The Scum at the Top
Commentary on the Rats in Washington
Palin's pork requests confound reformer image
By Andrew Taylor
APNews/Excite
© September 2, 2008
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) - John McCain touts Alaska Gov.
Sarah Palin as a force in the his battle against
earmarks and entrenched power brokers, but under her
leadership the state this year asked for almost $300
per person in requests for pet projects from one of
McCain's top adversaries: indicted Sen. Ted Stevens.
That's more than any other state received, per person,
from Congress for the current budget year, and runs
counter to the reformer image that Palin and the
McCain campaign are pushing. Other states got just
$34 worth of local projects per person this year, on
average, according to Citizens Against Government Waste,
a Washington-based watchdog group.
Palin actually reduced the state government's requests
for special projects this year to 31 earmarks totaling
$198 million, about $295 person, in the wake of President
Bush's demand for a cutback in earmarks.
The state government's earmark requests to Congress in
her first year in office exceeded $550 million, more
than $800 per resident. But there's only so much Palin
could do with state bureaucrats used to a free-flowing
spigot of federal dollars from Washington.
"I have championed reform to end the abuses of earmark
spending by Congress," Palin said in her vice presidential
campaign trail debut last week.
Palin's current request to Stevens, "would still put
Alaska No. 1," said Steve Ellis of Taxpayers for Common
Sense, a watchdog group that tracks earmarks closely.
The McCain campaign said Tuesday that Palin realized
that Alaska was too reliant on earmarks and ordered
state officials to cut back on their requests. It also
said Obama requested nearly $1 billion in earmarks over
three years for Illinois - a state with nearly 20 times
the population of Alaska.
"We cannot and must not rely so heavily on federal
government earmarks," Palin told state legislators in
January.
Budget watchdogs allied with McCain have annually railed
against Stevens, Alaska's senior senator, and his state's
addiction to earmarks, those locally popular pet projects
added to the federal budget by senators and House members.
McCain and Stevens are not friends, and the two men have
openly clashed on the Senate floor over earmarks.
In addition Palin's requests on behalf of the state
government this year, 124 public and private entities
in Alaska have asked Stevens for earmarks this year.
In her earlier political career as mayor of Wasilla,
Palin hired a private lobbyist to help the tiny town
secure earmarks from Stevens, entering Washington's
"pay to play" culture in which lobbyists, campaign
contributions and lawmakers are intertwined.
The town obtained 14 earmarks, totaling $27 million
between 2000-2003, according to data compiled by Taxpayers
for Common Sense, another watchdog group.
Federal lobbying records show that Wasilla hired the
firm of Robertson, Monagle & Eastaugh in 2000 to arrange
"funding of city projects." The signature on the
registration form is that of Steven W. Silver, a former
top aide to Stevens, who chaired the Senate Appropriations
Committee on and off between 1997 and 2005.
The firm initially was paid $24,000 a year, an amount
that increased to $36,000 in 2001. The firm has continued
to work for the town government since Palin left as mayor
in 2002. Silver gave $2,000 to Stevens' Northern Lights
political action committee in 1999, according to federal
records.
Stevens was indicted in July for failing to disclose
$250,000 in gifts from VECO Corp., an Alaskan oil
services company.
At the same time, Palin's campaign trail braggadocio last
week that she told Washington "'thanks but no thanks' on
that Bridge to Nowhere" didn't tell the whole story.
In fact, Palin was for the infamous $398 million bridge -
to connect the town of Ketchikan to an island with 50
residents and an airport on it - before she was against
it, speaking in favor of it during her 2006 race for governor.
Alaska has become so accustomed to largess flowing from
Congress through Stevens that most of Palin's earmark
requests this year - such as studies of Alaskan fisheries,
grants to combat drug trafficking, and rural airport
upgrades - simply keep ongoing programs going. Among her
requests was $150,000 to pay the travel bills of state
and fisheries industry representatives on the boards that
implement North Pacific fisheries agreements.
"They've definitely become addicted to earmarks," said Ellis,
of Taxpayers for Common Sense. "And Gov. Palin has continued
in at least some form that addiction."
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Last Modified:
October 21, 2008