One Alaskan's View of Palin

Granted, there will be a variety of opinions expressed among Alaskans as to their governor's name being placed on the Republican ticket, but I thought this one was fairly well-informed, being that she hails from Governor Palin's hometown and attended so many of the City Council meetings there:

> From Brad Smith to Anne Kilkenny:
> Dear Anne,
> Since you live in Wasilla where Sarah Palin was mayor please tell me about
> her as a person and public official. Did you know her personally? What
> observations can you share about Sarah Palin as she moved forward in Alaska
> politics?
> Regards, Brad
> --------------------------------------
>
> From Anne to Brad:
>
> I have known Sarah since 1992. Wasilla is a small town. Everyone here
> knows Sarah, so it is nothing special to say we are on a first-name basis.
> My son is a friend of her daughter Bristol. I also am on a first name basis
> with her parents and mother-in-law. I attended more City Council meetings
> during her administration than about 99% of the residents of the city.
>
> She has matured a lot since her early days on the City Council. Thank God.
>
> She is enormously popular, having enjoyed approval ratings above 70%, and
> as high as 80%, as Governor. In every way she's like the most popular girl
> in middle school. Even men who think she is a poor choice and won't vote
> for her can't quit smiling when talking about her because she is a "babe".
>
> She's smart and savvy, but her only real experience is as mayor of a city
> with a population of about 4,500 (at the time), and 1.5 yrs as governor of a
> state with under 700,000 residents.
>
> It is astonishing and almost scary how well she can keep a secret. She kept
> her most recent pregnancy a secret from her children and parents for eight
> months.
>
> She is "pro-life" and she walks that talk. She recently gave birth to a
> Down's syndrome baby.
>
> She has terrific parents who have been there for her and lots of help
> raising her kids and managing her family. She has good kids. Like all
> politicians, she is a largely absent parent, and spends more time with her
> kids in public when there are cameras rolling than in private. Her family
> was slow to grasp the reality of political life and used to complain about
> her parenting.
>
> She is photogenic in spades. She is a good smiler. She is a former TV
> reporter and is comfortable behind the camera. She is a former beauty
> queen.
>
> She is energetic and hardworking. She regularly worked out at the gym.
>
> She is savvy. She doesn't take positions; she just "puts things out there"
> and if they prove to be popular, then she takes credit.
>
> She has taken on the Republican Party power-brokers in Alaska.
>
> Her husband works "2 on, 2 off" on the North Slope for BP and is a champion
> snowmobile racer. He arranges his work schedule so he can fish for salmon
> in Bristol Bay for a month in summer, but by no stretch of the imagination
> is fishing their major source of income. Nor has her life-style ever been
> anything like that of native Alaskans.
>
> Sarah and her whole family are avid hunters; her pro-NRA positions are not
> just political posturing.
>
> During her mayoral administration most of the actual work of running this
> small city was turned over to an administrator who she had been pushed to
> hire by party power-brokers after she had gotten herself into some trouble
> over precipitous firings which had given rise to a recall attempt.
>
> Sarah campaigned in Wasilla as a "fiscal conservative". During her 6 years
> as Mayor, she increased general government expenditures by over 33%. During
> those same 6 years the amount of taxes collected by the City increased by
> 38%. This was during a period of low inflation (1996-2002). She reduced
> progressive property taxes and increased a regressive sales tax which taxed
> even food. The tax cuts that she brags about benefited large corporate
> property owners way more than they benefited residents.
>
> The huge increases in tax revenues during her administration weren't enough
> to fund everything on her wish list though, borrowed money was needed, too.
> She inherited a city with ZERO debt, but left it with indebtedness of over
> $22 million. What did Mayor Palin encourage the voters to borrow money for?
> Was it the infrastructure that she said she supported? No. $1m for a park.
> $15m-plus for construction of a multi-use sports complex which she rushed
> through to build on a piece of property that the City didn't even have clear
> title to, that was still in litigation 7 yrs later--to the delight of the
> lawyers involved! The sports complex itself is a nice addition to the
> community but a huge money pit, not the profit- generator she claimed it
> would be. $5.5m for road projects that could have been done in 5-7 yrs
> without any borrowing. Meanwhile, the City still lacks a sewage treatment
> plant and other basic infrastructure.
>
> While Mayor, City Hall was extensively remodeled and her office re-decorated
> more than once.
>
> These are small numbers, but Wasilla is a small city (population at that
> time of about 4,500). Public indebtedness under her mayoral administration
> increased over $4000 per capita.
>
> As an oil producer, the high price of oil has created a budget surplus in
> Alaska. Rather than invest it in technology that will make us energy
> independent and increase efficiency, she proposed distribution of this
> surplus to every individual in the state.
>
> SPEND AND BORROW. In this time of record state revenues and budget
> surpluses, she recommended that the state borrow/bond for road projects,
> even while she proposed distribution of surplus state revenues: spend
> today's surplus, borrow for needs.
>
> She's not very tolerant of divergent opinions or open to outside ideas or
> compromise. As Mayor, she fought ideas that weren't generated by her or her
> staff. While Sarah was Mayor of Wasilla she tried to fire our highly
> respected City Librarian because the Librarian refused to consider removing
> from the library some books that Sarah didn't like. City residents rallied
> to the defense of the City Librarian and against Palin's attempt at
> out-and-out censorship, so Palin backed down and withdrew her termination
> letter. People who fought her attempt to oust the Librarian are on her
> enemies list to this day.
>
> Sarah complained about the "old boy's club", so what did she bring Wasilla?
> A new set of "old boys", including Wasilla's worst-ever Public Works
> Director, the totally unqualified wife of a powerful person in state
> politics. She fired most of the experienced staff she inherited. At the
> City and as Governor she hired/elevated new, inexperienced, obscure people,
> creating a staff totally dependent on her for their jobs and eternally
> grateful, so fiercely loyal-- loyal to the point of abusing their power to
> further her personal agenda, as she has acknowledged happened in the case of
> pressuring the State's top cop (see below).
>
> Sarah fired Wasilla's Police Chief because he "intimidated" her, she told
> the press. Her recent firing of Alaska's top cop has the ring of familiarity
> about it. He served at her pleasure and she had every legal right to fire
> him, but it's pretty clear that an important factor in her decision to fire
> him was because he wouldn't fire her sister's ex-husband, a State Trooper.
> Under investigation for abuse of power, she has had to admit that more than
> 2 dozen contacts were made between her staff and family to the person that
> she later fired, pressuring him to fire her ex-brother-in-law. She tried to
> replace the man she fired with a man who she knew had been reprimanded for
> sexual harassment; when this caused a public furor, she withdrew the
> nomination.
>
> She has bitten the hand of every person who extended theirs to her in help.
> The City Council person who personally escorted her around town introducing
> her to voters when she first ran for Wasilla City Council became one of her
> first targets when she was later elected Mayor. She abruptly fired her loyal
> City Administrator; even people who didn't like the guy were stunned by this
> ruthlessness.
>
> Fear of retribution has kept all of these people from saying anything
> publicly about her. People fear her.
>
> When then-Governor Murkowski was handing out political plums, Sarah demanded
> the best, Chair of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission: one of
> the few jobs not in Juneau and one of the best paid. She had no background
> in Oil & Gas issues. Within months of scoring this great job which paid
> $122,400/yr, she was complaining in the press about the high salary. I was
> told that she hated that job: the commute, the structured hours, the work.
> A member of the Commission and the State Chair of the Republican Party was
> ethically challenged, by dramatically quitting and accusing him of ethics
> violations (for which he was fined) she solved all her problems in one fell
> swoop: got out of the job she hated and garnered gobs of media attention as
> the patron saint of ethics and as a gutsy fighter against the status quo.
>
> She is solidly Republican. Her battles with the Republican party were not
> over philosophy. They were over ethics and power. She is no political
> maverick in terms of philosophy.
>
> Around Wasilla there are people who went to high school with Sarah. They
> don't call her "Saint Sarah"; they call her "Sarah Barracuda" because of her
> unbridled ambition and predatory ruthlessness. When Sarah's mother-in-law
> ran for Mayor, Sarah endorsed the person who was running AGAINST her
> mother-in-law who was a highly respected member of the community and
> experienced manager.
>
> McCain is the oldest person to ever run for President. It scares the heck
> out of me to think that someone as inexperienced as Sarah Palin could become
> President. There has to be literally millions of Americans who are more
> knowledgeable and experienced than she.
>
> However, there's a lot of people who have under-estimated her and are
> regretting it.