Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
John McCain has tried throughout his political career to be earn the title Enemy of Earmarks, brave opponent of pork barrel spending that sent federal money to fund some project that allowed politicians to tell their followers that they were bringing home the bacon to their districts. And when he introduced Sarah Palin as his running mate, she tried to present herself as a "reformer" who refused federal money in the name of do-it-yourself rugged individualism:
And I championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress. In fact, I told Congress -- I told Congress, "Thanks, but no thanks," on that bridge to nowhere. If our state wanted a bridge, I said we'd build it ourselves.
But as the Washington Post reports, this is a highly dishonest pose. When she was elected mayor of Wasilla in 1996, that town had received no federal money for any projects for several years. So what did this intrepid fighter against wasteful spending do?
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.
Of course, those were really rugged, staunchly individualist self-reliant earmarks. And that lobbying firm is yet another tie between Palin and Sen. Ted Stevens, currently under indictment on seven felony counts of corruption:
As mayor of Wasilla, however, Palin oversaw the hiring of Robertson, Monagle & Eastaugh, an Anchorage-based law firm with close ties to Alaska's most senior Republicans: Rep. Don Young and Sen. Ted Stevens, who was indicted in July on charges of accepting illegal gifts. The Wasilla account was handled by the former chief of staff to Stevens, Steven W. Silver, who is a partner in the firm.
Does that sound like someone who "stood up to the old politics-as-usual, to the special interests, to the lobbyists"? I didn't think so. She spent about $25,000 a year of city money to pay a PR firm to secure federal money to the tune of about $4000 per person in her city. She sure stood up to those lobbyists.
Politics
Comments
Palin can talk. That's all she can do, but since McCain can't talk it doesn't matter. You know the Repubs don't care the slightest about corruption as long as the candidate has the right opinions. McCain doesn't. Palin does.
Posted by: Susan Brassfield Cogan | September 4, 2008 10:20 AM
I'd call her a bald-faced liar, except she wears too much paint on her face for that.
Posted by: Scott Hanley | September 4, 2008 10:37 AM
Did she give the money back to the federal government when she said "thanks but no thanks" to the bridge to nowhere? I thought she kept it to build other things? Am I missing something?
Palin: "Shame on you for giving me someone else's money to buy something I don't want. It's not fair to that other person to make them pay for something stupid for me. To show you how ethical I am about this, I will keep that other person's money to buy some stuff I really want, rather than the stupid thing you wanted me to get."
Posted by: Divalent | September 4, 2008 10:45 AM
That's my biggest question as well, Divalent. What it seems like she is saying is "Thanks for the money, No thanks on building that bridge!" Unless the money was actually refused, this seems rather transparent even for the Republican smoke screen professionals to cover up.
Posted by: Odie | September 4, 2008 10:52 AM
"I'd call her a bald-faced liar, except she wears too much paint on her face for that."
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/09/this_is_how_we_will_lose.php
Posted by: Nick Gardner | September 4, 2008 11:15 AM
No, the money was diverted to other projects. She didn't say thanks but no thanks, she said "Please please please give us more money. You won't? Okay, we'll take the money you did give us and do something else with it." In less than two years as governor she has requested nearly a billion dollars in earmarks. And she has the chutzpah to say last night that she has "championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress."
Posted by: Ed Brayton | September 4, 2008 12:33 PM
From Think Progress, some perspective:
-$50: The amount the average state received in earmarked funds, per capita in 2008
-$506: The amount received by Alaska's citizen per capita in 2008,represented by the Senate's earmarker in chief, Ted Stevens, ten times the national average
-Over $1000: The annual amount received per capita in Wasilla between 2000 and 2003, twice the 2008 Alaska state average
Some of these earmarks drew the scorn of Senator John McCain. The LA
Time reports that, "three times in recent years, McCain's catalogs of
'objectionable' spending have included earmarks for this small Alaska
town, requested by its mayor at the time -- Sarah Palin."
Posted by: Andrea | September 4, 2008 2:02 PM
@andrea
kinda makes you wish those rugged individualist secessionist types would succeed and leave us alone, don't it.
Posted by: khefera | September 4, 2008 2:08 PM
Khefera - I'm fine with it. Damned uppity for people who live in igloos, I say.
Posted by: Andrea | September 4, 2008 2:19 PM