgrace.
Although popular (88% approval) Governor Sarah Palin (R-AK) is very unlikely to run against Sen. Stevens, she would destroy him in a primary: 56-32.
Governor Palin came out opposed to the current symbol of Porking, the Bridge to Nowhere, and she seems to be in agreement with most of her state. Alaskans oppose this pork 66-25, even though it is ostensibly being used to buy their votes. This is a good reminder that pork is valued by those few individuals who directly benefit from it, those few corporations and those few lobbyists who get the big payout. Most people don't like politicians using taxpayer money to pay off their Big Business and Big Government buddies.
Hopefully, Senator Stevens will announce that he is not running for re-election. Then Governor Palin could run and join Sen. Dole as a second Senator on the Susan B. Anthony List. Palin would represent a new generation of Alaskans who don't see government's main role as building Bridges to Nowhere. If Rs don't find a way to push Stevens aside, it will give AK Dems a chance to take the mantle of fiscal responsibility and change. That would be a shame when such a great R candidate already has a 88% approval rating.
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AK-SEN: Palin (R) 56, Stevens (R) 32 17 Comments (0 topical, 17 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
I believe I read that Palin said she wasn't interested in running for Senate and wants to stay put as a first term governor. Though if she does enter she would destroy anyone
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Notice to All - I am an independent who has voted for Senator Bayh (Democrat) and Senator Lugar (Republican) along with over 60% of my state. You may take what I say with a grain of salt at your own party'
...who would be a good candidate for the GOP? What does the GOP political bench look like up there (aside from Palin)?
“.....women and minorities hardest hit”
Apparently they're looking for lawyers at the moment...
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Reality: Thompson/Romney Dream: Santorum/Watts.
The impression I've gotten from Achance is that he's far from alone.
HTML Help Central for Red Staters
Reality: Thompson/Romney Dream: Santorum/Watts.
Sorry, I got Murkowski and Palin somehow mixed up along the way, and I started researching the wrong one. Now I feel stupid.
just as long as you don't know enough.
If Ted Stevens is indicted, he's toast; he knows that and will probably resign. If Ben Stevens is indicted, Ted is probably toast and will probably resign. If neither of those things happens, Ted would probably be re-elected, though by a much narrower margin than he's had since his near death experiences after the D-2 ANILCA fight in the early eighties.
Sarah Palin is thus far one of the luckier politicians in history. She has staked her future on a gas line from the North Slope to the Interior US, the most expensive such project in history. I don't think it can be done absent some major disruption in US gas supply, so all the Stevens haters should really be wishing for a CAT 5 hurricane in The Gulf. If Stevens or his son are indicted, Palin is the favorite, but far from a certainty, to take the seat if she chooses to run. Mark Begich, Ethan Berkowitz, and even Tony Knowles or Fran Ulmer are all formidable Ds in the current climate here. If there are no indictments, Stevens runs again, wins, though more narrowly, and Palin stays Governor. Then her future is predicated on the, I believe, forlorn hope of a gas line.
You can poll with abstract questions all you want. Ask Alaskans if they're opposed to "wasteful" government spending and most will say, "of course," unless it is in their neighborhood and to their personal benefit. Half the population, and thus half of any poll is in Anchorage. Of course they'll say they don't want to see $223 Million spent on a bridge in far away Ketchikan. Ask them if they'd like to see $223 million spent on "relieving congestion" at the Lake Otis and Tudor Road intersection; the answer will be very different. They'd pay any price and bear any burden for that - as long as someone else was paying for it.
The Ketchikan Bridge was actually Young's project and it was earmarked purely and simply because Young, a fairly astute politician on his own turf, knew that if he just let the money go in the Highway appropriation, it would go to gild the gold plate in Anchorage with a few scraps for Fairbanks so they'd stay sullen but not mutinous about spending in ANC.
The KTN bridge is a good project and a Helluva lot less porky than a lot of what Federal transportation money has been spent on over the last decade or so. All you ever so righteous fiscal conservatives just unthinkingly bought off on what was largely Democrat opposition to the Knik Arm Bridge that would threaten the SEA/SFO/LA monopoly on trans-Pacific trade. The KTN "bridge to nowhere" was just collateral damage.
I'll make you a deal: use your Club for Growth power to open ANWR and NPRA to development and eliminate Federal restraints on State development of State-owned oil provinces, and Alaska will never ask the United States for another dime. In fact, when the Chinese cash in their chits, we might even be willing to help the US out - for a price.
In Vino Veritas
There is no loaded word like "wasteful."
"All things being equal, for whom would you be more likely to vote for Congress? A candidate who wants to cut overall federal spending, even if that includes cutting some money that would come to Alaska or a candidate who is willing to increase overall spending on federal programs, as long as more federal spending and projects come to Alaska?
Cut spending - 71%
Bring projects - 17.3%
DK/Refused - 11.7%"
I think porking is lining up to be similar to immigration where people inside the bubble see it one way and people outside the bubble see it differently (and in a more principled way).
I don't think Palin will run against Stevens regardless of Stevens vulnerability. I do think she would be a better Senator for the country (which is more what I care about). As an Oklahoman, I supported Sen. Coburn b/c I thought he would be the best Senator for the country. Hopefully other states think similarly.
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Bobby Jindal Saves Louisiana
Does she have a good chief of staff who can run for this office? Or maybe that guy who came in second in the GOP Gov. primary.
which is VERY unlikely, GOV Palin would name the replacement. I do not think she would appoint herself (or her own daughter like some other Alaskans). Maybe achance can inform us of other qualified and ethical AK GOPers who might be good candidates for appointment or election in the post-Stevens era.
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Bobby Jindal Saves Louisiana
After Murkowski appointed Lisa, the law was changed, by iniative, to require an election.
I liked working for Frank Murkowski and from a purely personal perspective couldn't have asked for a better Governor to work for. I would work with the Commissioner of Administration, COS Jim Clark, and, when necessary, Murkowski to set overall objectives and they'd leave me alone to accomplish them and they covered my back. At least until Clark essentially stepped down as COS to try to negotiate a gas line deal, I couldn't have asked for better. In the last year with Clark largely out of the loop and Murkowski facing re-election with his poll numbers in the toilet, the wheels came off the Administration and the holdover 'crats that FM should have fired when his hand came off the Bible started to more and more run things, so I dedided July 1, 2006, was a good day to retire; I had already worked two years past retirement eligibility.
With those kudos to my old boss out of the way, appointing Lisa was the dumbest, most arrogant, and self-serving thing I've ever seen done in government - and government sets a very, very high bar for "most" dumb, arrogant, or self-serving. The Administration never recovered. The People were just sick to death of Task Force Tony and economic stasis. Frank had as close to a genuine mandate as any Governor here has ever had and he squandered it all with that one action.
And then Frank just had to have a jet. The Legislature turned him down. Homeland Security, which will usually pay for anything, turned him down, and somebody predictably leaked the very contrived justification the Administration had ginned up. Frank bought one anyway, the People and the Legislature be damned, and the way he did it, though at least arguably legal, just looked sleazy. If there was any hope of recovering from the Lisa appointment, it ended with that jet. The jet purchase was so unpopular that Palin made selling it immediately upon taking office a major campaign piece and used it to telling effect.
Don't let Alaska's "Redness" fool you; the People of this State will tell you that they are conservatives, libertarians, or Republicans, but once you get past the anti-government piece of that, they are a lot like the Ronulans that post here; once you get past the superficial, they sound like Socialist Workers' Party talking points. Fear, greed, and class-envy work really, really well in politics here.
God knows that a State the size of Alaska could use some jet aircraft; it is five hours by commercial jet from Ketchikan to Barrow, not including airport time. I've personally spent enough time rattling around rural Alaska in propeller driven aircraft to never, ever want to see the inside of one again. You can say you've really seen Alaska when you've seen it while hanging upside down from the belts of a badly bent Cessna 207!
It wasn't the money; people here have no real sense of what all the things that they take for granted cost, and a couple or three million dollars just gets lost in the rounding errors in the State budget. It was pure class envy and it was ruthlessly exploited first by the Left and the ADN and then by Palin. People in this state spend a lot of time and money on being jammed into claptrap airplanes and the thought of the Governor having a luxurious executive jet at his beck and call just incensed them. It made no difference that the Whirlwind was old, used, and anything but luxurious. Then it got out that one of the reasons Frank wanted a jet was that he wanted a plane with a restroom so that Mrs. Murkowski would be more comfortable travelling with him. God did the ADN have fun with that!
Looking back at it all is so depressing that I try to never do it. We had it all; a Governor with a mandate and control of both bodies, and it was simply squandered to self-interest and greed. The good things that we did, and there were many good and necessary things done, will never be known. It wasn't just Frank Murkowski's reputation that went down the crapper in the '06 election; it was everybody's who'd been associated with the Administration, and there's no getting it back. Now every day we get to listen to the reports from the corruption trials and the stench permeates the State and sticks to everyone who's had any position of power in the State. A lot of good, dedicated, hard-working people will wear that Scarlet R for the rest of their lives because a few were willing to sell the State for chump change and bar tabs.
Whether or not Ted or Ben Stevens, Don Young, Frank Murkowski - the vultures are circling him too, or Randy Ruedrich (State Party Chair) did anything illegal, the hubris that they all exhibited and the ubiquity and banality of the legislative corruption has mortally damaged the Republican Party here. That doesn't mean the State is going to turn Blue, but a strong Purple tinge certainly is likely. Alaska's relationship with the oil industry, always contentious, is fundamentally changed, and I believe that the industry, at least the big producers, has written off further development here. That isn't good for the Country and will be catastrophic for Alaska.
He whom the Gods would destroy, they first make proud. There's a lesson for a lot of people around the Country here.
To your other point, I discussed some of the people who might put on their shield and buckler in other threads on this subject; John Binkley, Mike Miller, Gene Therriault, and Nancy Dahlstrom come readily to mind, but any or all of them will have to work through what I've described above.
In Vino Veritas
The general discussion of a big blown opportunity through hubris sounds like my general impression from afar. Hopefully, Gov. Palin can turn that around for the AK GOPers.
Have you considered running for any office? You seem informed, experienced, and interested in public service. Just a thought.
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Bobby Jindal Saves Louisiana
I spent twenty years representing the State in collective bargaining, grievance arbitration, and labor board adjudication; my list of sworn mortal enemies is long and illustrious! Any effective advocate has to be arrogant enough that he enjoys being judged by the quality of his enemies and not be bothered much by what is said about you so long as they spell your name right. That said, I can't say that it doesn't bother me to be tarred with the corruption brush being used to paint everyone in the State who's ever been in a position with any power.
I have to admit that it did bother me to see my wife cringe read the paper or listen to the radio and TV news. Some of it got really nasty and really personal. I just wish I'd done some of the things I've been publicly accused of and would really like to have done some of the things it's been whispered that I did. My wife sure didn't like it much, though.
Politics here, and unfortunately elsewhere as well, has become a blood sport. I really don't know why anyone who values their reputation and their family relationships would put their name on a ballot these days.
In Vino Veritas
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We are all heroes, you and Boo and I. Hamsters and rangers everywhere, rejoice!
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Bobby Jindal Saves Louisiana
Governor Palin is the most popular Governor in the entire country, and she seems to be doing a great job. I hope the GOP will keep her in mind for the Vice-Presidential nomination.