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@Lindbergh…my, my but Mrs. Palin sure does get under your skin. Every comment you make about her is some sort of personal attack. That is very telling, Lindy.
In 2008, Wasilla’s current mayor credited Palin’s 75 percent property tax cuts and infrastructure improvements with bringing “big-box stores” and 50,000 shoppers per day to Wasilla. A local gun store owner said Palin made the town “more of a community … It’s no longer a little strip town that you can blow through in a heartbeat.”
Yes, she increased spending, but she also helped turn a town that barely had any commerce and mostly unpaved roads into a bustling town with new businesses, paved streets and improved and revamped sewer systems. Today Wasilla is nearly twice as big as it was before her tenure as Mayor.
I guess we are to take it that you are against progress? Hmmm, that is odd, since you are such a “progressive.”
As for her record as Governor…
* She lived in Juneau while the legislature was in session and in her hometown of Wasilla the rest of the time. She took a $58 per diem for travel/food allowance, but rejected a hotel allowance, instead driving 50 miles home each night.
* Republicans and Democrats criticized Palin for taking the per diem, but it is worth noting that Palin’s gubernatorial expenses are 80% below those of her predecessor, Frank Murkowski.
* She also chose not to use the former governor’s private chef.
* In February 2009, the State of Alaska, reversing a policy that had treated the payments to her family for travel as legitimate business expenses under the Internal Revenue Code, decided that per diems paid to state employees for stays in their own homes will be treated as taxable income and will be included in employees’ gross income on their W-2 forms. And Sarah Palin herself had ordered the review of the tax policy that brought about this change. Talk about transparency.
And these are just a bare minimum of how she governed.
As for her dealings with the oil companies, it is in the Alaska State Constitution that clearly states the natural resources are to be treated as a public trust. So to answer your question as to my avoiding the question of taxing the oil companies, well I did not avoid that. I said that she doubled the state’s revenues during her tenure as Governor.
In fact, during a special legislative session in Alaska in October and November of 2007 Democrats and Republicans approved of her ACES proposal. ACES is the acronym for Alaska’s Clear and Equitable Share; the program she spearheaded to provide a new way of calculating Alaska’s share of revenue obtained from resource development, as per their State Constitution.
At first the oil companies cried foul, saying she was raising taxes on them, totally ignoring the rest of the program that focused on incentives for new exploration and drilling. But a year later the oil industry did admit that ACES worked and had increased their profits while promoting new exploration and drilling.
Finally as to this Alaska debt to GDP ratio of nearly 70%, well that has to do with the unfunded obligations of the state pensions; which were in place well before she was in office. I guess doubling the state’s revenues doesn’t count for anything because you hate her so much.
She is a public figure, she has a strong conservative record and she scares the hell out of the left. It seems by your posts that you take it personally when it comes to Sarah Palin. Looks like you are giving her a lot of power over you. LOL.
Old One
14 years ago
When libs (lefty totalitarian statists all) go bat scat crazy and start foaming at the mouth over a conservative such as Palin conservatives should immediately recogniize they have a surefire winner. The left always tell us whom to back and whom they fear and that is most certainly Sarah.
The lleft’s totalitarian statists and their media harlots ranted and raved endlessly in the same manner, with the same template and vitriol against Reagan for 16 years before he wiped Carter and the democorrupts off the presidential political map for 12 years.
When the democrats won the White House in 1992 Clinton did so only because Ross Perot tapped into conservative loathers of big government and drained off 19% of the vote while BJ sold himself with the aid of the media’s relentless propaganda machine drumbeat that that Clinton was a New Democrat and a moderate which he was not until forced to triangulate after the Republicans Party annhilated the democrats in the congressional elections of 1994.
atti
14 years ago
You only have to watch MSNBC for just a short time before you will see those morons stretching credulity and reaching for something snarky to say about Palin and finally settling on something that can be best called grammar school wit. My God, they are so sickening.
Old One
14 years ago
The left can not and will not debate and can only name call, scream, and shout because the American public overwhelmingly reject the left’s totalitarian statist ideology. Leftists and their so called liberal democrat tools know their marxist kool-aid is completely abhorent to 60% of adults and hence can only win elections by lying, name calling, and employing the politics of personal destruction against conservatives.
When the left tells voters what they have planned have been annihilated at the polls in every election since 1896. Let us all keep in mind that Roosevelt in all three of his non-wartime elections ran as a balance the budget conservative.
Linbergh
14 years ago
Nice list of conjectures, but the fact is unemployment is 11.2% in Wasilla, don’t really know what prosperity you are talking about. Keynesian Economics brings short term temporary “prosperity”, but building roads is not long term sustainable growth, as evident by the unemployment statistics. Deficit spending, leaving a small town tens of millions of dollars in debt is not sound fiscal policy. She couldn’t even run a town right. http://www.simplyhired.com/a/local-jobs/city/l-Wasilla,+AK
Also, I would prefer you use my whole name Lindbergh, I am not a woman, and stop acting like a child.
And Oil profits dropped. Conoco Phillips profits from oil production dropped from last year. But at least those Alaskans are still getting a bigger cut and a nice fat welfare check.
“Approved by the Legislature in 2007, the tax law boosts the state’s share of windfall oil profits but it has been fingered by Conoco and BP executives for their recent budget slashing on the North Slope. A new ad campaign paid for by The Alliance, an oil-field contractor group, claims the tax law has caused the oil companies to lay off hundreds of Alaska workers.”
And no, doubling revenues doesn’t t impress me, cutting spending does, which she didn’t do. Under her watch, Alaska became the state with the largest debt burden. Instead of cutting the debt to gdp ratio, she increased it, and left the pension plan in shambles for her successor to deal with when she couldn’t take th heat. And FYI, she increased spending 31%, so not only did she not deal with pensions, she ballooned spending. http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/2008-10-23-palinspending_N.htm
Ivan
14 years ago
Mr. Lindbergh,
A very enjoyable take-down of anticsrocks. 😈
You are correct, Palin grew government and governed more like a Democrat with her tax increases and big government programs than as a “conservative small government” Republican.
But you’ll find the Palin sycophants to unreceptive to reason or facts.
@Lindbergh…Whatever you say Lindy. You scream that I ignore your points, but then you bypass altogether the points I so soundly make.
Unemployment is 11.2% in Wasilla? Wow, do you think that has anything to do with El Presidente’s assault on the private sector? Try looking at the unemployment rate for the whole nation, Lind-A-Roonie.
The U.S. jobless rate was unchanged at 9.7% in March, flat from the previous month, but the government’s broader measure of unemployment ticked up for the second month in a row, rising 0.1 percentage point to 16.9%.
The comprehensive gauge of labor underutilization, known as the “U-6″ for its data classification by the Labor Department, accounts for people who have stopped looking for work or who can’t find full-time jobs. Though the rate is still 0.5 percentage point below its high of 17.4% in October, its continuing divergence from the official number (the “U-3″ unemployment measure) indicates the job market has a long way to go before growth in the economy translates into relief for workers.
Depending on whose numbers you use, Alaska’s oil industry is either perking along or on a downward slide.
Taxes are just one factor. Global oil prices are an even bigger one. When prices dropped last winter, oil companies around the world began a budget-cutting spree. In Alaska, Conoco cut 80 jobs last year.
Industry employment is one area in which people argue over the numbers.
On one hand, the number of oil industry jobs has been at record levels in 2008 and 2009. But the number of those jobs started slipping in the middle of last year, registering the first decline in about six years, according to Alaska Department of Labor statistics. Still, oil industry employment remains higher than it was when the legislators approved the tax reforms. And state economists predict employment this year will remain at “above-average levels.”
Gee, I guess you just didn’t read that part…
The state of Alaska has budgeted almost three-quarters of a billion dollars in various incentives to boost petroleum exploration and natural gas pipeline development next year, state officials said.
The bulk of the funds, almost $600 million, will be to pay for industry tax credits paid for new capital investment or exploration, according to state budget documents. The state allows a 20 percent tax credit on capital investments and additional credits for exploration spending, to the point that as much as 40 percent of the costs of an exploration well can be funded from the state budget.
This is a program that was started under Palin and continues under Parnell.
And maybe the price of oil has something to do with the fiscal woes of Alaska, since a whopping 90% of their revenues come from the utilization of their natural resources – as per their State Constitution.
The state budget spending-versus-revenue gap is largely due to a decline in the price of oil. In December 2008 state officials anticipated a $388.7 million surplus for FY 2010 but in just two months revenues dropped. In response to the state budget crisis Gov. Sarah Palin proposed that the state draw on reserves. A total of $1.36 billion and approximately $1.2 billion are estimated to be withdrawn for FY 2009 and FY 2010 respectively. “Responsible reductions and prudent use of reserve funds that we had set aside for tougher times will help us weather the storm,” said Palin. The includes Constitutional Budget Reserve totals $7 billion.
Well there ya go, Linderbergher. I say tomato, you say you hate Palin. Go ahead and give us another rant. Well, go on.
@Linbergh, let me see if I understand you correctly. You want to blame Wasilla’s unemployment numbers today on the back of a mayor who served from 1996 to 2002?
You want to blame oil profits for dropping in the past year on negotiations done when Palin was on the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission seve years ago? ‘Cause I’m pretty darned sure that the price of oil doesn’t have anything to do with the gas pipeline negotiations she did in the summer of 2008. And I’m also sure that the citizens of Alaska aren’t unhappy with their oil share profit sharing kickbacks. Odd to hear an O’faithul complaining that citizens are getting a cut from the big bad oil companies.
But how rich of you to cherry pick a comment from the ADN article you linked…. did you miss that the Dems were battling the Republicans on rolling back that profit sharing, but the Dems stated that despite the drop in profits at the time, their profits that year still “…stood out as the biggest single contributor to the company’s global oil production income, according to new financial statements.”
The new SEC filings show how important Alaska is to Houston-based Conoco’s global business. Last year, Conoco earned a $1.54 billion profit from Alaska oil and gas production, about 30 percent of its worldwide profits.
The company lost $37 million on its Lower 48 production last year, but those numbers don’t jibe well with Alaska because most of the Lower 48 production is from natural gas rather than oil and natural gas prices plummeted last year.
Pesky little factoid, eh Linbergh/Lindbergh… whichever you are?
As far as the state operating budget being higher than Murkowski, wonder if anyone figured in the over $2 million in frivolous complaints costs, and then added in their Alaskan witchhunt on TrooperGate. Hummm… did that drive up state costs much? It was one of the reasons she resigned… the unbelievably absurd costs this crap was costing the Alaskan taxpayer. duh wuh
Another couple of lines from your own link, where you cherry picked data, was:
Because 90% of the state’s revenue comes from the oil and gas industry, Alaska has been flush with cash in recent years. State coffers grew fatter still when Palin, with help from Democrats in the Legislature, increased taxes this year by billions on the energy industry.
The Alaska government tends to spend more in good times, said Greg Erickson, an economic consultant in the state capital.
In a newsletter, Democratic Rep. Mike Doogan compared the 2008 budget process to a feeding frenzy by piranhas.
“The legislature is chewing through the financial bonanza brought by higher oil taxes and higher oil prices at a prodigious rate,” he said.
Let me see… Pelosi/Reid taxing big bad oil=good. Palin taxing big bad oil, and sharing profits with citizens=bad. Naw… no hypocrisy there.
It seems that Alaskan lawmakers love to spend as much as Pelosi/Reid/Obama like to do. Only they had cash to spend, and the other forenamed are banking on the income from the nation’s grandkids….
@MataHarley…Right on! Great post and yeah, I just love to see how much power those lefties give Palin over them. She tweets and they go into super panic overdrive, with the froth spitting from their collective mouths. LOL
Even if she never runs for President, she has accomplished more for the Conservative cause and to really point out the hypocrisy and viciousness of the left.
John A
14 years ago
I agree that when the left continues to offer nothing but blabbering insults that we KNOW we have finally found our 2012 Winning Presidential Candidate in Sarah Palin. The list of 2 term Presidents in our history that they said the exact same ignorant things about proves they simply do not learn from their past. I thought these liberals were supposed to be the “smart” ones? Sarah will prove to be just another President the left miscalculated, misjudged, underestimated and embarrassed themselves over by the stupid remarks that came back to bite them in the ass.
I do thank them for confirming our next winner though! When the hatred, fear and rampant insults reaches this type of level from the left, we KNOW we have found our Winner!
atti
14 years ago
Thanks to antics and johnA above. Love to read cogent commentary about the liberals. Whatever one may think about Bush or Cheney, nothing compares to the horrors heaped onto the American people by these scum.
Thinking of going to my first Tea Party on Friday in Vero Beach. Very much impressed by the enthusiasm of the locals. I had no idea there are so many this weekend all over the country. Sorry if I’m duplicating. http://www.teapartypatriots.org/Default.aspx
John A
14 years ago
Going into 2012 with the mood shifting AGAINST this radical President and the liberal Democrats, Nationwide, what will Obama do? Sarah will eat him for lunch, running on Smaller Government, Common Sense Solutions, A stronger Defense, a FAIR tax system and not redistribution, stricter immigration laws etc. etc. – will BURY Obama and send his band of Chicago crooks back home where they belong. Conservatives, Independents and the Tea Party crowd will support her and rout Obama out of office. It will not be a close election in 2012. Until then, she will build her media empire bigger and get positioning herself to be THE Republican Candidate to beat!! Romney, Pawlenty, Gingrich better get behind her now and get this thing organized. They can’t compete with her and need to admit it and start supporting her NOW!!!
atti
14 years ago
Wow, John A, you should be Sarah’s Chief of Staff.
atti
14 years ago
…or Campaign Manager.
atti
14 years ago
Where is the pompous Gorge Will these days? I will never forget his extremely insulting comments about Sarah when she was chosen by McCain to be his running mate. He said them with such loathing that I truly hope, that in her stunning successes of the future, he will be reduced to total embarrassment. What a self-possessed stuffed shirt.
John Alden
14 years ago
I am one of many “new” to the political scene voices that would caucus for her in a heart beat! She is one of the shrewdest political forces I have ever seen. She “connects” with voters. Obama and the liberals are so disconnected to voters now it’s pathetic!
Independents gave Obama the benefit of the doubt in 2008. They now have buyers remorse!
We need to get back out country from this Saul Alinsky radical!!
John Alden
14 years ago
The entire elite Washington media (Conservative and liberal) got it wrong with Palin. Since the Country has now shifted clealry to the right, they will have to recognize Palin’s force with VOTERS this time. She speaks to them. She is against Socialism, Big Government, Marandizing Terrorists, Allying WITH Israel instead of what Obama has done. If the left is scared, they should be because she is clearly a force to be reckoned with. Obama appears worried and he should be because he was naive to assume Americans would swallow his Socialist agenda with Huge Growth in Government and limiting the freedoms of us all!
TIME ,is playing with SARAH because she is surely taking note of the level of the fight that she will be against and by sticking to her position,means she feel confident that she can face opponents when her time arrive to ease : her position on top,,do not under estimated thoses who will be on her back fighting for her,,we have highly intelligents people gearings up on our side that she can depend on… 🙄
John Alden
14 years ago
I wish she would hire New Gingrich to be her Campaign Chief because he could lay out her domestic and foreign affairs agenda with a level of expertise that would be un-touchable for Obama’s Chicago gang to compete with, given the mood of the country. She could then deliver the message which would increase her electorate HUGE!! She is making Millions and will need Millions to beat Obama. Although I think the cracks in the Democratic party and lack of enthusiasm there will be all she needs to win in 2012.
atti
14 years ago
Further to John Alden’s comment, I just read a few days ago on another blog that the key members, viz., Axelrod and Emmanuel, of Obama’s staff are looking for ways to abandon ship. Wouldn’t that be a kick in O’ private parts!
Newt is shrewd and an excellent historian. For the most part, he is right on target, but I think Newt’s weakness is his overwhelming desire to “reach across the aisle.” Bipartisanship is a wonderful thing, but it flows out of good legislation, not the other way around. You don’t begin by wooing the other Party, you let good legislation do it for you.
He would make an excellent Vice Prez or as was mentioned a great Chief of Staff.
John A
14 years ago
Nice work anticsrocks! I concur with all the above. Axelrod and Emmanuel have kept with the “Chicago” style of politics i.e.our way or the highway approach to advice and I think Obama is smelling the coffee now and is worried. All Palin needs are terrific advisors/managers around her and she can deliver the goods. She has the energy, the fight, intuition and the connection for what Americans actually “want” from an elected official versus Obama’s my way and like it approach that the majority of Americans are outraged about. If he picks a left wing liberal to the Court, shoves Cap and Tax down the throats of American businesses and other radical left wing agenda, he is surely finished going into the Mid-terms and Democratic candidates wil run, not walk away from his endorsements/campaign help.
Lindbergh
14 years ago
I will address Matt and Anti here. For one, you guys cannot accredit Palin’s policies(building public roads, public facilities, the short term Keynesian model) for the supposed growth it brought to the town and ignore the fact that Wasilla has higher average unemployment than both the state of Alaska and the United States. You cannot have your cake and eat it to. I also figured you would bring up “real unemployment” statistics. All you are doing is mixing and matching different mathematical formulas and then comparing different numbers. That is intellectually dishonest. Both the 9.7% number and the 11.2% number were gathered using the same unemployment formulation. You site that real unemployment in America is 17%, I would say it is 20% or higher, but the fact remains, is that if by traditional unemployment measurements, wasilla has a higher rate, than once can logically deduce they have a higher real unemployment rate.
Real Unemployment calculates those who no longer collect unemployment benefits, and those who who have given up looking for work, where as traditional unemployment mechanisms don’t.
Taxes are a huge part of the equation. Yes, oil prices dropped drastically in 2008, but have been rising since 2009. Please, don’t talk about commodities markets when you know nothing about them. leave investing to the grown ups. They are back to roughly January 2008 prices right now in April 2010. http://quotes.post1.org/historical-crude-oil-price-chart/
Look, you can cite how the state got more money and residents got a larger welfare check, but unemployment numbers and the debt to gdp ratio numbers are on my side. She may have doubled revenue. but she increased spending 31% and created a 70% debt to GDP ratio. She increased spending, she did not cut it, and now Alaska is paying the price for high tax high spending policies.
The job losses and the fact that no jobs are being recovered is evidence that high taxation burdens big business. It prohibits them from hiring new workers because with new taxes, it would cost more to hire a worker than he would be worth in productive capital output. It is like what happened during the Great Depression. 90% taxation rates prohibited economic recovery and job creation, whereas in the 1920s Harding slashed the budget and cut taxes and America was out of the Post World War 1 Depression in a year. Coolidge continued his policies and we went from 20% unemployment in Feb 1921 to a 3.3% average for the rest of the decade. Unemployment was pared from its high in 1921 of 20% to an average of 3.3% for the remainder of the decade. The misery index which is a combination of unemployment and inflation had its sharpest decline in U.S. history under President Harding. The Gross National Product averaged 7% from 1924 to 1929. http://www.calvin-coolidge.org/html/the_harding_coolidge_prosperit.html
As for Obama, I will agree, his policies have been disasterous, but fiscally conservative states with low spending and low taxes like the Dakotas, Texas, Virginia, Utah, Montana, Wyoming, and New Hampshire have lower debt to gdp ratios and lower levels of unemployment. Evidently, they don’t have the cash to spend, as they have the highest debt burden in the Union. I don’t understand you, you are awfully hypocritical, you denounce deficit spending from Washington yet justify it when Alaska does it. You denounce windfall profits taxes when Pelosi does it, but justify it under Palin. You can’t have it both ways. Either you support what Pelosi and Palin do, or you oppose it all together. http://www.bls.gov/web/laus/laumstrk.htm
@Lindbergh, you’re a real hoot. Condescending “grown up” that you proclaim to be. To attribute Wasilla unemployment in 2010 to Palin’s mayoral tenure ending eight years ago is pie in the sky PDS at best. How about we attribute entering the Afghanistan battle field around that same time to Obama?
duh
And you also want to attribute the ever morphing commodies market to Palin policies? Talk about entering into debates where you are clueless….
Then you call Alaskan oil profit sharing “welfare”. There is no end to your illogic, Lindbergh. The resources are owned by the state, and in some cases the feds. Profit sharing in owned resources is a far cry from “welfare”, save in your dementia.
Were you to chit chat a bit less, and research a bit more, you might find that the state spending didn’t necessarily include an increase in the size of Alaskan government, but they had more outlays for improvements while the revenue was flush, and the added expense of legislation witchhunts and frivolous complaints. That’s called “state spending”. In fact, Palin reduced staff and department sizes from her predecessor. So your oversimplistic representation of facts lacks detail.
My problem with your presentation of facts is that the spending of the state went up… as it usually does… while revenues were up. This is considerably preferable to our federal spending going up when revenues are declining. Or perhaps you felt they should just keep it in a rainy day fund, and ignore their community development spending packages that benefited from their revenue increase enjoyed under Palin’s service?
I can’t say as I disagree with over taxation of the private sector. And I can’t say as I disagree that Palin is far from the perfect administrative branch official. Nor do I need a history lesson from you INRE taxation and it’s effect upon the economy. Especially since that is not where we disagree.
I just suggest that the arenas in which you choose to criticize Palin are distorted to reflect your personal opinion of her as a politician.
And BTW, if you wish to be addressed by your handle, Lindbergh, correctly, then I suggest you return the favor. The handle is Mata or MataHarley. And if you have any grasp of history, you’ll figure out that I’m female… not a “you guys”.
Ivan
14 years ago
@Mata
You said,Were you to chit chat a bit less, and research a bit more,
That’s a hoot. Given that Lindbergh backed his assertions with links to accepted statistics and all you do is drone on and on like some boring College Professor who likes the sound of their voice, I think it’s time you took a time out Mata and researched yourself. 🙄
Palin left Alaska with a budget in the red and left her state with the highest per capita debt in the Union. You and the rest seem to overlook this fact.
She also dramatically grew the size of government. In this respect she is like Obama!
She was a disaster to Alaska as witnessed by the sorry state she left the place in.
Lindbergh
14 years ago
Sorry, Mata, but you have to take the good with the bad. If you are going to give her credit for the economic expansion and debt expansion that resulted from her public works projects, than you have to accept the economic consequences thereafter. You can’t just say the temporary positive effects are her’s while the long term consequences aren’t.
Look, I know you are mad, you don’t understand markets, most Americans don’t. They are small minded people like yourself who can only grasp broad campaign slogans and appealing personalities. It is funny how you don’t address commodities markets, you only mock me for providing you with the facts.
Profit sharing is socialism, and it is welfare. Profit redistribution by the government is social welfare. Communal ownership of resources is socialist.
” any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods” http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/socialism
The 500,000 dollar lawsuit does not account for the 31% increase in spending and turning Alaska into the state with the largest debt burden in the union at 70%. So clearly, spending outstripped her new revenues, she added more debt. So the fact she brought in more revenues is irrelevant to a discussion where we are talking about her increasing the debt. She kept spending where it was or increased it in every sector, and the debt rose accordingly. http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/Alaska_state_spending.html#usgs302a
But I am glad you oppose Palin’s tax increases and recognize their negative effects on the oil industry in Alaska. You aren’t totally biased.
uh huh, Ivan…. like read all the anti-Palin journalist hit pieces and ignore the Dept of Revenue Treasure debt docs…. LOL
You know, you idiot, I’m not even a Palin for POTUS person. Which makes your commentary even more absurd and soaked with PDS. I just have a problem with people misrepresenting the fiscal facts because they don’t examine the details of revenue to spending. But I’m sure that brilliant self-proclaimed stocks/bonds/commodies expert, Lindbergh, may figure it out if he decides to be unbiased, and takes the time to check out the Alaskan budget reports over the years.
And no… Palin didn’t add tons of agencies and staffers to the state government rolls. Spending is not always the result of adding more to the state payrolls. “nearly bankrupted”…. BWAHAHAHAHA…. that state has built in hefty revenues with their natural resources, not to mention federal funding since so much of the state actually belongs to the feds. We should all be so “bankrupt”.
@Lindbergh, please don’t be assuming you know my mood. I am not mad, and I assure you if I were, you’d know it. I have a high tolerance level for certain amounts of ignorance. You haven’t hit my threshhold yet.
Let’s try a picture for a property overview in spending in Alaska over time, shall we?
Palin became Governor in 2006, and resigned early 2009. That makes the last two blue bars spending under her admin. My my… looks like all that heinous spending rose post-Palin era, eh?
At the time she assumed office, the GDP-AK was 43.264%. At the time of her resignation, it 47.912%. Today it’s at 48.517%… just over a year later. And I don’t suppose that their Dem majority legislature holds any responsibility for the spending, since it is only they who can appropriate, and the admin branch who vetos or enacts…. just as it is with our Congress.
However that federal site is generic and doesn’t give the breakdown in spending, and when it occurred. So I tend to go to the state sites for the specifics because those little details happen to be important. In this case, you can find all the debt breakdowns by year at the Alaska Dept of Revenue, Treasury Division.
One of the first things you’d notice, if you compared the years… and remember that Palin left in early 2009… is that post’Palin, the state issued General Obligation Bonds for the first time since 2003 (pre’Palin) to the tune of $315,050,000… the majority of that going to transportation, the second to education and the third to water/sewer infrastructure. That was Palin’s doing??
State revenue debt declined under her admin. Sportfish and int’l airport bonds went down, as well as the student loan bonds.
Housing finance debt increased 2007-08. Gee, wonder why. Spending was less under Murkowski by $86,128,000… but then Murkowski didn’t have the revenue income to address the states transportation, education and infrastructure needs either. If you had haunted the Alaskan blogs like I did in 2008, you would have noticed that their community infrastructure was in dire straits and a constant bitch. So in 2009, after garnishing the Palin/AK legislature revenue by means which you and I tend to agree on, they decided to spend that cash on the state’s needs.
So you diss Palin today, for spending done after she left, using revenue increases she was a part of??
Believe me, I don’t like heavy government spending at any level. But there is a degree of spending for needed infrastructure that is part of a state’s legitimate spending. And transportation, infrastructure for utilities and even wise education appropriation (that’s usually an oxymoron too…) are some of those items.
However to suggest that somehow Palin’s governance record is more heinous based on actions the successor governor and their Dem legislature after her departure… especially in light of their increasing revenue intake… is utterly absurd. No more than Obama/Pelosi/Reid’s spending today can be considered Bush’s fault.
But I will say in the long run, as an independent, I have equal opportunity disdain for all politicians and their spending… despite what side of the aisle they reside on. Frankly they all need to be reigned in, at all levels of government.
~~~
@Ivan, as usual you prove yourself merely to be a rude a’hole with no input except for personal assaults. You’d be surprised at how often I bail you out of moderation and spam. I think that courtesy I’ve extended to you has long since been abused. So, as far as I’m concerned, you can sit there and rot until another author gets in the mood to post your anal dissertations, dude.
Ivan
14 years ago
Mata,
You are wrong. She didn’t become governor until 2007. And she didn’t leave in “EARLY” 2009. She left office on July 26th, 2009.
Once again you play fast and loose with the facts, only showing you’re not up to speed for this or most discussions of political importance.
You need to spend some time doing research before engaging your mouth.
As Grandpa used to say,”Engage the brain before engaging the mouth.”
Now Aye… don’t be boggling Ivan’s braincell with details like when she was sworn in. And we won’t be further scrambling what’s left of his brain cell with the facts that the Alaskan legislature session is short… 120 days from Jan 1st. Tho they tried to make it shorter. Alaskan lawmakers are genuinely dual citizens…. part time legislators, and the rest of the time having a job in the private sector. Something I think that’d be a great mandate for federal Congress. Gives ’em a dose of reality instead of being career politicians.
And “duh” on the additional bond dollars. It was I who provided you the link, Lindbergh. You never got further than the US Government Spending site. Lazy? Or just uninterested in details?
Lindbergh
14 years ago
I have exited out of my post 3 times now. Oh well, I will just keep it short and sweet.
Ivan is correct, Palin authored the Budgets for Fiscal Years 2008, 2009, and 2010
The Predecessor to Palin authored Budgets for fiscal year 2006 and 2007. Just think for a second, how would Palin author a budget for 2006 when she wasn’t even Governor? Just think about that for a second and realize how absurd that sounds. Same with 2007. What you gave was the debt report, not the budget. Palin’s administration did a debt report on Murkowski’s 2007 budget.
Ah yes… was waiting for you to take the bait, Lindbergh. Love it when I know the prey is close. Wanted to make sure you were paying attention… LOL!
You, of course, mean the budgets that she slashed by 30% that were sent to her. As in the operating budget bill that was $11.1 bil for education, the university, public health and safety, transportation, and resource development that she slashed to $8.7 bil? Or the capital budget that she received that was slashed in half by Palin from $3.6 bil to $1.87 bil?
Good thing she was there or the Dem majority legislature would have “spent Alaska into bankruptcy”…..
INRE “State Revenue Debt”, apparently you have shown us unwilling to go check out the Alaskan budget breakdowns online and still cling to your generic overview, Lindbergh. Otherwise you would have noted the 5th category down clearly marked “State Revenue Debt”. Bonus for you… they have a category called “State Moral Obligation Debt” too.
But then, that entails reading and pouring thru budgets now, doesn’t it?
Care to talk about the rainy day fund she created for these sketchy commodies times? But nooooooo
Lindbergh, thank you for *finally* going to the site that I, myself, sent to you in order to see just what the spending is, when it happened, and what it was for. For that I give you kudos…. even if only having to be noodged into it.
Other places where Palin increased state spending was in the special needs education funds… where the anti-Palin pundits claimed she slashed spending by 62%. In fact, she increased that spending by triple over three years time. So that figures in to part of the education increases.
However I will still take issues with you for being too generalized for numbers, and not examining just what the state was doing with their revenue… ala issuing bonds for highly needed transportation and infrastructure. (I still have problems with “education”, depending on how it’s being used….). There are good “earmarks” and bad. It’s not that there should be “no” spending, but wise spending by government.
Alaskan roads and infrastructure suffer mightily because of their weather. Can you say “permafrost”? I see nothing wrong with a state spending for needed state improvements when they have both the revenue income, combined with a rainy day fund. And, in fact, despite what the legislature *wanted* to spend, Palin still reigned them in. Therefore, despite you wanting to say she increased their debt – which has been happening every dang year for decades, so that’s not unusual for any state – the spending was both reigned in for what the legislature wanted to spend, and what they spent it on.
As far as their debt goes, I will again say the same thing to you that I said to bozo Ivan…. Commodies, Alaska’s main revenue source, fluctuate. If the rest of the US had the same resource base of an integral national necessity like oil as revenue income, I would have less fears (not *no* fear) of the spending going on. What is today’s reality on revenue is not likely to be next year’s reality because of the global supply/demand pricing. But it was because of that fluctuation that Palin built in the rainy day fund to tide them over.
When it comes to necessary spending for a state for the base needs of their denizens… transportation, utilities/infrastructure and education, Palin is cuts above the norm.
Live with it… or play with the numbers and seek out your fellow peers that suffer from PDS so you may rest comfortable in your misrepresented details.
Oh yes… Lindbergh… may I draw your attention to something? Here’s your NYTs cute little graphic as “proof positive”.
Let’s see…. “unfunded pensions”… as in government pensions, that require revenue. Now how many of those states have oil/gas pipelines as a revenue source?
Hint… TX isn’t on that graph….
Think such an in demand commodity such as oil has any future value, when compared to the other states that depend upon retail/service oriented success for their revenue?
I think I’ll be betting on Alaska coming thru a global pinch, as well as TX, before I do the rest of the nation.
Oh yeah… anyone notice where Romney’care MA is on the list?
@John Alden, all I can say is we @non-grown ups does what we cans….. Glad you appreciate the logic wondering about something dissing “debt” in a global economy where there are precious few NOT in debt – all the while ignoring the slashing of the budgets presented that occurred.
It’s all in the presentation. Lindbergh should stick to PDF friendly site to pull of those tricks.
Meanwhile, Ivan disappears from his lonely moderation existence into the cyber trash can … oh my. What will he do without a friendly author to bale his rude self out?
Lindbergh
14 years ago
You nudged me there to see Palin was increasing the debt? That is what I was telling you all along…
Well, no matter, as long as we are clear Palin increased spending, increased taxes, and increased the debt, I have not further issues.
Just because she has a disabled child, doesn’t make it ok to rob the taxpayers and increase their debt burden. If she were a conservative, she could have enacted an education tax credit for parents, allowing parents to have the choice to attend a private school better equipped to meet their needs, and cut spending accordingly. Increasing public education funding is not conservative, and it isn’t conducive to promoting better education. Private schools provided better education and are more cost efficient( just look at this chart, a public school education in D.C costs almost as much as a tuition to Harvard). http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2010/02/dc-public-schools-129-trillion-28170.html
That is a fundamental difference between you and me, I just flat out disagree with increased spending, anywhere, particularly in a recession. If you want to talk about road improvements down the pipeline, maybe. but serious budget cuts, and drastic tax cuts must be in order first, and should always be the goal, particularly in a recession where taxpayers can ill afford the bills the government foots them or the debt imposed on them. You have to realize where the money for bonds comes from. It comes from investors and banks(commercial and investment), so instead of investors and bankers putting money into businesses to create more jobs and help upstart businesses during a down turn, money is reallocated to government pet projects. so particularly in a state like Alaska, with a fluctuating revenue due to shifts in crude oil, reigning in spending is key.
@Mata and Aye…Awesome! I score this as a win for the Conservatives over the dynamically dismal duo of Lindy and Ivanovich.
Doncha’ just hate it when the facts blow the libtards right outta the water??!! I get home from work today and take in this great debate in which every lie and absurd assumption about Palin by Lind-A-Roonie and Ivan-to-make-sense-but-can’t are put down to their death like sick dogs at the animal shelter.
Thanks for the chuckle, MataHarley and Aye Chihuahua. It is hilarious to see that each time you smack Lindy down, he comes back, but with less vitriol. Like if he agrees with you nicely enough he can still make his point. Funny that when you take away his salient points, he loses his bluster. 😆
There’s something about discussing Palin and/or Alaska with liberal/progs or Paulbots that just brings out the venom in people. Always amusing. And it becomes especially entertaining when they concoct some high threshhold meant only for her. You, Lindbergh are seriously anal about this. You become fixated on one thing, and one thing alone, in order to redeem yourself from superficial research. There’s only one thing you want to be able to say… that the budget in Alaska went up compared to what it was the prior year.
Whoa… revelation. Devil in the details? Who cares. Immaterial.
Tell you what, Lindbergh. Why don’t you introduce us to this perfect conservative in the world. You know, the one who not only helps create increased revenues for their state, and who doesn’t just settle for just slashing a Dem budget by 30%, but actually decreases the entire budget from the prior year?
Where is this perfect candidate? We’re all ears, guy. We’re all pining to know just who is it you are speaking of, since we can use this guy or girl immediately on the conservative forefront.
But that’s not the game you’re playing, is it? Slashing budgets written by a Dem majority isn’t good enough. In your strange world, all you need to be right is to say that the end figure is still higher than the previous year. Hey, ta hell with the veto override power and a dose of reality, eh? That interferes with your over simplistic and incomplete argument used to prove Palin’s inadequate.
Ya know, I’m a year older this year than last. And it’s likely I’ll be a year older next year. ’tisn’t much different an argument.
Ya know something else, Lindbergh…. I’m willing to bet you have no perfect candidate and there is no state that has a smaller budget this year than last. But hey… truly… I’d be genuinely excited to know of that super pol. Christie’s about the only one coming close to it, and I’m not sure if even his slashed budget is less than the previous year’s.
So here’s the scoop… you had your best money income last year, plus stashed cash in a savings account or mattress. But despite your healthy balance sheets and savings, you slash your spending instead of fixing that roof on your house needing repairs, or replacing that faulty water heater.
If you don’t do the repairs when you have the cash and savings in order to prevent more deterioration (that will cost more to fix it later), just when do you do it?
But no.. you say hang, let the Alaskan roads sink and crack. Let freight and goods transportation suffer with lengthy delays. Let the private operators absorb the repair costs and shortened lifespan for the damage to their fleet vehicles. Just as long as it fits your numbers, right Lindberg? Looks so darn good on paper.
To you the record revenue doesn’t count, the genuine needs be damned. Palin was charged with doing something no one has done… having a budget that was less that it was the prior year so she can prove her conservative credentials to you, personally.
And then you come up with the absurdity that commercial lending suffered because investors and financial institutions did Alaskan bonds instead.
WTF? Does diversity even appear on your laptop portfolio definitions??
But let me give you a couple of clues. First, I hardly think that bonds for roads and infrastructure provided an “either/or” lending environment in Alaska. And secondly, there hasn’t been any substantive, or job creating, commercial lending around since 2008. That makes it even more unlikely the bonds became the sacrificial lamb of money for Alaskan jobs. In fact, Alaska has better unemployment numbers than my state…. and we don’t have any road work going on except what Obama’s making the taxpayers pay for. At least Alaska’s not doing the hand out trip.
Here’s another revelation for you. Commercial lending isn’t going to be around for a while to come, and bonds are only going to get even more popular. Investors are going to be escaping the high risk, big turnover bucks to nestle into some safe investments post Fed/MBS buys and the inevitable increasing rates. I’d say AK and TX bonds are going to be far more attractive than MA or CA bonds…. the former being resource rich states with high potential revenue. Lots of security there. And you have heard of the resetting of commercial leases and loans coming at the end of this year and next, yes?
Your arguments are tunnel visioned, anal in definition, idealistic and specifically aimed to create a standard for Palin that exists for no one else. This sounds like a personal problem.
@Mata…WOW! Standing ovation. I was going to chip in on this debate once again and try to shed a bit of light on the stupidity and dead horse beating arguments of Lindy, but damn girl you rock!
Feel free to chime right on in, anti…. Paulbots are used to multifront assaults. LOL
But thank you for the kind words.
Old Trooper
14 years ago
I’d like to know just what is it about Sarah Palin that scares the daylights out of some of the posters here. Is it because she was a competent Mayor and Governor or is it just that she embraces traditional American values that are no longer taught in schools these days. Is it her gender or the fact that she was not Ivy League educated or a product of old money or sired by Career Politicians?
The bitter medicine that it will take to reclaim and restore the Republic just may entail the acceptance of someone like Palin that has the ability to get things done and be the reality check that a complacent America needs right now. She certainly can do no worse than the current Pretender in Chief and I doubt if she is as economically illiterate either.
Okay, I tried to post a gif for ya’ Mata. A standing ovation gif, but when I hit submit, my comments disappeared, so just imagine the pic. LOL 😕
ditto
14 years ago
@Theodore Herrera #2
Ditto the only way to stop a moderate McCain is close off the primaries to ONLY Republicans.I wish we could close it off to ONLY conservatives.I hate to break it to the Sarah haters out there but she is the future.Ron Paul,John McCain and other Liberals need to be handed their walking papers.
That would be acting stupidly. You are in effect advising that the Republican party become a GOP version of the Current Democratic leadership. A moderate Republican is still a Republican. If you totally block out moderates from appearing in the primaries, then you will absolutely lose most of your chance of getting moderate votes. You apparently don’t understand the concept and purpose of a balanced ticket. The logical preference should be for a strongly Conservative Presidential Candidate, and a Vice Presidential Candidate that appeals to the party moderates. If you leave moderates totally out of the equation, you will not gain the votes from the middle that you need to win.
Lindbergh
14 years ago
Mata, I am not going to critique your whole post. Most of it was bloviating and a defense of increased spending, increased debt, and increased taxes. Here it goes
“But no.. you say hang, let the Alaskan roads sink and crack. Let freight and goods transportation suffer with lengthy delays. Let the private operators absorb the repair costs and shortened lifespan for the damage to their fleet vehicles. Just as long as it fits your numbers, right Lindberg? Looks so darn good on paper.”
That is a pretty extreme argument, the roads were not sinking and collapsing before the increased spending. You are just giving a hypothetical apocalyptic vision with no basis in facts.
“To you the record revenue doesn’t count, the genuine needs be damned. Palin was charged with doing something no one has done… having a budget that was less that it was the prior year so she can prove her conservative credentials to you, personally.”
Revenue is irrelevant in a discussion where she increased spending 31% and increased the debt. These are cold hard facts. Now, if she had used the revenue to pay down the debts in the relatively good economic times they wouldn’t be facing 70% debt to GDP ratios right now. But they didn’t. They just blew it all.
“And then you come up with the absurdity that commercial lending suffered because investors and financial institutions did Alaskan bonds instead.”
Apparently, you don’t understand how depositors attain interest. Commercial Banks return interest to depositors by putting money into corporate bonds, small business loans, and government loans. You may not have much money or have enough to have a large portfolio, so you probably don’t take the time to study the intricacies of the market. This is ok, but that you have to understand is that increased Government bonds divert capital away from the private sector.
“But let me give you a couple of clues. First, I hardly think that bonds for roads and infrastructure provided an “either/or” lending environment in Alaska. And secondly, there hasn’t been any substantive, or job creating, commercial lending around since 2008. That makes it even more unlikely the bonds became the sacrificial lamb of money for Alaskan jobs. In fact, Alaska has better unemployment numbers than my state…. and we don’t have any road work going on except what Obama’s making the taxpayers pay for. At least Alaska’s not doing the hand out trip.”
There hasn’t been any economic growth in Alaska or around the nation for a couple of reasons. One, the high tax burden(ie. Conoco slashing jobs: http://www.adn.com/2010/02/02/1121858/conocos-alaska-profits-drop-in.html), two, increased government spending(capital is being directed away from the private sector to buy government debt). Consumers are also getting royally screwed(though be it slowly), by the low interest rate policies of the Federal Reserve in their attempt to facilitate large amounts of government borrowing. Prices on food and energy are slowly going up week by week http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5h6dT1TIKE1iwkoR1HuZA_E1pd5tQD9F2RTH83 http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5i5TtajgUpSm7KY5jf-lCJGHBB-tAD9F3OGTG0
“Here’s another revelation for you. Commercial lending isn’t going to be around for a while to come, and bonds are only going to get even more popular. Investors are going to be escaping the high risk, big turnover bucks to nestle into some safe investments post Fed/MBS buys and the inevitable increasing rates.”
You are telling me something I already know, but that is the problem, capital is being diverted to finance government largesse.
yada yada yada, Lindbergh. Nothing’s changed. You still charge Palin with standards you don’t apply to your beloved Houston king of pork, Ron Paul. You still avoid the pertinent question…. just who is your perfect conservative candidate that no one measures up to.
Can’t answer that, can you?
Just more yada yada yada. In case you TX folk don’t figure that out, it’s sorta yiddish for “bloviating”.
Lindbergh sez: That is a pretty extreme argument, the roads were not sinking and collapsing before the increased spending. You are just giving a hypothetical apocalyptic vision with no basis in facts.
What is it with you, Lindbergh. If you, personally, don’t know it, it can’t possibly exist or be true? And people wonder why Alaskans feel they have little in common with the lower 48 mentality…
Today, almost all of the two-lane highway is surfaced with asphalt. But it’s no freeway. There still are stretches where the highway is narrow and curvy, where it lacks center lines and ample shoulders. Also, watch out for sudden loose-gravel breaks where the pavement has failed or is under repair. Sometimes the gravel gaps are marked with little, red flags; sometimes they aren’t. And that asphalt paving can ripple like a roller coaster track in places where “frost heaves” are caused by seasonal freezing and thawing of the ground.
Maintainence crews do their best to patch the annual outbreak of frost heaves, but it’s a never-ending, high-cost job. Long dry spells can make the gravel portions of the road dusty, and if it’s extremely dry, you may have washboard and roughness problems. Drive with your headlights on at all times as it is easier for oncoming vehicles to see you.
The above is from OutWestNewspaper. Or maybe a dose of reality of what Alaskan and Canadian weather can do to roads from Roads To Alaska is due. Again about one of the more well known and traveled roads, the Alcan.
At times, the road conditions are excellent. At other times, it might take you two hours to travel 12 miles. The earth and the elements do violent things to roads in Alaska and Northern Canada. They’re usually in constant need of repair, and the Alcan can only be worked on during the summer. You will frequently sit idle waiting for what seems like an eternity for road construction workers to let you pass by. Much of the road under construction will be dirt and rock and you can bet that one of those rocks will fly up and hit your windshield at least a few times during your trip. Many cars in Alaska have cracked windshields, and there is a good chance yours will be one of them if you drive the Alcan. So, before you decide to take your car on the Alcan, consider the wear and tear a 4,600-mile round trip on the Alcan will put on it. After thousands of miles of rough terrain, your shiny new car may never be the same.
If your vehicle is not in good working order, don’t take it. Many miles stretch between one car-repair shop and the next, and if you break down in between them you may end up dumping your entire budget into transporting your car to a repair shop and getting it fixed.
There’s a reason my friend tells me that Alaska has two seasons… winter, and road repair (Continuously running from May to Oct annually).
You think building and/or maintaining roads in that environment is the same as the lower 48? Have you got any idea what those road conditions do to vehicles annually? Just in the north, the State maintains 1500 miles of paved roads and 2000 miles of gravel roads. Even back in 1998, they had hefty annual budgets, especially for the northern roads where the discontinuous permafrost would do the most damage, and resurfacing was done annually. It’s a constant battle against the elements, not only for roads, but for homes.
But of course, I’m exaggerating as to what happens when they just let the road repairs go so they can please you with budget numbers, Lindbergh. I guess they should have done it Ron Paul’s way… let the feds/via the taxpayers pay for it instead of spending their own cash.
Lindbergh
14 years ago
Mata, you aren’t even discussing the issues anymore, you are just defending spending increases, tax increases, and increased debt. You have been reduced to, “yada yada yada, Lindbergh.” Just posts ago, you said ” I’m not even a Palin for POTUS person”, yet now you mention her as a candidate and claim I am setting unreasonable standards. You totally lose it when people do not support her. Sorry, I am not jumping on the bandwagon, I don’t like people who raise taxes, raise the debt, and wear Israeli flag pins. Not my cup of tea.
“pork”
It doesn’t increase the deficit, it merely reallocates spending from the Executive branch to the legislative branch. It is used as a tool by big government republicans who vote for unbalanced budgets to claim they are fiscally conservative when they oppose appropriating all the money through the Congress.
Seems like you lose it when Ron Paul enters the conversation. Looks like you got a case of PDS. lol.
another Lindbergh gem: Just posts ago, you said ” I’m not even a Palin for POTUS person”, yet now you mention her as a candidate and claim I am setting unreasonable standards.
You got a reading problem, Lindbergh? I didn’t mention Palin as a candidate. I asked you… several times now… just who was this perfect candidate you compare everyone to. You know, the one who increases revenue, and reduces a budget from the prior year. I see you continually dodge that question.
Most especially since your king of pork hero has no consistent principles. I’ve actually been waiting to see when you were going to, again, present him as the conservative god we should all be worshipping. You brought it up way early in the thread. Yeah.. .Mr. Conservative. The guy who puts in for his local pork for Houston to up the appropriations spending… which the nation pays for in taxes for the budget… then votes against the bill so he can bring home the bacon plus pretend he has “principles”. He calls that “transparency”. Right….
I always laugh when I hear him pull that routine. He feels like since it’s already been stolen, he’ll be stealing it back for his constituents. Trouble is, he’s robbing the nation for his little back yard.
But then I see you have your Paulbot talking points down…. naw, pork’s not spending. Dang… you quote him just about verbatim.
So it’s no problem you don’t answer the question. We all know there is no answer you can give. Or, how is it you put dodging questions” Oh yes, “not jumping on the band wagon”. heh
Obviously you’re new here. I’m quite sure that those who know me quite well can straighten out your smug self-perception that you bother me enough to make me “lose it”. LOL Ah but the lofty dreamers you Paulbots are. A mosquito bite gives me more chagrin. But is just so danged much fun to watch you sink in your own verbal bogs.
@Lindy…ROFLMAO, you really have no idea how absurdly inane you really are, do you? I mean you jump on a subject and beat it nearly to death.
Revenue is irrelevant in a discussion where she increased spending 31% and increased the debt. These are cold hard facts.
Yeaah, well Mata already destroyed that little argument of yours in comment number 95.
And you mention Ron Paul?
We need educated and intelligent people with an in depth understanding of economics(Ron Paul…
Then Mata mentions that you defend his pork thusly:
But then I see you have your Paulbot talking points down…. naw, pork’s not spending. Dang… you quote him just about verbatim.
As usual, Mata is right on target with that one, too…
From 2007:
Texas congressman and Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul — who is campaigning as a critic of congressional overspending — has revealed that he is requesting $400 million worth of earmarks this year.
The Wall Street Journal reports Paul’s office says those requests include $8 million for the marketing of wild American shrimp and $2.3 million to pay for research into shrimp fishing.
…leads the Houston-area delegation in the number of earmarks, or special funding requests, that he is seeking for his district. He is trying to nab public money for 65 projects, such as marketing wild shrimp and renovating the old movie theater in Edna that closed in 1977 — neither of which is envisioned in the Constitution as an essential government function.
Paul’s arguments for using pork barrel projects in his own district is that, “if they take it, we should ask for it back.” Of course, on that basis, there is little spending which is not justified.
Paul also argued that these special earmarks, used by Congressman to increase their own popularity at home, don’t add anything to the budget. The funding is already in the budget he says and the budget is not increased to compensate for them. But spending $400 million on pork, as Paul requested, still means the $400 million is spent. And, under the current budget, if it is spent, it contributes to the deficit that will, no doubt, mean higher future taxes. While agencies try to spend their full budget so they can request more the next year. There is some slim chance that funding allocated will not be spent. Earmarking makes sure the funds are spent.
From 2009 here are Ron Paul’s earmarks, pretty long list for a fiscal conservative…
Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice and Science:
• $250,000 for Galveston Economic Development Partnership, for Galveston Center for Business and Technology Development to help spin off private investment at National Lab of the University of Texas Medical Branch
• $500,000 for City of Bay City for NuBlac Rehab Center (youth rehabilitation)
Subcommittee on Defense:
• $3.5 million for study of health risks of exposure to vanadium
Subcommittee on Military Construction:
• $2 million for City of Bay City for NuBlac Rehab Center (serving minority veterans)
Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development:
• $41.073 million for Army Corps of Engineers to deepen and widen Texas City Channel
• $21.6 million for Army Corps of Engineers to dredge and reconfigure jetties at mouth of Colorado River
• $7.02 million for Army Corps of Engineers to dredge Freeport Harbor
• $16.021 million for Army Corps of Engineers to maintain Galveston Harbor
• $1 million for Army Corps of Engineers for construction at Cedar Bayou
• $3.297 million for Army Corps of Engineers to maintain Texas City Channel
• $200,000 for Army Corps of Engineers to maintain Cedar Bayou
• $13.038 million for Army Corps of Engineers to maintain Matagorda Ship Channel
• $42.018 million for Army Corps of Engineers to maintain Gulf Intercoastal Waterway
• $3.026 million for Army Corps of Engineers to maintain channel to Victoria
• $600,000 for Army Corps of Engineers for feasibility study for Sabine Pass to Galveston Bay
• $400,000 for Army Corps of Engineers for feasibility study for Feeport Harbor
• $100,000 for Army Corps of Engineers for feasibility study for Lower Guadalupe River Basin
• $400,000 for Army Corps of Engineers for preliminary engineering and design study at Freeport Harbor.
• $21.7 million for Army Corps of Engineers for construction at Houston Galveston Navigation Channel
• $2.165 million for Army Corps of Engineers to maintain Trinity River
• $6.979 million for Army Corps of Engineers to maintain Wallisville Lake
• $1.3 million for Army Corps of Engineers to study flooding around Colorado River
• $11 million for Army Corps of Engineers for construction at Wharton and Onion Creek
• $3.026 million for Army Corps of Engineers for Chocolate Bayou
• $533,000 for Army Corps of Engineers to maintain channel to Port Bolivar
• $41.623 million for Army Corps of Engineers to maintain Houston Ship Channel
• $1.01 million for Army Corps of Engineers to maintain Double Bayou
• $3 million for Army Corps of Engineers for construction at Clear Creek
• $500,000 for Army Corps of Engineers to maintain Port Palacios
• $100,000 for Army Corps of Engineers to study sand placement near Brazoria County shoreline
Subcommittee on Interior and the Environment:
• $5 million for Fort Bend County for City of Kendleton water and sewer improvements
Subcommittee on Homeland Security:
• $10 million for Coast Guard to improve Galveston Rail Causeway
• $8.8 million for FEMA for drainage at Cove Harbor in Aransas County
• $2.2 million for FEMA to reconfigure and stabilize Capano Causeway Pier
• $500,000 for FEMA for Aransas County drainage master plan
• $35 million for FEMA for drainage in Friendswood
• $10 million for FEMA for drainage project for Friendswood/Clear Creek
• $10 million for FEMA for drainage project for Friendswood/Clear Creek
• $5 million for FEMA to recycle household hazardous waste in Friendswood
Subcommittee on Transportation:
• $1.96 million to replace buses in and around Victoria
• $2 million to renovate transit maintenance facility in Galveston
• $5 million to reconfigure Texas Clipper training ship
• $25,000 to install security cameras at Fox Run Apartments in Victoria
• $2 million to beautify Galveston Seawall and support Transit Access Program in Galveston
• $3.6 million to construct inter-modal transit facility in Victoria
• $3.5 million for analysis of commuter rail alternatives in Galveston
• $10.3 million for City of Bay City for NuBlac Youth/Community Center
• $2.2 million for City of Bay City for improvements to electrical wiring in low and moderate income housing
Subcommittee on Labor, HHS, Education:
• $90,000 for Victoria Chamber of Commerce for business/career-related education for youth
• $248,942 for UTMB for employee wellness program for small businesses
• $1.748 million for University of Houston-Victoria for DNA testing and genetic diagnostic lab
• $300,000 for Bay City MEHOP for fund reinstatement of mobile unit
• $200,000 for Bay City MEHOP to recruit nurse practitioner
• $1.92 million for UTMB to study muscle mass loss in aging vs. microgravity (NASA related) at International Space Station National Lab
• $750,000 for Houston Memorial Hermann HealthCare system for Life Flight operations center
• $26 million for Washington, D.C. “Reading is Fundamental” program
• $10 million for Boston, Mass., “Reach Out and Read” national center
Now some of these programs might really be needed and qualify as good spending, but like Obama making “transparency the touchstone” of his Presidency, then making all kinds of back room, behind locked door deals, Ron Paul is in the same boat with earmarks. He decries spending that is not Constitutional, yet he dips into the cookie jar over and over.
But what do you say that earmarks are Lind-A-Roonie??
It doesn’t increase the deficit, it merely reallocates spending from the Executive branch to the legislative branch.
Nope, earmarks are what politicians use to buy votes in their districts. Plain and simple.
Lindy, are you even capable of making a point without insulting or attacking someone?
I didn’t think so.
ditto
14 years ago
@Lindberg
Mata is absolutely correct about the effects of extreme winters on roads. These extremes can destroy a road surface in very short periods of time, requiring quick temporary repairs or complete resurfacing. Of course, you couldn’t know about that coming from Texas. Unless you want to go dig-up the Alaska Department of Transportation’s communications with the Governor’s office regarding ACTUAL repair and resurfacing projects during the years in question, (rather than relying only on “projected” numbers put forth previously in yearly budgets, and comparing them with actual spending), you can’t really say whether Palin HAD to approve additional spending on Alaskan roads, or didn’t. State budgets generally can only estimate such repair needs for a fiscal year, they can not foresee the future of what will actually happen. Nor can an administration simply say that they won’t approve spending additional funds for such repairs in highly rural states like Alaska. A governor’s office would not say, “Sorry, we can’t fix your broken and gaping open road fissures because we didn’t set aside enough money in the budget.” Nor could or would such rural area’s be reasonably expected to do without roads because of winter damage.
ditto, ditto… 😆 And anti, you certainly sourced the Ron Paul “fiscal conservative” fallacy well. Since I was a former libertarian, I pretty much stay up on those that bear some resemblance to them in Congress. Paul fell off that bandwagon back when the Dems assumed power in 2007. Guess he figured if he couldn’t beat ’em, he’d join ’em. But he’s certainly figured out a way to spin his fall from fiscal grace to the Paul’faithful.
Frankly, I like having Ron Paul in the Congress… or did pre’2007 anyway. Would I want him for POTUS? Hang no. While I do like some of his fiscal policies, I can’t abide his trade or foreign policies. Too big a chasm to leap for me there. But I’m sure he’ll be in Congress for a long time to come since he’s now literally bringing home the bacon on the taxpayer’s dime.
What’s most disingenuous about the argument Lindbergh insists upon making is this “for Sarah only” standard. He ignores the rainy day fund created, and increased revenue. Then says they should have used that revenue to pay down the debt. ta hell with needed improvements.
He harps on budget increase of 31%, but ignores it was supposed to be a 61% increase. Then refuses to acknowledge that what the bulk of that increase was spent on was genuinely needed for that state. Perhaps most offensive is he can sit there and live off of Paul’s pork for improvements, and then slam Alaskans for spending their own revenue, paying their own way.
It’s not a perfect world. Personally I wish he could come up with the super pol, and tell us just who is the person that can increase the revenues and shrink the budget from the year before. But he’s stymied there…. dodges that question with a 10 foot pole.
Oh wait… for Mr. Lindbergh, it has to be “…white men of privilege and high education to bring this country back to it’s greatness. White trash just won’t cut it.” That line reveals such a despicable, and dislikable mentality you have to be embarrassed the guy shares any commonality in politics with conservatives. He is the epitome of what the libs/progs hold up as an example of the tea party movement. And in some ways, this mentality is our own worst enemy when their words bubble to the forefront.
But of course, no one is allowed to mention his distasteful view of humans because that’s avoiding the argument. Guess he doesn’t want to get his white robes and hood dirty in debate.
But perhaps most laughable is the condescending way he speaks of economics to the forum. The leaps of assumption INRE bonds and lending distort and morph truth…. i.e. he portrays that the dollar that went towards the government bonds can’t be spent on private lending. Of course that’s true. A dollar is spent one way or another. But that doesn’t support his argument that the increased bonds were the reason for the job losses, or that it stopped lending that was not being done for high risk and shaky financial institution portfolios.
To suggest that if the bonds had not been bought, they would have automatically been rechanneled into commercial lending in Alaska… or anywhere… is absolutely Paulbot delusional. If the investors wanted a safe haven for that allocated cash, and didn’t buy one government bond, they may find that safe haven elsewhere. Thus the reason they diversify. Some in risk… great right now with the US Treasury putting any risk on the tax payers with zero interest… and some in safer, long term yields. Again, Alaska and Texas are inviting state bonds because of the revenue potential of those states, compared to those that depend upon retail, service, industry or high tech.
Yet still he links the Conoco article while ignoring that Conoco gained it’s highest profit from it’s Alaska operations. The job losses are not tied to Alaskan bonds. Nor to the profit sharing agreement. (no profits, no sharing). And BTW, I’ve never said I supported that agreement. I merely support Alaskans to make their own decisions about their resources, and collecting profit sharing on state resources is a far cry from “welfare”, as Lindbergh puts it. Instead, Conoco’s business drop comes down to supply and demand. Quite simply, it’s reduced demand as the reason for the job losses.
But no… comes back over and over with the same shuck and jive dodge, trying to make the same anal point. “but but but spending went *up*”. duh
One more time, Lindbergh… why don’t you consult your “white men of privilege” and show us where any one of your heroes:
1: increased private sector revenue for their state (not via pork theft)
2: slashed a budget of over 61% increase to 31% increase… no, wait. To meet Lindbergh’s criteria, slashed that budget to less than what it was the previous year
3: wisely allocated the cash to needed spending instead of pet projects for future donations
… and oh, we’re more flexible than you, Lindbergh. We’ll be happy to accept a black/any race or ethnic man *or woman* – privileged or not – who does that as our conservative icon.
@Lindbergh…my, my but Mrs. Palin sure does get under your skin. Every comment you make about her is some sort of personal attack. That is very telling, Lindy.
Yes, she increased spending, but she also helped turn a town that barely had any commerce and mostly unpaved roads into a bustling town with new businesses, paved streets and improved and revamped sewer systems. Today Wasilla is nearly twice as big as it was before her tenure as Mayor.
I guess we are to take it that you are against progress? Hmmm, that is odd, since you are such a “progressive.”
As for her record as Governor…
* She lived in Juneau while the legislature was in session and in her hometown of Wasilla the rest of the time. She took a $58 per diem for travel/food allowance, but rejected a hotel allowance, instead driving 50 miles home each night.
* Republicans and Democrats criticized Palin for taking the per diem, but it is worth noting that Palin’s gubernatorial expenses are 80% below those of her predecessor, Frank Murkowski.
* She also chose not to use the former governor’s private chef.
* In February 2009, the State of Alaska, reversing a policy that had treated the payments to her family for travel as legitimate business expenses under the Internal Revenue Code, decided that per diems paid to state employees for stays in their own homes will be treated as taxable income and will be included in employees’ gross income on their W-2 forms. And Sarah Palin herself had ordered the review of the tax policy that brought about this change. Talk about transparency.
And these are just a bare minimum of how she governed.
As for her dealings with the oil companies, it is in the Alaska State Constitution that clearly states the natural resources are to be treated as a public trust. So to answer your question as to my avoiding the question of taxing the oil companies, well I did not avoid that. I said that she doubled the state’s revenues during her tenure as Governor.
In fact, during a special legislative session in Alaska in October and November of 2007 Democrats and Republicans approved of her ACES proposal. ACES is the acronym for Alaska’s Clear and Equitable Share; the program she spearheaded to provide a new way of calculating Alaska’s share of revenue obtained from resource development, as per their State Constitution.
At first the oil companies cried foul, saying she was raising taxes on them, totally ignoring the rest of the program that focused on incentives for new exploration and drilling. But a year later the oil industry did admit that ACES worked and had increased their profits while promoting new exploration and drilling.
Finally as to this Alaska debt to GDP ratio of nearly 70%, well that has to do with the unfunded obligations of the state pensions; which were in place well before she was in office. I guess doubling the state’s revenues doesn’t count for anything because you hate her so much.
She is a public figure, she has a strong conservative record and she scares the hell out of the left. It seems by your posts that you take it personally when it comes to Sarah Palin. Looks like you are giving her a lot of power over you. LOL.
When libs (lefty totalitarian statists all) go bat scat crazy and start foaming at the mouth over a conservative such as Palin conservatives should immediately recogniize they have a surefire winner. The left always tell us whom to back and whom they fear and that is most certainly Sarah.
The lleft’s totalitarian statists and their media harlots ranted and raved endlessly in the same manner, with the same template and vitriol against Reagan for 16 years before he wiped Carter and the democorrupts off the presidential political map for 12 years.
When the democrats won the White House in 1992 Clinton did so only because Ross Perot tapped into conservative loathers of big government and drained off 19% of the vote while BJ sold himself with the aid of the media’s relentless propaganda machine drumbeat that that Clinton was a New Democrat and a moderate which he was not until forced to triangulate after the Republicans Party annhilated the democrats in the congressional elections of 1994.
You only have to watch MSNBC for just a short time before you will see those morons stretching credulity and reaching for something snarky to say about Palin and finally settling on something that can be best called grammar school wit. My God, they are so sickening.
The left can not and will not debate and can only name call, scream, and shout because the American public overwhelmingly reject the left’s totalitarian statist ideology. Leftists and their so called liberal democrat tools know their marxist kool-aid is completely abhorent to 60% of adults and hence can only win elections by lying, name calling, and employing the politics of personal destruction against conservatives.
When the left tells voters what they have planned have been annihilated at the polls in every election since 1896. Let us all keep in mind that Roosevelt in all three of his non-wartime elections ran as a balance the budget conservative.
Nice list of conjectures, but the fact is unemployment is 11.2% in Wasilla, don’t really know what prosperity you are talking about. Keynesian Economics brings short term temporary “prosperity”, but building roads is not long term sustainable growth, as evident by the unemployment statistics. Deficit spending, leaving a small town tens of millions of dollars in debt is not sound fiscal policy. She couldn’t even run a town right.
http://www.simplyhired.com/a/local-jobs/city/l-Wasilla,+AK
Also, I would prefer you use my whole name Lindbergh, I am not a woman, and stop acting like a child.
And Oil profits dropped. Conoco Phillips profits from oil production dropped from last year. But at least those Alaskans are still getting a bigger cut and a nice fat welfare check.
“Approved by the Legislature in 2007, the tax law boosts the state’s share of windfall oil profits but it has been fingered by Conoco and BP executives for their recent budget slashing on the North Slope. A new ad campaign paid for by The Alliance, an oil-field contractor group, claims the tax law has caused the oil companies to lay off hundreds of Alaska workers.”
http://www.adn.com/2010/02/02/1121858/conocos-alaska-profits-drop-in.html
And no, doubling revenues doesn’t t impress me, cutting spending does, which she didn’t do. Under her watch, Alaska became the state with the largest debt burden. Instead of cutting the debt to gdp ratio, she increased it, and left the pension plan in shambles for her successor to deal with when she couldn’t take th heat. And FYI, she increased spending 31%, so not only did she not deal with pensions, she ballooned spending.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/2008-10-23-palinspending_N.htm
Mr. Lindbergh,
A very enjoyable take-down of anticsrocks. 😈
You are correct, Palin grew government and governed more like a Democrat with her tax increases and big government programs than as a “conservative small government” Republican.
But you’ll find the Palin sycophants to unreceptive to reason or facts.
Still enjoyable to see him put in his place.
@Lindbergh…Whatever you say Lindy. You scream that I ignore your points, but then you bypass altogether the points I so soundly make.
Unemployment is 11.2% in Wasilla? Wow, do you think that has anything to do with El Presidente’s assault on the private sector? Try looking at the unemployment rate for the whole nation, Lind-A-Roonie.
Source
From the very article you cited:
Gee, I guess you just didn’t read that part…
Source
This is a program that was started under Palin and continues under Parnell.
And maybe the price of oil has something to do with the fiscal woes of Alaska, since a whopping 90% of their revenues come from the utilization of their natural resources – as per their State Constitution.
Well there ya go, Linderbergher. I say tomato, you say you hate Palin. Go ahead and give us another rant. Well, go on.
*taps foot impatiently*
@Linbergh, let me see if I understand you correctly. You want to blame Wasilla’s unemployment numbers today on the back of a mayor who served from 1996 to 2002?
You want to blame oil profits for dropping in the past year on negotiations done when Palin was on the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission seve years ago? ‘Cause I’m pretty darned sure that the price of oil doesn’t have anything to do with the gas pipeline negotiations she did in the summer of 2008. And I’m also sure that the citizens of Alaska aren’t unhappy with their oil share profit sharing kickbacks. Odd to hear an O’faithul complaining that citizens are getting a cut from the big bad oil companies.
But how rich of you to cherry pick a comment from the ADN article you linked…. did you miss that the Dems were battling the Republicans on rolling back that profit sharing, but the Dems stated that despite the drop in profits at the time, their profits that year still “…stood out as the biggest single contributor to the company’s global oil production income, according to new financial statements.”
Pesky little factoid, eh Linbergh/Lindbergh… whichever you are?
I also find the Washington Indy version of reality a bit sketchy when compared to the State’s own Dept of Revenue, who proclaimed that 2008 was a record revenue year, with unrestricted revenue totalling $10.79 billion.
As far as the state operating budget being higher than Murkowski, wonder if anyone figured in the over $2 million in frivolous complaints costs, and then added in their Alaskan witchhunt on TrooperGate. Hummm… did that drive up state costs much? It was one of the reasons she resigned… the unbelievably absurd costs this crap was costing the Alaskan taxpayer. duh wuh
Another couple of lines from your own link, where you cherry picked data, was:
Let me see… Pelosi/Reid taxing big bad oil=good. Palin taxing big bad oil, and sharing profits with citizens=bad. Naw… no hypocrisy there.
It seems that Alaskan lawmakers love to spend as much as Pelosi/Reid/Obama like to do. Only they had cash to spend, and the other forenamed are banking on the income from the nation’s grandkids….
@anticsrocks, I see you and I were headed for many of the same places. LOL!
@MataHarley…Right on! Great post and yeah, I just love to see how much power those lefties give Palin over them. She tweets and they go into super panic overdrive, with the froth spitting from their collective mouths. LOL
Even if she never runs for President, she has accomplished more for the Conservative cause and to really point out the hypocrisy and viciousness of the left.
I agree that when the left continues to offer nothing but blabbering insults that we KNOW we have finally found our 2012 Winning Presidential Candidate in Sarah Palin. The list of 2 term Presidents in our history that they said the exact same ignorant things about proves they simply do not learn from their past. I thought these liberals were supposed to be the “smart” ones? Sarah will prove to be just another President the left miscalculated, misjudged, underestimated and embarrassed themselves over by the stupid remarks that came back to bite them in the ass.
I do thank them for confirming our next winner though! When the hatred, fear and rampant insults reaches this type of level from the left, we KNOW we have found our Winner!
Thanks to antics and johnA above. Love to read cogent commentary about the liberals. Whatever one may think about Bush or Cheney, nothing compares to the horrors heaped onto the American people by these scum.
Thinking of going to my first Tea Party on Friday in Vero Beach. Very much impressed by the enthusiasm of the locals. I had no idea there are so many this weekend all over the country. Sorry if I’m duplicating. http://www.teapartypatriots.org/Default.aspx
Going into 2012 with the mood shifting AGAINST this radical President and the liberal Democrats, Nationwide, what will Obama do? Sarah will eat him for lunch, running on Smaller Government, Common Sense Solutions, A stronger Defense, a FAIR tax system and not redistribution, stricter immigration laws etc. etc. – will BURY Obama and send his band of Chicago crooks back home where they belong. Conservatives, Independents and the Tea Party crowd will support her and rout Obama out of office. It will not be a close election in 2012. Until then, she will build her media empire bigger and get positioning herself to be THE Republican Candidate to beat!! Romney, Pawlenty, Gingrich better get behind her now and get this thing organized. They can’t compete with her and need to admit it and start supporting her NOW!!!
Wow, John A, you should be Sarah’s Chief of Staff.
…or Campaign Manager.
Where is the pompous Gorge Will these days? I will never forget his extremely insulting comments about Sarah when she was chosen by McCain to be his running mate. He said them with such loathing that I truly hope, that in her stunning successes of the future, he will be reduced to total embarrassment. What a self-possessed stuffed shirt.
I am one of many “new” to the political scene voices that would caucus for her in a heart beat! She is one of the shrewdest political forces I have ever seen. She “connects” with voters. Obama and the liberals are so disconnected to voters now it’s pathetic!
Independents gave Obama the benefit of the doubt in 2008. They now have buyers remorse!
We need to get back out country from this Saul Alinsky radical!!
The entire elite Washington media (Conservative and liberal) got it wrong with Palin. Since the Country has now shifted clealry to the right, they will have to recognize Palin’s force with VOTERS this time. She speaks to them. She is against Socialism, Big Government, Marandizing Terrorists, Allying WITH Israel instead of what Obama has done. If the left is scared, they should be because she is clearly a force to be reckoned with. Obama appears worried and he should be because he was naive to assume Americans would swallow his Socialist agenda with Huge Growth in Government and limiting the freedoms of us all!
TIME ,is playing with SARAH because she is surely taking note of the level of the fight that she will be against and by sticking to her position,means she feel confident that she can face opponents when her time arrive to ease : her position on top,,do not under estimated thoses who will be on her back fighting for her,,we have highly intelligents people gearings up on our side that she can depend on… 🙄
I wish she would hire New Gingrich to be her Campaign Chief because he could lay out her domestic and foreign affairs agenda with a level of expertise that would be un-touchable for Obama’s Chicago gang to compete with, given the mood of the country. She could then deliver the message which would increase her electorate HUGE!! She is making Millions and will need Millions to beat Obama. Although I think the cracks in the Democratic party and lack of enthusiasm there will be all she needs to win in 2012.
Further to John Alden’s comment, I just read a few days ago on another blog that the key members, viz., Axelrod and Emmanuel, of Obama’s staff are looking for ways to abandon ship. Wouldn’t that be a kick in O’ private parts!
Newt is shrewd and an excellent historian. For the most part, he is right on target, but I think Newt’s weakness is his overwhelming desire to “reach across the aisle.” Bipartisanship is a wonderful thing, but it flows out of good legislation, not the other way around. You don’t begin by wooing the other Party, you let good legislation do it for you.
He would make an excellent Vice Prez or as was mentioned a great Chief of Staff.
Nice work anticsrocks! I concur with all the above. Axelrod and Emmanuel have kept with the “Chicago” style of politics i.e.our way or the highway approach to advice and I think Obama is smelling the coffee now and is worried. All Palin needs are terrific advisors/managers around her and she can deliver the goods. She has the energy, the fight, intuition and the connection for what Americans actually “want” from an elected official versus Obama’s my way and like it approach that the majority of Americans are outraged about. If he picks a left wing liberal to the Court, shoves Cap and Tax down the throats of American businesses and other radical left wing agenda, he is surely finished going into the Mid-terms and Democratic candidates wil run, not walk away from his endorsements/campaign help.
I will address Matt and Anti here. For one, you guys cannot accredit Palin’s policies(building public roads, public facilities, the short term Keynesian model) for the supposed growth it brought to the town and ignore the fact that Wasilla has higher average unemployment than both the state of Alaska and the United States. You cannot have your cake and eat it to. I also figured you would bring up “real unemployment” statistics. All you are doing is mixing and matching different mathematical formulas and then comparing different numbers. That is intellectually dishonest. Both the 9.7% number and the 11.2% number were gathered using the same unemployment formulation. You site that real unemployment in America is 17%, I would say it is 20% or higher, but the fact remains, is that if by traditional unemployment measurements, wasilla has a higher rate, than once can logically deduce they have a higher real unemployment rate.
http://knol.google.com/k/how-to-calculate-unemployment#
Real Unemployment calculates those who no longer collect unemployment benefits, and those who who have given up looking for work, where as traditional unemployment mechanisms don’t.
Taxes are a huge part of the equation. Yes, oil prices dropped drastically in 2008, but have been rising since 2009. Please, don’t talk about commodities markets when you know nothing about them. leave investing to the grown ups. They are back to roughly January 2008 prices right now in April 2010.
http://quotes.post1.org/historical-crude-oil-price-chart/
Look, you can cite how the state got more money and residents got a larger welfare check, but unemployment numbers and the debt to gdp ratio numbers are on my side. She may have doubled revenue. but she increased spending 31% and created a 70% debt to GDP ratio. She increased spending, she did not cut it, and now Alaska is paying the price for high tax high spending policies.
The job losses and the fact that no jobs are being recovered is evidence that high taxation burdens big business. It prohibits them from hiring new workers because with new taxes, it would cost more to hire a worker than he would be worth in productive capital output. It is like what happened during the Great Depression. 90% taxation rates prohibited economic recovery and job creation, whereas in the 1920s Harding slashed the budget and cut taxes and America was out of the Post World War 1 Depression in a year. Coolidge continued his policies and we went from 20% unemployment in Feb 1921 to a 3.3% average for the rest of the decade. Unemployment was pared from its high in 1921 of 20% to an average of 3.3% for the remainder of the decade. The misery index which is a combination of unemployment and inflation had its sharpest decline in U.S. history under President Harding. The Gross National Product averaged 7% from 1924 to 1929.
http://www.calvin-coolidge.org/html/the_harding_coolidge_prosperit.html
As for Obama, I will agree, his policies have been disasterous, but fiscally conservative states with low spending and low taxes like the Dakotas, Texas, Virginia, Utah, Montana, Wyoming, and New Hampshire have lower debt to gdp ratios and lower levels of unemployment. Evidently, they don’t have the cash to spend, as they have the highest debt burden in the Union. I don’t understand you, you are awfully hypocritical, you denounce deficit spending from Washington yet justify it when Alaska does it. You denounce windfall profits taxes when Pelosi does it, but justify it under Palin. You can’t have it both ways. Either you support what Pelosi and Palin do, or you oppose it all together.
http://www.bls.gov/web/laus/laumstrk.htm
@Lindbergh, you’re a real hoot. Condescending “grown up” that you proclaim to be. To attribute Wasilla unemployment in 2010 to Palin’s mayoral tenure ending eight years ago is pie in the sky PDS at best. How about we attribute entering the Afghanistan battle field around that same time to Obama?
duh
And you also want to attribute the ever morphing commodies market to Palin policies? Talk about entering into debates where you are clueless….
Then you call Alaskan oil profit sharing “welfare”. There is no end to your illogic, Lindbergh. The resources are owned by the state, and in some cases the feds. Profit sharing in owned resources is a far cry from “welfare”, save in your dementia.
Were you to chit chat a bit less, and research a bit more, you might find that the state spending didn’t necessarily include an increase in the size of Alaskan government, but they had more outlays for improvements while the revenue was flush, and the added expense of legislation witchhunts and frivolous complaints. That’s called “state spending”. In fact, Palin reduced staff and department sizes from her predecessor. So your oversimplistic representation of facts lacks detail.
My problem with your presentation of facts is that the spending of the state went up… as it usually does… while revenues were up. This is considerably preferable to our federal spending going up when revenues are declining. Or perhaps you felt they should just keep it in a rainy day fund, and ignore their community development spending packages that benefited from their revenue increase enjoyed under Palin’s service?
I can’t say as I disagree with over taxation of the private sector. And I can’t say as I disagree that Palin is far from the perfect administrative branch official. Nor do I need a history lesson from you INRE taxation and it’s effect upon the economy. Especially since that is not where we disagree.
I just suggest that the arenas in which you choose to criticize Palin are distorted to reflect your personal opinion of her as a politician.
And BTW, if you wish to be addressed by your handle, Lindbergh, correctly, then I suggest you return the favor. The handle is Mata or MataHarley. And if you have any grasp of history, you’ll figure out that I’m female… not a “you guys”.
@Mata
You said,Were you to chit chat a bit less, and research a bit more,
That’s a hoot. Given that Lindbergh backed his assertions with links to accepted statistics and all you do is drone on and on like some boring College Professor who likes the sound of their voice, I think it’s time you took a time out Mata and researched yourself. 🙄
Palin left Alaska with a budget in the red and left her state with the highest per capita debt in the Union. You and the rest seem to overlook this fact.
She also dramatically grew the size of government. In this respect she is like Obama!
She was a disaster to Alaska as witnessed by the sorry state she left the place in.
Sorry, Mata, but you have to take the good with the bad. If you are going to give her credit for the economic expansion and debt expansion that resulted from her public works projects, than you have to accept the economic consequences thereafter. You can’t just say the temporary positive effects are her’s while the long term consequences aren’t.
Look, I know you are mad, you don’t understand markets, most Americans don’t. They are small minded people like yourself who can only grasp broad campaign slogans and appealing personalities. It is funny how you don’t address commodities markets, you only mock me for providing you with the facts.
Profit sharing is socialism, and it is welfare. Profit redistribution by the government is social welfare. Communal ownership of resources is socialist.
” any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods”
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/socialism
The 500,000 dollar lawsuit does not account for the 31% increase in spending and turning Alaska into the state with the largest debt burden in the union at 70%. So clearly, spending outstripped her new revenues, she added more debt. So the fact she brought in more revenues is irrelevant to a discussion where we are talking about her increasing the debt. She kept spending where it was or increased it in every sector, and the debt rose accordingly.
http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/Alaska_state_spending.html#usgs302a
But I am glad you oppose Palin’s tax increases and recognize their negative effects on the oil industry in Alaska. You aren’t totally biased.
http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/Alaska_state_spending.html#usgs302a
All of you people who are supporters of the anointed one, Sarah Palin, need to go to that link and see the official government statistics.
Don’t listen to the spin of her handlers and apologists (Mata and Mike). Do some research, think for yourself. 🙄
They have lied to you about her being a small government conservative.
She nearly bankrupted the State of Alaska. 🙄
uh huh, Ivan…. like read all the anti-Palin journalist hit pieces and ignore the Dept of Revenue Treasure debt docs…. LOL
You know, you idiot, I’m not even a Palin for POTUS person. Which makes your commentary even more absurd and soaked with PDS. I just have a problem with people misrepresenting the fiscal facts because they don’t examine the details of revenue to spending. But I’m sure that brilliant self-proclaimed stocks/bonds/commodies expert, Lindbergh, may figure it out if he decides to be unbiased, and takes the time to check out the Alaskan budget reports over the years.
And no… Palin didn’t add tons of agencies and staffers to the state government rolls. Spending is not always the result of adding more to the state payrolls. “nearly bankrupted”…. BWAHAHAHAHA…. that state has built in hefty revenues with their natural resources, not to mention federal funding since so much of the state actually belongs to the feds. We should all be so “bankrupt”.
@Lindbergh, please don’t be assuming you know my mood. I am not mad, and I assure you if I were, you’d know it. I have a high tolerance level for certain amounts of ignorance. You haven’t hit my threshhold yet.
Let’s try a picture for a property overview in spending in Alaska over time, shall we?
Palin became Governor in 2006, and resigned early 2009. That makes the last two blue bars spending under her admin. My my… looks like all that heinous spending rose post-Palin era, eh?
At the time she assumed office, the GDP-AK was 43.264%. At the time of her resignation, it 47.912%. Today it’s at 48.517%… just over a year later. And I don’t suppose that their Dem majority legislature holds any responsibility for the spending, since it is only they who can appropriate, and the admin branch who vetos or enacts…. just as it is with our Congress.
This data is also from the US Government Spending site, which is a constant tool for me as well.
However that federal site is generic and doesn’t give the breakdown in spending, and when it occurred. So I tend to go to the state sites for the specifics because those little details happen to be important. In this case, you can find all the debt breakdowns by year at the Alaska Dept of Revenue, Treasury Division.
One of the first things you’d notice, if you compared the years… and remember that Palin left in early 2009… is that post’Palin, the state issued General Obligation Bonds for the first time since 2003 (pre’Palin) to the tune of $315,050,000… the majority of that going to transportation, the second to education and the third to water/sewer infrastructure. That was Palin’s doing??
State revenue debt declined under her admin. Sportfish and int’l airport bonds went down, as well as the student loan bonds.
Housing finance debt increased 2007-08. Gee, wonder why. Spending was less under Murkowski by $86,128,000… but then Murkowski didn’t have the revenue income to address the states transportation, education and infrastructure needs either. If you had haunted the Alaskan blogs like I did in 2008, you would have noticed that their community infrastructure was in dire straits and a constant bitch. So in 2009, after garnishing the Palin/AK legislature revenue by means which you and I tend to agree on, they decided to spend that cash on the state’s needs.
So you diss Palin today, for spending done after she left, using revenue increases she was a part of??
Believe me, I don’t like heavy government spending at any level. But there is a degree of spending for needed infrastructure that is part of a state’s legitimate spending. And transportation, infrastructure for utilities and even wise education appropriation (that’s usually an oxymoron too…) are some of those items.
However to suggest that somehow Palin’s governance record is more heinous based on actions the successor governor and their Dem legislature after her departure… especially in light of their increasing revenue intake… is utterly absurd. No more than Obama/Pelosi/Reid’s spending today can be considered Bush’s fault.
But I will say in the long run, as an independent, I have equal opportunity disdain for all politicians and their spending… despite what side of the aisle they reside on. Frankly they all need to be reigned in, at all levels of government.
@Ivan, as usual you prove yourself merely to be a rude a’hole with no input except for personal assaults. You’d be surprised at how often I bail you out of moderation and spam. I think that courtesy I’ve extended to you has long since been abused. So, as far as I’m concerned, you can sit there and rot until another author gets in the mood to post your anal dissertations, dude.
Mata,
You are wrong. She didn’t become governor until 2007. And she didn’t leave in “EARLY” 2009. She left office on July 26th, 2009.
Once again you play fast and loose with the facts, only showing you’re not up to speed for this or most discussions of political importance.
You need to spend some time doing research before engaging your mouth.
As Grandpa used to say,”Engage the brain before engaging the mouth.”
You would be wise to heed Grandpa’s advice!
Ummm….actually Ivan it’s you who is wrong. Again. She was sworn in as Governor of Alaska…wait for it…December 4, 2006….
For those keeping score at home, December 4, 2006 is not 2007 as our resident sexist, homophobic, bigot would like for you to believe.
As to the rest of your post:
What was your point again?
Now Aye… don’t be boggling Ivan’s braincell with details like when she was sworn in. And we won’t be further scrambling what’s left of his brain cell with the facts that the Alaskan legislature session is short… 120 days from Jan 1st. Tho they tried to make it shorter. Alaskan lawmakers are genuinely dual citizens…. part time legislators, and the rest of the time having a job in the private sector. Something I think that’d be a great mandate for federal Congress. Gives ’em a dose of reality instead of being career politicians.
And “duh” on the additional bond dollars. It was I who provided you the link, Lindbergh. You never got further than the US Government Spending site. Lazy? Or just uninterested in details?
I have exited out of my post 3 times now. Oh well, I will just keep it short and sweet.
Ivan is correct, Palin authored the Budgets for Fiscal Years 2008, 2009, and 2010
The Predecessor to Palin authored Budgets for fiscal year 2006 and 2007. Just think for a second, how would Palin author a budget for 2006 when she wasn’t even Governor? Just think about that for a second and realize how absurd that sounds. Same with 2007. What you gave was the debt report, not the budget. Palin’s administration did a debt report on Murkowski’s 2007 budget.
And that is incorrect, the 315,050,000 dollars issued in GOBs was in 2008 under the Palin administration.
http://www.revenue.state.ak.us/treasury/programs/documentviewer/viewer.aspx?715f
The Revenue increases are immaterial to the fact she increased the deficit. She spent the increased revenue and then some, resulting in a 70% debt to GDP ratio. If she just spent what she got in increased tax revenues, she wouldn’t have had to issue the new debt.
http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2010/03/30/business/economy/30statesGraphicA.html?ref=economy
There is no such thing as “state revenue debt”, no such statistic exists, you are just making up statistics as you go along.
Ah yes… was waiting for you to take the bait, Lindbergh. Love it when I know the prey is close. Wanted to make sure you were paying attention… LOL!
You, of course, mean the budgets that she slashed by 30% that were sent to her. As in the operating budget bill that was $11.1 bil for education, the university, public health and safety, transportation, and resource development that she slashed to $8.7 bil? Or the capital budget that she received that was slashed in half by Palin from $3.6 bil to $1.87 bil?
Good thing she was there or the Dem majority legislature would have “spent Alaska into bankruptcy”…..
INRE “State Revenue Debt”, apparently you have shown us unwilling to go check out the Alaskan budget breakdowns online and still cling to your generic overview, Lindbergh. Otherwise you would have noted the 5th category down clearly marked “State Revenue Debt”. Bonus for you… they have a category called “State Moral Obligation Debt” too.
But then, that entails reading and pouring thru budgets now, doesn’t it?
Care to talk about the rainy day fund she created for these sketchy commodies times? But nooooooo
Dayum Lindy!
That’s gonna leave a mark.
Heh!
Thanks MataHarley! Nice work!
Keep up the discussion. Liberals are in for a reality check this fall and should enjoy the limelight for as long as they can – it will be short.
Sarah is about to make the liberal media go insane. God help them. I hope they can deal with it. Perhaps they can’t. Oh well.
Mata, I will admit, I didn’t see that, but once I did, I realized you were being deliberately misleading.
In fiscal year 2007-2008, Total Alaska Public debt is 9,195.9(in millions). In fiscal year 2009-2010, Total Alaska Public Debt is 9,335.7(in millions).
http://www.revenue.state.ak.us/treasury/programs/documentviewer/viewer.aspx?428f
http://www.revenue.state.ak.us/treasury/programs/documentviewer/viewer.aspx?716f
The debt under Palin grew to a debt to GDP ratio of 70%.
http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2010/03/30/business/economy/30statesGraphicA.html?ref=economy
“But then, that entails reading and pouring thru budgets now, doesn’t it?”
I will ask the same thing to you.
Lindbergh, thank you for *finally* going to the site that I, myself, sent to you in order to see just what the spending is, when it happened, and what it was for. For that I give you kudos…. even if only having to be noodged into it.
Other places where Palin increased state spending was in the special needs education funds… where the anti-Palin pundits claimed she slashed spending by 62%. In fact, she increased that spending by triple over three years time. So that figures in to part of the education increases.
However I will still take issues with you for being too generalized for numbers, and not examining just what the state was doing with their revenue… ala issuing bonds for highly needed transportation and infrastructure. (I still have problems with “education”, depending on how it’s being used….). There are good “earmarks” and bad. It’s not that there should be “no” spending, but wise spending by government.
Alaskan roads and infrastructure suffer mightily because of their weather. Can you say “permafrost”? I see nothing wrong with a state spending for needed state improvements when they have both the revenue income, combined with a rainy day fund. And, in fact, despite what the legislature *wanted* to spend, Palin still reigned them in. Therefore, despite you wanting to say she increased their debt – which has been happening every dang year for decades, so that’s not unusual for any state – the spending was both reigned in for what the legislature wanted to spend, and what they spent it on.
As far as their debt goes, I will again say the same thing to you that I said to bozo Ivan…. Commodies, Alaska’s main revenue source, fluctuate. If the rest of the US had the same resource base of an integral national necessity like oil as revenue income, I would have less fears (not *no* fear) of the spending going on. What is today’s reality on revenue is not likely to be next year’s reality because of the global supply/demand pricing. But it was because of that fluctuation that Palin built in the rainy day fund to tide them over.
When it comes to necessary spending for a state for the base needs of their denizens… transportation, utilities/infrastructure and education, Palin is cuts above the norm.
Live with it… or play with the numbers and seek out your fellow peers that suffer from PDS so you may rest comfortable in your misrepresented details.
Oh yes… Lindbergh… may I draw your attention to something? Here’s your NYTs cute little graphic as “proof positive”.
Let’s see…. “unfunded pensions”… as in government pensions, that require revenue. Now how many of those states have oil/gas pipelines as a revenue source?
Hint… TX isn’t on that graph….
Think such an in demand commodity such as oil has any future value, when compared to the other states that depend upon retail/service oriented success for their revenue?
I think I’ll be betting on Alaska coming thru a global pinch, as well as TX, before I do the rest of the nation.
Oh yeah… anyone notice where Romney’care MA is on the list?
@John Alden, all I can say is we @non-grown ups does what we cans….. Glad you appreciate the logic wondering about something dissing “debt” in a global economy where there are precious few NOT in debt – all the while ignoring the slashing of the budgets presented that occurred.
It’s all in the presentation. Lindbergh should stick to PDF friendly site to pull of those tricks.
Meanwhile, Ivan disappears from his lonely moderation existence into the cyber trash can … oh my. What will he do without a friendly author to bale his rude self out?
You nudged me there to see Palin was increasing the debt? That is what I was telling you all along…
Well, no matter, as long as we are clear Palin increased spending, increased taxes, and increased the debt, I have not further issues.
Just because she has a disabled child, doesn’t make it ok to rob the taxpayers and increase their debt burden. If she were a conservative, she could have enacted an education tax credit for parents, allowing parents to have the choice to attend a private school better equipped to meet their needs, and cut spending accordingly. Increasing public education funding is not conservative, and it isn’t conducive to promoting better education. Private schools provided better education and are more cost efficient( just look at this chart, a public school education in D.C costs almost as much as a tuition to Harvard).
http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2010/02/dc-public-schools-129-trillion-28170.html
That is a fundamental difference between you and me, I just flat out disagree with increased spending, anywhere, particularly in a recession. If you want to talk about road improvements down the pipeline, maybe. but serious budget cuts, and drastic tax cuts must be in order first, and should always be the goal, particularly in a recession where taxpayers can ill afford the bills the government foots them or the debt imposed on them. You have to realize where the money for bonds comes from. It comes from investors and banks(commercial and investment), so instead of investors and bankers putting money into businesses to create more jobs and help upstart businesses during a down turn, money is reallocated to government pet projects. so particularly in a state like Alaska, with a fluctuating revenue due to shifts in crude oil, reigning in spending is key.
@Mata and Aye…Awesome! I score this as a win for the Conservatives over the dynamically dismal duo of Lindy and Ivanovich.
Doncha’ just hate it when the facts blow the libtards right outta the water??!! I get home from work today and take in this great debate in which every lie and absurd assumption about Palin by Lind-A-Roonie and Ivan-to-make-sense-but-can’t are put down to their death like sick dogs at the animal shelter.
Thanks for the chuckle, MataHarley and Aye Chihuahua. It is hilarious to see that each time you smack Lindy down, he comes back, but with less vitriol. Like if he agrees with you nicely enough he can still make his point. Funny that when you take away his salient points, he loses his bluster. 😆
There’s something about discussing Palin and/or Alaska with liberal/progs or Paulbots that just brings out the venom in people. Always amusing. And it becomes especially entertaining when they concoct some high threshhold meant only for her. You, Lindbergh are seriously anal about this. You become fixated on one thing, and one thing alone, in order to redeem yourself from superficial research. There’s only one thing you want to be able to say… that the budget in Alaska went up compared to what it was the prior year.
Whoa… revelation. Devil in the details? Who cares. Immaterial.
Tell you what, Lindbergh. Why don’t you introduce us to this perfect conservative in the world. You know, the one who not only helps create increased revenues for their state, and who doesn’t just settle for just slashing a Dem budget by 30%, but actually decreases the entire budget from the prior year?
Where is this perfect candidate? We’re all ears, guy. We’re all pining to know just who is it you are speaking of, since we can use this guy or girl immediately on the conservative forefront.
But that’s not the game you’re playing, is it? Slashing budgets written by a Dem majority isn’t good enough. In your strange world, all you need to be right is to say that the end figure is still higher than the previous year. Hey, ta hell with the veto override power and a dose of reality, eh? That interferes with your over simplistic and incomplete argument used to prove Palin’s inadequate.
Ya know, I’m a year older this year than last. And it’s likely I’ll be a year older next year. ’tisn’t much different an argument.
Ya know something else, Lindbergh…. I’m willing to bet you have no perfect candidate and there is no state that has a smaller budget this year than last. But hey… truly… I’d be genuinely excited to know of that super pol. Christie’s about the only one coming close to it, and I’m not sure if even his slashed budget is less than the previous year’s.
So here’s the scoop… you had your best money income last year, plus stashed cash in a savings account or mattress. But despite your healthy balance sheets and savings, you slash your spending instead of fixing that roof on your house needing repairs, or replacing that faulty water heater.
If you don’t do the repairs when you have the cash and savings in order to prevent more deterioration (that will cost more to fix it later), just when do you do it?
But no.. you say hang, let the Alaskan roads sink and crack. Let freight and goods transportation suffer with lengthy delays. Let the private operators absorb the repair costs and shortened lifespan for the damage to their fleet vehicles. Just as long as it fits your numbers, right Lindberg? Looks so darn good on paper.
To you the record revenue doesn’t count, the genuine needs be damned. Palin was charged with doing something no one has done… having a budget that was less that it was the prior year so she can prove her conservative credentials to you, personally.
And then you come up with the absurdity that commercial lending suffered because investors and financial institutions did Alaskan bonds instead.
WTF? Does diversity even appear on your laptop portfolio definitions??
But let me give you a couple of clues. First, I hardly think that bonds for roads and infrastructure provided an “either/or” lending environment in Alaska. And secondly, there hasn’t been any substantive, or job creating, commercial lending around since 2008. That makes it even more unlikely the bonds became the sacrificial lamb of money for Alaskan jobs. In fact, Alaska has better unemployment numbers than my state…. and we don’t have any road work going on except what Obama’s making the taxpayers pay for. At least Alaska’s not doing the hand out trip.
Here’s another revelation for you. Commercial lending isn’t going to be around for a while to come, and bonds are only going to get even more popular. Investors are going to be escaping the high risk, big turnover bucks to nestle into some safe investments post Fed/MBS buys and the inevitable increasing rates. I’d say AK and TX bonds are going to be far more attractive than MA or CA bonds…. the former being resource rich states with high potential revenue. Lots of security there. And you have heard of the resetting of commercial leases and loans coming at the end of this year and next, yes?
Your arguments are tunnel visioned, anal in definition, idealistic and specifically aimed to create a standard for Palin that exists for no one else. This sounds like a personal problem.
@Mata…WOW! Standing ovation. I was going to chip in on this debate once again and try to shed a bit of light on the stupidity and dead horse beating arguments of Lindy, but damn girl you rock!
Feel free to chime right on in, anti…. Paulbots are used to multifront assaults. LOL
But thank you for the kind words.
I’d like to know just what is it about Sarah Palin that scares the daylights out of some of the posters here. Is it because she was a competent Mayor and Governor or is it just that she embraces traditional American values that are no longer taught in schools these days. Is it her gender or the fact that she was not Ivy League educated or a product of old money or sired by Career Politicians?
The bitter medicine that it will take to reclaim and restore the Republic just may entail the acceptance of someone like Palin that has the ability to get things done and be the reality check that a complacent America needs right now. She certainly can do no worse than the current Pretender in Chief and I doubt if she is as economically illiterate either.
Okay, I tried to post a gif for ya’ Mata. A standing ovation gif, but when I hit submit, my comments disappeared, so just imagine the pic. LOL 😕
@Theodore Herrera #2
That would be acting stupidly. You are in effect advising that the Republican party become a GOP version of the Current Democratic leadership. A moderate Republican is still a Republican. If you totally block out moderates from appearing in the primaries, then you will absolutely lose most of your chance of getting moderate votes. You apparently don’t understand the concept and purpose of a balanced ticket. The logical preference should be for a strongly Conservative Presidential Candidate, and a Vice Presidential Candidate that appeals to the party moderates. If you leave moderates totally out of the equation, you will not gain the votes from the middle that you need to win.
Mata, I am not going to critique your whole post. Most of it was bloviating and a defense of increased spending, increased debt, and increased taxes. Here it goes
“But no.. you say hang, let the Alaskan roads sink and crack. Let freight and goods transportation suffer with lengthy delays. Let the private operators absorb the repair costs and shortened lifespan for the damage to their fleet vehicles. Just as long as it fits your numbers, right Lindberg? Looks so darn good on paper.”
That is a pretty extreme argument, the roads were not sinking and collapsing before the increased spending. You are just giving a hypothetical apocalyptic vision with no basis in facts.
“To you the record revenue doesn’t count, the genuine needs be damned. Palin was charged with doing something no one has done… having a budget that was less that it was the prior year so she can prove her conservative credentials to you, personally.”
Revenue is irrelevant in a discussion where she increased spending 31% and increased the debt. These are cold hard facts. Now, if she had used the revenue to pay down the debts in the relatively good economic times they wouldn’t be facing 70% debt to GDP ratios right now. But they didn’t. They just blew it all.
“And then you come up with the absurdity that commercial lending suffered because investors and financial institutions did Alaskan bonds instead.”
Apparently, you don’t understand how depositors attain interest. Commercial Banks return interest to depositors by putting money into corporate bonds, small business loans, and government loans. You may not have much money or have enough to have a large portfolio, so you probably don’t take the time to study the intricacies of the market. This is ok, but that you have to understand is that increased Government bonds divert capital away from the private sector.
“But let me give you a couple of clues. First, I hardly think that bonds for roads and infrastructure provided an “either/or” lending environment in Alaska. And secondly, there hasn’t been any substantive, or job creating, commercial lending around since 2008. That makes it even more unlikely the bonds became the sacrificial lamb of money for Alaskan jobs. In fact, Alaska has better unemployment numbers than my state…. and we don’t have any road work going on except what Obama’s making the taxpayers pay for. At least Alaska’s not doing the hand out trip.”
There hasn’t been any economic growth in Alaska or around the nation for a couple of reasons. One, the high tax burden(ie. Conoco slashing jobs: http://www.adn.com/2010/02/02/1121858/conocos-alaska-profits-drop-in.html), two, increased government spending(capital is being directed away from the private sector to buy government debt). Consumers are also getting royally screwed(though be it slowly), by the low interest rate policies of the Federal Reserve in their attempt to facilitate large amounts of government borrowing. Prices on food and energy are slowly going up week by week
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5h6dT1TIKE1iwkoR1HuZA_E1pd5tQD9F2RTH83
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5i5TtajgUpSm7KY5jf-lCJGHBB-tAD9F3OGTG0
“Here’s another revelation for you. Commercial lending isn’t going to be around for a while to come, and bonds are only going to get even more popular. Investors are going to be escaping the high risk, big turnover bucks to nestle into some safe investments post Fed/MBS buys and the inevitable increasing rates.”
You are telling me something I already know, but that is the problem, capital is being diverted to finance government largesse.
yada yada yada, Lindbergh. Nothing’s changed. You still charge Palin with standards you don’t apply to your beloved Houston king of pork, Ron Paul. You still avoid the pertinent question…. just who is your perfect conservative candidate that no one measures up to.
Can’t answer that, can you?
Just more yada yada yada. In case you TX folk don’t figure that out, it’s sorta yiddish for “bloviating”.
What is it with you, Lindbergh. If you, personally, don’t know it, it can’t possibly exist or be true? And people wonder why Alaskans feel they have little in common with the lower 48 mentality…
The above is from OutWestNewspaper. Or maybe a dose of reality of what Alaskan and Canadian weather can do to roads from Roads To Alaska is due. Again about one of the more well known and traveled roads, the Alcan.
Then, of course, there’s the seasonal load limitations on many roads to minimize the damage, as the Alaskan study on the Elliott Highway, north of Fairbanks.
There’s a reason my friend tells me that Alaska has two seasons… winter, and road repair (Continuously running from May to Oct annually).
You think building and/or maintaining roads in that environment is the same as the lower 48? Have you got any idea what those road conditions do to vehicles annually? Just in the north, the State maintains 1500 miles of paved roads and 2000 miles of gravel roads. Even back in 1998, they had hefty annual budgets, especially for the northern roads where the discontinuous permafrost would do the most damage, and resurfacing was done annually. It’s a constant battle against the elements, not only for roads, but for homes.
But of course, I’m exaggerating as to what happens when they just let the road repairs go so they can please you with budget numbers, Lindbergh. I guess they should have done it Ron Paul’s way… let the feds/via the taxpayers pay for it instead of spending their own cash.
Mata, you aren’t even discussing the issues anymore, you are just defending spending increases, tax increases, and increased debt. You have been reduced to, “yada yada yada, Lindbergh.” Just posts ago, you said ” I’m not even a Palin for POTUS person”, yet now you mention her as a candidate and claim I am setting unreasonable standards. You totally lose it when people do not support her. Sorry, I am not jumping on the bandwagon, I don’t like people who raise taxes, raise the debt, and wear Israeli flag pins. Not my cup of tea.
“pork”
It doesn’t increase the deficit, it merely reallocates spending from the Executive branch to the legislative branch. It is used as a tool by big government republicans who vote for unbalanced budgets to claim they are fiscally conservative when they oppose appropriating all the money through the Congress.
Seems like you lose it when Ron Paul enters the conversation. Looks like you got a case of PDS. lol.
You got a reading problem, Lindbergh? I didn’t mention Palin as a candidate. I asked you… several times now… just who was this perfect candidate you compare everyone to. You know, the one who increases revenue, and reduces a budget from the prior year. I see you continually dodge that question.
Most especially since your king of pork hero has no consistent principles. I’ve actually been waiting to see when you were going to, again, present him as the conservative god we should all be worshipping. You brought it up way early in the thread. Yeah.. .Mr. Conservative. The guy who puts in for his local pork for Houston to up the appropriations spending… which the nation pays for in taxes for the budget… then votes against the bill so he can bring home the bacon plus pretend he has “principles”. He calls that “transparency”. Right….
I always laugh when I hear him pull that routine. He feels like since it’s already been stolen, he’ll be stealing it back for his constituents. Trouble is, he’s robbing the nation for his little back yard.
But then I see you have your Paulbot talking points down…. naw, pork’s not spending. Dang… you quote him just about verbatim.
So it’s no problem you don’t answer the question. We all know there is no answer you can give. Or, how is it you put dodging questions” Oh yes, “not jumping on the band wagon”. heh
Obviously you’re new here. I’m quite sure that those who know me quite well can straighten out your smug self-perception that you bother me enough to make me “lose it”. LOL Ah but the lofty dreamers you Paulbots are. A mosquito bite gives me more chagrin. But is just so danged much fun to watch you sink in your own verbal bogs.
@Lindy…ROFLMAO, you really have no idea how absurdly inane you really are, do you? I mean you jump on a subject and beat it nearly to death.
Yeaah, well Mata already destroyed that little argument of yours in comment number 95.
And you mention Ron Paul?
Then Mata mentions that you defend his pork thusly:
As usual, Mata is right on target with that one, too…
From 2007:
Source
Source
From 2009 here are Ron Paul’s earmarks, pretty long list for a fiscal conservative…
Source
Now some of these programs might really be needed and qualify as good spending, but like Obama making “transparency the touchstone” of his Presidency, then making all kinds of back room, behind locked door deals, Ron Paul is in the same boat with earmarks. He decries spending that is not Constitutional, yet he dips into the cookie jar over and over.
But what do you say that earmarks are Lind-A-Roonie??
Nope, earmarks are what politicians use to buy votes in their districts. Plain and simple.
Lindy, are you even capable of making a point without insulting or attacking someone?
I didn’t think so.
@Lindberg
Mata is absolutely correct about the effects of extreme winters on roads. These extremes can destroy a road surface in very short periods of time, requiring quick temporary repairs or complete resurfacing. Of course, you couldn’t know about that coming from Texas. Unless you want to go dig-up the Alaska Department of Transportation’s communications with the Governor’s office regarding ACTUAL repair and resurfacing projects during the years in question, (rather than relying only on “projected” numbers put forth previously in yearly budgets, and comparing them with actual spending), you can’t really say whether Palin HAD to approve additional spending on Alaskan roads, or didn’t. State budgets generally can only estimate such repair needs for a fiscal year, they can not foresee the future of what will actually happen. Nor can an administration simply say that they won’t approve spending additional funds for such repairs in highly rural states like Alaska. A governor’s office would not say, “Sorry, we can’t fix your broken and gaping open road fissures because we didn’t set aside enough money in the budget.” Nor could or would such rural area’s be reasonably expected to do without roads because of winter damage.
ditto, ditto… 😆 And anti, you certainly sourced the Ron Paul “fiscal conservative” fallacy well. Since I was a former libertarian, I pretty much stay up on those that bear some resemblance to them in Congress. Paul fell off that bandwagon back when the Dems assumed power in 2007. Guess he figured if he couldn’t beat ’em, he’d join ’em. But he’s certainly figured out a way to spin his fall from fiscal grace to the Paul’faithful.
Frankly, I like having Ron Paul in the Congress… or did pre’2007 anyway. Would I want him for POTUS? Hang no. While I do like some of his fiscal policies, I can’t abide his trade or foreign policies. Too big a chasm to leap for me there. But I’m sure he’ll be in Congress for a long time to come since he’s now literally bringing home the bacon on the taxpayer’s dime.
What’s most disingenuous about the argument Lindbergh insists upon making is this “for Sarah only” standard. He ignores the rainy day fund created, and increased revenue. Then says they should have used that revenue to pay down the debt. ta hell with needed improvements.
He harps on budget increase of 31%, but ignores it was supposed to be a 61% increase. Then refuses to acknowledge that what the bulk of that increase was spent on was genuinely needed for that state. Perhaps most offensive is he can sit there and live off of Paul’s pork for improvements, and then slam Alaskans for spending their own revenue, paying their own way.
It’s not a perfect world. Personally I wish he could come up with the super pol, and tell us just who is the person that can increase the revenues and shrink the budget from the year before. But he’s stymied there…. dodges that question with a 10 foot pole.
Oh wait… for Mr. Lindbergh, it has to be “…white men of privilege and high education to bring this country back to it’s greatness. White trash just won’t cut it.” That line reveals such a despicable, and dislikable mentality you have to be embarrassed the guy shares any commonality in politics with conservatives. He is the epitome of what the libs/progs hold up as an example of the tea party movement. And in some ways, this mentality is our own worst enemy when their words bubble to the forefront.
But of course, no one is allowed to mention his distasteful view of humans because that’s avoiding the argument. Guess he doesn’t want to get his white robes and hood dirty in debate.
But perhaps most laughable is the condescending way he speaks of economics to the forum. The leaps of assumption INRE bonds and lending distort and morph truth…. i.e. he portrays that the dollar that went towards the government bonds can’t be spent on private lending. Of course that’s true. A dollar is spent one way or another. But that doesn’t support his argument that the increased bonds were the reason for the job losses, or that it stopped lending that was not being done for high risk and shaky financial institution portfolios.
To suggest that if the bonds had not been bought, they would have automatically been rechanneled into commercial lending in Alaska… or anywhere… is absolutely Paulbot delusional. If the investors wanted a safe haven for that allocated cash, and didn’t buy one government bond, they may find that safe haven elsewhere. Thus the reason they diversify. Some in risk… great right now with the US Treasury putting any risk on the tax payers with zero interest… and some in safer, long term yields. Again, Alaska and Texas are inviting state bonds because of the revenue potential of those states, compared to those that depend upon retail, service, industry or high tech.
Yet still he links the Conoco article while ignoring that Conoco gained it’s highest profit from it’s Alaska operations. The job losses are not tied to Alaskan bonds. Nor to the profit sharing agreement. (no profits, no sharing). And BTW, I’ve never said I supported that agreement. I merely support Alaskans to make their own decisions about their resources, and collecting profit sharing on state resources is a far cry from “welfare”, as Lindbergh puts it. Instead, Conoco’s business drop comes down to supply and demand. Quite simply, it’s reduced demand as the reason for the job losses.
But no… comes back over and over with the same shuck and jive dodge, trying to make the same anal point. “but but but spending went *up*”. duh
One more time, Lindbergh… why don’t you consult your “white men of privilege” and show us where any one of your heroes:
1: increased private sector revenue for their state (not via pork theft)
2: slashed a budget of over 61% increase to 31% increase… no, wait. To meet Lindbergh’s criteria, slashed that budget to less than what it was the previous year
3: wisely allocated the cash to needed spending instead of pet projects for future donations
… and oh, we’re more flexible than you, Lindbergh. We’ll be happy to accept a black/any race or ethnic man *or woman* – privileged or not – who does that as our conservative icon.
BURN!!! Ouch, it is almost too painful to read, Mata. You ALMOST have me feeling sorry for little old Lindy.