"I told the Congress, 'Thanks, but no thanks,' on that Bridge to Nowhere."
Sarah Palin on earmarks....
Palin's earmark requests: more per person than any other state
GOP vice presidential candidate Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin touts her record as a reformer who worked to end the "abuses of earmark spending in Congress." But Palin has embraced earmarks from early on in her career as a mayor of Wasilla to the governor's mansion in Juneau. Just this year she sent to Sen. Ted. Stevens a proposal for 31 earmarks totaling $197 million more, per person, than any other state.
By Hal Bernton and David Heath
Seattle Times staff reporters
ANCHORAGE As she introduced herself to the nation Friday as the Republican vice-presidential candidate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin touted her record as a reformer who worked to end the "abuses of earmark spending in Congress."
But earmarks have never been a dirty word in Alaska, a huge state dotted with small communities that have enormous dollar needs for sewers, roads and other projects.
Instead, earmarks pet projects that members of Congress fund but that no federal agency has requested have become a mainstay of political life here, and one that Palin embraced from early on in her career as a mayor of Wasilla to the governor's mansion in Juneau.
Just this year, she sent to Sen. Ted. Stevens, R-Alaska, a proposal for 31 earmarks totaling $197 million more, per person, than any other state.
Palin's requests to Congress came at a time of huge federal deficits, while Alaska state revenue was soaring due to rising oil prices and a major tax increase on oil production that Palin signed into law in late 2007.
But by 2000, into her second term, the city had hired a Washington, D.C., lobbyist, Steven Silver, a former aide to Stevens, then the ultimate rainmaker as chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee.
"She was hungry for earmarks just like everybody else," said Larry Persily, who worked at the Alaska state office in Washington, D.C., until earlier this year. "Everyone was feeding at the trough."
Before she left office, Wasilla, with aid of the lobbyist and the blessing of Stevens and Rep. Don Young, got $27 million in earmarks, according to the nonpartisan Taxpayers for Common Sense.
During her fall 2006 campaign for governor, Palin appeared to embrace the so-called "Bridge to Nowhere," even after Alaska had been held up for ridicule by McCain and others for what was seen as a wasteful boondoggle, a $233 million bridge that would replace ferry service connecting Gravina Island and its Ketchikan airport to mainland Ketchikan.
seattletimes.nwsource.com
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Sarah Palin=LIAR and QUITTER
