While not as dramatic as pregnant teenagers or investigations into abuses of power, there is another possible problem with Palin, and that is her pursuit of earmarks as mayor and governor.
The LAT reported yesterday that Palin relied on earmark system she now opposes.
On Friday, when McCain introduced her as his running mate, she said she “championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending,” the legislative technique used to slip projects into appropriations bills without rigorous congressional review.
But under her leadership, the state of Alaska has requested 31 earmarks worth $197.8 million in next year’s federal budget, according to the website of Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), the former chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee.
The story notes that when she ran for governor in 2006 she supported the pursuit of funding for the now infamous bridge to nowhere.
Granted, a lot of this could have been the actions of Stevens, but read on before deciding what to think about the situation.
When she was mayor of Wasilla, she hired lobbyists to seek federal funds:
As mayor of the small city of Wasilla, Alaska, Palin appears to have made use of the system she now decries, hiring a Washington lobbyist, Steven Silver, to represent the town. Years ago, Silver worked as an aide to Stevens.
After he was hired, the city obtained funding for several projects, including a city bus facility that received an earmark valued at $600,000 in 2002. That year a local water and sewer project received $1.5 million in federal earmarks, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, a nonpartisan watchdog organization.
WaPo also has a story on the subject: Palin’s Small Alaska Town Secured Big Federal Funds:
the city benefited from additional earmarks: $500,000 for a mental health center, $500,000 for the purchase of federal land and $450,000 to rehabilitate an agricultural processing facility. Then there was the $15 million rail project, intended to connect Wasilla with the town of Girdwood, where Stevens has a house.
[...]
In fiscal year 2002, Wasilla took in $6.1 million in earmarks — about $1,000 in federal money for every resident. By contrast, Boise, Idaho — which has more than 190,000 residents — received $6.9 million in earmarks in fiscal 2008.
All told, Wasilla benefited from $26.9 million in earmarks in Palin’s final four years in office.
That’s a lot of money for a small town, to be sure.
As governor, it should be noted:
In February, Palin’s office sent Sen. Stevens a 70-page memo outlining almost $200 million worth of new funding requests for Alaska.
Now, none of this is anything other than normal politics. This isn’t a scandal. But (and this is big but), McCain is running as the anti-earmark Maverick who selected Palin because she is cut from that same cloth. If Palin was, instead, a master of the earmarks (which the numbers from Wasilla suggest), then what does that do for McCain’s argument about her status as an anti-earmark crusader?
At a minimum, this gives the Obama campaign some talking points, and at worst it again raises the question of how well Palin was vetted by the McCain campaign.
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September 2nd, 2008 at 10:13 am
[...] Taylor has an excellent rundown of Sarah Palin’s reliance on earmarks during her tenure so far as governor and especially during her tenure as the Mayor of Wassila. Of [...]
September 2nd, 2008 at 10:47 am
(Cross-posted from a comment I left at the OTB post trackbacked just above:)
More pertinent evidence to suggest how she’d govern in Washington, and more recent, is the fact that this spring she used her line-item veto as governor of Alaska to cut $268 million from state spending bills — in a state that, comparatively, is flush with money, which makes pork projects almost irresistible. She resisted, and it appears that she’s going to make her vetoes stick.
$268 million, every dollar of which was some legislator’s pet project. Gee, I wonder why the WaPo didn’t mention those 268,000,000 reasons to think she really is a fiscal conservative and reformer?
Gov. Palin has always had instincts for reform and fiscal conservatism, even when she was a city councilman and then mayor of Wasilla. (She took a voluntary salary cut from $68,000 to $64,200, for example). But she will be among the first to tell you that it wasn’t until she was part of the Frank Murkowski administration in 2003-2004 and saw the “good old boy network” from that perspective that she resolved to risk her political career by taking them on. She’s learned on the job, and become a more consistent and effective reformer.
September 2nd, 2008 at 11:01 am
Palin also killed the Bridge to Nowhere because it was too fiscally irresponsible.
September 2nd, 2008 at 1:11 pm
Beldar:
My point was not to say anything in particular about how she governed, or to even assert that there are any character or political flaws here. I am saying that from a purely political perspective this damages one of McCain’s big weapons and one of his rationales for picking her despite her relative lack of experience.
Scott:
But, she supported it while running for governor–not exactly a profile in courage/sign of the great anti-earmark crusader to be for something and then oppose it later. And, as I understand it, she opposed the bridge itself (and kudos to her for that) but still wanted the money for other projects.
Again, the issue her isn’t whether this is weird behavior for a governor (it is quite normal) but whether this helps McCain’s narrative or not.
September 2nd, 2008 at 2:05 pm
This is illogical. Maybe it gives a talking point because people don’t really pay attention, but to say that seeking earmarks makes her unqualified to speak against them doesn’t make sense.
It would be like saying because you think Social Security is a collasal train wreck, you should not collect social security upon retirement because it would be hypocritical.
This is simply not the case. Ron Paul similarly sought earmarks. This is the system we are in, and politicians are forced to live within it. To me, it is not hypocritical to rail against the system, yet still, for the sake of constituents, seek to capitalize on the system as it stands in the meantime. In fact, she would probably be doing her constituents a disservice leaving that money on the table.
I hope that if and when she gets in a position to change the rules about earmarks, she does, and unlike her opponents, she at least talks the talk. Now republicans in Congress have not walked the walk on this issue, and are hypocrites for their behavior. But Palin is not a hypocrite until she is in a position to affect change and takes no action. Until then, this is much ado about nothing.
September 2nd, 2008 at 4:39 pm
Dr. Taylor,
It’s been a while since I ventured over to your blog to comment but since your post has been referenced at OTB I thought I would pay a visit.
The first problem I see is the LAT using the term “relied on” when speaking of Alaska’s requested earmarks. The bias in that term is very obvious yet there is no evidence of reliance on those earmarks to balance the budget or do essential public works projects. In fact most earmarks are not new request for funds but merely a request to prioritize already budgeted dollars.
A community could lobby for an earmark to build a freeway interchange and force it to be prioritized before a resurfacing project. Local input in this way is very common and most likely productive. It’s earmark abuse that needs to be corrected not all earmarks.
This is neither a political scandal or even worthwhile talking points for the Obama campaign as it is easily explained and not contradictory. Palin is undamaged by this.
Your other contributors have made great points on this topic.
Thanks.
September 2nd, 2008 at 4:41 pm
One thing that is really weird about all of these aspects of Palin’s record that keep coming up is the rather incompetent way the McCain campaign has handled it.
For instance, why hasn’t Palin granted any media interviews? Biden was giving exclusives the day before the Democrat convention.
She appears to have gone underground (a la Cheney)!
September 2nd, 2008 at 4:48 pm
Steve,
Thanks for venturing over.
As I stated in the post, it isn’t a scandal at all, and indeed is normal politics.
But that fact doesn’t mitigate the fact that McCain wants to present her as an enemy of earmarks, and yet she clearly lobbied to get earmarks for her town. That creates a political opening for Obama.
I really don’t see how the usage of the phrase “relied on” is relevant to any of this, btw.
At any rate, I do understand that you (and Beldar and Scott, amongst others) disagree with me, but I think my position is quite a bit more solid than yours on this issue.
Do I think that the election will turn on this? Heck, no. Do I think that it is one of several issues that damage the Palin selection, and by extension perception of McCain’s judgment? Yes.
The crux of my post remains:
I really don’t think any you are dealing with those issues, but instead want to argue about the details, which I readily admit aren’t scandalous.
September 2nd, 2008 at 4:52 pm
Ratoe: along those lines, they canceled a scheduled appearance/tribute that she was supposed to attend to today for a right to life gathering. That makes no sense to me.
Some info here.
September 2nd, 2008 at 5:00 pm
Steve/others,
Let’s put it this way: if Al Gore’s usage of private planes can be used to attack his authenticity on environmental issues, I don’t see how Palin’s earmarked past can’t be used against her.
September 2nd, 2008 at 5:17 pm
if Al Gore’s usage of private planes can be used to attack his authenticity on environmental issues,I don’t see how Palin’s earmarked past can’t be used against her.
Speaking of environmental issues…another bizarre incongruous aspect of the pick that is getting scant attention is her firm position as a science-denier on anthropogenic climate change issues.
Considering that a major part of McCain’s domestic policy platform–and one that would, frankly, be extremely significant for the country’s economy–is a cap-and-trade greenhouse gas scheme, how can he reconcile the VP pick? No one expects the Pres and the VP to necessarily to be eye-to-eye on every issue, but climate change is MAJOR (much larger in its sum effect than, say, abortion) and the difference between Palin and McCain is extreme.
It is not inconceivable, for instance, that a cap-and-trade bill would require the VP’s tie-breaking vote in the Senate. Where would she stand? With her weird, anti-science ideology? Or with the President?
I haven’t heard anyone even ask McCain about that.
September 2nd, 2008 at 5:51 pm
[...] misleading to claim she’s McCain’s compatriot here. (Added: Dr. Steven Taylor has a fuller analysis of this aspect). But then I read this: Today is the beginning of a petrol-tax holiday for [...]
September 2nd, 2008 at 7:23 pm
The more I’ve learned about Palin the more she seems like a double-edged sword for the McCain campaign.
I think McCain probably knows everything we know about her, and probably more. I’m guessing that he’s rolling the dice, knowing that the outcome might be bad, and might be good.
If you put yourself in his shoes for a minute, gambling sort of makes sense. We’ve talked ad nauseum about the problems he’s going to have in this campaign, how the odds are against him in the wake of the Bush administration. If you’re McCain you have to be acutely aware of this.
If it was me, I might roll the dice on my running mate and take a chance. I’m not sure that a “safe” pick (Romney, Pawlenty) is really that safe. With the Republican base as limp as it’s been about McCain. . . he probably needed to do something a bit radical and unusual just to have a chance.
Which, of course, does not bode well for him. I get it. But it might explain the choice of Palin; if he was enjoying a healthy lead over Obama it wouldn’t make sense to take such a chance. But with things being the way they are. . . it sort of makes sense to me.
Call it “political going for broke” if you will; I think he’s taking a gamble and hoping it pays off. I’m not sure if it will.
I guess we’ll know in a few months.
September 2nd, 2008 at 9:49 pm
Call it “political going for broke” if you will; I think he’s taking a gamble and hoping it pays off.
Dude, if this is the method he deploys to make probably the most important unilateral decision relating to governance, this is bad news for the country if he wins.
The one truism about gambling is that the house always wins. Sane people gamble only as entertainment–they don’t gamble when it comes to serious decision making involving the public good.
September 2nd, 2008 at 10:08 pm
You’re kidding, right?
Politicians of all flavors take “gambles” all the time.
Wake up and smell the coffee!
September 2nd, 2008 at 10:57 pm
Politicians of all flavors take “gambles” all the time.
The issue here, Cap’n, is the VP choice–of course on many (hell, all) issues politicians have to deal with uncertainity when making decisions.
Normally they weigh the costs and benefits of each decision. The wreckless thing in this case is the criteria for what constitutes a “cost” and a “benefit” deployed by McCain.
McCain’s gamble–as you describe it–is ENTIRELY based on his electoral self-interest; not the country’s interest.
There are scores of well-qualified candidates McCain could have picked, but for some reason he picked Palin–who comes far short from meeting criteria that he has set out in the past.
He really hasn’t given an adequate answer as to why she is a better candidate than other possible choices. Its just a really weird pick.
McCain’s judgment on a whole host of things has been quite erratic, so I think you’re probably right about him being a gambler.
September 3rd, 2008 at 10:26 am
Well, your idealism is lost on me, Mr. Ratoe! I don’t believe any politicians do anything out of any force other than self interest. So the argument that McCain should have picked a VP not out of electoral self interest but out of some sense of national good - you lost me there, because while it’s a nice sentiment, I don’t think it’s possible. I don’t think that we can expect that kind of behavior out of any of our politicians, and think that, especially when campaigning, everying - and I mean EVERYTHING - that they do should be looked at only as a means to an end. Obama and McCain don’t use the toilet without someone telling them how, where, and what to say afterward.
I congratulate you on still having some kind of idealism left, but experience has stripped mine bare. I hope yours does better for you in your life than mine did for me.
September 4th, 2008 at 7:33 am
[...] one would reasonably expect an Alaska politician to do, all sorts of earmarks for her state. As Steven Taylor reminds us, Palin supported the so-called Bridge to Nowhere during her 2006 campaign for [...]
September 4th, 2008 at 8:54 pm
Gov Palin’s support for the earmark during her governor’s race seems to consist of her being insulted at calling the bridge a bridge to nowhere.
Was there anything more? Otherwise, pretty weak support for earmarks.
She appears to be a true reformer, much more so than Sen Obama, champion reformer of the left who opted out of public financing and wants to change presidential bundler reporting limits from $15K to $50K. Let’s just pull some clouds over that sunshine law…
September 4th, 2008 at 9:08 pm
I don’t think you read the post or the stories linked.
September 5th, 2008 at 10:04 pm
Actually, I did read the post. Just see lots of other reasons for the actions she was taking. I guess you don’t. Some solution for accessing the island was important, so bringing a road to the water makes some sense. Overall, the governor vetoed quite a few building projects during her short tenure in office. So no smoking gun that I can see or even posit. Although my comment was primarily directed towards the LAT article, which intimated she supported the bridge before she was against it. While that might be true, I could not find anything on it other than the repeated quotation that she thought it was insulting to call it a bridge to nowhere. Not rabid support, IMHO.
September 5th, 2008 at 10:10 pm
You miss the point, which I will repeat:
In short: I am not questioning any of the moves, I am questioning the politics of presenting her as an anti-earmark crusader, when her record demonstrates otherwise.