---VERY ENLIGHTENING AND VERY DISTURBING!!
By Dewie Whetsell, Alaskan Fisherman.
As posted in comments on Greta's article referencing the MOVEON ad about Sarah Palin.
The last 45 of my 66 years I've spent in a commercial fishing town in Alaska. I understand Alaska politics but never understood national politics well until this last year. Here's the breaking point: Neither side of the Palin controversy gets it. It's not about persona, style, rhetoric, it's about doing things. Even Palin supporters never mention the things that I'm about to mention here.
1. Democrats forget when Palin was the Darling of the Democrats, because as soon as Palin took the Governor's office away from a fellow Republican and tough SOB, Frank Murkowski, she tore into the Republican's "Corrupt Bastards Club" (CBC) and sent them packing. Many of them are now residing in State housing and wearing orange jump suits The Democrats reacted by skipping around the yard, throwing confetti and singing, "la la la la" (well, you know how they are). Name another governor in this country that has ever done anything similar.
2. Now with the CBC gone, there were fewer Alaskan politicians to protect the huge, giant oil companies here. So she constructed and enacted a new system of splitting the oil profits called "ACES." Exxon (the biggest corporation in the world) protested and Sarah told them, "don't let the door hit you in the stern on your way out." They stayed, and Alaska residents went from being merely wealthy to being filthy rich. Of course, the other huge international oil companies meekly fell in line. Again, give me the name of any other governor in the country that has done anything similar.
3. The other thing she did when she walked into the governor's office is she got the list of State requests for federal funding for projects, known as "pork." She went through the list, took 85% of them and placed them in the "when-hell-freezes-over" stack. She let locals know that if we need something built, we'll pay for it ourselves. Maybe she figured she could use the money she got from selling the previous governor's jet because it was extravagant.
Maybe she could use the money she saved by dismissing the governor's cook (remarking that she could cook for her own family), giving back the State vehicle issued to her, maintaining that she already had a car, and dismissing her State provided security force (never mentioning - I imagine - that she's packing heat herself). I'm still waiting to hear the names of those other governors.
4. Now, even with her much-ridiculed "gosh and golly" mannerism, she also managed to put together a totally new approach to getting a natural gas pipeline built which will be the biggest private construction project in the history of North America. No one else could do it although they tried. If that doesn't impress you, then you're trying too hard to be unimpressed while watching her do things like this while baking up a batch of brownies with her other hand.
5. For 30 years, Exxon held a lease to do exploratory drilling at a place called Point Thompson. They made excuses the entire time why they couldn't start drilling. In truth they were holding it like an investment. No governor for 30 years could make them get started. Then, she told them she was revoking their lease and kicking them out. They protested and threatened court action. She shrugged and reminded them that she knew the way to the court house. Alaska won again.
6. President Obama wants the nation to be on 25% renewable resources for electricity by 2025. Sarah went to the legislature and submitted her plan for Alaska to be at 50% renewables by 2025. We are already at 25%. I can give you more specifics about things done, as opposed to style and persona Everybody wants to be cool, sound cool, look cool. But that's just a cover-up. I'm still waiting to hear from liberals the names of other governors who can match what mine has done in two and a half years. I won't be holding my breath.
By the way, she was content to return to AK after the national election and go to work, but the haters wouldn't let her. Now these adolescent screechers are obviously not scuba divers. And no one ever told them what happens when you continually jab and pester a barracuda. Without warning, it will spin around and tear your face off. Shoulda known better.
You have just read the truth about Sarah Palin that sends the media, along with the democrat party, into a wild uncontrolled frenzy to discredit her. I guess they are only interested in skirt chasers, dishonesty, immoral people, liars, womanizers, murderers, and bitter ex-presidents' wives.
So "You go, Girl." I only wish the men in Washington had your guts, determination, honesty, and morals. I rest my case. Only FOOLS listen to the biased media.
If you've read this far ...............................................
First Lady Michelle Obama's Servant List and Pay Scale
First Lady Requires More Than Twenty Attendants
1. $172,2000 - Sher, Susan (Chief Of Staff)
2. $140,000 - Frye, Jocelyn C . (Deputy Assistant to the President and Director of Policy And Projects For The First Lady)
3. $113,000 - Rogers, Desiree G (Special Assistant to the President and White House Social Secretary)
4. $102,000 - Johnston, Camille Y. (Special Assistant to the President and Director of Communications for the First Lady)
5. $100,000 - Winter, Melissa E. (Special Assistant to the President and Deputy Chief Of Staff to the First Lady)
6. $90,000 - Medina , David S. (Deputy Chief Of Staff to the First Lady)
7. $84,000 - Lelyveld, Catherine M. (Director and Press Secretary to the First Lady)
8. $75,000 - Starkey, Frances M. (Director of Scheduling and Advance for the First Lady)
9. $70,000 - Sanders, Trooper (Deputy Director of Policy and Projects for the First Lady)
10. $65,000 - Burnough, Erinn J. (Deputy Director and Deputy Social Secretary)
11. $64,000 - Reinstein, Joseph B. (Deputy Director and Deputy Social Secretary)
12. $62,000 - Goodman, Jennifer R. (Deputy Director of Scheduling and Events Coordinator For The First Lady)
13. $60,000 - Fitts, Alan O. (Deputy Dir ector of Advance and Trip Director for the First Lady)
14. $57,500 - Lewis, Dana M. (Special Assistant and Personal Aide to the First Lady)
15. $52,500 - Mustaphi, Semonti M. (Associate Director and Deputy Press Secretary To The First Lady)
16. $50,000 - Jarvis, Kristen E. (Special=2 0Assistant for Scheduling and Traveling Aide To The First Lady)
17. $45,000 - Lechtenberg, Tyler A. (Associate Director of Correspondence For The First Lady)
18. $43,000 - Tubman, Samantha (Deputy Associate Director, Social Office)
19. $40,000 - Boswell, Joseph J. (Executive Assistant to the Chief Of Staff to the First Lady)
20. $36,000 - Armbruster, Sally M. (Staff Assistant to the Social Secretary)
21. $35,000 - Bookey, Natalie (Staff Assistant)
22. $35,000 - Jackson, Deilia A. (Deputy Associate Director of Correspondence for the First Lady)
(This is community organizing at it's finest.)
There has NEVER been anyone in the White House at any time who has created such an army of staffers whose sole duties are the facilitation of the First Lady's social life. One wonders why she needs so much help, at taxpayer expense, when even Hillary, only had three; Jackie Kennedy one ; Laura Bushone ; and prior to Mamie Eisenhower social help came from the President's own pocket.
Note: This does not include makeup artist Ingrid Grimes-Miles, 49, and "First Hairstylist" Johnny Wright, 31, both of whom traveled aboard Air Force One to Europe .
FRIENDS.....THESE SALARIES ADD UP TO SIX MILLION, THREE HUNDRED SIXTY FOUR THOUSAND DOLLARS ($6,364,000)FOR THE 4 YEARS OF OFFICE????? AND WE ARE IN A RECESSION????? WELL....MOST OF US ARE. I GUESS IT'S OK TO SPEND WILDLY WHEN IT'S NOT YOUR OWN MONEY??
Copyright 2009 Canada FreePress.Com
Yes, I know, The Canadian Free Press has to publish this because the USA media is too scared they might be considered racist. Sorry USA!
Fred Barnes, "What Obama Accomplished in Asia" - from the article: Obama struck out on his entire agenda in China and he acquiesced as the Chinese subjected him to the humiliation of a choreographed town hall meeting with student members of the Young Communist League. And he suffered through a 30-minute news conference with Chinese President Hu Jintao in which no questions from the media were allowed. Presidents normally come away on visits to foreign countries with "deliverables"--that is, tangible signs of progress like a treaty signing. All Obama got was a list of things the United States and China would do in the future. There's a name for this: diplomatic boilerplate.
As disgraceful as the President's inexperience is, there may be no way to get the American people - on both the Right and the Left - to admit that politics is a skill which requires practice and involves making hard decisions better than most people can. Our culture of individualism means that we think ourselves automatically self-governing and independent, and to a degree, we are. But many of us on the Right complaining about Obama's inexperience would vote someone in who had absolutely no clue how to govern if they said the right things, and sometimes not even that. I like Sarah Palin as a person, but she's got a long way to go in terms of being articulate and less shrill, her record in Alaska is solid but very limited, and the fact that she pretty much is the face of the opposition is a serious problem for those of us who know that the future can made or broken by politics. I know for myself, I've only got one aspect of the solution: don't let things get dumbed down, don't let news analysis degenerate into conspiracy theory. But I don't know how to express the more positive aspect of what political discourse has to become, except that to say if I wanted to run for President, I'd be spending a ton of time studying problems and talking to experts, asking how people get things done given the bureaucracy, trying to meet the right people who would help and instruct, trying to understand how Congress and the judiciary work and what concessions need to be made to them on any given issue. In short: I wouldn't run for Senator and then immediately run for President. Nor would I surround myself with a fan base that only told me what I wanted to hear, not what I needed.
Off-topic, at my blog - Rant: The Banality of Conservatism
One of the most revealing things about liberals is their insistence that only they can define a “real” minority or a “real” woman. In the eyes of the left, Clarence Thomas, Ken Blackwell and J.C. Watts will never be “real” black men. Likewise, Michele Bachmann, the smiling firebrand conservative congresswoman from Minnesota, and Sarah Palin, the popular former governor of Alaska, will never be “real” women.
How can they be? After all, these women don’t support abortion. In fact, Palin actually had the audacity to give birth to a baby with Down Syndrome. As one embarrassed liberal wag put it during last year’s presidential campaign, “If abortion isn’t for that, what is it for?”
These female leaders believe that marriage is a sacred bond between one man and one woman and anything else is a counterfeit. In the case of Bachmann and Palin, they have lived out their values by staying married to the same men for decades. MORE humanevents.com
...three blog posts from different blogs TIN readers might like:
- Conservative Girl with a Voice, "Heels On, Gloves Off" - Thought this was notable because of the relation many conservatives have to our cultural environment generally. fta: While those in Hollywood will try to preach that liberal is the only way to be, don't falter and don't fall- stick to your conservative values. I know I don't have to tell many of you this twice because you don't and never have listened to those liberal freaks in Hollywood. Do they know what it's like to earn a hard-earned living? Do they know what it's a like to live on Mainstreet U.S.A? Do they know what it is to have to sacrifice on the battlefield like our soldiers do day in and day out? Do they know what it's like to have to say goodbye to a family member who's in the military knowing that it will be months before they are reunited?
- Conservative Matters, "Don't judge Obama on results only intentions" - Don't agree with everything here, but the overall assessment needs to be heard. fta: Iran has been able to accelerate its nuclear program to a point where it is now a serious threat and all Obama can do is throw away the missile defense plan for Eastern Europe. North Korea has thumbed its nose at us again... These are not paths to peace; these are paths to more severe conflicts in the future. This is a “bury your head in the sand approach to foreign policy” that will result in larger conflicts down the road. Never mind the disaster that is the Obama domestic policy, Obama hasn’t succeeded at anything other than getting elected and collecting awards based on “Hope” not results.
- Finding Myself in Alaska, "Do it again" - Does God have the same sense of wonder toward Creation as a child does? fta: [Children] always say, "Do it again"; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is.... It is possible that God says every morning, "Do it again" to the sun; and every evening, "Do it again" to the moon. - Chesterton
Hope all of you enjoy those links, and if that's not enough reading for you, I do have an analysis of Lincoln's Second Inaugural you can look at which I'm sure will be plenty of reading.