Today the Washington Post wrote, “Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin employed a lobbying firm to secure almost $27 million in federal earmarks for a town of 6,700 residents while she was its mayor, according to an analysis by an independent government watchdog group.”
“In fiscal year 2002, Wasilla took in $6.1 million in earmarks — about $1,000 in federal money for every resident. By contrast, Boise, Idaho — which has more than 190,000 residents — received $6.9 million in earmarks in fiscal 2008.”
“All told, Wasilla benefited from $26.9 million in earmarks in Palin’s final four years in office.
“She certainly wasn’t shy about putting the old-boy network to use to bring home millions of dollars,” said Steve Ellis, vice president of Taxpayers for Common Sense. “She’s a little more savvy to the ways of Washington than she’s let on.”
In addition, Palin has reversed course on at least one major earmark: After initially supporting the $223 million bridge, which was to connect the town of Ketchikan with a remote island, she reversed course last year and canceled the project because of cost overruns. Critics have dubbed the project the “Bridge to Nowhere.”
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Where to begin?
First of all, I thought the choice of Sarah Palin was a poor one as an American. Let me explain. In 2004 I thought there was no way George W Bush would be re-elected given his many, uh, missteps such as the still missing “Weapons of Mass Destruction”. But he was- (even though Bob Fitrakis says he used chicanery). Now I believe Barack Obama and Joe Biden will win this election, but my fear is they will not and we will have a person with ZERO foreign relations experience and someone that has NEVER worked in a federal capacity. As a liberal? I’m thrilled. This was perhaps the worst pick John McCain could have made. The revelations that he made it after only talking to her once only serve to point out further that McCain uses his “gut” and sometimes his impulsive gut is wrong. This would have been a much harder campaign had he chosen Mitt Romney or Joe Lieberman.
Cheers,
Tom
1 Comment
September 8, 2008 at 3:19 pm
I thought it was simply the “Double-talk Express”, but now I know they are Palin-drones: http://tinyurl.com/6ajcuk